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 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
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
impossible for him to taste and receive Christ into his heart Herod being dead Christ returned into Judea Matth. 2. The document is plain so long as the mind doth play the Fox with the World Christ cannot enter into it and therefore thou must die to the Fox First die unto Adam that Christ may live in thee Herod that the child Christ may live in thee All which returnes to this that you must die unto Adam or the old man before Christ can live in thee Paul to the Galat 2. saith I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me And to the Coloss 2. You are dead yet he writes to the living and your life is hid in Christ for then every one is truly dead when he ceaseth to be that he was before Those which are of the spirit doe understand the things of the spirit saith St. Paul Rom. 8. and to the Galat. 5. If we live in the spirit we walk also in the spirit Neither is it sufficient to boast of the faith and the spirit in words but words are to be approved by the fruits and works for it is spoken to all men by the Apostle If you live after the flesh you shall die but if you mortifie the works of the flesh by the spirit you shall live wherein very many are like unto Saul who did not slay Agag the King of the Amalekites Concupiscences are to be morâ—ified not hidden as God commanded him but put him into prison so these men doe nourish and hide closely their concupiscence when they should be eradicated utterly and not any part of the root left behind let us doe this unlesse with Saul we lose our Kingdome The scope of the whole Scripture requireth the new man that is lest we be deprived of our eternall life In briefe the whole Scriptures with the consent of all Histories Types and Figures doe point out Christ whose life we ought to imitate and doe set out the scope thereof neither doe I speak here of the great world and of his exceeding testimonies of God and divine love There is a sort of men that not unfitly may be compared to Winter trees for as they receive easily their leaves which were cast off the yeare changing and becomming favourable so many in adversity doe retaine their pleasures within and hide them which yet doe forthwith in prosperity having as it were gathered a troop breake out on a sudden A true Christian is most unlike to those hypocrites who in prosperity and adversity liveth according to piety equally just and faithfull to his Christ and taketh all things indifferently his lot doth cast upon him When our great God did grant to Achab victory over the King of Syria upon that condition that being taken he should hold him in prison that he should remain an example to shew that God was stronger then all his enemies and did require just punishment against those that did blaspheme his Name he despising the Name of God and his Commandements having taken his enemy in battell saluted him as his brother and let him goe for which disobedience and giving life to a man deserving to die the Prophet pronounceth the pain of death to Achab by Gods appointment To whom these are most like who nourish and feed their own concupiscences when they should pull them up by the roots therefore willingly without mortification of the flesh there is no good in man do draw eternall death upon themselves And therefore it is most true that without mortification of the flesh no prayer nor piety Lastly without mortification no work of spirituall devotion can abound in the soule which was the cause God Almighty Exod. 19. appointed all those beasts to die that should approach unto the mount Sinai and by how much more ought we to kill our beastly concupiscences if we ascend to the holy mount of God and offer our prayers to God and if we meditate on the word of God lest if we do otherwise we die the death Gen. 32. we Iacob thou must be before thou be Israel read that a new name was given unto Jacob to wit Israel which signifieth a Champion or a Prince of God because in wrastling with the Angell of God he beheld his face But before this Jacob which signifieth a Supplanter or Vnderminer for so he was not onely in name but in deed after whose example unlesse thou first through the holy Ghost doe tread down thy concupiscences to become Israel or the Prince or Captain of God thou shalt never attain Man must displease himselfe to please God the place of a Captaine or see the face of God The same Jacob that he might enjoy the beautifull maid Rachâ—l he was constrained to take Lea with bleared eyes doe thou such a thing and if thou art in love with Rachel that is if thou darest marry with Christ the true Jacob first doe not despise Lea that is despise thy self as a beast-like and sinfull man displease thy selfe and force it to death But there be very many who like unto Jacob are deceived of their owne life thinking verily he had met with Rachel that is that he had led a Christian life pleasing to God inwardly declared in truth afterward then see that they live with Lea that is they have not yet learned Christ and therefore not in the favour but in the hatred of God and that most deservedly Therefore let us doe this Before all let us displease our selves and as Lea in the house of her father be counted unworthy so let us contemne our selves taking to us humility lowlinesse and patience that at the last we may obtain faire Rachel for whom as Jacob served constantly the whole seven yeares her love The service of mystical Iacob mitigating the hardnesse of his labour and wearing out the time without tediousnesse so the most faithfull spouse of our soules Christ Jesus served full thirty three yeares in this world a most hard service or servitude for our cause according to that of Matth. 