nor esteemeth any thing so sweet He that loveth God serveth him from his heart he that loveth not God he serveth not him although he heap mountains upon mountains So then nothing can befall a man better or more profitable then that the love of God should wax warm in his heart Whatsoever faith worketh in man and all things ought to be done in faith Faith in charity should doe all things in man ought to be done in charity no otherwise then the soule through the body seeeth heareth tasteth smelleth speaketh and doth all things I say after that manner should charity doe all things in thee that All things ought to be done in charity towards our neighbour whether thou eat or drink hear or speak praise or dispraise all things should be done in charity after the example of Christ in whom most pure love wrought all things Wherefore if thou dost look upon thy neighbour let sincere charity fix thine eyes upon him if thou hearest him let charity erect thine eares if thou speakest unto him let most loving commiseration governe thy tongue Lastly have a care and study this one thing that charity through faith may be the root and beginning and cleave unto thee alwayes which can beget in thee nothing but what is good and wherewith thou beginnest the law of God whose love also is the fulfilling of the law or the true abridgement thereof Which majesty of the divine love all the old Saints of God with admiration exclaime O Charity The praise of Charity of God in the holy Ghost the sweetnesse of the soul and the divine life of man he who hath not thee is dead though alive he that hath thee never dieth before God where thou art not there the life of men is continuall death where thou art there the life of man is a fore-tast of the eternall life And thus much of Charity so farre as it is the end of the Law Let us God is mans soveraigne good come now to the other attribute the purity of the heart which consisteth in this That the mind being void of worldly love doth rest upon God as his chiefest good according to Psalm 16. The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup thou art he that dost restore my inheritance to me Psal 37. The Lord knoweth the dayes of the unspotted and their inheritance shall be for ever And therefore the mind of man ought to take his chiefest delight and pleasure in God alone because he is the chiefest good and consequently good it selfe and vertue it selfe verily meer favour grace love lowlinesse patience faith truth consolation peace joy life and happinesse all which he bestowed upon Christ also so that he Why vertue is to be loved which hath him hath all things Wherefore he that loveth God ought to love also his truth mercies goodnesse and all vertues For the true lover of God loveth all things that are acceptable to God and contrariwise abhorreth and hateth all things that be against God Therefore justice is to be beloved truth mercy because God is all these meeknesse humility by reason of the example of our most humble and meek Saviour Contrariwise a true lover of God hates every vice as the adversary and enemy of God and the work of Why vice is to be hated the Devill therefore he hateth a lie because the Devill is a lier and consequently other sinnes because they are part of the Devill And whosoever loveth sinne as a lie and injustice this is a sonne of the Devill as it is in John 8. Even as he that loveth Christ our Redeemer and Saviour he also loveth the example of his most innocent life I say his meeknesse humility and patience he is the sonne of God But thou must remember that thou pray to God for this purity of love who certainly willingly and freely through the love of Christ doth kindle it in thee if so thou incessantly with daily prayers cease not to importune him and offer up thy heart unto him every houre and moment But if thy charity be could and weak so that sometimes thou faile and fall goe to rise again and goe to work and renew thy Charity be sure the eternall light of the divine love is not extinguished God our most gentle Saviour will enlighten thee again which albeit it be so yet thou shouldest The charity of God and our neighbour cannot be severed pray unto God daily lest at any time hereafter he suffer the most bright fire of divine love to be extinguished And thus much of the Charity from the heart purged from the love of the world and the creatures Let us see now the charity of our neighbour out of a pure conscience The charity of God and our neigbour is one and they cannot be severed neither is the love of God more manifest in any thing then by and in the love of our neighbour If any man say that he loveth God and hateth his neighbour he is a lier For hee that loveth not his brother whom he seeth how can he love God whom he seeth not And this is the commandement we have received from God That he that loveth God should love his brother also 1 John 4. For the love of God cannot dwell in the heart of a man-hater or hostile revengefull man Whereupon if thou hast no pitie on thy brother and knowest that he hath need of thy help how canst thou love God that hath no need of thy help As by faith we are united to God so by charity wee are to our neighbour joyned 1 John 4. He that abideth in charity abideth in God and God in him As a man consisteth of body and soule so faith and charity of God and our neighbour doth make a true Christian And seeing that God is well affected towards all men who is so indeed it followeth that he is of one mind with God and so consents It is the property of Charity to bewaile a sinner to him he that doth contrary is adversary to God because he is an enemy to mankind Furthermore it is the property of this charity to bewaile humane errors because they represent as in a glasse our own proper defects and bring to our memory the most infirm condition of our humanity whereupon it followeth that we are to bear the infirmity of our neighbour with patience humility and meeknesse Truly such as sin through want of strength We are to bear with the weak more then of purpose and whereof they soon recollect themselves doe rebuke and punish themselves and doe of themselves acknowledge their sinne these truly are to be pitied and condoled and doe deserve pardon He that denieth this surely hath not the spirit of Christ For to punish the fallings and infirmities of our neighbour rashly and with severe judgement without mercy or commiseration onely is proper to him that is without the most mercifull law of God the Father Sonne
this man it is manifest doth not know God who is nothing but Charity or Love For the knowledge of God and Christ is known by experience and feeling and seeing that Christ is meer love and meeknesse it followeth that he that is without charity is without Christ according to that of By charity God is known Saint Peter Epist 2. chap. 1. If you had charity this would not leave you empty nor without fruit in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ And Christ himselfe John 13. In this all men may know if you be my Disciples What a disciple of Christ should doe if you love one another But to be the Disciple of Christ is not sufficient to be a Christian in name and outward profession but it behoveth us to be more to beleeve in Christ to love him and follow him to live in him to counsell with him to listen to him to be inwardly loved of him and lastly to participate with him in all his goodnesse Which love of Christ who so hath not this man is not of Christ for how should Christ know him which is destitute of Christ For even as an Apple by his savour and a Flower by his smell is knowne so a Christian is known by his love Bouldly and without doubt blessed Paul affirmeth it 1 Corinth 13. All gifts without Charity is nothing And in truth the knowledge of divers Tongues nor Miracles nor knowledge of Mysteries or any such like good things doe shew a good Christian but faith which God requireth no hard thing worketh by charity Moreover God commandeth not hard things unto us as to work miracles but to exercise charity and humility neither in the day of judgmeÌ„t shal it be demanded of thee how thou hast been verst in the Arts Tongues Sciences but whether thou hast loved charity through faith I have been hungry saith our Saviour Matth. 25. and thou gavest mee to eate And blessed Paul to the Galatians chap. 5. witnesseth In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but Faith which worketh by Charity Furthermore the words of Saint John Epist 1. Chap. 4. If any man say he loveth God and hateth his brother he is a lier For he that doth not love his brother whom hee seeth how can hee love God whom hee hath not seen And this commandement have we of God He that loveth God should also love his brother And this one thing they teach That the charity and love towards God cannot consist without the He must love his neighbour that wil love God love and charity towards our neighbour For he that hateth him cannot but hate God that is the chiefe lover of man Charity is the Law of Nature from which doe flow all good things to mankind and without it mankind would perish Al good is out of charity of necessity When any good thing happeneth to man it proceedeth from Love whereupon Saint Paul calleth charity the Bond of perfection to the Colossians chap. 3. and Rom. 12. doth declare in excellent words and magnificent oration the fruits thereof And our Saviour himselfe The whole law depends on charity Matthew 7. doth teach All things that you would that men should doe unto you doe you the same unto them for this is the Law and the Prophets I passe by that of the Ethnickes whose famous Adage or Sentence is out of the Law of Nature and taken from their Schoole That which you would not should be done to you doe not the same unto another Which most excellent admonition the Emperour Severus a Prince most praise-worthy daily had in his mouth and inserted it in his written lawes Charity is a Charity is the hope of eternall life certain figure of eternall life and a foretast or sweet drink of it wherein the elect doe mutually love each other sincerely do receive singular delight one from another and doe converse together in a wonderfull and ineffable concord sweetnesse affection cheerfulnesse and mildnesse and courtesie one with another Who so therefore doth desire as it were a certain fore supper of the eternall beatitude let him study Love wherewith he may Affinity with God by charity be delighted with singular pleasure and affection in the inward of his soul For how much purer more fervent and fruitful your charity is so much the neerer it approcheth to the divine nature when in God in Christ and the holy Ghost the charity is most pure most rare most fervent and noble Therefore that love will be pure when we love not for private profit but onely for the cause of God alone whom we may know in like manner he loved us and took in us delight most purely and for no good of his own Which he that doth not so but loveth his neighbour for his own profit his love is not pure and divine wherein The difference betwixt Ethnick and ChristiaÌ„ charity also consisteth the difference betweene Ethnick and Christian charity for they do all their vertues in seeking after their own private gain and honour do as it were cast ink upon Ivory but the Christian he loveth his neighbour in God and Christ gratis And the love is true and unfained when theâ—e is no hypocrisie nor dissimulation and love is born in the heart not in the lips and tongue wherewith many are deceived Lastly charity is ardent when it is accompanied with mercy and compassion and when the affairs of our neighbour goe as near to our heart as our own so that we should be ready to lay down our life if need It is the Christians property to love their enemies were for him John 3. after the example of Moses and Paul who wished to be accursed for their brethren Wherupon that also followeth that we ought even to love our enemies Matth. 5. Love your enemies do good unto those that hate you and pray for them that persecute you revile you that you may be the children of your Father which is in heaven for if you love them which love you what reward have you or shall you have Doe not the publicans the same In this therefore conâ—isteth the excellency prerogative nobility and dignity of Christians to subject nature unto it selfe to tame his flesh and bloud and to overcome the world with the evill that is therein with goodnesse to the Romanâ— chap. 12. It is the commandement of God in Exod. 23. If thou meetest with thine enemies Oxe or Asse going astray bring him home If thou seest the Asse of him that hateth thee falling under his burden thou shalt not passe by him but thou shalt succour him What care hath God about dumb creatures blessed Paul 1 Cor. 9. admiring writeth Hath God care of Oxen And doth hee not speak this concerning us much more And Rom. 12. he elegantly giveth in charge If thine enemy hunger give him meat Wherefore lest wee think it not sufficieÌ„t not to hurt our neighbour but moreover we
alone that is to say essentially and but for and without God no good can be Yet further is to be noted that man out of this Image should learn to know himselfe to wit that there The Image of God ought to represent nothing but God is a very great difference between him and God and man not God himselfe but his Image similitude likenesse or proportion in whom God alone should be seen And therefore besides God nothing should live appeare work will love think speak and rejoyce in man but if any thing else besides God should move and work in him then the man cannot be the Image of God but his contrariwise by whom he is moved driven and carried away And to speak briefly the man ought to suffer himselfe wholly to be delivered up devoted resigned up to God fulfilling the divine God wil be all things in man will by a passive manner by denying his 〈◊〉 proper will and suffering God alone to doe and work in him this truly is the accomplishment of God so that the man may be a more pure and holy instrument of God and his works and will by which it cometh to passe the man doth not move his will but hath the divine will for his own he loveth not himselfe but God he seeketh not his own honour but Gods he challengeth no goods to himselfe being contented to possesse God and consequently without the love of the world and the creatures In briefe nought should be in man live and work in him but God alone wherein consisteth the chief innocency purity and holinesse of man for what greater The chiefe innocency and simplicity innocency can be thought upon then that the man should not do his own proper will but to suffer God in him to work and finish all things what greater simplicity can there be then that in little children void of all ambition and selfe-love The Kingdome of God in man both without and within Christ Jesus shewed a most perfect â—xample of in his life time which was the most absolute Image of God by sacrificing Christ the perfect Image of God and consecrating his will to his heavenly Father in perfect obedience humility and meeknesse dispoyling himselfe of all honour and selfe-love all pleasure and joy permitting God alone to think speak and doe all things in him by himselfe alone In a word he had the will and pleasure of God for his own that which God himselfe testified by a voyce sent from heaven Mat. 3. This is my welbeloved Sonne in whom I am well pleased this Jesus Christ I say is the true Image of God out of whom nothing did appeare and shine forth but God himselfe that is to say meer love and mercy long-suffering patiences meeknesse mildnesse love towards man holinesse consâ—lation life and blessednesse eternall by him the invisible God would be seen manifested God manifested in Christ and known to men who also yet after a more sublime manner is the Image of God according to his Divinity as being God himselfe and his essentiall Image a splendor or clearnesse of the uncreated light as it is Heb. 2. of which I will say nothing now but onely of his appearing and manifestation according to his humanity in his life and most holy conversation such an Image of God or most perfect innocency also Adam had which I would to God he in true humility and obedience had kept and had acknowledged himselfe not to be the chiefe good but yet to be the expresse and perfect Image of the chiefe good Now seeing he would be the chiefe good and God himselfe herewith he contaminated himselfe with the greatest and most detestable of all sins But there was another part of knowing himselfe through the Image to be desired that he was made capable of the benefits of this divine Image and most sincere pleasure of flowing love joy peace life rest fortitude vertue and light that God alone in him should be all things and alone live and work selfe-will being excluded and the love and honour and praise of himself denied only God should be his glory and praise and honour for e-every like is capable of his like not of his contrary and in that rejoyceth and is glad In this wise God had decreed to infuse himselfe with all the treasures of his goodnesse into the man and so goodnesse is most of all communicative of it selfe Last The chiefest tranquility is the union of God of all by the image of God the man ought to understand that he is by it united to God and in this union the true union of the man doth rest peace joy life and everlasting happinesse contrariwise the chief unrest of the mind torment and vexation cannot happen otherwise then by ceasing to be the Image of God or giving over to be the Image of God turning himselfe from God to the creature and consequently hereby is frustrated or deprived of the chiefe and eternall good CHAP. II. Of the fall and apostasie of Adam Rom. 5. As by the disobedience of one man many were made sinners so by the obedience of one also many are made righteous THe sin of Adam is disobedience against God by which the man turned from God to himselfe became a theefe of the divine honour whilst he went about to make himselfe God deprived himselfe of the divine image and perfect hereditary justices and holinesse blinded in his understanding in will undutifull and contumelious against God Lastly as concerning the affection of the whole heart from God alienated and in hostiall manner opposite Which abomination in all men is propagated by carnall generation and passeth by hereditary necessity and bringeth to passe that man is spiritually dead and the sonne of wrath and condemnation unlesse Christ redeem him and therefore let poore simple Christians take heed lest they extenuate the fall of Adam in their own interpretation The fall of Adam was the greatest sin and account it as a light matter and the eating of an Apple but rather let them beleeve that Adams and Lucifers was one and the same offence and that most grievous one and extreamly to be detested even a tyrannicall affectation of the divine Majesty This sinne in the beginning was conceived in the heart soon after by eating of the forbidden apple broke forth into light of which the sinne of Absolom giveth us a faire and elegant example or pattern for as he was not content first of all to be the sonne of a King then to be the most beautifull amongst men without blemish from the head to the sole of the foot thirdly most dearly beloved of his parents as may be gathered by the teares of David unless actually he were a King by thrusting his father out of his Kingdome by violence which opinion once confirmed in the mind he did after professe himselfe the enemy of his father and began to lie in wait for his life So when man did not account
