heat would scorch Therefore when God promised to Israel the beauty of the Lilly the stability of the Cedâ—r the fruitfulness of the Olive to effect all this he saith he will be as the dew And what ground can but bring forth when he who is the Father of the Rain and begetteth the drops of the dew shall himself descend upon it in bounty and goodness Who can but love him with a love of duty whom he shall thus tender with a love of mercy Who can but love him with a love of Concupiscence as being more desirous of new Influences than satisfied with former Receipts whom he so freely loves with a love of Beneficence O Lord my Soul thirsteth for thee as the gaping and chapped earth doth for the moysture of the Heavens I am nothing I can do nothing without thee my fruitfulness my growth my life depend wholly upon the droppings of thy grace when they dew lieth all night upon my Branch my glory is fresh in me and my whole man is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed Be not therefore unto me O my God as a Cloud without Rain left I be as a Tree without fruit But let thy grace alwaies distill upon me as the dew and as the small rain upon the tender herb and then shall I be as the ground which drinketh in the showers that come oft upon it and bringeth forth fruit meet for him by whom it is dressed and receive also new blessing from God Meditation XIV Vpon a Pearl in the Eye VVHat specious names have Physicians put upon diseases who call a Plague Sore a Carbuncle and the white film which taketh away the delightful sight a Pearl in the Eye Do they gild over Diseases as they do their Pills or a Bolus that so their Patients may less fear and feel the evil of the one as they less taste the bitterness of the other And are any by such slender Artifices brought into an opinion that a Carbuncle is less mortal or loathsome than any other swelling that hath not so gay a name Or that blindness which is caused by a Pearl in the Eye is more comfortable than the loss of sight that comes by other accidents Methinks Reason should not run at so low an ebb in any as to please themselves in such fancies may not a Poyson have a name that sounds better to the ear a colour more pleasing to the eye and a taste that is more grateful to the Pallate than the Antidote which expels it May not Alchimy glister when Gold looks pale And yet alas in spiritual maladies in which the danger is so much the greater by how much the soul is of more value than the body with what strange delusions are many transported who when their minds are poysoned with Errour and Blasphemy do then put upon their corrupt Opinions and Tenents the glorious names of Revelations Visions Raptures refined notions and what not that may confirm themselves in their own dotages and win others into an admiration of their persons Thus Montanus gave out himself to be the Comforter that Christ had promised to send forth into the World Arius proudly boasted that God had revealed something to him which he hid from his Apostles And Eunomius fondly imagined that he was taken up to Heaven as Elias was and had seen Gods face as had Moses and was wrapt up to the third heaven as was Paul But what other thing are these Follies or rather Phrensys than as if an Israel te infected with the botch of Egypt and overspread with it from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head should boast that he had robbed the Egyptians of their most precious Jewels and had decked himself with them Would not men pitty his distemper rather than believe his confidence Would not they offer medicines to heal him rather than suffer him to perish under his miserable delusion of possessing great riches How is it then that in matters of faith in which there is both clear evidence and certainty Hereticks that are no other than ulcerous persons fitter for Dogs to lick than Christians to love should throughout all Ages so easily gain to themselves such a great multitude of Proselytes only by putting fair Names upon foul Errours It is because men for their lusts sake will not see but willingly corrupt themselves in those things which they know or is it because God hath smitten them with a spirit of blindness that they shall not see for their not receiving of the truth in the love of it Surely whatever the cause be such is the infatuation as that I had need both to tremble and to pray To tremble at the sad woe which is denounced by God himself against those that call evil good and good evill That put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter And to pray as David did Teach me thy way O Lord I will walk in thy truth unite my heart to fear thy name Meditation XV. Vpon Spiritual and bodily sickness THe soul hath its maladies as well as the body and such that for their likeness to them do often borrow their names from them Pride is a Timpany Avarice a Dropsie Security a Lithargy Lust a Calenture Apostacy an Epilepsie And yet though these names of bodily diseases do happily serve to point and shadow out the nature of spiritual how wide is the difference between the Patients of the one and of the other in regard of those qualities which may dispose them for a cure and recovery out of them In the diseases of the body it matters not whether the Patient know the name of his disease or understand the vertue of the medicines which are prescribed or be able to judge of the increase height and declination of his distempers by the beatings of his pulse the whole business is managed by the care and wisdom of the Physician who oft times conceals the danger on purpose least fear and fancy should work more than his Physick and hinder the benefit of what he applies But in the maladies of the soul it is far otherwise the first step unto spiritual health is a distinct and clear insight of sin such which makes men to understand the Plague of their own hearts Christ heals by light as well as by Influence he first Convinceth them of sin and then gives the pardon he discovers the disease to them and then administers the medicine Ignorance is a bar to the welfare of the soul though not of the body and makes the divine remedies to have as little effect upon it as Purges or Cordials have upon the Glasses into which they are put It is Solomons peremptory Conclusion that a soul without knowledge is not good nor indeed can be because it wants a principle which is as necessary to goodness as a visive power to the eye to enable it to discern its object How can he ever value holiness who understands not what sin is Or