20. The Sonne of man came not to be ministred unto but to serve others and give his life a redemption for many And according to that of Jacob which he indured after a sharper manner for our love This twenty yeares saith he I served thee in thy house abiding both heat and cold and frost and I watched both day and night And shall we doubt yet to love Christ again and make warre all our life against his capitall enemy the world CHAP. XIII For Christ and eternall salvation to which we were created and redeemed every Christian ought willingly to die to themselves and the world 2 Corinth 8. You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ because for you he was made poore being rich that by his poverty yee might be made rich FOr thy Christ thou must die to thy selfe thy sinnes and the world thou must doe good and live a holy and innocent life not that thou canst
eternity the visible world with the invisible the earthly habitation with the heavenly mortall with immortall things frail with eternall things The meditation of eternall and temporall things doth introduce wisdom In which comparison or meditation of contrary things our soule is enlightned and by faith we behold many things to the knowledge whereof they are not admitted those which to this contemplation are not at leasure and therefore like a Sow in the mire so they wallow in earthly matters drowned in covetousnesse fixed to the cares and study of earthly things given to usury and as concerning the soule blind howsoever otherwise they have a quick sight and have Lynxes eyes Because such as these thereby have addicted themselves to this fraile and worldly life and thinke this alone most pleasant the best and most To Christians the world is a crosse and exile noble when true Christians esteeming all things with a sound judgement and right estimation accounteth it an exile a valley of teares a den of misery a prison of griefe and sorrow Therefore those which love the world do not exceed brute beasts in prudence and die like a beast as saith the Psalmist they think not on heavenly things they rejoyce not in God they are pleased onely in earthly things in these things they take sweet delight and rest and having obtained these things doe thinke they are exceeding well Men in deed and truth wretched all manner of wayes blind and meere animals sitting here in the darkness of ignorance and hence removing to that of death and eternall damnation Christians are strangers in the world But we must firmly imprint this in our mindes that we are strangers and Pilgrims in this world after the example of Christ whose doctrine and life wee we ought alike to love and to him as an Image and pattern for all true Christians to follow and set before them to conform our manners thoughts and the whole course of our lives conversations Who when he was the most noble of all men he chose voluntarily that life in which nothing is notable as for himselfe besides extream poverty and contempt of honour wealth and pleasure which three the world hath for their three Gods Therefore thereupon Matth. 8. he confesseth that the Sonne of man hath not whereon to rest his head David before he was called to the Kingdome was poore vile and contemned and being made King esteemed all Kingly splendor as nothing in comparison of life eternall whereupon the Psalmist singeth Psal 84. How delightfull are thy Tabernacles O God of power my soul fainted and failed me in the Courts of the Lord my heart and my flesh were exalted in the living God Better is one day in thy house then a thousand elswhere I have indeed a Kingdome I have subjects and people subdued unto me I have Kingly Palaces and the Tower of Sion but these are nothing in respect of thy Tabernacle O Lord. Neither was blessed Job of another mind when he rejoyced in his Redeemer nor Peter nor Paul nor the other The Saints live in Christ Apostles which intended not the riches of this world but sought after the riches of another world took upon them the life of Christ walking in his charity lowlinesse and patience they contemned the world they prayed for them that cursed them they thanked them that reproached them in persecutions they praised The Saints were dead to themselves and the world God by many tribulations it behoveth us to enter into the Kingdome of heaven And last of all when they were slain they with Christ prayed Father forgive them And what is it to die to wrath revenge bitternesse of mind ambition pride the love of the world and himselfe also what is it to live in Christ and in his charity lowlinesse humility and patience Lastly what is it to be made alive in Christ by faith if this be not it Which most noble way of living to the lover of this world is altogether unknown Therefore because they live not in Christ being ignorant that the true life is in him Eph. 4. it commeth to passe that they are dead in their sinnes wrath hatred envie covetousnesse usury pride and covetousnesse of revenge in which so many as are drowned therein those for that cause are without true repentance neither live in Christ by faith whatsoever they perswade and boast of themselves Contrariwise true Christians doe understand that it is their duty to follow the steps of Christ to conform their lives to the life of Christ and to take from him as from a book and an authentick author the Rule of life and doctrine And these are found to be such that none but this is the onely true life which is in Christ Jesus according to that saying The life of Christ can teach us all things these say with the Apostles 2 Corinth 4. We doe not contemplate those things which are seen but those things which are not seen For those things which are seen are temporall but those things that are not seen are eternall And Hebrews 6. 