whose hearts not onely by nature but by the word revealed the new covenant the word of God is written and yet do despise and cast behind them this grace and favour Of which new Covenant Jeremy saith Chap. 3. This shall be my compact I will put my Lawes into their inwards and I will write it in their hearts and a man shall not any more teach his neighbour and a man his brother saying Know the Lord for all men shall know me saith the Lord even from the least to the greatest because I will forgive their iniquity and I will not remember their sins any more Heare what is said Heb. 10. To those that voluntarily offend or sinne against God after the knowledge he hath received for such there is no sacrifice left for him but a certain terrible expectation of judgement and offering by fire which consumeth the adversary He that breaketh the Law of Moses without any mercy by the mouth of two or three witnesses shall die the death how much more and worse doe you thinke doe they deserve death which have contemned against the Sonne of God and polluted the bloud of the Testament in whom he is sanctified and contumaciously despised the spirit of grace for we know who hath said Vengeance is mine and I will return it upon them And again because the Lord will judge his people It is a fearfull thing to fall into the hands of the living God With which heavie sentence without doubt those are not strucken which fall through humane frailty but those that wittingly and willingly sin against the truâ— knowledge and persevere in impenitencie CHAP. VIII Without true repentance no man can challenge Christ and his merits to belong unto him Numb 9. The unclean may not celebrate the Passeover THe words of our Saviour Christ Mat. 9. are The healthy hath no need of the Physitian but the sick I did not come to call the just but the sinners to repentance whereby we are clearly taught that Christ indeed did call sinners but to repentance neither can any come unto him without repentance without conversion from sinne and What is true repentance faith for repentance is no other thing then by true contrition and sorrow to die unto sinne and by faith to obtain forgivenesse for sinne and to live unto righteousnesse in Christ so that in true repentance necessarily serious and divine contrition must go before a heart as I may say broken and câ—ucifying the flesh whereupon in Cap. 6. Epist ad Hebr. Repentance is said to be or is called the worke of dead men because by it we abstain from those works whose reward is death which if it be not done then the merit of Christ profiteth not us one haire For seeing Christ proffereth himselfe to be the Physitian of our souls his holy bloud to be the only and most true medicine of our sins and no medicine although it be most pretious can cure the sick man which will not refraine from hurtfull thinâ—s and things resisting the power of the medicine so it remaineth that the bloud of Christ and death can profit nothing those that purpose not to abstain from sinne Whereupon blessed Paul cap. 5. ad Galat. saith Whosoever doth such things the works of the flesh doe not obtaine the Kingdome of heaven nor shall have any part in Christ Moreover if Christ by his bloud is become our medicine who can doubt that first we must be sick for the whole have no need of a Physitian but the weake And none is spiritually sicke who is not penitent and who is not sorrowfull from his heart for his sinnes who hath not a contrite heart and humble who is secure as concerning the wrath of God who hath not resolved and firmly in his mind decreed to flye all worldly concupiscence who lastly seeking after honour wealth and pleasure takes no knowledge of his sinnes such as are so those are not sick and consequently need no Physitian and Christ profiteth them nothing it is manifest Therefore again and again let this be remembred that Christ called sinners but it was to repentance because a penitent heart contrite pensive and faithfull onely and alone is capable of the most pretious bloud death and merit of Christ I account him happy whosoever he be that heareth this holy calling inwardly and in his heart I call that a divine sorrow and anguish for sinnes which worketh repentance God worketh spirituall sorrow to stedfast salvation as the words be 2 Cor. 7. The holy Spirit doth produce this divine sorrow by the Law and serious meditation of the passion of the Lord because it not onely aboundeth with the documents of grace but also withall hath in it an earnest exhortation to repentance and a most terrible glasse of the divine wrath For if we seek into the cause of his The Passion of Christ efficieÌ„t to repentance most bitter death what else can we say was the cause but our sinnes If you joyn the divine love out of which he most willingly gave his Son for us as also you shall have his singular example both terrible and wonderfull of his divine justice and clemency which seeing they are so who then sincerely loving Christ can be affected and delighted with sinne which he knows Christ had with his bloud washed and purged Consider also with me O man which art subject to pride and art slave unto ambition with what contempt and how great humility Christ Jesus ought to repaire our pride and insolency think of his poverty that he might satisfie for thy covetousness The fruits of Christs passion surcease at last through God so studiously to seek after wealth and insatiably to thirst after riches most wretchedly He with incredible griefe of mind and anguish not to be uttered doth satisfie and abolish the pleasures and concupiscence of the flesh and thou contrariwise continually dost give thy selfe to pleasure and lust how evill is thy preposterousnesse pravity and wickednesse to take delight and pleasure in those things which to Christ were so wonderfully bitter he died to expiate thy wrath hatred enmity rancor bitternesse desire of revenge and implacability with extreame mildnesse and patience and wilt not thou even for the least cause be very angry and account revenge more pleasant then life even for which thy Redeemer did drink the most bitter cup of death wherefore so many as aspire to the name of Christians and doe not abstain froÌ„ sin those I say do even crucifie Christ and doe make a mock of him as it is said The impenitent do even crucifie Christ in the Epistle to the Hebrews Chap. 6. Therefore it is unpossible that those should participate of the merits of Christ which indeed they doe tread under foot as it is in the same Epistle Chap. 10. And because they doe pollute the blood of the Testament neither beleeve truly that their sinnes are expiated by him or much esteem his death or think
boldly and willingly to sinne is nothing else then to live in the Devill In whom therefore the life of Christ is not this man is without repentance neither is a true Christian nor the sonne of God nay Christ knoweth him not He who will rightly know him as a Saviour and example of life it is meet he know him to be meere love meere courtesie patience and humility which vertues of Christ it behoveth thee to have and love them from the bottome of thy heart and fasten them to thy self As a plant by its favour and smel that it sendeth forth bewrayes its own nature so thou oughtest to know Christ and by experience be certain that he is a certain most fragrant The true knowledge of Christ stock from whence thy soule doth draw and obtain admirable strength and new vitall spirits as also singular joy and solace And after this manner is tasted how sweet the Lord is so is the truth known so is the chiefe and eternall good perceived and then doth he know certainly that nothing is better then the life of Christ nothing more pleasant sweet pretious or more full of tranquillity And lastly nothing can be more likened or be compared to life eternall And do we doubt that because it is better then all it should be more desireable for in whom the life of Christ is not this man cannot know what the peace and tranquillity of eternall life is nor what the chiefe good is nor everlasting truth nor what is true peace and joy the true light and true charity seeing Christ is all these himselfe whereupon John Ep. 1. chap. 4. saith Every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God he that loveth not knoweth not God because God is love Whereby the fruits of the new birth which is of God appeareth and also life and a new creature not to be words and an externall forme but a substance but the Queen of vertues and which is God himselfe that is to say Charity for of whomsoever any is born it is meet he should have the same properties and he that saith he is born of God let him shew that by charity because God is charity In like manner the knowledge of God resteth not in words and shadowed or vain knowledge but in lively amiable pleasant and most sincere pleasure which ought to flow into the bottome of our heart and mind and there to dwell when we taste by faith inwardly in our hearts the sweetnesse of God This I say this is the true lively and efficacious knowledge of God of which David in Psalm 84. speaketh saying My heart and my flesh rejoyceth in the living God and Psalm 63. How pleasant is thy mercies over our lives where it is presently manifested the joy and sweetnesse of the knowledge divine which is infused into the faithfull heart and so at length the man liveth in God and God in him so is truth known and so the same truth knoweth man CHAP. XII The being of a Christian man is to die to himselfe and the world and to live unto Christ 2 Corinth 5. Christ died for all men that those which live might not now live unto themselves but unto him who died for them and rose again OVer and above this that this sentence is full of consolation whilst it is manifested that Christ died for all men as also it containeth a most wholsome doctrine concerning the way of a Christian life how we ought to live that is to say not to our He that wil live in Christ must dy to the world selves onely but to him who died for our cause but this by no means can be done unlesse first we die to our selves and the world Therefore if thou hast purposed to live in Christ necessarily thou must die to worldly concupiscence but if thou mind to live to thy selfe and the world it will profit nothing to be with Christ But there be 3. kinds of death one spirituall when the Death is three fold man daily dieth to himselfe that is to the concupiscence of his flesh covetousnesse pride voluptuousnesse wrath such like the second naturall the third everlasting of the second speaketh Paul to the Philippians châ—p 1. To live to my selfe it is Christ and to die it is gain as if he should say To a Christian desiring to die Christ is his life and death gaine for when he changeth this short and miserable life for a better life and this earthly and fraile goods for stable and eternal goods this is a most gainful exchange and he who shall be well pleased with this saying and fit himselfe to the first sort of death in my judgement he shall not erre For that soule is thrice and foure The life of Christ times happy to whom to live is Christ that is wherein Christ liveth or that hath the life of Christ that is followeth his humility and lowlinesse But alas most men The life of the Devill at this day have taken upon them the life of the Devill and their life is the Divell As for example covetousnesse pride concupiscence wrath blasphemy for this is the life of the Devill But thou O man walk carefully and look about thee again and again and see who liveth in thee and thou What it is to die to themselves and the world shalt be most happy if thou canst truly say To me to live is Christ not in the other life only but also in this present life so truly it is needfull also in this present life now that for thee to live is Christ gain to die For is there any thing more profitable then to die in this condition to covetousnesse pride concupiscence wrath and hatred that Christ by that means may live in thee For how much every one dieth to the world so much Christ liveth in him Goe to them let Christ live in thee in time that thou in like manner maist live with him in From whence be the perturbations of the mind eternity But seeing that the mind distracted with divers worldly concupiscences is not capable of true tranquillity and peace it followeth that those that doe die before they begin to live in Christ that which our Sarah the type of the new birth great God hath taught us in divers figures in the old Testament for Sarah when by reason of her age she was unfit to bring children and dead to marriage bed did conceive in her womb and brought forth Isaac which word signifieth Laughter So then unlesse thou root out of thy mind worldly love thou shalt not be able to feel and receive the joy of the Spirit The promise was not made unto Abraham of Christ Abraham is a type of the abnegation of the world and the covenant of circumcision annexed before he left his proper habitation and his own inheritance it is no otherwise with man so long as he hath his mind fixed to the world it is
which is life it selfe this Way is Truth this Truth is the Way O the blindnesse a worm of the earth will make himself great when the Lord of glory in the world did willingly give up his own life Blush therefore faithfull soule and doe not thou when thy heavenly spouse celestiall Isaac cometh Humility is the way to Christ on foot to meet thee fit aloft on thy Cammel but like to Rebecca who beholding her Husband for bashfulnesse covered her face and comming down from her Camel went on foot with him so thou from the toylsome beast of thy proud heart descend lowly upon the ground and meet thy Spouse and he wil infold thee in his armes and bring thee into his heart Goe from thine own land and from thine acquaintance and from thy fathers house and come into the Land I will shew unto thee so said God unto Abraham Gen. 12. Goe thou likewise out of the house of thy selfe love and proper will for selfe-love corrupteth true judgement blindeth the understanding The evil fruits of selfe love disturbeth the reason seduceth the will corrupteth the conscience shutteth the gates of life and knoweth neither God nor his neighbour expelleth vertue hunteth after honours lyeth in wait for riches longeth after pleasures and lastly preferreth earth before heaven who so doth so love his life loseth it John 12. but whosoever hateth his own life that is doth deny his selfe-love this man shall keep it to eternall life selfe-love is the root of impenitence and eternal damnation with the which whosoever are bewitched they are without humility and acknowledgement of their sinnes the remission whereof can be obtained with no teares For they were not teares for God offended but for their own proper losse Mat. 13. the kingdome of heaven is compared to a pretious stone or pearle of great value which to obtain the Jeweller went and sold all that he had This Pearle is God himselfe or eternal life which to obtain all other things are to be left of which thing wee have a most absolute example Jesus Christ who descended from heaven not for his owne but for thy cause not to serve or profit himselfe but thee and shall we then doubt to seek him alone who did forget himselfe and for us gave himselfe unto death It is the part of a faithful Spouse to seek to please none but her husband and thou being spoused to Christ desirest still to please the world See then thou remember What soule is the virgin and spouse of Christ that thy soule is espoused to Christ yet not without a sacrifice with this condition annexed that thou mayst not love any but Christ rather perswade thy selfe thus that thou oughtest to contemne and put all things out of thy mind that thy Spouse might deem thee worthy of his loving imbracements for if thou darest divide thy love so that thou beholdest not Christ alone in all things now thou art no virgin but an adulterer for it behoveth the charity of Christians to be a chaste virgin and without spot Therefore as in the Law of Moses it was lawfull for the Priests onely to marry with virgins so Christ our true high Priest doth desire a virgin soule and which is taken with nothing besides his love and so knoweth not her own self in respect of Christ that which he professeth in expresse words saying If any come unto me and hateth not his own sâ—ule he cannot be my Disciple What it is so to doe to hate himselfe Why a man must hate himself let us shew in a word We all doe carry about with us the old man and are so the old man himselfe whose nature and property is to doe nothing but sinne to love himselfe to follow his profits and honors to pamper his own will and the flesh for the flesh and bloud is at all times like unto it self studieth it selfe giveth honour to it selfe doth applaud it selfe doth serve it selfe doth respect it selfe in all things it is easily grieved envious bitter covetous of revenge All which thou dost and art for seeing they arise and flow from thy heart this is thy life thine I say of the old man Wherefore thou must hate thy selfe if thou desirest to be Christs Disciple And he that loveth himselfe he that loveth his proper pride covetousnesse wrath hatred envie lying perfidiousnesse unrighteousnesse and wicked concupiscence which without doubt are not to beloved of any they are not to be excused and covered but followed with professed and open hatred mortified and utterly denied by him that will be Christs Disciple CHAP. XV. In a true Christian it behoveth the old man should daily die and the new man be renewed Also what it is to deny himself and what is the true Crosse of Christ Luke 9. If any will follow me let him deny himself and take up his crosse and follow me THese are the words of St. Paul Ephes 4. of the old man Lay aside according to your former conversation the old man which is corrupted according to the desires of error but be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put you on the new man wich is created according to God in justice and holinesse of truth And he expresseth the cause 1 Cor. 6. For yee are bought with a great price therefore glorifie and beare about with you God in your hearts What the old man is we said even now as What the old man is pride covetousnesse lust unrighteousnesse wrath enmity hatred and envie all which must die in a true Christian that the new man might spring up and be daily renewed The old man therefore dying the new man quickneth in opposit to it that is pride wasting humility succeedeth by the grace of the holy Ghost wrath dying lowlinesse shineth in the room covetousnesse being extinguished trust in God is increased the love of the world being taken away the love of God waxeth warm And What the new man is this then is the new man with his members these are the fruits of the Spirit this is the living and powerfull faith this is Christ in us and his most noble life this is new obedience this is the new commandement this is the fruits of regeneration in us in which whoso live these verily are the onely sonnes of God and therefore it is said that a man ought to deny himselfe as proper honour selfe-will and his own judgement privat profits and his own estimation yea to forgoe his own right and not onely all other things but to think himselfe unworthy to live his owne life What it is to deny himselfe Wherfore a true Christian and one that is indued with the humility of Christ doth willingly acknowledge that the man cannot All things are to â—e used with feare by his own right challenge or require any of those things which God bestoweth on him seeing that all things that are are the free gifts of Gods divine munificence wherupon he useth