THE Spiritual Chymist OR SIX DECADS Of Divine Meditations On several Subjects By William Spurstow D. D. Sometime Minister of the Gospel at Hackney near London My meditation of him shall be sweet Psal 104. 34. LONDON Printed in the Year 1666. The Preface to the Reader Christian Reader THe natural Sun in the Firmament whether we consider the vastness of its Globe or the splendour and dazling of its light or the variety and beneficialness of its motion and operations attended with duration and perpetuity is the top and Prince of all inanimate beings Yet the least insect that the most Artificial Microscope can discern life in is able to weigh against it and in genere entium is more perfect How excellent a being then is the Soul of man that doth not only out-strip the Sun but all other sensitive things even those that have the most lively 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Philosopher calls them which the Oratour translates Virtutum simulacra the faint imitations of Reason Now among the many demonstrations of the excellency of the Humane Soul the operations of it do abundantly witness for it and among them to go no farther the operations of those two supream Faculties the Understanding and Will in apprehending and loving God These are more excellent than the Suns enlightning the world I choose to instance in that because the ornament beauty life of all things depend upon it for to what purpose were these things made were it not that the light of the Sun made them Proximè visibilia Yet this is nothing in compare with the Soul of man in its apprehending and loving God This speaks the Subject endued with a principle not to be transcended but only in degree in perfection You cannot have more persect operations in heaven in kind though you may in degree Angels and Souls made perfect it is true do this more intirely more perfectly more constantly and unweariedly But in knowing God and making choice of him in loving and cleaving to him the souls of holy men do according to the capacity of the present state communicate with them Now these two have a mutual aspect on each other and the happy Conjunction of Knowledge and Devotion speak the Soul Regular and Uniform in its Acts and to be in a good measure of spiritual health When Knowledge doth guide and steer as it were Devotion and Devotion doth in a kind of gratitude warm and enflame our Knowledge which otherwise is apt to chil and grow cold as experience shews in many knowing Creatures in whom the waters of the Sanctuary have put out the fire And as the separation of the love of God from the knowledge of God breeds swarms of hypocrites in the visible Church so the separation of the knowledge of God from affection to God begets a strange kind of wild fire in the Spirits of men and while they have Zeal for God which is nothing but Affection in its full stature got out of its swadling cloaths without Knowledge they are but like a Ship without a Rudder or Ballast that is a prey to every Pirate and if it miss them is carried by its own levity and the winds impetuousness on its own ruine When therefore the blessed Spirit comes to work in the soul he first enlightens the mind and sets open 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the gates of light and then the Will ecchoes to the Understanding and certainly that action is most congruous to so excellent a being as the Soul when the Mind takes its aime before the Affections shoot For otherwise though the action doth prove materially good yet it is no more commendation to him that doth it than to him that shuts both his eyes and then contingently hits the mark The apprehensions and affections of Mans Soul being thus regulated and conjoyned do admirably fit and dispose for that we call Meditation I mean Divine and Christian Meditation which is the off-spring of a good heart and a good head How excellent and sweet an employment this is none can know but those that have tasted it and have the skill to spiritualize all objects and providences turning every thing by a Divine Chymistry in succum sanguincm into spirit and nourishment Making the Word and Works and Ordinances of God as so many Rounds to climbe up to a more clear Vision and fervent love of God and then descending make these a clear Mirrour wherein they see themselves and to be like windows to let in that light into the private and dark recesses of the heart that discovers the hidden works of darkness and so provokes the soul to endeavour a more through purgation of it self which it is the more easily exstimulated to being under a deep sence of Gods purity and a serious affection to be like him But this duty of Divine and Spiritual Meditation is a thing that in this degenerate age the generality of Christians are utter strangers to and very hardly brought to the practice of Though there was never any time wherein the thoughts and minds of men were more busie and active and the helps inducements and encouragements more plentiful and cogent and the calls and invitations on Gods part both by his Word and Works more frequent Yet it is a work of inexpressible difficulty to bring these subtil and volatile acts of the mind to a fixation to make any considerable immoration upon those subjects that are in themselves of the greatest worth and to us of the nearest consequence Now considering that man is by God made a providential Creature and doth naturally cast up damages and gain and project the obtaining the one and avoiding the other I have therefore thought it worth the enquiring what should be the reason of their awkness to this beneficial employment and considering that Knowledge and Love are the two things that dispose for it I have thought it might arise from some defect in these and sometimes thus argued Surely this wisdom is too high for fools that men that have incrassated their souls and almost extinguished this Divine Lamp by shooting themselves so deep in sensuality and worldliness that they who have well-nigh forgot their God their own being their happiness should ever be able to mount so high as Meditation But when I considered how stupid or sottish soever these men were by debauchery or pretended to be through want of education yet they were ingeniously wicked and could in their minds lay Schemes of villany and that their phantasies were alwaies minting and forging wicked devices which they could in their second thoughts revise and polish and like a Second Edition make the Model to be Auctior nequior larger and more wicked I then saw no excuse for them that had wit enough to be wicked but none to do good And therefore looking further into the ground of it I found it arose from the second want of love to God which is the stream that sets all the Wheels of the soul