13. We have no abiding Citie here but seek after one to come Which if it bee true that we be strangers and have not any abiding place in this world it followeth that we were not created for the cause of this world and it followeth then that there remaineth for us another world another countrey other dwellings for which we shall think it gain to lay down hundred worlds yea our life it selfe which a true Christian well knowing he rejoyceth in his inwards that he was ordained to eternall life and attending this one thing that he may grow rich in God he laugheth at the madnesse of those that are made blind with the love of the world who feareth not miserably to afflict their souls for these brickle and frail things and so unhappily to lose them CHAP. XVIII That God is grievously angry with those that prefer frail things before eternall also why and how farre we ought not to set our heart on creatures Behold burning among them in wrath the fire of the Lord hath devoured the extream part of the Tents Numb 11. THe people of Israel that murmured against Moses saying Who shall give us flesh to eat We doe remember the Fishes The type of the true false Christian and Cucumbers which wee did eat in Egypt is a type of men of this time who under the pretext of the Gospel and title thereof seek after nothing but earthly and carnall things as honours wealth and pleasures they use more diligence to be sumptuous then to become blessed and happy they study to please men more then God And lastly attribute more to the concupiscence of the flesh then to the poverty of the spirit Contrariwise the Character of a true Christian is to have more care of eternal honour and glory then this momentary to thirst after heavenly and let earthly goe to seek after invisible and neglect
what measure we measure to our neighbour with the same measure shall it be meted unto us For those three Cities should effectually represent Christ who is the sole merit as Bezer soundeth that by interpretation is a Tower of Defence according to the Proverb 18. The Name of the Lord is a most strong Tower Jesus Christ to that runneth the just and shall be exalted the same is true Ramoth which Christ our refuge voyce signifieth Exalted to whose Name every knee shall bow in heaven in earth or in hell Phil. 2. Neither is there for us another Golan besides him which according to the etymology of the name is nothing but a heap of thankesgiving or graces and gifts celestiall as a certain overflowing vessell Whereupon Psal 29. we read With the Lord there is mercy and with him is abundance of redemption And Rom. 10. The Lord is rich to all those that call upon him And thus much of the third part of the internall spirituall and true divine worship flowing from the knowledge of God which is likewise the fountain of repentance as this is of remission of sinnes which three indeed are one and set forth and declare the solid knowledge of God And God did shadow unto us this third part by the Priest which was to eat of the oblation of God which what other thing did it imply then the application of the merits of Christ by faith in the holy place wherein is signified repentance For the faith by the vertue and merit of Christ and his bloud doth make the man before the just God as if he had never been defiled with any sinne according to that of Ezekiel 18. If the wicked shall repent him of all his iniquities that he hath committed I will not remember them And after this manner the Law of Moses is changed into the spirit Moses Lawes holy things are chāged into spirit or life internall holy and another life and his sacrifices into repentance by which we offer our bodies and souls a living sacrifice and give thanks unto him because hee hath manifested unto us what is the true conversion acceptable unto him which is the justification and remission of sinnes that God alone be all things his grace as it is meet should be acknowledged and with gratefull minds and tongues be praised for ever and ever This then as we have often said heretofore is the true divine worship of which Mich. chap. 6. speaketh I will shew thee O man what the Lord requireth of thee that thou execute judgement and love mercy and walk carefully before the Lord thy God Because therefore O mortals doe we repent to get remission of sinnes seeing but by this alone we cannot come to remission of sinnes for neither can those sins bee remitted whose sense and griefe the mind never yet found by grace divine and consequently never to grieve for them nor hee which never had it in his mind to change The true worship of God consisteth in the heart is not external his life and mend his manners Which true and safe-making conversion that God for his Christs sake would bestow it upon us I humbly pray whose favour also it is that now it appeareth that his true worship consisteth in the soule and mind in the knowledge of God in true repentance by which the flesh is mortified and the man renewed after the image of God whereby he is made the Temple of God wherein by the holy Ghost the true and divine worship of the holy Trinity is exercised I say Faith Love and Hope Humility Patience Prayer giving of thankes and praises to God And although this worship respecteth God himselfe and is performed to him alone let us not think or beleeve Why called the worship of God that God for his own cause and because it joyneth with his profit that he inviteth us unto him but rather