is Christ doth as it were call back his merit from them that do not pardoÌ„ their neighbour not first reconciled to his neighbour For all mankind under the person of the wicked servant Matth. 18. is described who when hee had not wherewith to pay the King remitted him all his debts but when he afterwards behaved himselfe so cruelly towards his fellow servant the King revoked his pardon condemning the wicked servant by reason of his hard usage of his neighbour Which Parable Christ concludeth with this farewell So will my heavenly Father doe unto you Like unto that is the saying of Matth. 7. What measure you mete unto others the same shall hee meted unto you Christs mandate Whereby it appeareth that man was not onely created for himselfe alone but for his neighbours cause also And immediatly he passeth over the precepts of loving our neighbour to withdraw the love of God and to proceed with his justice by whose most rigid decree hee is immediatly condemned but if we should call such things to mind as this Parable we should never be angry long with our Neighbour neither should the Sun go down in our wrath for it A heart irreconcilcable is not capable of Christs merits is in truth a horrible thing to be thought that the merit of Christ whereby he satisfied for the whole world fully and after the example of that little King of meer grace hath remitted all our sins I say that this merit should be cut off and become of no effect if we do not pardon our brother and hate him But although this law seem hard yet so it is written and it so bindeth us that God without the love of our neighbour will not be loved of us and if wee become irreconcileable wee lose the love and favour of God Neither may we think The cause of charity it was for other cause that man was not created one better then another but that one should not insult over another but as twins of one mother and one father we should live lovingly peaceably together our consciences never accusing us Therfore whosoever hateth his brother and despiseth him let him know that God doth hate him and despise him because he hath most severely forbidden it and consequently that he is hatefull and abominable to him as also guilty of eternall condemnation and altogether excluded from the merit of Christ Neither can it by any means come to passe that a heart in enmity without mercy and inhumane should participate of the bloud of Christ which was shed out of meere love seeing out of the Parable Matth. 18. it is manifest that God was lesse moved or offended for the debt of ten thousand Talents then at the unmercifulnesse and cruelty of the fellow-servant Wherefore let us never forget but daily remember that saying of Christ So will my Heavenly Father doe unto you CHAP. XXVI Wherefore a mans Neighbour is to be loved Rom. 13. Owe nothing to any man but that you love one another for he that loveth his Neighbour fulfilleth the Law THese are the words of Micah chap. 6. What good things shall I offer unto the Lord Shall I offer unto him Meat-offerings and Calves of a yeare old Can the Lord bee pleased in thousands of Raâ—â—nes or in many thousands of fat be-goats Shall I give my first-born for my wickednesse and the fruits of my womb for the sinnes of my soule I will shew thee O man what is good and what the Lord requireth of thee Even to doe judgement and to love mercy and to walk carefully before thy God By which judgement he teacheth us Wherein consisteth the true worship of God wherein the true worship of God consisteth not in Ceremonies and Sacrifices which conferre nothing on God because all is his own nor in humane offerings which hee requireth not nay rather hee abhorreth because they contain the reproach of Jesus Christ the Propitiatory offering which God appointed to take away the sinnes of the world but in pure faith which the Prophet describeth in this form To doe judgement I say in the exercise of faith in charity in mercy better pleasing then all sacrifices in humility according to the Psalm 51. The sacrifice to God is a troubled spirit a contrite heart and humble O God thou wilt not despise To which divine worship consisting in the inwards of the heart and in faith charity and humility Saint Paul exhorteth us Rom. 13. whose admonition we have prefixed to this chapter which containeth the praise of Charity and the perpetuall debt to our neighbour For certainly there is no other way of serving God but this to whom we can approve of nothing but what wee our selves allow and he himselfe worketh in our hearts so that to worship God is nothing but to observe our neighbour and to doe him good To this love of our neighbour the Apostle inciting us useth an argument somthing plausible to those which Charity praised are desirous to lead a Christian life calling it a breviary of all vertues and a fulfilling of the Law not that we are able possibly by our charity to fulfill the divine Law or that consequently it followeth to gain eternall life thereby but it insinuateth unto us the noble bounty and majesty of this most excellent vertue and inflameth us to love it with all our desire For our justice and happinesse is founded on the merit of Jesus Christ which we apply to our selves by faith out of which also the love to our neighbour doth flow and all other vertues which therefore are called the fruits of justice to the praise and glory of God Seeing then the dignity of this vertue is so great it were worthy the labour to seeke more arguments to draw us unto the love of it but the strongest in my opinion is that which Saint John useth Epist 1. Chap. 4. The impâ—lsive cause of charity God is Love and he that remaineth in Love remaineth in God and God in him for who would not wish to be in God and remain in him and that God in like manner shall be and remain in him And who on the contrary would not abhorre to bee in Satan and Satan in him which is so often as charity is repulsed barbarisme and inhumane hostility doth dwell in our hearts For as it is the delight of God to be with the sonnes of men so contrariwise the Devill is a devourer of men To which belongeth that place of John who saith He that Charity is a token of the sons of God loveth is born of God and knoweth God In this is made manifest whether they be the sons of God or the Devil and can there be any thing more desirable then to be the sonnes of God to be begotten of God to know God truly and whosoever hath his heart void of charity nor by experience hath known the force of it life gifts goodnesse gentlenesse long-suffering and patience
stroke I say for honor pleasure and wealth which you doe not strive for this one thing that you may enjoy God alone That which in old time was done by the holy men of God whom the divine love with the admirable sweetnesse thereof had so tied and fixed them thereunto that they became forgetful of the world and of What man is most wise who most foolish themselves also Whom therfore as fools worthy to be derided some did so account them when themselves indeed were the most foolish of all others because they preferre fraile things like unto childrens lakings before the greatest good A true lover of God loveth him no otherwise then as if there were nothing under the heavens but God alone and therefore followeth him onely And by this reason he findeth â—ll things in God which hee followed beâ—ore in the world For God is all things essentially true honour and joy peace and pleasure riches and magnificence all which â—re found in a more excellent manner in God then in the world Whosoever therefore loveth any creature for beauties sake take my counsel neglect those things transferre thy love unto God which is the fountain of all beauty And he that would follow any thing because it is good follow God rather which is the onely and eternal good essentially and without whom nothing is good so that all creatures for that From whence all creatures do receive their goodnesse cause onely are good because even a spark and a little drop of water be it never so little a thing stained with many imperfections because they participate of that Ocean of goodnes why then do we not rather love God the fountain and perfection of that which is good and who is the good essentially and the out-flowing of every good thing in singular manner By how much lesse earth or earthly gravity every thing hath so much lighter it is and is easier carried upwards so our soules and mindes the more they are addicted to earthly things and by them are as it were made heavie doe by consequence endeavour celestial things the lesse and joy lesse in God weigh well alwayes the damage of The gravity of earthly minds earthly love with the divine love in ballance and that which is necessarily annexed unto it that of our neighbour Whereupon it followeth that he which loveth God cannot but love his neighbour and hee that dare offend God will not forbear to offend his neighbour CHAP. XXIX Of the Reconciliation of our Neighbour without which God taketh away his grace from us Numb 5. If any man shall offend against a man he shall be judged by the Lord. MEmorable is this Sentence because Offending man offends God he conjoyneth both God and Man as also the love and offence of both that every one by Moses Law in expresse words that did offend his neighbour might be judged to offend God or injure God Whereby that followeth consequently He that will bee reconciled to God hee must do the same to his neighbour seeing that God taketh the injurie offered to man to be his own then he that offendeth God and man he cannot return into favour with him before hee bee reconciled to his neighbour As Christ manifestly beareth witnesse Matth. 5. Wherefore it is needfull and a work worthy regard that I should forthwith shew that the love of God and The love of God our neighbour cleaveth together our neighbour cannot be separated which is the true and most clear shining fountain of brotherly love The words 1 Ioh. 4. If any man say that he loveth God and hateth his brother he is a lyar For he that loveth not his brother whom he seeth how can he love God whom he seeth not And this commandement wee have of God that hee that loveth God should love his neighbour also Which Sentence teacheth the same that we exhorted even now That the love of God cannot consist without the love of our neighbour Whence also floweth or followeth this saying He that sincerely without hypocrisie loveth God loveth his neighbour with the same love But contrariwise hee that loveth or can love either of both with false and fained affection loveth neither of them truly Whereby it commeth to passe that the love of our neighbour is a sort of divine love and that which is no other then a Loadstone pointing out the sincerity or hypocrisie of it Wherefore we shall not erre if we shall speake of a double The double scope of man scope or end prefixed to man whereunto all the actions of his life are to tend as to certain tooles which we ought to imitate and use I say charity of God and our neighbour whereunto all our studies ought to obey and be bestowed and we ought to profit and make progresse therein more and more daily seeing that we are to this end created redeemed and sanctified although The charitie of God is manifest in the incarnation of Christ perhaps it is more fit to say Christ is our scope to whom we are so much the nearer joyned in neighbourhood as we are neerer him in charity For by this counsel God is made man that he might set before our eyes a living and breathing image of his love and that he should shew his love to be in the inscrutable incomprehensible essence infintie and divine that men should be transformed through Charity into this image of God which is Christ Furthermore The bond of charity as in Christ God and man are bound together by an undissolveable knot â—o the Charity of God containeth in it the Charity of our neighbour which are and be no more easily dis-joynted and pulled asunder then the divine and humane nature in Christ so that he which hath injured the humane nature of Christ the same man is held guilty of the divinity and he which offendeth man is declared guilty God is offended in our neighbour to offend God nor any man the bond of charity being broken can bee angry with his neighbour separate himselfe from him but by that divorce he declineth from God and sinneth against him Let us shew that which we teach by a similitude Even as hee that by the middle circle draweth lines every way from the circle about or out circle beginneth at the same or from the said circle but uniteth and gathereth together all the neere joyning poynts in the center from whence it must needs depart if we will take any away from another so God is a center as it were or a certain center from which hee departeth that separateth himselfe from the charity of his neighbour but he that will continue neer unto him he must relieve him and participate by a sympathy with him in his Compassion out of charity afflictions and miseries for if he do otherwise it is manifest in God he is not who is as it were in a center wherein all lines are coupled together And to this place
way of the Devil when true faith and the works thereof doe not leave us empty or void of knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ 2 Pet. 1. Now seeing that a man having the Light and Life of Christ dwelleth in him for all these things hee is himselfe therefore according to the saying of the Prophet Esay chap. 11. upon such and no otherwise then upon Christ himselfe do rest the gifts of the holy Ghost that is to say the Spirit of wisdome and understanding the Spirit of counsell and fortitude the Spirit of knowledge piety and the feare of the Lord. Wherefore Saint Peter in the second of the Acts speaketh thus to the Jewes Repent and you shall receive the gifts of the holy Ghost as if he should say The Spirit of God of which you have had experience and which is the Illuminator of the heart sendeth not it self into other minds then those that are faithful and repent Goe to then O mortals which desire to bee freed from the blindnesse of heart and everlasting darknesse and lastly from the Devil himselfe imitate Christ in faith and true conversation and amendment being sure that the neerer you are to Christ the neerer you are to Eternall Light and by how much morâ— unfaithful you are so much neerer you aâ—â— to Darknesse and the Devill For as Faith Christ and all vertues are knit together so in like manner incredulity the Devil and all vices doe cleave together Behold with me the Apostles imitating Christ in faith contemning the world denying themselves renouncing their possessions and living in eternity by which things they attained to this that they might be heavenly illuminated and might bee indued with the holy Ghost To whom was most unlike the young man that was so rich whilst hee studied himselfe and thought himselfe something Luke 18. Therefore hee remained in the darknesse of the world neither was he inlightned to eternall life For hee that loveth the world the love of the Father is not in him And blessed John professeth plainly That he which loveth not remaineth in darknesse and knoweth not whither hee goeth because darknesse hath blinded his eyes To whom agreeth Taulerus who in all his Sermons every where sheweth and admonisheth without serious exercise of faith without mortification and selfe-denial without inward turning himselfe to his heart and lastly without the inward Sabbath of the soule no man can receive the divine Light or perceive it in himselfe In brief as much as in the condition after conversion the works of darknes by the spirit of God in man are destroied so much is he illuminated and by how much more more powerfully on the other side our corrupt nature as the flesh the world in man do beare rule so much lesse Grace Light Spirit of God and Christ is in him Therefore it remaineth without daily coÌ„tinual repentance no man can be illuminated when as he hath not resisted one â—ice nor The further froÌ„ the life of Christ the further from the true light rooted out one and exerciseth innumerable others bringeth forth out of himselfe continually with more increase then people are wont to doe And as darknesse is thicker in it selfe and more cloudy by how much the Sunne goeth back from us by so much we are unlike to the life of Christ so much more plentiful are wee in sinne and darknesse groweth the thicker in us till they become eternal night On the contrary hee which by the grace of God entereth the Chariot of virtue with a good courage and firm hope this man cannot but profit in them daily one following another as rings be linked one to another in a golden chain Which connexion blessed Peter expresseth The knowledge of Christ in love faith and the fruits thereof is to grow in Christ profit in him writing in the second Epistle cha 1. And you ought to have care and to use diligence ministring in your faith virtue and in your virtue knowledge in knowledge abstinence in abstinence patience in patience piety in piety brotherly love in brotherly love charity And if yee doe these things and abound therein you shall not be found empty nor without fruit in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ As if he should say he that shall not addict himselfe wholly to the study and exercise of these virtues he knoweth not Christ but he that by faith profiteth in them he groweth in Christ all other as proud ones wrathfull ones covetous ones impatient ones profit not in Christ but in the Devil And it is left us Christians in precept that as a child by little and little and in time is made a man so we may grow in faith and in the study of virtue to perfect The fruit of the death of Christ in us men to the measure of full age in Christ Ephes 4. Coloss 1. But to whom these things are not ready or at hand saith Saint Peter 2. Epist 1. he is blind and hand-bound forgetfull of the purging of his old sinnes As if he should say It is for certain that Christ by his death and bloud took and did beare all our sinnes but in the mean time we must beware that we addict not our selves to sin hereafter but rather the death of Christ fructifying in us we die to the world and live in Christ which whosoever doth not care to doe to this man it is plain that the purging of his old sins profiteth nothing Whereupon it followeth if wee desire to have the sinnes of our former life remitted and pardoned we must forbeare â—â— sin we must repent and beleeve in Christ which if we doe not then we retain all those sinnes of our former life and they are to be lamented by us to all eternity without all hope of expiation or forgivenesse so that it is possible that even for wrath alone a man may be damned which if he had by Christian lowliness corrected then in truth he had obtained pardon for all his other sins which because he neglected to do therfore according to the words of Saint Peter He is blind being forgetfull of the purging of his old sinnes Whereby it is given to understand The necessity of repentance how necessary a thing repentance is and the changing to a betternesse For although Christ died for our sins blotting them out and abolishing them with the incomparable price of his bloud yet we doe not participate of that merit unlesse we repent it profiteth nothing And howsoever every man is promised pardon for his sins for the merit of Christ yet that promise pertaineth nothing to thee to the unbeleever nor the impenitent but to those alone which doe amend their lives when it is most meet that those sinnes be remitted which we goe not about to remember but those onely which we were heartily grieved for And to this pertaineth that which is spoken Matth. 11. The poore receive the Gospel that is obtain the remission of sinnes Now