let us be so assured that he is willing through his boundlesse mercy to bestow and communicate all himselfe to us with all his benefits and to live work and dwell in us if so be we be ready through his true Knowledge Faith and Repentance to receive him For no work is gracious and acceptable to God of which hee was not the authour of in us What kind of works are pleasing to God therefore he commandeth us to repent to beleeve to pray to fast not as to him but that the fruit thereof might be ours No man can give or take any thing from God nor hurt nor profit him for we sow and we mow to our selves if we be good but we create evill to our selves if we be evill And what dammage hath God if thou wilt not doe well therefore he commandeth thee to serve him not for his owne cause but for thine who seeing he is Charity it selfe therefore amongst things acceptable and deare and so fit accounteth it that there be many be who participate of his charity yea of himselfe that is to wit as a mother loveth her Infant cannot but rejoyce that it sucketh her milk from her so God is to be thought of out of his most loving communicating of himself after his manner to receive singular delight CHAP. XXII As we know a tree by the fruit so a true Christian by no other token is known then by love and amendment of life daily Psalm 92. The just man flourisheth as a Palm Tree as a Cedar of Lebanon he shall multiply being planted in the House of the Lord They shall flourish in the entrance of the House of God they shall flourish Moreover they shall be multiplied in a fruitfull old age and they shall be very patient that they may shew it forth because just is our Lord God and there is no iniquity in him IT is not the name but the life of a Christian that maketh a true Christian whose daily and onely study ought to be that in him Christ might be manifested and be made conspicuous by love humility and humanity In whom therefore Christ liveth not it followeth that this man cannot be a Christian Furthermore it behoveth this life to be from the bottome of the heart and spirit even as the Apple is derived and commeth from the naturall branch of the Tree faculties and vegetable power yea it is necessary that our life be informed by the Spirit of Christ and fashioned after his life according to that of Paul Rom. 8. Those which are carried by the Spirit of God those are the sonnes of God But if any have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his or belongeth not to him to wit every life cometh of the Spirit which even as the All life is from the Spirit inward man moveth driveth and is carried so in like manner the outward man fareth or is carried whereby it is manifested how much it availeth to a Christian life to have the grace of the Holy Ghost which therefore Christ did command us to seek
and keepeth holy day and resteth from his wicked concupiscences will and works Which is to be taken of the state after conversion and of daily illumination and of the increase of gifts and spirituall grace Now neither is it unfitly said which Christ John 14. speaketh I am the Way the Truth and the Life calling himselfe the Way who sheweth the same unto us not How Christ is the way onely in doctrine but in his most holy life Which life is no other thing then a living faith and working by love hope patience meeknesse humility prayer the feare of the Lord and to speak in a word true repentance turning to God whereby we are drawn to the Truth and the Life wherein the whole Christianity doth consist which is the breviary or epitome of all bookes and precepts Which is also the true and Kingly way to life and truth and is Christ himselfe the book of life in the involving and learning whereof wee ought Christ is our book to spend all our life This I say is that strait way and narrow gate Matth. 7. which few doe find this is the book of life which almost none doe reade although in it all things are contained which a Christian ought to know so that wee shall need no other book to our eternall salvation Which is the reason why also the holy Scripture is contained in very few bookes to wit that it might appeare that Christianity did not consist in the multitude of The brevity of Scripture whereupon Commentaries and great Volumes but in living faith and imitation of Christ according to that of Eccles c. 12. There is no end of making many books and much meditation of the flesh is affliction In like maner let us all hear the end of speaking Fear God and keep his commandements Moreover Matth. 7. it is said That the Devill when men are asleep soweth Tares in the Wheat that teacheth us when men neglect repentance and sleep soundly in their sinnes and are overtaken with the love of this world we having more care of frail things then immortall goods then by little and little doth the Devil sprinkle his Pride is the field of heresies seed of false doctrine in the field of pride whereupon doe arise Sects and Heresies for by pride both Men and Angels lost the true light and all errors came into the world which yet we might have wanted if Satan and Adam had lived in the humble life of Christ Whereupon Saint Paul deservedly Ephes 6. saith Arise thou that sleepest and Christ shall inlighten thee being willing to shew that no man can bee divinely enlightned who hath not before shaken off from his eyes the sleep of sinne and driven from him security and impiety according to that of the Acts chap. 2. Repent and receive the gift of the holy Ghost And that of John chap. 17. The world cannot receive the holy Ghost understanding by the world a wicked and worldly life Likewise when Christ saith You know them by their fruits All things are known