most noble is that man in whom Christ is all and doth all whose noble thoughts mind words are the will of Christ the thoughts of Christ and the mind of Christ according to that of Paul * 1 Cor. 2. We have the mind of Christ Lastly whose words are Christs And so it needs to be indeed because the life of Christ is that new and another life in man neither is the new man any other thing then he who liveth in Christ according to the Spirit whose life I say courtesie patience and humility is no other then that of Christ And this the new creature and the life of Christ in us according to that of Paul to the Galatians Gâ—l 2. I live but not I but Christ in me liveth this also is to follow Christ truly and truly to repent for by this method the old man is destroyed and the carnall life declineth the new spirituall and heavenly life ariseth and breaketh out of the clouds This who ever doth he truly is a Christian not in title only but in work and truth a true son of God begotten of God and Christ renewed in Christ and quickened by faith and so long as the inward man dwelleth in flesh and blood we may wish so much perfection rather then attain unto it but it is as meet and necessary to indeavour and to aspire thereunto and study the same and to wish it from our inward minde and to strive that the life and kingdom The strife daily fighting with corrupt nature of Christ may be in us and not the life of Satan let all our counsels respect this all our cares and inward groans be sent this way and let this be our only strife and warfare that we may mortifie the old man by daily repentance For how much every one dieth to himself so much doth Christ live in him how much corruption How the man is daily renewed departeth from our nature by the Holy Ghost so much divine grace cometh in how much the flesh is crucified so much is the spirit quickened so much of the work of darknesse as is destroyed so much is the man illuminated by how much the exterior man is lessened and wasted so much the inward is renewed 2 Cor. 4. so much as you lose of your vaine affections and carnall life and are wasted as self-love ambition wrâ—th covetousnesse and voluptuousnesse so much Christ liveth in you the further a mans heart is set from the world from concupiscence of the eyes flesh and pride of life so much more of God Christ and the Holy Spirit doth flow into him Last of all the more nature flesh darknesse and the world do bear rule in man so much lesse grace spirit of light God and Christ is found in him Moreover this new kind of living is to the flesh The new life is the crosse of the flesh an enemy and bitter crosse because it is that by which it is subjugated and brought under and crucified with all the desires and concupiscences thereof but yet is that wherein the whole power and fruit of penitency consisteth This is the inward desire of the flesh and blood that it had rather lead a free life dissolute according to its own will and among pleasures and all kind of voluptuousnesse for it only knows this to be sweet and pleasant as contrariwise the life of Christ to the flesh and the old man is a heavie crosse but to the new man and him that is spirituall it is an easie yoak a light burden and a most quiet Sabbath truly the true rest is sought for in vain else were they in the faiâ—h of Christ and in his sweetness humility patience and love of Christ whereupon it is said Mat. 11. You shall find rest for your souls Truly he that loveth Christ will not think it bitter to suffer death it self for him This therefore is that sweet yoak of Christ which we are commanded to take upon us that our soules might be refreshed and come into his rest which command if we determine to obey and mean to put on Christ his life and yoak then we must shake off the yoak of the Devill our way of carnall life wicked and dissolute nor must we suffer the flesh as a Lady to insult and disquiet the spirit but all things are to be brought under the Law obedience and yoak of Christ will I say reason understanding and all carnall What the yoak of Christ is appetites which the concupiscence of Adam and this flesh of ours is well pleased to be honoured worshipped and to be praised of men to abound in riches and pleasures to bring all which on the other side under the yoak of Christ and his discipline nothing regarding his ignominy contempt and poverty to think himself unworthy all things that the world gapeth What the life of Christ is after and for which other men do contend that truth is the crosse of Christ wherewith the flesh is delighted I say that extreme humility of Christ and his most noble life which to the spirit is a most easie yoak and a most easie burden for what other was the whole life of Christ then holy poverty extreme contempt and vile persecution who came not into the world to be attended on but to serve us himself and spend his life and shed his dearest blood to redeem our offences It is the property of The naturall man the spirituall the naturall man to seek after honours and hunt after great things The spirituall on the other side loved the humility of Christ and desireth to become nothing And whereas most men do desire to go before or excell others scarce one coveteth to be reputed as nothing of whom the one belongeth to the square or rule of life of the old Adam the other to the rule of Christ The carnall man and he who hath not yet learned what Christ is that is to say meer humility courtesie and love accounteth it folly to live as Christ liveth and thinketh those onely wise that live after their owne The false true light will delicately and easily not knowing that then he chiefly liveth in the Devill when most foolishly he applaudeth himselfe and esteemeth his own life as the best and most pleasing which most miserable men being fast bound in the lust of their own carnall wisdome doe inforce others to follow the like errours contrariwise those whom the true and eternall light hath inlightned those are touched at the heart when they doe see the pomp and disdaine pride pleasure wrath revenge and such kind of fruit of the carnall life which causeth them to sigh from the bottome of their hearts saying How farre is this from Christ and his knowledge from true repentance from genuine Christianity and lastly from the fruits of the new birth of the sonnes of God for he liveth yet in Adam in the old creature and in the Devill himselfe for to offend
merit any for Christ did that for all but out of thy sincere love towards him and because he To love Christ is to live in him the love of Christ overcometh the world death willingly died for thee for neither in thy tongue or words lest thou bee deceived must thou love him but in deed and work and in vertue and truth and in keeping his commandements as thou art taught by himselfe John 14. If any man love me he will keep my words and my Father loveth him and we shall goe unto him and have a mansion with him For this is the love of God That we keep his commandements and his commandements are not heavie St. John 1 Epist Cap. 5. and our Saviour himselfe Matth. 11. doth affirm My yoak is pleasant and my burden is light And to those that love Christ fervently it cannot but be easy and pleasant to want the sweetnesse of worldly trifles and to live in Christ mitigating all sense of difficulty through the vehemency of love but to those that doe not embrace Christs love with sincere affection doing all things ingratefully and with an evill will all things must needs be found sharp and difficult in the study of an holy life when contrariwise to a true friend of Christ not death it selfe if it be required for him is in any wise terrible For unto us it is given saith St. Paul to Phil. 1. for Christ not onely that we might beleeve in him but also that we might suffer and die for him Behold Moses with me of whom honorable mention is made in most ample words in the Epistle to the Hebrewes Chap. 11. By faith Moses denied to be made great and denied himselfe to be the sonne of the daughter of Pharaoh rather chusing to be afflicted with the sonnes of God then to have the pleasantnesse of a temporall office esteeming the opprobry of Christ to be greater riches then the treasures of Egypt The love of wisdom doth cause the contempt of pleasure Consider with me Daniel Chap. 1. set apart by the King of Babylon with a certain number of his fellowes in captivity and reserved by the King and nourished with meat and drink from the Kings Table untill he should be fit to execute the offices appointed by the King and forth with he was brought up yet he and his fellowes despised those dainties and desired the Prince of the Eunuches that they might rather be fed with Lentiles and drink water for so much could the love of divine wisdome work in their young and tender minds with which to be divinely indued they onely desired Therefore take thou heed and doe not think thou mayst doe otherwise but if thou wish that Christ who is the eternall wisdome of the Father should come into thy mind perswade thy selfe again and again that thou must abstain from carnall pleasures as from the delicate dishes of the Babylonians Court. And as those children by themselves were made more beautifull when they lived soberly and temperatly satisfying nature with Lentiles and water so be thou assuredly perswaded in thy mind that it will be before God the best of all and most excellent and so become partaker of his divine nature as saith Saint Peter 2 Epist chap. 1. if thou detest worldly pleasures and sinne The words of S. Paul are to Gal. 6. The world is crucified to me and I to the world that is I am dead to the world and the world to me In example of this all true Christians are in the world truly but not of the world and although they live in it no part of the love of it cleaveth unto them accounting it for shadowes and as nothing worldly pomps dignities concupiscence of the eyes and the flesh with the pride of life how the world is dead to them and is crucified and they Christians account al worldly things but shadows to the world likewise are dead and crucied because they esteeme little of honours wealth and pleasures and account them as dung to obtain Christ or in respect of Christ But happy and thrice and foure times happy is that heart who is so divinely indued and in whose heart such graces are infused that it is withdrawn with no desire of worldly honours wealth and pleasure which to obtain it is needfull and very behoovefull for a true Christian to pray daily to God for the same Solomon the wisest of all Kings by this meanes obtained his desire of God Prov. 30. Two things I desire of thee deny them not unto me That thou neither give me Riches nor Poverty but give me so much as is necessary for my life Let a true Christian in like manner so pray Two things are necessary for a Christian Two things I desire of thee O Lord two things That I may die to my selfe and the world without these two things it is unpossible to be a true Christian And if thou thinkest otherwise thou art deceived and thou shalt heare this I know you not Although to flesh and bloud it be a grievous crosse to die to himselfe and the world that is to set by no worldly thing in respect of heaven yet the spirit overcommeth and breaketh through all these difficulties so A spiritual life is a cross to the flesh great is the force so great is the love of Christ that they passe through all these things as a sweet yoak and easie buâ—den And although those which are so are hated of the world yet they are beloved of God For the enmity of this world is the friendship and love of God And in like manner the enmity of God is the friendship of the world Whosoever therefore would be a friend of the world is sure to be the enemy of God witnesse James chap. 4. and Christ himselfe John 15. plainly professeth If you were of this world the world would love that which were its own but because you are not of the world for I have chosen you out of the world therefore the world doth hate you For as the Sea receiveth and will beare quick men and casteth out dead men so the world is adversary to those that are dead to the world and so esteemeth them and is otherwise to those that live in pomp and splendor it commendeth them Finally to speak briefly he who so liveth that in his heart pride covetousnesse pleasure wrath revenge the desire thereof mortified are to him indeed the world What it is to die to the world is dead and he to the world this man liveth in Christ and Christ in him And those that are so these Christ doth acknowledge for his to others it is said I know you not who in like manner knew him not and were ashamed of his life I say his meeknesse humility and patience In brief he who refuseth to live with Christ here in time how should he live with Christ in eternity For how should he live in thee after this life who
canst not live with him in this life It remaineth therefore whose life in this world is not in Christ he shall not have life in the other world Here I pray thee now examine thy life and see whether it be more like to Christs or the Vnion with Christ or the Devill Devils Certainly with one of them thou shalt be joyned eternally after death But who is dead to himselfe he is in love with no businesses yea is dead to the world what other thing is it to die unto the world then not to love the world and the things of this world according to that of John Epist 1. chap. 2. He who loveth the world is not of God For what should he doe in the world who inwardly and in his heart is dead to it Whom also whosover loveth he is no otherwise then Samson of Dalila overcome of it and condemned to all the torments and vexations which the He is overcom of the world that loveth it worldly life containeth or affordeth Moreover the love of the world belongeth to the old man not to the regeneration because the world hath nothing but honours The old man delighteth in the world the new man in Christ wealth concupiscence of the eyes and of tâ—e flesh with the pride of life in which the old Adam is conversant and delighteth it selfe And contrariwise to the new man he hath all things in Christ as joy honour wealth and pleasure for what can be more The Image of God the great est dignity of man honorable to a man or is more to be desired then the Image of God renewed by Christ Or if we seek pleasures what man in his wits can doubt that God doth give delight to his above all creatures and delight The man is made for greater things then this world them more as the words of Taulerus say Furthermore what think you of that which the Scripture teacheth Man was not made for the worlds sake but the world for mans sake nor to fill his belly with delicate meat pamper his own wit heap up riches spread his Empire abroad to get most ample possessions grounds and fruits of the earth to be gorgeously attired to abound in gold and silver to be Lord of the earth to put all his delight and joy therein as in his paradise to place it and know hope for nothing but what is before his eyes Or lastly for any terrene cause whatsoever or any thing that is fraile although of it selfe it be good pleasant and pretious No truly he must goe hence he is but a tenant and a life-renter of this great world into which we enter many at one instant as it were by heaps yet death calls for us also As it is not profitable for any of us to carry with us a grain of all the treasure we have heaped whereby it evidently appeareth that we were not created for this temporall life To what man was created neither this world to be the principall end of our creation seeing that we live therein as prilgrims and guests therefore another cause brought us into this world and for whom we were born which is God himselfe and the image of God which we bear in Christ and unto whom we are renewed In this we are convinced evidently to wit that we are especially created for the kingdome of God and life eternall which Christ hath recovered for us and to whom we are regenerate by the holy Ghost How preposterous then is it for one to fix his heart to the world and give his minde to earthly things when we know the other to be more noble then the whole word I say for a man to attend and spend his time on earthly things which is the most excellent of all creatures which carrieth about him the image of God in Christ and is renewed to this image Wherefore as I said before the man for the world was not created but the world was created for man and therefore carrleth about with him the image of God in Christ of which the excellency and nobility is so great that all men with all his workes and power could not repaire one soule or renew the Image of God But for this cause it was necessary that Christ should die that because the image of God was defaced and destroyed in man it should be renewed by the holy Ghost and he should become forthwith the habitation and house of God And this being known and called to mind if he be right minded he will never compare the riches of the world honours To preferre earthly things before heuvenly is great madnes and pleasures with the price of his soule which Christ hath redeemed at such a price for what is it to cast pearls in the mire and before swine if this should not be That which our Saviour saith Matth. 16. pertaineth to this place What profiteth it a man to get the whole world and lose his owne soule For seeing the world is mortall and the soul of man immortall the world with all his pomp cannot recover one soul CHAP. XIV A true Christian ought after the example of Christ to contemne the world and hate his life in this world John 12. He that loveth his soule loseth it and he that hateth his soule in this world doth preserve it to eternall life HE that will hate himselfe he must first not love himselfe so that he may daily die to sinne and therefore he must continually Selfe-love the chiefest enemy of the soul Idolatry wrastle with himselfe and his flesh for nothing is more hurtfull to a man that is desirous of his salvation and more hindereth him then self-selfe-love I say that carnall Philautia of which this following discourse in all this book is the subject I doe not say that care of preserving our selves but loving our selves is forbidden For seeing that God alone is to be loved it followeth that he who loveth himselfe is an Idolater and maketh himselfe God what every one loveth in that his heart is fixed neither can we be taken but with the love and servitude of something so as we become servants despoiling our selves of our proper liberties and consequently having so many Lords we are subject unto as we have objects to love but if thy love be sincerely and simply towards God then thou art subject to no object but it is manifest thou art at liberty wherefore thou must be very circumspect that thou follow nothing that may hinder the divine love in thee And if thou desirest to possesse God alone as much as thou art able so much in like The law of God brings forth tranquillity the world perturbation manner of thy all must thou consecrate to him But if thou love thy selfe and please thy selfe much pensivenesse sorrow feare and sadnesse will befall thee Contrariwise if thou love God and rejoycest in him onely and dost dedicate thy selfe onely to him then will he be thy
the same as other mens goods with feare and trembling not to his private pleasure or instruments of his private Comparison between a carnall and a spirituall man profits praise and estimation Goe to then let us compare together a Christian in deed and selfe-lover as also a genuine man and one answering to his name and one desirous of this deniall of which we speak If you offer the one a contumelious affront presently you shall see him wax hot to be grieved with anger to reprove him to brawle and play the mad-man in words deeds to be revenged and to bind his allegation with an oath all which are the old man to whom it is proper and easie to be angry to practise hatred and revenge On the contrary he that hath denied himselfe is courteous well-pleased patient thinking nothing of revenge confessing himselfe to be worthy of all these and much more because all these are contained under the name of self-deniall of which patience humility and lowlinesse Christ denied himself we have an absolute example Christ Jesus who sooner would deny himselfe when he said Matth. 20. The Sonue of man came not to be ministred unto but to minister unto others And Luke 22. I am in the midst of you as one that ministreth And Cap. 9. The Son of man hath not where to rest his head And Psalm 22. I am a worm and no man In like manner blessed David when Shimei reviled him denied himselfe saying The Lord hath commanded him for I am a worm in the sight of the Lord I am worthy farre worse All the Saints have denied themselves things Briefly all the Saints of God and the Prophets have denied themselves holding themselves unworthy of any good thing hereupon they did beare all things patiently they cursed no man giving thanks for their injuries they blessed their persecuters and prayed for them that slew What it is to deny our selves them and so by many tribulations have entred the Kingdome of heaven Thou hast now what it is to deny their selves That is to acknowledge themselves unworthy of any good thing and worthy of all evils that might befall And this is the Crosse of Christ which he commanded us to carry Luke 9. He that will be my Disciple let him deny himselfe and take up my Crosse and follow me For this life of Christ is a crosse to the old man and to the flesh and bloud a punishment The works of Christ yea death it self because he had rather lead an unbridled life after his own wil in this kind of pleasure then in humility lowlines patience and lastly to assume the life of Christ entirely Which nevertheless is to be done necessarily whatsoever is The decay of the old man is the beginning of the new the old man ought to die in a Christian for thou shalt never put on the humility of Christ unlesse thou put off the pride of the old man nor his poverty unlesse thou cut off avarice by the root nor the contempt of glory and reproaches unlesse thou pull up ambition by the root Lastly nor the lowlinesse and patience of Christ unlesse thou correct thy desire of revenge and thy wrath All which things the Scripture calleth the deniall of himselfe the bearing of the Crosse of Christ and the following of Christ and that for no hope of profit merit reward praise or glory but only for the love of Christ because he hath done this first because this is his life and lastly because he hath left this in cōmand Furthermore seeing this is the Image of God in Christ and us a greater honor then this none can happen to man it were a thing very unworthy to expect other reward The Image of God the greatest dignity of man of our work and daīly labour for those that define all things by the honour of this world and attend this onely by which onely part they are made better then others when by their own judgement Fortune hath bestowed all things upon them The beginning and end of all men is one No man better then others neither is one better then another nor one entreth this life or goeth forth with better conditions then others and yet what madnesse is this of ours we vex our selves willingly and to other crosses we adde a wheele of ambition to the vice of self-selfe-love self-Selfe-love forbidden from whence that mad giddy hunting after honour doth spring or flow forth Which whosever loveth and applaudeth and flattereth himselfe in and serveth both pomps honours and praises it is certain that he averteth his minde from God and Christ to the world and himselfe And to such as this appertaineth that of our Saviour If thou wilt keep thy self thy soul and thy life thou must hate all these things but if thou intend to love them truly thou art in the way of perishing Which paradoxicall sentence old Adam to whom it is alwayes pleasing to be accounted some body out of his own image or inward man refuseth and is adversary to it Thereupon it is that there be few which know this genius of Adam or being known dare meet and encounter it specially when we must needs extirpate both this and all other things that have their beginning with us and their continuance and die with Christ as is pride covetousness ambition pleasures wrath which we must kill and bury in the humility of Christ poverty contumely suffering and lowlinesse of Christ But whosoever is dead after this fashion to himselfe he easily thenceforth contemneth the world God maketh glad the heart of him that is dead to the world with all the pomps thereof wealth honours and pleasures comprizing all these in one Christ a true stranger to this world new born but a continual guest and table-friend of Christ who by and by will fill his heart with joy exceeding and in this life wil keep a daily jubilee with him and in the other and in the other an eternall jubilee with all the Saintss CHAP. XVI In a true Christian the strife of the Flesh and Spirit never ceaseth Rom. 7. I see another Law in my members resisting the Law of my mind IN a true Christian the man is two-fold Man is twofold in use Exterior and Interior which two although they be conjoyned yet they doe daily differ by turnes ruling and dying according to that of S. Paul 2 Cor. 4. If our outward man be corrupted yet the inward is daily renewed The same Paul calleth Rom. 7. The law of the mind and of the flesh to the Gal. 5. the Flesh and the Spirit The flesh he saith coveteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh Therefore when the spirit overcommeth the man liveth in a new nativity and a new creature and in God and in Christ But the flesh reigning the same man liveth in the Devill and in the old nativity The carnall and spiritual man without the
present things and lastly to crucifie the flesh that the spirit may live in him Truly in this is both the foredeck and the poop of Christianity to imitate our Saviour or as Augustine saith The chiefest Christ is the rule of our life of religion is to imitate him whom thou lovest from which opinion differeth not much that saying of Plato drawn from the law of Nature The perfection of men consisteth in the imitation of God whereupon nothing else is left unto us then that Christ ought to be the example and square of our life and that all our counsels studies and cogitations should respect that one thing how we should come to him by him be saved and live with him eternally All things are to be done in faith expecting with joy the dissolution of our prison And that we shall attain if we direct all our labours actions businesse and vocations by faith and goe on with desire and hope of eternall life or to speak more significantly if we never lay aside the memory The love of the world is extinguished by faith of eternall happinesse in all our actions because through this feare of God is begotten in man a certain holy desire of eternal things and withall the desire coveting of earthly things insatiable in its own nature is restrained according to that saying of St Paul to the Coloss 3. Whatsoever you doe in word or deed doe all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ giving thankes to God the Father through him And the name of God is nothing but the honour praise and glory of God According to thy Name let it be O God and thy praise to the ends of the world saith David Psal 48. Which Whâ—â— the name of God iâ— scope if all our works and life doe chiefly respect then we think of eternity and our works are done in God and consequently our selves are in God Briefly God our chiefe good and the eternall life of all our thoughts works and words should be the first mover if we will not faile of eternall salvation That which Paul most elegantly expresseth to 1 Tim. chap. 6 But thou O man Who iâ— the man of God or the man of the world of God flie these things to wit covetousnes He calleth a Christian a man of God because borne of God and living in God hee is the sonne and heir of God Even as contrariwise a man of the world is he who liveth after a worldly life whose inheritance is the world and whose belly is filled with the goods of the earth as it is in Psalm 17. Which way the Christian is farre from seeking after faith and love and unsatiably covetous of eternall life to which he was created alone which if it come not to passe then the man linketh himselfe to enormous sins which our just God doth punish with eternall fire prefigured by the burning of the Tents sent from heaven and from an angry God to punish and revenge the excesses of the Israelites The wrath of God from whence Wherefore so often as such like plagues are sent upon the wicked as inundation fire warre hunger pestilence let us alwayes call to mind and remember that these are the most just punishments of a moved and angry God because the people of Israel unmindfull of heavenly things did follow after transitory things did prefer present things before future and had more care of the body then of the soule which things let us not erre in It is an extream point of ingratitude and contempt A great contempt ingratitude to God of God both here and hereafter to be punished to wit to contemne God for whom we beare about both body and soule and from whom we received them and instead thereof to worship Idols of the creatures the work of mens hands to esteem eternall things after transitory For these creatures Why creatures are given to us are given to us for necessity and not to set our hearts and minds after them that which God alone deservedly challengeth to himself and that they might be as prints and testimonies of God whereby we come neerer to the knowledge and love of God the author of them all which divine institution when the love of the world dare abrogate it then the same by the most just vengeance of God together with the proper Idolaters are turned into the fire The love of the world Is converted into the fire of Sodom and infernall flood of which Sodom and Gomorrah is a type and this burning of the Tents of which we speak Truly all creatures are of themselves good but when men set their hearts upon them and that not after a lawfull manner but doth worship them as Idols then they become abomination How the creature becometh abomination before God Almighty no otherwise then the detestable and execrable Images of gold and silver and therefore matters of eternall fire although gold and silver of themselves are good creatures In brief the love of Christians joy wealth and honour are circumscribed in eternity whereupon there followeth even life eternall for where thy treasure is there is thy heart Luke 1â— On the contrary from the concupiscence The fruit of worldly love and love of the world nothing can follow but eternall damnation for the world passeth away with all the pomp thereof but he that doth the will of God continueth for ever whereupon B. John 1. Epist chap. 2. beseecheth the faithfull saying Little sonnes doe not love the world nor those things that be in the world which being so manifestly shewed thee that God would not have us love any creature first Why the creatures are not loved because love is the heart of man and the most noble of all affections which therefore is due to God alone as to the chiefest and onely good Secondly because it is a great folly to love that which cannot love us again whereupon in vain are frail and transitory things beloved by good right is God alone to beloved above all creatures who out of his exceeding love created us to eternall life redeemed and sanctified us Thirdly because naturally like things are Why man was created after Gods Image loved therefore God made thee after his own image and likenesse that thou mightest love him and thy neighbour Fourthly although our soule be like to wax ready The soule is the lookingglasse of God to take any impression put upon it rather like a glasse representing all objects set before it whether of heaven or earth yet it is born onely to set God before it Fifthly as the Patriarch Jacob when he lived in Mesopotamia amongst strangers and after twenty yeares service demanded his two What our mind ought alwayes to respect wives and his wages and being provoked with the sweet memory of his country did think and desire to return to the same so our soule among worldly occupations and businesses of our
callings as the Loadstone it ought never to decline from the Pole of eternity our countrey Sixthly because men are good or evill by reason of that which they love therefore he that loveth The fruit of love God participateth of every kind of vertue and good thing on the other side he that loveth the world is defiled with all the sins and evils thereof Seventhly like as King Nebuchadnezzar when he loved the The love of the world maketh man a beast world more then was meet he lost the essentiall form of man he degenerated into a beast for when the Scripture speaketh expresly that he in the end recovered his former shape it followeth that he was in humane shape and kind So all men blotting out of their hearts the image of God become according to the interior man Wolves Dogges Lions and Beares even so are all those that addict themselves wholly to the love of the world Last of all what every one here savoureth in his The manifestation of hearts from the world heart it will be manifested in him and he will follow it God or the World to which of the two he turneth himselfe into it may be hell fire prefigured in this type CHAP. XIX That he who in his own judgement is most miserable to God is most deare and so by Christian knowledge of his own proper misery obtaineth grace with God Isaia 66. To whom should I shew respect but to the little and poore and a contrite heart or spirit trembling at my words THis sentence our most gentle God doth The contempt of our selves set forth to erect and lift up our minds oppressed and dejected with sorrow which propitiatory whosoever desireth to have it behoveth him to declare himself in his own judgement wretched and unworthy of divine or humane favour But whosoever yet seems somthing to himself is not yet wretched nor humbled in his own opinion nor capable of divine favour whereupon Saint Paul saith Gal. 6. If any man esteem himselfe something when he is nothing he deceiveth himself For God alone is all things which he that onely knoweth and doth not inwardly in his heart approve it and shew it in his example argueth the knowledge of God in him to be superficiall and slight Therefore if thou wilt give God the glory and teach it in thy deed that God is all things it must needs be so that thou use a most sharp judgement against thy self and beleeve most assuredly that thou art nothing after the example of David who dancing before the Ark of the Lord when Michol contemned him as an abject person he answered I will yet bee more vile then I have been He that wil be somthing he is the The matter of which God maketh fools matter of which God maketh nothing yea a fool And he that on the contrary loveth to be reputed as nothing and in his owne judgement is so this is the matter of which the great workman maketh somthing yea halfe Gods he who professeth himselfe before God to be more miserable and worse then all men he in his judgement is made the greatest and chiefest of all others and he that in his own judgement is the greatest sinner him doth God account among the Saints This is in truth that humility which God exalteth the misery which he respecteth Lastly this nothing is that of which God no otherwise then the old world is wont to produce the men of God and create them so of which things we have David for example whose basenesse our most gentle God beholding transformed him into a most noble instrument then Jacob whose saying this is I am lesse then all thy mercies And Christ dejected below the common sort of men who also for God maketh all things of nothing us was accursed and made a worm into how great majesty did his heavenly Father exalt him For as a workman shewing his skill upon some speciall peece of work to labour it more exactly taketh a new matter polluted with no mans hands so that man that God will make something he must be nothing And hee that will make himselfe great and beleeveth himselfe to be something this cannot be the matter for divine workes because that which is nothing and void is it of which he after a A man iudgeth himselfe worthy of nothing wonderful maner shapeth all things which the virgin Mary knew full well saying Luk. 1. He beholdeth the lowliness of his Handmaid behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed But he is indeed inwardly and in heart wretched which thinketh himselfe worthy of no divine benefit neither corporall nor spirituall for he that arrogateth any thing to himselfe this man indeed esteemeth himself something when in truth he is nothing and therefore is furthest from divine graces and most impatient of all arrogances who if he judge himselfe What is proper to man worthy any thing he taketh not all things gratis of God for grace is not merit what soever we wish to obtain for our selves from heaven Moreover nothing is proper to man except sin misery and infirmity all other things are Gods Behold the shadow of a tree with me which is no more something then a man and therefore as it followeth the motion of a tree from Man is a shadow whom it hath its being so this man carrieth his life and all hee hath received of God according to that of Paul Acts 17. In him we live move and have our being And although apples appeare in the shadow of the tree they doe not therefore belong to the shadow but to the tree Now think thou the like with me the good fruits that appeareth in thee and are apparent but are not thine own But as the apple groweth not out of the tree as the unskilfull vulgar think although it hang thereon no otherwise Man is a very tree then a child on the mothers paps So all men are fruitlesse trees and withered the Lord onely is their force and vegetable power according to Psalm 17. The Lord is the horn of my salvation And that of Luke 23. If they doe these things to a green tree what will they doe to a dry tree I saith the Lord Hos 14. will hear and direct him that he shal flourish of me shall thy fruit proceed And our Saviour John 15. If you remain in me you shall beare much fruit But when a man is truly in his understanding wretched and moved at all times and trusteth onely in the heavenly grace of Christ then doth God respect him which respect is not done or commeth to passe after a humane manner and without force and efficacie but is full of vertue life and consolation And as some contrite hearts are capable of this divine aspect onely so how much more cleare amiable and frequent it is so much the lesse doe they think themselves worthy thereof How much humility have we shadowed in The