by the fruits what other thing signifieth it then not O Lord Lord but the fruits of life is the signe and mark of true and false Christians For what belongeth the pure doctrine to those false Christians use who under pretext of sheeps cloathing doe make shew when inwardly they are nothing less thē true Christians And although the life be corrupt yet it should not or may not bee drawn into the argument of false and wicked doctrine as the Papists do at this day esteeming and condemning our doctrine by the wickednes of our lives which way of arguing if it were worth any thing now the doctrine of Christ his Apostles had not been sound because even then many false Christians were found but it is yet and will be a shew and mark of the men themselves whereby The life is the mark of a man wee may know whether they bee true or false Christians he that teacheth otherwise teacheth otherwise then he liveth and when he beleeveth aright he doth blot his faith with an Antichristian life as if Ivory were spotted with Ink. In which sense so many as are so Christ calleth them false Christians unfruitfull trees fit for nothing but to be burned lastly that onely is true and Christian faith which worketh by love by which a man is made or becometh a new creature by which he is regenerated by which he is united with God by which Christ liveth in us dwelleth and worketh in us by which the kingdome of God is built in us and lastly by which the holy Ghost purgeth and enlightneth our hearts To which doe belong many golden Oracles of holy Scripture such as that 1 Cor. 6. He that cleaveth to the Lord is spirit And what is it to have the Spirit of Christ and to breath with it then to have the same understanding and mind and the same heart which joynt breathing and consent is nothing else but a new holy noble heavenly spirituall and heroicall life of Christ in us Also 2 Cor. 6. In Christ is a new creature terming to bee in Christ not onely to beleeve in him but to live in him Also Hosea 2. I will espouse thee to me for The espousing of Christ and its fruit ever in faith I will spouse thee to me Which indeed signifie nothing else then that a man wholly and spiritually is to bee united to Christ so that where faith is there is Christ where Christ is there his life is in man where the life of Christ is there is love where love is there is God himselfe for God is love and the holy Ghost remaineth For all things are connexed and chained together they cleave together no otherwise then the head with the members and the cause with the effect Which connexion of faith and life blessed The chain of vertue Peter Epist 2. chap. 1. representing to us writeth thus But of all have especiall care adde virtue to your faith and in virtue knowledge and in knowledge abstinence and in abstinence patience and in patience piety and in piety brotherly love and in brotherly love charity For if you have these things and abound therein you shall not bee empty nor bee without fruit in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ But for those that have not these things those are blind and hand-bound being forgetfull of the purging of their old sinnes In which place the Apostle eloquently declareth in whom this conjoyning of faith and life is not when to bee ignorant of Christ to fall from faith and to walk in darknesse For it is the property of true True faith faith to change a man wholly to renew him and to quicken him in Christ so that hee may live and remain in Christ and Christ likewise in him CHAP. XL. Certain Rules very profitable to lead our lives Christian-like and devoutly 1 Timothy 4. Exercise thy selfe in piety for piety is profitable for
state of innocencie to love God with all his heart with all his soule and all his strength and his neighbour as himselfe Hereupon it is that when Almighty God requireth the heart of man the whole man as concerning body soule and all his strength is to be understood In which sense the name of heart in Scripture is understood every where so that with it doe come all the strength of the soul and â—â— it were the nerves the understanding memory affections and desires Neither is it for other reasons when God requireth the soule understanding by that denomination the whole man so much as in him is which indeed is to bee conformed to Iustice righteousnesse and ioy cleave together him to bee renewed in Christ and that he ought to walk in spirit or in a new and spirituall life But the perfection of most sincere joy doth accompany the perfection of holinesse righteousnesse and love in the man wherewith he was most sincerely affected God so disposing it that where divine holinesse is there also should be divine joy which two as they cannot be separated so they make the Image of God But we who in this life doe attain to onely an unperfect and begun righteousnesse of God and his holinesse for these beginnings of the righteousnesse of Christ living in all the faithfull if we be devout if we be exercised in the Kingdome of God we shal do participate thereof in this world and have the fruits thereof even the first fruits of that heavenly joy Therefore how much every Christian profiteth in love so much divine pleasure and joy hee doth find in himselfe Which holy and divine love because in that day it shal receive the last hand and its perfection therefore also our joy shall be then perfect Christ bearing witnesse John 16. For charity or love is life and joy as contrariwise where love is not there is neither life nor joy but death it The greatest ioy for the love of God selfe wherein the Devil and wicked impenitent men shall remain to all eternity This love maketh the father of the son the