blessed Spirits embrace an holy soule CHAP. XXIV Of the Charity or Love towards God and our Neighbour 1 Timoth. 1. The end of the Commandement is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and faith unfained THis being delivered blessed Paul describing the most noble vertue that is to say Charity doth insist chiefly on foure things concerning it First of all that it is the end of the Law or a brief and short collection of all the commandements because by this or in this the law is fulfilled The reason is because in it all the commandements are fulfilled and lastly because without it all the gifts of vertues are unprofitable idle and fruitlesse And whereas he saith in the second place that Charity ought to proceed out of a pure heart that The sincerity of divine love pertaineth to charity towards God wherto it is requisite that the heart be void of all worldly love according to that of 1 Ioh. 2. Little children do not love the world nor the What a cleane heart is things that be in the world because every thing that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life The world passeth away and the concupiscence thereof but he that doth the will of God abideth for ever Therefore whosoever hath his heart free and at liberty from all love of the creatures so as he rest not in any fraile creature neither put his trust in them but onely from the bottome of his heart longeth and seeketh after God alone after the example of David who in the Psalmes saith My flesh faileth me and my heart it fainteth O God of my heart and my portion for ever O God For what is there in heaven that I regard or in earth that I preferre before thee This mans charity proceeded out of a pure heart Also if any take singular delight pleasure and joy in the love of God such a purity of heart as the holy Ghost sheweth in the Psalm 18. I will love thee O God my strength the God of my health and my refuge my rock my protection the horn of my salvation and my Redeemer The Charitie out of a good conscience third thing requisite to charity was a good conscience which respecteth our neighbour who is to be loved of us for no profit sake for this is the property of false love and that which proceedeth from an evill conscience neither in word nor deed proudly to offend him and diligently to beware neither openly nor closely to detract from him or hate him nor with envie wrath or disdain to maligne him lest our heart doe check us in our prayer 1 Joh. 3. The fourth thing requisite in Charity Love from fraile consciscience is faith unfained lest we determine any thing against the rule of Faith and Christian profession and lest we deny God openly or secretly in prosperity or adversity Goe to now let us consider apart the singular heads Paul saith Charity is the end of the Law For Charity or Love which proceedeth out of true faith is the most noble of all fruits and works of God then which a man can doe nothing better or more acceptable to God for God requireth God requireth not of us costly gifts and workes not of man any heavie things nor lofty nor great workes to his service and worship but rather he hath contracted the most rigid religion of the old Testament and a multitude of Commandments and the variety of them in Faith and Charity and hath added thereunto the gift of the holy Ghost according to that of Saint Paul Rom. 5. The love of God is infused into your hearts by the holy Ghost which is given unto us By which words he insinuateth unto us the originall of Charity Moreover Charity is not a heavie work but a pleasant and easie work to a good and faithfull man according to that of St. John 1 Epist chap. 5. His commandments The easines of charity are not heavy that is to say to illuminate Christians to whom the holy Ghost hath given a cheerfull heart and a free will moved and stirred up Furthermore God God requireth not much learning requireth not of us much learning or teaching but only charity which if it be sincere burning vehement is far dearer then arts and wisdom of the whole world so that all other things Arts Sciences works and gifts without it are unprofitable and thought of as dead works 1 Cor. 13. For without Charity every work is of no momēt learning is indifferent and common equally as well to Christians as to Ethnicks and the works of the faithfull and the Infidels in that are alike But charity onely is the sure Badge and Character of a Christian discerning the false from the truth For where charity is wanting there is no goodnesse whatsoever externall shew of greatnesse and excellency it commendeth it selfe by For God is Charity and he that abideth in Charity abideth in God and God in him 1 John 4. Whereupon it followeth where Charity is not God is not there Charity maketh all things easie is heavy to no man Charity is pleasant and acceptable with God and also the man that exerciseth it For where other Arts and Sciences and Wisdomes are gotten with great labour care and griefe and with the losse of their strength charity onely cheereth the body and mind doth adde vegetation and mendeth the soule neither is it losse to any but rather of it selfe bringeth ample fruits For love is the reward of the lover and vertue is a reward unto it selfe like as vice in like manner doth punish and torment it selfe And when other faculties of the body What is done out of charity hath God the Author pleaseth him and mind are weakened and tired and wearied only charity is never weary nor ever ceaseth howsoever Prophesie may passe away Tongues may cease and Sciences may be destroyed yea and faith it self shall fail 1 Cor. 13. What God will accept must necessarily proceed from God He that loveth God praieth wel and freely for he approveth of nothing which he doth not first work in us And seeing that God is love therfore that ought to proceed from faith which is pleasing to God and out of love without hope of any profit that it shall profit our neighbour And so should our prayers arise from love Oh then you mortals imagine what prayers those can poure out to God whose hearts are ful of wrath and rancor which if such should recite the whole Psalterie they can neverthelesse be nothing else but abomination before God when true adoration consisteth in Spirit in Faith and chiefly in Charity not in words Let Christ be in our memory who out of his abundant mercy prayed Father forgive them In a word he that loveth not God that man prayeth not in whom the love of God is that man preferreth nothing before God
and holy Ghost and without God himselfe Contrariwise a true Christian and he which is anointed with the spirit of Christ doth beare with all men in condoling commiserating and loving him after the example of Christ And this is the Touch-stone whereby every one is to be tried whether Where charity is not there God is not he be of God or not But if he find he hath no love of his neighbour in him let him assuredly perswade himselfe he hath not the charity of God in him rather let him feare God himselfe hath forsaken him wherewith he ought to be afraid and be sory from his heart and seek to return into his neighbours favour Which being done God through his love will marry himselfe unto him and whatsoever thereafter he shall doe in faith and charity is and will be accounted for good holy and divine Moreover by reason of the inherent love of God of his free will he embraceth all with his mercy and love neither is any thing more acceptable then to doe good or as Jeremy speaketh He rejoyceth in them he will doe good unto them Without charity in man all things are altogether evil and Devillish neither is there Why all things that the devill doth are evill other cause why the Devil can do no good but because he is destitute of the love of God and his neighbour and thereupon what he doth is altogether evill neither doth his workes and counsels whatsoever tend to other end then the reproach of God and damage of mankind and that he may satisfie his malicious mind and rancor against God and man For which cause he useth such cruell and vengeable mindes to execute and bring to passe the counsels and contrivement of his wrath envy And this is the mark of the sonnes of Satan whereby they are discerned from the sonnes of God Charity proceedeth from faith not fained which cleaveth and adhereth to God equally in prosperity and adversity Whosoever loveth a man heartily he cannot be ungratefull because what God He that loveth God all his works he loveth all his punishments hath appointed against him he doth after the example of Christ who with a cheerfull mind tooke up his Crosse which he knew to be put upon him by his Fathers will whereupon Luke saith chap. 12. I have a baptisme to be baptized with and how grieved am I untill it be finished which all the Martyrs of the Church did imitate bearing his Crosse with joy And for a truth whosoever loveth God heartily he cannot but beare his Crosse easily which he knoweth to be the yoak of Christ And if a Load-stone can lift up a weight of Iron and draw it unto it selfe what cannot that celestiall Load-stone of love divine do Shal not it take up the worst weight of our Crosse and mitigate the feeling of it Also why doth Sugar rather correct the bitternesse of the hearb and medicine then the sweetnesse of love take away the ungratefull and inhumane savour of our crosse whose force is such as the holy Martyrs had no other where that strength of their incredible and cheerfull constancy but they did draw it out of this fountain of Love wherewith being most sweetly intoxicated they did not feele the paines of their torments CHAP. XXV Of love to our Neighbour in speciall 2 Peter 2. Of whom any man is overcome he is that mans servant AMongst all kinds of servitude none is The servitude of the affections is most heavie more hard and sharp then to be under the subjection of affections neither of these is any more cruell then hostility or inhumanity because that wearieth and bindeth all the powers and strength of the body and soul and so leaveth to a man not the least thought free but he that exerciseth or remaineth in charity he is free in his minde neither is he the servant or captive to wrath envie covetousnesse usury pride lying and slander from all which being free by charity he suffereth not himselfe to be brought into slavery by his evill concupiscences but remaineth a freeman of Christ through the spirit of liberty 2 Cor. 3. For where the spirit is there is liberty whosoever therefore walketh in the charity of Christ he ceaseth to be the slave of sinne and servant to affections and carnall lusts For by the spirit of divine charity we are purged and set free And The universality of divine Charity charity divine is equally reached and extended to all men so that not onely out of the word of God but by nature universall also it is made known for we are all equally and alike covered with the heavens and we have the use of the Sunne Aire Earth Water both high and low degree alike Moreover with what mind God Almighty is towards all mankind so ought our mind to be affected towards our neighbour seeing what things even now we shewed thou dost not say it happened for that cause God would have it so but that by his example he might teach us and make it manifest that he loveth all with like equall affection and that it is without reâ—pect of persons and prerogative of dignity or merit in Christ to love every one alike so that as hee sheweth himselfe towards us such ught we to be and to carry our selves toowards our neighbour whom after the same manner as wee shall deal with God will deale with us Which Law God writ in our hearts that evidently he might convince and teach us with what mind he was affected to us lest we should be mistaken and overtaken unawares we ought to carry the same mind towards our neighbour every one of us Wherefore he that would know what respect hee is in with God it is sufficient to ask his conscience for that thing will tell him presently as his mind is towards his neighbour whereby he The triall of divine love may gather how God is affected towards him For like as we have done to our neighbour so it is meet God should doe to us And in this sense the great God is good to the good and averse to the averse neither doth hee deserve to have God his friend that is an enemy to his neighbour Now seeing that God hath no need of our works as our neighbour hath it appeareth by this counsell that the charity towards our neighbour gives us in charge that it should be as a Load-stone a most certain argument of our charity towards God For if these things were otherwise he would not have directed these things to our neighbor so exactly as to a certain sope nor bound us to this as a law but that we might know his affection to us thereby and we should approve the same mind every houre and moment to our neighbour Wherefore though Christ Jesus by his death once sufficiently made satisfaction for the sinnes of the whole world and all men therein for which all men are to give thanks no man can warrant him who
What extream impiety out of his great and meer favour did he pardon his enemies crying Father pardon them Truly to this end our Redeemer set his example before our eyes that it might The example of Christ our Panacea be an ever-living mark set before us in our whole life by which whatsoever was proud or lofty in us might be depressed and abated what was weak should be comforted what was unprofitable should bee made good lastly whatsoever was wicked or depraved should be corrected Or at the last what pride of man is so cruell and intolerable that cannot be made whole with the extream humility of the Sonne of God Or what covetousnesse is so great that cannot be sanctified with the poverty of Christ What wrath so vehement that his meeknesse cannot mollifie What desire of revenge so barbarous that his patience cannot asswage and reconcile What inhumanity so great which Christ with his charity and benefits so great and so many doe not expell Lastly what heart so hard that is not mollified with the teares of Christ Or who would not wish from the bottome of his heart to be like God the Father and his Sonne and the holy Ghost and to carry the excellent image of the holy The Image of God Trinity which chiefly consisteth in charity and pardoning injuries For it is the principall of all divine properties to have mercy to spare to pardon to be propitious The highest degree of vertue wherupon it can no way be doubted but that that is the most noble of all vertues by which we become most like unto God and all vertuous men most eminent in praise Last of all the highest degree of a vertuous man is to overcome himselfe and consequently to forget pardon and exercise clemency He is stronger that overcommeth himselfe then hee that overcommeth strong Walls and Vertue can goe no higher whose double Kinsman is that in the Proverbs Chap. 16. A patient man is better then a strong man and hee that ruleth over his own minde then one that overcommeth Cities And this as I said is the top and stem beyond which no man can goe because then he is in God resteth is sanctified and made perfect CHAP. XXVIII How and wherefore the love of the creator of all creatures should bee preferred in love Also wherefore our Neighbour is to be loved in God 1 John 2. If any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him IN the heart of man such is his nature and that property indued of God that it cannot cease to love and therefore one man loveth God and another the world another himselfe Whereby appeareth the necessity of love this most noble of all affections Charity is the most noble of all the affections therefore only due to God implanted by God and kindled by the holy Ghost is to be bestowed in the study of the chiefest good and given unto God by seeking daily of him that he would vouchsafe to kindle the divine love more and more For he loved us first which if it meet with love again the same doth more and more ardently imbrace us according to that of Saint John 14. He that loveth me is loved of my Father Now in whomsoever the love of God is hee ought to love and wish well unto all men which is the property of the love in God and consequently circumvent no man nor to Nothing bette then the love of God hurt any man in word or deed but for the most part all men are so fascinated with the love of the world that they never admit the love of God into their heart that which they doe openly in their hypocriticall love towards their neighbour covetous of their own gain or advantage not of him nor his But it were more meet so to love the world and whatsoever is in the world that no injury be done to the divine love nor the way or means thereof impeached especially seeing there is so great vanity and vilenesse of the world and The creatures unworthy of our love of God so great eminency majesty as no comparison can be betwixt them for even as God doth infinitely excell all his creatures so doth the love of him in holinesse nobility and dignity goe before all the love we have to any creature and leaveth it behind by a most exceeding distance not to bee computed by humane reason therefore no creature is worthy to be compared to divine love The words of Saint Paul 1 Cor. 9. Who planteth a vineyard and eateth not of the fruit thereof Let us make something like to this and say Who is more worthy of our love then he that put it in our hearts and to whose love we owe our life And we all live by the love of God in Christ whose way of love is shewed unto us throughout all our life what condition soever we be of Even as Mariners when a storm commeth do cast anchor so wee so often as this great sea of the world doth tosse and shake the little ship of our heart hither and thither with the Floods and waves of sinne as wrath pride impatience covetousnesse and lust of the flesh we should remember to strengthen our selves by the Anchor of Divine love and love of Christ being ready rather to suffer the losse of all things then our selves The love of God cannot be taken away from us to be pull'd from him of which mind we ought to be so often as we fall into spirituall temptation and be tossed by sin death Devill hell and miseries no otherwise then when we are tossed by cruell raging floods and waves For the love of God is that hill which was shewed to Lot that he might flie unto it and eschew the fire of Sodom For what other thing is this world then spirituall Sodom Also what is the burning of it but the burnings and flames of worldly concupiscences which must needs burn those that doe not endeavour to keep in memory the divine love or willingly to depart with it I say of that love or divine fear which preserveth a man from the world as Joseph was preserved from the wife of Potiphar For no man can love the world but he that never tasted the divine Love no man can hate his neigbour but he that doth not love God from his heart For the sweetnesse and delight of divine love is so great that it mitigateth the sense of all miseries and death it selfe Such is the nature and instinct of Love as all cogitations omitted it is fixed upon that onely thing which it loveth and forgetteth and contemneth all other things by reason of the incredible desire by which The nature of divine love it is carried towards that which it loveth Therefore can you shew any cause O mortals which say you love God that for all things for which others are wont to contend you blot all out of your minds w th one
belongeth the history of Job which doth insinuate what we spake erewhile in a most gallant divine or mystical way Therefore when it was told Job by a messenger that he was overthrown and spoiled of all his goods and livelihood he said The Lord gave it the Lord hath taken away Let the Lords name be blessed bearing such and so great a losse moderately But when it was told him that he had lost all his children even then he was much more moved and began to rent his garments Let a true Christian doe so or the like when he heareth of the calamity of his neighbour whom the children of Job do represent let him know that must be more grievous unto him then if that affliction had touched his fields For the property of true love is to be more moved with other mens miseries then his owne Therefore O happy The happy life in or of love mankind if we could all live in love frauds would cease injuries would not be known neither would there a man be found to vex another or complain of damage Truly that we might think of this therefore God Almighty in the beginning of the world when he had brought forth many beasts and plants on the other side created but one man from him by and by producing Eva that humane kind derived from one stock or root and mindfull of his own originall and kindred should conspire in love and mutuall affection one towards another The excellency of charity commanded by God to us is onely wanting that causeth us to faint both in strength of body and mind a thing most convenient to our nature and that which bringeth with it a most quiet life And if the same God Almighty had commanded thee to hate thy neighbour then he had set thee a farre haâ—der burden and heavier yoak upon thee for the hatred revengefulnesse of a mind of an enemy doth torment and cruciate it selfe On the other To love is more easie then to hate side love onely recreateth the whole man Also to those that love God it is a pleasant thing to love their neighbour onely it is hard and difficult to those who do not love God But if thy depraved nature hold it a hard matter to settle it on the love of thy neighbour bethink thy self thou shalt take in hand a farre harder task if thou incurre the pangs of hell which if thou hadst rather to doe then be reconciled to thy neighbour certainly then thou art Reconciliation brings rest the most unhappy of all men alive seeing it is no great labour nor can be in reconciliation which a man of small experience may understand Even as faith begets peace with God Rom. 5. so charity and reconciliation with a man maketh our minds more quiet and easie Contrariwise hatred and revenge doth vex and torment them For this is the property of all vertues that he that hath them of their own accord they increase in worthy esteem and honour and of vices that they punish their favourers with the punishment which they deserve But how friendships are to be renewed we are taught by Scripture which Vertue is a â— word to it selfe commandeth the faulter to bee reconciled to his neighbour and ask pardon of him then to restore the thing taken from them that is the thing it self the head or lot and the fifth part over and above to him whom they have offended and if there be none Restitution is a part of repentance to receive it to give it to the Lord. Which restitution of things taken away is commanded in expresse words Numb 5. and is part of true repentance Whereupon B. Augustine saith The sinne is not remitted unlesse the thing taken be restored and by and by as a declaration of what he had spoken he addeth When the thing saith he that is taken away may bee restored and is not restored there is no repentance that is true but fained Because it is the property of true repentance which converteth man unto God to contemne all earthly things and esteeme all things as dung in respect of the grace of God that which Zacheus by his example teacheth us to doe very few such are now to be found to cleanse their heart to purge their consciences by faith and restitution of the thing wrongfully detained For which in the heart and in the conscience he remaineth a thiefe before God who keepeth back He that restoreth not before God is a thiefe and doth not restore the thing taken away by theft howsoever hee cease to steale any more thereafter Wherefore that repentance may be true and the conscience may be pure restitution is to be made as much as possibly may be or otherwise he must pray to God with all his heart that he would in his room or place restore the things taken God is not reconciled unlesse there be first restitution to our neighbour away to his neighbour For seeing that a sinner is bound in two things to God his neighbour that his repentance may be full both are to be satisfied God not acknowledging repentance unlesse a man be reconciled to his neighbour Therefore it sufficeth not no if thou shalt say unto God Most loving God I doe acknowledge and confesse that I have offended and done injury to my neighbour I have damaged him by wicked gain and fraud and lastly have dealt so with him as I would not another should deale with mee which iniquity I humbly intreat thee to pardon me for thy Sons sake And even this prayer is most unjust which God repelleth neverthelesse and saith Restore that which w th fraud usury thou hast taken and thy pardon shall bee ready Not indeed as if a man after this manner should deserve remission No not so but because not this onely is due to his neighbour but many things more by him are owing to his neighbour that because it is the divine decree Matth. 7. Whatsoever Repentance without restitution is nothing things you would that men should doe unto you doe you the same unto them Also Luke 6. The same measure that you measure to others shall be measured to you againe Matth. 5. Goe first and reconcile thy selfe unto thy brother and then come and offer thy gift Isa chap. 1. Wash yee and bee cleane take away the evill of your thoughts from mine eye cease to doe perversly learn to doe good seek after judgement aid the oppressed judge the Orphan defend the widow And come argue with mee saith the Lord. If your sinnes were as scarlet they shall be made white as snow and if they shall be as red as bloud they shall be as white as wooll And chap. 58. And is not this that which I have chosen rather then fasting Vnbind the bonds of impiety loose the bonds of oppression let them goe free that are bound and unlade every burden that is burdensome or heavy breake thy bread to the hungry and
bring the wayfaring man and the needy into thy house when thou seest one naked cover him or cloath him and doe not despise thine owne flesh Then shall thy light break forth as the morning and thy salvation shall arise betimes and thy justice shall goe before thy face and the glory of the Lord shall gather thee together All which with one voyce do cry That God will not accept the repentance of any man or his prayer unlesse he first be reconciled to his neighbour CHAP. XXX Of the fruits of Love 1 Cor. 13. Charity is patient courteous charity striveth not it doth no wrong it is not puffed up it is not disdainfull it seeketh not his own it is not easily provoked it thinketh no evill it rejoyceth not in iniquity but rejoyceth in the truth it suffereth all things it beleeveth all things it hopeth all things it sustaineth all things EVen as in the middest of Paradise the Tree of Life was planted the fruits whereof whosoever should eat hee should lead an immortall life according to that of Gen. 3. Now therefore lest he hap to put his hand thereto and take of the Tree of life and The life of the faithful is Christ eat and live for ever the Lord God sent him out of the Paradise of pleasure that he might labour the earth from whence he was taken So Almighty God in the midst of the Paradise of the Christian Church set Christ Jesus that all the faithfulll from him might draw life and spirit and be comforted For all Christian discipline consisteth in Faith and Charity and the summe of Christian life in generall by reason of faith in Christ is pleasant acceptable to God So in like manner we cannot approve or allow of the reasons of our neighbour but through charity And so true it is that all vertues without charity are nothing and dead that faith it self is not excepted which although it onely justifieth when it onely apprehendeth the merit of Christ neither in the businesse of justification any reason of workes going before present or to come or to follow but Christ onely is accounted of yet it is most sure where charity doth not follow there is not true faith but hypocriticall although it work by miracles For even as a body destitute of a soule is dead so the spirituall or inward man whose members are vertues if charity be wanting with all his members ought to be accounted for dead Whereupon B. Paul hath set it as a Loadstone of faith and such faith doth require as worketh by charity Truly I know well in the work of justification that faith without works doth consist Rom. 4. but that it should want works I professe it cannot be when it shall have to doe amongst men in the market of charity Wherefore to the Galatians chap. 5. it is called Faith which worketh by charity And 1. Cor. 13. the fruits of this most beautifull Tree are remarked to bee fourteen And the first of these is Patience and Long-suffering whose nature and constitution no man better expresseth then Christ himselfe the true tree of life whose goodly fruits we ought to eat and turn them into the juice and bloud of Christ Therefore even as he by his wonderfull long-suffering did beare the malice and sinne of the world that he might allure and draw sinners to repentance Rom. 2. So then also order thy life and manners that the most gentle Christ may live in thee and thou in him as a member united to his head and breathe together The second fruit is Benignity or well-doing which was chiefe and principall in Christ according to Psalm 45. All grace did drop from thy lips And Luke 4. They wondred at the words of grace which proceeded out of his lips Which doe thou heare that thou mayst follow and to cause thee love thy neighbour Christ will speak by thy mouth and thou shalt remain united to him in perpetuall charity The third fruit is not to be emulous or revengefull but to remit and pardon then which nothing is more proper to God Psal 103. David saith He will not be angry for ever threaten thee eternally He hath not done to us according to our offences nor rewarded us according to our iniquities To which like is that of Ezekiel chap. 18. If the wicked shall repent him of all his sinnes and iniquities that he hath wrought he shall live by his life and shall not die I will not remember all his iniquities which he hath wrought And in Jeremy 31. In perpetuall love have I loved thee therefore have I drawn thee to me in mercy I will have pitie on them I will be reconciled as concerning their iniquities and I will remember their sins no more And in Esay chap. 43. I am I am he that blotteth out thy iniquities for my own sake and I will not remember thy sins Therefore doe thou the same remit I say pardon and forget thy neighbour and in like manner Christ will pardon thine offences and thou shalt have his Spirit and shalt remain in him The fourth fruit is not to mis-judge thy neighbour nor causelesly or crookedly or perversly to deride thy neighbour before others or by sycophantizing or collusion to damnifie him but contrariwise let thy heart bee seen in thy brow and doe all things ingenuously and clearly without hypocrisie Example whereof Christ gives unto us who carried himselfe equally to his friends and foes and from the bottome of his heart would that all should be most rightly guided both in deeds and counsell in which foot-steps whosoever doth insist in him doth remain the candor and ingenuity of Christ Therefore let all of us from the heart study the good of others by which means we shall remain united as true members to Christ our head The fifth fruit is Not to be puffed up to insult or wax proud but behold Christ Jesus the tree of life to whom the woman Luke 11. with a loud voice in a great assembly and concourse was bound to say Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the paps that gave thee suck He turned this praise most worthily due from himselfe to them that feared and loved God yea rather subjecting himselfe saying Happy are they that heare the word of God and keep it And this is the character of true love to transferre all his praises due to himself upon his neighbour which if thou after the example of Christ dost resolve to doe then truly humble Christ liveth in thee and thou in him In the sixth place true charity is not cruell not disdainfull not rough not discourteous in manners but tempered and composed to all humanity which Charity Christ used according to the prophesie of Esay chap. 42. who was not rigid nor turbulent but with admirable gentlenesse and sweetnesse of tongue hee accommodated The worship of God profiteth not God but our selves himselfe to his neighbour and commanded the same to others Whosoever studieth to imitate
defiling the greatest and most excellent gifts 1 Corinth 13. If I should speak with the tongues of men and Angels and have not love I shall be as a tinckling Cymball or sounding brasse LEst any man should marvell that Saint Luther of the Church part 2. fol. 13. Paul doth adorn Charity with so many praises you must know that God himselfe is love and consequently like praise to belong to both neither greater or more ample vertue to be found in man or in God himselfe Now that which respecteth our neighbour is twofold one true living sincere and cleare the other hypocriticall and dissembled or cloaked The first St. True love false Paul describeth by a most ample catalogue and an account of the fruits and properties thereof added thereunto the latter with all his words gifts and workes abused as a Bawd to and for private gain and honour And howsoever in outward shew it seemeth to affect divine and humane good and profit yet inwardly and in his heart he respecteth nothing but his private profit and honour and wealth and whatsoever floweth from this fountain cometh not from God but from the Devill and it What ariseth not of charity ariseth not of God is poyson infecting all good workes and the most excellent gifts For as a flower in sight tast and smell most beautifull and sweet if it retain any venome is not approved by the beauty of the colour nor pleasantnesse of smell nor sweetnesse because it is deadly or hurtfull to man if it be not foreseen So man if he be adorned with the gifts of Angels and if he be full of avarice pride selfe-love and arrogancy then those gifts doe not onely faile in their fruits but become pernicious for that which is good indeed ought to have God in the beginning and ending who as he is the onely author of every good thing What is good so whatsoever he worketh in thee is truly that onely good But it is otherwise if arrogancy self-selfe-love the desire of honour or private profit shall have any designe in it for when it commeth not from God his impulsion and provocation it can never be good Therefore God alone is good also love it self by which all good is conveyed to our neighbour through love no otherwise then from God to our selves this necessarily cometh to passe It is said that a certain Saint of old should wish that he should be of no other use unto God then his own right hand was unto him which seeing it was nothing but an instrument aptly to give and receive what was fit and consequently arrogateth neither honour nor glory to it selfe And indeed it is meet we all should be such and because all things come from God to us freely in like manner we should render all things to our neighbour in single simplicity and without the desire of vainglory and praise out of pure love for unto God alone as to the author is honour and glory due but unto us nothing at all we are onely instruments created and made fit to receive and deliver which if any be without this sincere charity he with all his gifts is nothing So I say Although hee speake with the tongues of Angels can prophesie know all mysteries and all knowledge and had never so much faith even that it would remove mountaines and give all that he hath to the poore lastly give himselfe to be burned Selfe love and arrogance was the fall of the Devill 1 Cor. 13. For all selfe-love that is the desire of honour and praise and private profit is of the Devill and was his Apostasie by which hee fell from heaven and for which hee was worthily driven from thence For when God had created Lucifer the most beautifull Angell and adorned him with most excellent gifts of wisdome light glory and riches he began to admire himselfe in his gifts as a Peacock doth admire himselfe to love honour and praise himselfe which was the first step to his ruine even to give honour to himselfe not to God and to turne his love from God to himselfe whereupon he was worthily cast out of heaven with all his companions which his pride by contagion had infected neither was hee contented with his principality amongst Angels according to that of Saint Jude The Angels which kept not their principality And that of Saint Paul to the Colossians chap. 2. Spoyling Principalities and Powers traduced them confidently And of man and openly triumphing over them in himselfe Now by what sinne Lucifer procured his own ruine he was the cause and perswader by the same sinne of the losse of mankind turning him frō the love of the honor of God to himselfe whereby followed self-love and arrogancy such and so great even to affect the similitude of God whereby consequently hee was no otherwise cast out of Paradise then Lucifer out of Heaven leaving to us all the heritage of arrogancy and self-love And this is the fall and Apostasie of Adam which all men in like manner doe iterate and with flesh and bloud give and deliver every one to other the same the means of amendment and cure whereof can and ought no other wayes be sought and obtained but by the merit of Christ apprehended by faith whereby thenceforth wee are renewed in Christ and our flesh is crucified neither now doe we love our selves any more but Denying our selves necessary hate our selves Luke 9. that is all our own works doe begin to displease us we do not honour our selves or beare out our selves but deny our selves Luke 14. that is wee set nought by our selves lastly we do not now seek our singular praise and glory but by denying all things that we have place our pleasure and trust in no earthly thing and likewise doe fight and strive with flesh bloud our inward enemies which whosoever hath not nor doth not as abovesaid he neither is nor can be the Disciple of Christ seeing by this meanes in serious and true repentance the conversion of humane nature must be changed Moreover seeing that means is greater then the strength of man which of it selfe and by its nature can doe nothing but love it self favour it selfe and boast and cannot forbeare By the incarnation of Christ our nature is renewed to seek his own ends or to speak in a word to sinne therefore it behoveth God to be the beginning middle and end and prop the Sonne of God to take the forme of a man upon him and consequently to renew our nature that thereby every one of us being regenerate by him in him and from him we become a new creature for even as in Adam we were dead bodily and spiritually so it behoveth us in Christ to rise and be spiritually renewed Even as by carnall nativity we entred upon the sin of Adam as a certain heritage so in Christ by a spiritual birth and faith wee must bee justified Finally as radically we draw from Adam