bridegroome of the bride draw an incredible delight yet it is a far greater love that is perceived from the love of the Creator which most lovingly kisseth us with the kisses of his mouth that is in Christ and in him by the charity or love of the holy Ghost cometh upon us and taketh up his dwelling with us And of this image of God the Image of God differ God which consisteth in similitude with God when wee make mention of it we doe not mean that a man should be every way like God in justice righteousnesse and holinesse and become like God himselfe for God is incomprehensible and he is immense as concerning his essence virtue and properties but onely to carry about the image of God as is declared in divers places of this book Where what wee have commented of the Image of God those are no conjectures but things indeed neither can it be denied of the most perverse that Almighty God created man that he might be his most cleare looking-glasse so that if one were desirous to know the nature of God he might look back to himselfe and counsell with himselfe contemplate God in himselfe as in a glasse might see his Image within and in his heart as his life and happinesse But the Devil beholding this Image The acts of the Devil to abolish the Image of God of God in man with wicked envious eyes laid in wait with many deceits and machinations until at last through disobedience and an hostile mind conceived against God hee overthrew that Image and destroyed it which he hath attained unto with such craft as never any thing was attained unto or shall be Neither was it an obscure thing unto him if the man had remained in that state he had been his Pride the original of all sin Lord but so soon as he fell from him hee became a tyrant to him Therefore when all his forces of malice and craft displayed hee found nothing more fit to perfect his cogitations then that sinne by which hee was bewitched and pulled from God hee began to insinuate into our mother the affectation of the divine Majesty by sweet and flattering speeches with the help of the Serpent that old and deceitful Parasite and the atchiever of so great The fall of Adam a wickednesse which proud thought once entied into the heart and admitted there followed Apostasie disobedience and transgression of the precept concerning the Tree of knowledge not to bee touched Hereby came the image of God to be overthrown the holy Ghost to fly away and the image of the Devil to bee set up in the place of the divine Majesty and both of them to become the bondslaves of the Devil and he their Lord to handle their souls most cruelly and as a Giant handleth a child to blind the understanding to turn the will from God to accompany all the powers of the whole heart against God and intoxicate them with Satanicall malice to overthrow all the image of God in man to plant his own in the roome to infect them with the contagion of his own nature to beget after his own image children not now of God but his own to fulfill all kind of sinne and enmity against God and lastly to slay them with eternal death For even as in the image of God life eternall and the happinesse of man was contained so death and condemnation did follow its losse This death those doe best understand which fall and are cast into most grievous spirituall temptations being exposed to the tyranny of the Devill by infesting the miserable soule of them most cruelly with the custome of sinning Spiritual death and eternall by the fall of Adam under which crosse being depressed and troden down only unlesse the holy Ghost doe under-prop him and comfort him then the Devil doth fasten his death upon them and tormenteth their soules with pains grief infernal whereupon it must needs be that all the powers of the body doe faile the heart waxeth dry and the marrow to be consumed Psal 6. and the Spirituall temptation 38. and the word of God if any go about to be without life with juice and with all devotion and spirituall life Into which Spiritual death state when the businesse is to bee brought then the man is converted in the agonie of a true spirituall death esteeming nothing of the holinesse of all men righteousnesse dignity strength power glory honour arts and wisdome of all men without doubt this man shall perish unlesse the grace of God doe prevent him Therefore learn of me O man that Originall sin is the most terrible of terrible sinnes that is the losse of the hereditary righteousnesse of God and contrariwise the hereditary unrighteousnesse What our originall sin is of the Devil and man planted in the place for which the
it sufficient to be the Sonne of God that he was the fairest of all creatures in body and mind without fault and lastly that he was in the favour and love of God unlesse he should be God himselfe hereupon he conceived hostile hatred against God being ready as farre as in him lay utterly to deface and extirpate God A more detestable sinne then this can no man think Then afterwards it followed Adam and the Devill Lucifer committed one fault that the man concerning his heart and minde became like unto the Devil because they both committed one fault and now was no more the sonne of God nor the Image of God but of the Devil and the instrument of the Devill capable of all Devillish malice to this adde that he became of a divine celestiall and spiritual Image altogether earthly and carnall and a beastly creature for the Devill that he might erect his own Image in man durst first by inticing deceitfull and crafty speeches sow his seed in man that is to say selfe-love ambition selfe-will and affectation of the Divinity whereupon the Scripture calleth all selfe-lovers a Generation of vipers Matth. 