smell so Christ which is the tree of life by tasting and by triall is understood I say by tasting in faith his lowlinesse and humility and patience and by eating of his fruit whereby consequently his soule might find rest and tranquillity and be made capable of divine grace and consolation Which two into a heart void of faith and unfenced with the humility and lowlinesse of Christ cannot enter to fructifie seeing that God giveth grace only to the humble Seeing then it is thus what doth Christ profit a man who hath no society with him Such are all those who living in the darknesse of sinne cannot be companions of light according to that of Saint John If we say we have society with him and walk in darknesse we are liers and want the truth But if we walk in the light as hee is in the light we have joynt fellowship with him Which in the second chapter hee addeth The darknessc is passed over and the true light now shineth hâ—e which saith hee is in the light and hateth his brother is in darknesse untill now He that loveth his brother abideth in the light and there is no offence in him But he that hateth his brother is in darknesse and walketh in darknesse and knoweth not whither he goeth because darknesse hath blinded his eyes And how long a man remaineth in that terrible cloud of sinnes he cannot bee lightned of Christ which is the true Light and come to the knowledge of God For the true knowledge of God and Christ consisteth in that hee understands God to be meere The true knowledge of Christ Grace and Charity which who hath not and exerciseth this man knoweth it with the most ignorant So all knowledge consisteth ariseth out of the understanding experience and works of truth and so certain it is that hee which doth not exercise charity howsoever hee make many words of it yet he perceiveth not the perfect nature of it In like manner Christ is meere love humility meeknesse patience and vertue the which who hath not is ignorant of Christ although hee can prattle many things of him and usurp his name After the same manner the word of God is nothing but Spirit whereupon they which live not in the Spirit these consequently doe not know what the word of God is although they fable and dispute of it every where Therefore it belongeth not to him to judge of love who never exerciseth it For all knowledge as we said even now beginneth with feeling experieÌ„ce Knowledge ariseth out of experience Nor is it his part to speak of the light that never moved a foot out of his own darknesse to see the light and what is light in man but faith and charity according to the saying of Christ Matth. 5. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorifie your Father which is in heaven Now seeing that the most holy life of Christ is nothing but meer love if we endeavour to drink and draw from him true faith humility lowlinesse and patience as it is given in commandement to us by the severe Law of Learning then truly we are transformed into his image and we are beautified and adorned with his love no otherwise then if we were covered with Christ himselfe which is the eternal and true Light according to that of the Ephesians chap. 5. Arise thou that sleepest and arise from the dead and Christ will inlighten thee Whereupon it followeth again that as many as doe not awake from the sleep of the world that is concupiseence of the eyes of the flesh and pride of life their soule cannot truly be illuminated by Christ Contrariwise they which assume the life of Christ and follow him in faith these truly are illuminated according to that of Saint John chap. 8. I am the light of the world he which followeth me in faith charity hope patience lowlinesse humility feare of Onely the martyrs of Christ illuminated God and prayer walketh not in darknesse but shall have the light of life As if he should say Onely those that imitate me have the light of life and the true illumination and knowledge of mee By reason of the same Faith and Life of Christ or Christian life blessed Paul Ephes 5. calleth the faithful the Light You were saith he sometimes darknesse but now light in the Lord. And 1 Thess 5. You are all the sonnes of light and the sonnes of God we are not of the night nor darknesse having put on the breast-plate of faith and love and the helmet of salvation To this belongeth that of the Book of Wisdome which faith That the holy Ghost doth flye wicked persons but comes into holy souls and of them makes Prophets and friends of God Which if it flye the wicked it is plain that they cannot be inlightened of it To which that is like that Christ denieth the world that is carnal minds not repenting them at all can they receive the holy Ghost But that there might be a perfect and absolute example amongst men and an Idea of vertue therefore the Son of God became Man and by his most holy life became the publick Light of the world that all men might follow him beleeve in him and be illuminated from him Now seeing the false Christians themselves know not Christ to be the most perfect and absolute righteousnesse or vertue therefore they did not care for following him it is manifest that the Ethnicks the most rigid observers lovers of vertue did goe far beyond them Of whom the wisest as Plato Aristotle Cicero and Seneca determined If the virtue of the body may be seen or could bee seen it would appeare more cleare then Lucifer or the day starre But those that shal behold Christ with the eye of faith he being the true Lucifer or Day-star doth far excel them and Faith in Christ illuminateth the heart those shall so see and contract the word of life 1 John 1. But if the Ethnicks did so esteeme virtue and desired to see it how much more ought Christians to esteem it above all things seeing Christ is meere virtue meere The love of Christ is to imitate Christ lowlinesse yea God himselfe Whereupon not without cause Saint Paul preferreth the love of Christ before all Sciences or knowledge for that he which loveth him it necessarily followeth that hee doe embrace his lowlinesse and humility out of his meere and most sincere love towards him whereby he is further illuminated and daily Light grace is given by humility transformed into the image of Christ from glory to glory 2 Cor. 3. For God giveth grace to the humble saith Saint Peter 1 Epist chap. 5. And Saint Bernard The floods of grace doe flow downwards not upwards By all which it cometh to passe that the grace of the light and of knowledge divine is not communicated to a man that liveth not in Christ but walketh in the
contempt persecution contumely and reproach the crosse death martyrdome and punishment whereupon Moses preferred the contumely of Christ before the treasure of Aegypt which is true illumination XV. The true name of Christians written The name of Christians in heaven is the true knowledge of Christ in faith by which we are transplanted into Christ and written in him as in the book of life from whom do flow living virtues which God in that day will beautifie with an honorable testimonie Mat. 25. bringing forth all those treasures which we have layed up in heaven 1 Tim. 6. and bringing to light every work which is wrought in God Joh. 3. None of the Saints hath made himselfe famous by any vertue which will be forgotten Psal 112. And this vertue of his as faith charity mercy patience and the like are that name written in heaven and the note and character of the Saints and the eternall names of heaven Of which more in the second Book CHAP. XLI In which is repeated the summe of the whole Book That the whole Christian Religion doth consist in the restauration of the divine Image in Man and extirpation of the Image of Satan 2 Corinth 3. We all beholding with a revealed face the glory of the Lord are transformed into the same Image from glory to glory as it were by the Spirit of the Lord. IN the true knowledge of Christ and of his person offices benefits and heavenly gifts doth consist the blessed life which the H. Ghost doth enlighten in us as a certain new light which in it selfe becometh more and more cleare as a certain metalline body Wherin consists eternall life or a glasse by making it cleane becommeth more neat and clearer or as an infant daily augmented in stature and growth For even as righteousnesse is given to a man by faith in Christ and then hee beginneth his conversion or regeneration or to bee begotten in his conversion and daily to be renewed after the Image of God neither is he by and by a man but is an infant whom afterwards the holy Ghost doth nourish and from day to day doth more and more conform him to Jesus Christ For the whole life of a Christian man upon this earth What Christianity is ought to be nothing else then a reformation of the image of God so that hee might live continually in the new birth and on the contrary mortifie the old man daily Which manner of life is onely begun in this world and perfected in the world to come Therefore he that before the day of the last judgement and so of his death hath not made his beginning in this man the Image of God shal never be erected to all eternity Wherefore I hold it very needfull forthwith to inculcate and inform what is the Image of God and also what the Image of Satan is seeing that in the knowledge of these the whole Christian religion consisteth and from this one head many other doctrines of originall sin of freewill and so of repentance of faith of justification of prayer of regeneration renovation sanctification and of the new life and obedience come to be explained Therefore the soul of man is an immortall spirit indued by God with excellent powers and faculties as understanding will memory and other motions and affections of the mind And this ought to be turned to God in him to be made the image of God so The soul of man is the glass of God that as the object in a glasse so in it God may be manifested and made conspicuous In which sense Saint Paul speaketh 1 Cor. 3. That the glory of God in the image of God renewed doth shine as in a glasse Moreover as God is good and holy himself so the substance and essence of the soule in the beginning The conformity of our soule with God in the state of inâ—ocency was originally good and holy And as in God there was no evill so the soul of man was without all evill from the beginning as in God nothing is but good Deut. 32. Psal 92. so in the soule there was nothing that was not good as God is all-knowing and wise the humane soule was full of divine knowledge and spiritualls celestiall and eternal wisdome as the divine wisdome disposed all things in number weight and measure and knew the strength of all creatures as wel celestial as terrestrial so the mind of man was enlightned by the same light Neither was the will inferiour to the understanding as equally holy and conformable to the divine wil in all things Therefore as God was so the soule of man was just benigne merciful long suffering patient meek courteous true and chast Which conformity of the humane wil with the divine all the affections appetites desires motions of the heart did participate emulating or following most perfectly the motions and affections of the divine wil even as God is charity so the affections of the man did breathe nothing but meer charity and as God Father Sonne and holy Ghost are joyned together and conspire in ineffable and eternal love so all the affections motions and desires of the humane soule by a meer most pure most perfect and most ardent love from the bottome of the heart did grow warm and Thâ— body of man is the temple of God prosper together so that the man loved God and his honour more dearly then himselfe Moreover even as in the soule so also in the body the image of God did shine most gloriously which therefore in all the faculties thereof was holy chast subject to no filthy concupiscences or motions beautiful comely of perfect health immortal and was without molestation tediousnesse passion griefe vexation and old age In brief the whole man both in mind and body was perfect holy just and acceptable to God every way For as the man was the image of God it followeth necessarily that the body it self be holy and conformable to God according to blessed Paul who commanded to sanctifie the body soule and spirit together For seeing that the man consisteth of soule and body and therefore bodily and spiritual functions going together it is necessary that a soule holy and just accomplishing its workes through the body and in the body should have an observant instrument and equally holy as it selfe Therefore as the soule did burn or was zealous in the most pure love of God so all the faculties of the body did imitate the same gesture in the love of God and his neighbour As the soule was all mercifull so the body with all the powers thereof did incline to clemency As in the divine soul chastity did shine so all the body with all internall and externall senses and powers did use perfect purity and chastity In brief the perfections of virtues were conspicuous no lesse in the body then in the mind or soul Wherefore it was easie What heart signifieth in Scripture for a man in the
holy life is righteousnesse before God and so to be interpreted and it is as sure that all that thou dost is unperfect lame and defective Moreover that thou beware of the Devils Cobwebs and his devices whose properties and custome is to sow Popple amongst the Wheat to whom therefore thou art not to give place but how much more is in the new gifts the more do thou beware thou abuse it not to thine honour but in humble fear of God ascribe whatsoever it be to the great and eternal author of them Remedies against spiritual pride and to thy selfe on the contrary thou shalt deny all things lest perhaps thou mayst say sometimes in thine heart O great faith of mine great knowledge great gifts for lest thou deceive thy selfe none of these are thine but Gods without whose illumination thou remainest a dead filthy and vile sheafe Therefore these gifts are none of thine no more then the glistering of a gem or pretious stone wherein as a Jeweller hee putteth his treasure so God placeth in thee his goods but without them thou art empty and void And it were great dotage and foolery to take occasion to boast thy self of another mans goods as I shall speak more in the second book For even as a Jeweller when as so oft as he pleaseth hath power to put his treasure or Jewels into another box to carry where hee pleases or keep about him so God every moment may take his gifts from thee whom therefore thou oughtst to feare and with all diligence eschew spiritual arrogancy Moreover thou must think that Almighty God will require an exact account of those things of thee And how great soever those things be which our heavenly Father hath lent thee through Christ they are onely beginnings and first fruits of solid graces Furthermore it is thy part to know that there is no perfect gifts obtained but by prayer from God without which whatsoever they be that thou hast those truly are but shadowes and unprofitable dead seeds bearing no ripe fruits as thou mayst understand by my little book of prayers No profitable gifts are obtained without prayer whereby examples we teach that without prayer no heavenly gifts doe descend into the heart of man Of which little book that thou mayst have some taste I invite thee to read those things which I have written in the second booke of prayers There be two things in speciall which all our prayers ought to respect one is the destruction of the Devils image which commeth in power of incredulity pride covetousnesse lust wrath and such like The other is the restauration of the divine Image in which is contained faith hope charity humility patience lowlinesse the fear of the Lord which two things are by The sum of the Lords prayer divine workmanship briefly contracted in the Lords prayer as I may so say that it maketh part for us and part against us For if the power of God be to be sanctified then it behoveth thee to kill thine owne power with all the pride of old Adam If thâ— kingdome of God be to be built in thee the Devils must be overthrown if the will of God be to be fulfilled in thee thine must needs be contemned and denied And these two heads in the book of prayer are required if thou wilt have it profitable unto thee are shadowed as I said even now in the Lords Prayer which is a certain breviary of heavenly and temporall gifts which because the Son of God commanded us to pray therefore those things his heavenly Father will give us much more willingly it is more sure then needs be called in question or any doubt made thereof Of which in another place Finis Glory to God alone The Contents of the Chapters of this Book CHap. 1. Of the Image of God pag. 1 2 Of the Fall and Apostasie of Adam 9 3 How Man is renewed in Christ to life eternall 18 4 What true repentance is and what the Crosse 28 5 What true faith is 36 6 How the word of God ought to live in man 44 7 How the Law of God is written in the heart 52 8 Without true repentance man cannot challenge Christs merit 60 9 The Antichristian life of men deny Christ and true faith 71 10 Worldly men by their lives deny Christianity 75 11 Those that imitate not Christ are none of his 78 12 A Christian must die to himself live to Christ 91 13 A Christian must die to the world himself 100 14 A Christian ought to despise his own life 110 15 The old mâ—n should die the new man revive 122 16 The combat of the Flesh and Spirit 129 17 A Christians inheritance is not of this world 136 18 Eternal things to be preferred before temporal 146 19 Most miserable to himself most dear to God 154 20 By contrition our life is to be amended 163 21 What true divine worship is 176 22 Amendment of life a mark of a Christian 193 23 The friendship of the world is to be avoyded 199 24 Of love towards God and our Neighbour 206 25 Of love to our Neighbour in speciall 221 26 Wherefore our Neighbour is to be loved 227 27 Wherefore our enemies are to be loved 238 28 The Creator to be loved before the Creatures 245 29 Of the reconciliation of our Neighbour 251 30 Of the fruits of love 261 31 Self-love and arrogancy defile the best gifts 273 32 Good works without charity not acceptable 281 33 God accepteth works according to the heart 286 34 God alone the author of our salvation 291 35 Without a holy life all things are unprofitable 302 36 Who tast the virtue of the hidden Manna 308 37 Their loss who follow not Christ in their lives 324 38 The fruit of an Antichristian life 341 39 How the purity of doctrine is to be obtained 350 40 Certain Rules conducing to a devout life 362 41 Christian Religion wherein it â—onsisteth 375 42 Spirituall pride is to be eschewed 400 FINIS