3. and those that be of a Devillish nature The seed of the Serpent I will put enmity between the seed of the Serpent and the seed of the woman Gen. 3. And from this seed of the Serpent or seed of Vipers nothing or no off-spring can come but terrible fruit as the Image of Satan the off-spring of Belial the children of the Devil for as even as in any other seed be it never so small yet after a wonderfull and hidden manner all the qualities and properties stature thicknesse length bredth with boughes leaves flowers and fruits and so the whole tree with innumerable fruits of the whole stock and plants is contained so in this pestilent and The pestilent seed of Adam fatall seed of the Serpent I say in the self-love of Adam and his disobediences so oft as we delivered it by carnall generation there lieth the death deadly bearing tree the innumerable fruits of malice and lastly the image of Satan with all his markes and properties For shew me any child and behold even from his mothers womb first swadling cloaths this native Scandal called an action originally sinne corruption and especially disobedience and self-selfe-love doe grafie or sow it selfe and so soon as it groweth up regard and you shall see a violent naturall self-love ambition a desire of glory covetous of revenge lying and by and by as an Army marching commeth on disdain arrogancy pride blasphemy oathes fearfull dire imprecations deceits contempts of God and his Word contempts of his parents Magistrates to these adde wrath brawlings hatreds envie dissimulations revenge homicide and all kind of cruelty especially when scandals and occasions doe happen therewith which as Midwives doe help to bring forth the off-spring of Adams and the Devils corruption for you shall see break forth impudencie shamelesnesse lust venereall cogitations whoredoms obscene and filthy speeches shamelesse behaviour both in words and deeds drunkennesses gluttony intemperance in food and apparell levity effeminacie Besides all these covetousnesse usury deceits frauds fallacies craftinesse impostures and juglings and to speak all at once all kind of wickednesse and naughtinesse and so various and abounding that cannot be declared Scandals of doctrine according to that of Jeremy 17. The heart of man is wicked and inscrutable who shall find it out But if you adde thereunto the seducing and hereticall spirit then you shall heare renouncing of God forsaking of him idolatry hatred of the truth and persecution the sinnes against the holy Ghost faith-breakings corruptions of the faith depraving of Scriptures and terrible seducings All which are no other then the fruits of the Serpent and the image of Satan in the man And who could even suspect in the beginning in so weake and feeble an Malice is hidden in man infant such a heap of wicked deeds or a heart so pestililent and that such a Basilisk did therein lurk and hide it selfe thereunder but he that is in life and conversation worst of all and in the cogitation of his heart intentive to evill at all times even from his tender infancy as it is Gen. 6. written who could have produced these things to light and expressed them if triall had not manifested it therfore wicked and extream evill is that root from whence so deadly and pestiferous a tree doth grow O terrible seed of the Serpent and of vipers from whom so deformed and stinking an image doth arise and increase for within all evils are fomented and from thence doe arise and grow provoked nourished set forward by externall provocations for what cause it is to Why offences were for bidden by Christ be thâ—ught Christ Jesus did so seriously prohibit that children should be provoked by evil example for in whom this seed of the serpent lurketh and the beginning of all wickednesse and flagitious acts their beginning and entrances are closely hidden and are deceiveable no otherwise then cruell poyson in a pestilent worm Learn therefore O man of me that the sins of Adam and originall corruption of Originall sin unexpressible our kind is not lightly to be regarded or slighted because this infection and depravation is greater then any words can expresse or human intellect can search into know thy selfe and what thou becamest to be after the fall of Adam consider how thou from the Image of God became the Image of the Devill a compendium I say and an epitome or an abridgement to receive all Devillish nature malice and wickednesse into a little roome for even as in the Image of God all vertues and divine The Image heavenly and earthly properties were contained and as before the fall man did carry the celestial Image that is to say he was all heavenly spirituall Angelical and divine so now after his apostasie he carrieth about with him the image of The man is a beast the earthly and is become altogether and fundamentally earthly carnall and beastly And why so This thy fierce wrath is it thine Is it proper to a Lion or to a Man Thy envie and covetousnesse insatiable do not Dogges and Wolves the same Thy intemperance and shamelesnesse is hoggish yea if thou look rightly into thy selfe thou shalt find within even in thy heart a certain world of beasts yea even in thy tongue alone in that least of thy members as St. James saith Chapt. 3. a lake and a sea of venemous worms a harbour of unclean spirits a biding place or cage of unclean birds as witnesse Isa 3. Apoc. 18. but we often increase so much in malice that in wrath we exceed all kind of beasts the Dogges in envie the Wolves in covetous ravening the Foxes in craftinesse the Basilisk in poyson of the eye and last of all the very Hogges in filthinesse And from this beastly nature Christ Mat. 3.
in the heart with earnest sorrow and most assured feeling of heavinesse we be made contrite and afflicted and again be made holy and joyfull purged and changed and amended by remission of sinnes by faith in Jesus Christ whereby it cannot but come to passe that the outward life and manners be renewed and changed What if now one should onely doe outward penance or repentance abstain from great and erroneous offences for the feare of punishment and the inward man doe keep his old spots still and take no care to enter into the inward and new life in Christ shall not such a one neverthelesse be damned neither shall it profit him a straw to cry Lord Lord but he shall be constrained to hear that terrible voice I know you not For certain and sure it is not all that say Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdome of heaven but onely those that doe the will of the heavenly Father Under which terrible sentence of the Divine Majesty it is manifest men of all orders are comprised for as many as doe not inwardly and from the heart truly repent and become new creatures in Christ those surely Christ will not acknowledge for his CHAP. V. What is true Faith 1 John 1. 5. Every one that beleeveth that Jesus is Christ is born of God FAith is a solid trust and a firm and cernain perswasion of the grace of God promised in Christ for the remission of sinnes and life eternal kindled through the word of God and the holy Ghost in our hearts by this faith is conferred unto us the remission of our sinnes and that gratis or freely for no merits of ours but Christs alone and that of meere grace that our faith may remain fixed or unmoveable upon a firme and solid foundation And this absolution or forgivenesse of our sinnes is our justice or justification and that true solid and eternall before God For neither is it of Angels but by the obedience of the Sonne of God his merits and ransome which by faith we appropriate unto us fixing and applying the same to our selves therefore neither is the imperfections Properties of a true faith of our life or any sinnes left remaining to withstand us but they be covered with the vaile of grace for Christs sake Psal 32. Furthermore by this solid and firm trust this followeth that the man doth dedicate his whole heart solely to God in him he resteth alone to this one is he glewed or fastened with this alone he entreth society and is joyned to God and participateth all things that are of God and Christ and is made one spirit with God taketh and collecteth from him power and strength a new life new joyes many recreations peace lightnesse of heart the soules Sabbath and rest Lastly justification and holinesse or sanctification in the holy Ghost What other thing then is it at the length but to be regenerated through faith for where true faith is there is Christ with all his justice holinesse redemption merit grace remission of sins adoption and inherttance of life eternall And this is the new life and regeneration New birth through faith in Christ whereupon the Apostle to the Hebrews Cap. 11. calleth faith a Substance that is the undoubted solid firm trust of things which were hoped for and a certain manifest and notable conviction and experience of things invisible And finely so great and powerfull is the consolation of a true living faith in our hearts as it cannot but convince by arguing most firmly from experience and tast of the soveraigne good in his soule that is from the quietnesse and peace in God Iustified faith where peace whereby that preservation remaineth most certain which a Christian doubteth not to seale with his death and this is that strength of spirit and inward man this is vigor and alacrity of faith or Parrhesia Eph. 3. Phil. 1. 1 Joh. 2. 3. this joy in God 1 Thess 2. Lastly this Plerophoria and immoveable The certainty of faith firm certainty 1 Thess 3. even for which I shall dare to dye that truly cannot but first be perswaded in my mind most firmly through the H. Ghost infixed and impressed in my inward understanding also it behoveth to be lively inward in most powerful consolation wherby that commeth to the mind which is supernaturall divine and a celestiall strength to overcome the feare of death and the love of he world to be uttetly extinguished in me I say so great so solid Prolepsis or perswasion To be born of God is no dead work and union with Christ is needfull that neither death nor life can dissolve it Rom. 8. whereupon B. John pronounceth That he that is born of God hath overcome the world But to be born of God cannot be any vain or shadowed thing it ought to be a lively thing and very powerfull For it were wickednesse to beleeve that the living God did beget a dead off-spring frivolous anâ— dead members or instrumentss but It is living overcometh so it be true faith rather it is for a certain rule that God cannot being a living God but beget a living man no other then new Now seeing our faith is the victory by which we overcome the world who can doubt that it should overcome being indued with powerfull strength and greatest force and that our faith which is commanded by God to overcome the world ought to be lively overcomming and affections working divine faith a certain force and influence yea Christ himselfe apprehended by faith and fixed in our minds and graffed in our understanding and by this vertue of God What we are with Christ without him what we return into God and become intimate and one with God And from Adam as from a cursed Vine we are transplanted into Christ that living and blessed Vine John 15. So in Christ we possesse all his goods and in him are justified Even as a Scien or a plant graffed in a good tree groweth flourisheth and beareth fruit without it it withereth so man without Christ is a cursed vine and all his works are sinfull the grapes of it are bitternesse gall Deut. 32. but in Christ blessed and justified wherefore St. Paul saith 2 Cor. 5. that hee â—hat knew no sinne for us became sinne that we might be justified before God in him By this it appeareth manifestly that works do not justifie because we must be graffed in Iustification is not by works Christ by faith before we can do any good work and so thy justification is the gift of God freely given before and preventing all our merits we may as well say a dead man may see stand and doe good of himselfe I think so indeed but he must first bee raised from death so thou likewise that art dead in sinne to God canst not performe any work to God unlesse thou be first raised by Christ to life which being granted it followeth thy
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
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
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
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
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