the sweeter because his name is so often in it but I have cause to be ashamed at the uneven temper of my heart which discovers it self in those intermissions of love and affection that I too often labour under how often am I chill and cold in the same duty At what poor trifles do I often stick when my love to him should blush at the name of difficulty Can I ever do or suffer for him too much whose perfections render him wholly uncapable of being loved too much If I were melted in the Flames and Ardors of Divine Love might I not say still there are degrees and intentions of heat which I want and others have Christians should be the rivalls of Seraphims whose Name expresseth them to be of a flaming Nature and whose Imployment in Isaiahs Mysterious Vision is to cry one to another holy holy holy Lord God of hosts he is the object to which those Flames that warm them do aspire and tend O that my heart like the Prophets Lips were touched by some Seraphim that I might love Christ which is the best of Duties with an heart flaming with the Fire of Heavenly Love which is the best of tempers Meditation XLV Vpon a Bee-bive and a Waspes nest THose two insects have as the Naturalists observe a likeness in sundry Particulars The Waspes have one common habitation as well as the Bees and are under the Government of a King who as the King of Bees is the largest and most beautifull among them In the Building of their Cells and Combes they are exact and make them much like to the Bees both for their figure and size But they make no Hony at all nor yet any Wax that is for service they live onely upon Rapine and are injurious to most kind of fruits like Thieves they enter by force into the Hives of Bees and devour the Hony which hath with much industry been gathered by them So eager are they after what is sweet as that any narrow mouthed glass set neer the Hive with a little sweet liquor becomes a snare to drown and destroy them and a security to the Bees to prevent their Theft which pass the more freely into their Cells not tempted to endanger theit lives or to neglect their Work by the sight of such a pleasing bait And now whither my thoughts carry me who cannot easily conjecture is there not a double Polity or Society of Men the one of which may justly be resembled to Waspes and the other to Bees It was Tertullians saying long since Faciunt favos vespae faciunt Ecclesias Marcionitae Waspes make Combes but they are empty ones and so Hereticks make Churches but they are void of Truth which is that sweet Hony that is to be found onely amongst the Assemblies of the Faithfull What else is the Church of Rome notwithstanding all those pretences which it makes of being a Mother-Hive but a Neast of Angry Waspes under the Rule and Sway of a Spiritual Abaddon how many swarmes have gone out from thence not to make Hony but to destroy what others have made fraudes robberies violence have been the things which they have practised and with which their habitations have been filled have they not thrust their Stings deep into â—housands who have detected their Impostures and have endeavoured to hold the Mystery of the Faith in a pure Conscience Have they not wasted many places which were like the Garden of the Spouse full of precious fruits into which her Beloved might come and eat of his hony and hony-combe who can express the rage and scorn with which they have trampled upon those that durst not abett their impieties how fond and fruitless then must the attempts of those be who as if they had forgotten what Amaleck had done are setting on soot overtures of Peace and termes of Accommodation between Protestancy and Popery as if the distances between the one and the other were more seeming than reall and might as readily be brought together as the two extreames of a Serpent who can when he pleaseth cast himself into a Circle and take his Tail into his Mouth But who knoweth not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump and so will a little Error diffuse its poyson through the whole body of truth like a drop of oyl on Cloath it no sooner falls then spreads like a spark on Tinder it catcheth and runs at once And therefore Paul would not for one hour give place unto false Brethren least the Truth of the Gospel might be endangered To do it then with the least prejudice to Truth is sinfull and to effect it without it is impossible Sooner may they reconcile Antipathies in Nature than in Religion When therefore they have combined Fire and Water without extinction of each other and made an amity between the Dove and the Hawk between the Waspe and the Bee So that the one shall not infest the other then may they promise themselves success in making up the breaches between Babylon and Zion But O that they who are so sludious to make strife to cease between the Philistines and the Israelites would bend their Mindes to heal the Divisions of Israel among whom there are great thoughts and searchings of heart Is it not pity to see the Industrious Bees whose Labours are so usefull to their owner to make a War in the Mouth of their Hive and to kill one another by those Stings with which they should defend their Cells against Waspes and Drones and is it not then a sad spectacle to behold Christians who should be joyned together fidei vinculo glutine Charitatis by the Bond and Cement of Faith and Love to be divided one from another and in Animosities to draw the Sword and to sheath it also in the Bowells of each other And yet such heats there have sometimes been and still are between Brethren I could methinks give way to my Sorrow and let it overflow the Bankes to see Professors to be less tender of Christs Body than the Souldiers were of his Coat and few or none to prize that Unity which is the Glory of the Faith of the Gospel Have we not all one Father God blessed for ever have we not all one Elder Brother Jesus Christ who is the First-Borne of every Creature are we not all quickened by one Spirit who is a Spirit of Love are we not all under one Solemne Vow of Baptisme in which we have dedicated our selves to Gods Service as his Souldiers how can we then turn Enemies one to another O God do thou who hast made that blessed Promise of giving thy People one Heart and one Way put into them a Spirit of Wisdome and Love that they may walk Wisely to those that are Without and Lovingly one towards another that by this all Men may know that they are Christs Disciples and believe that thou hast sent him Meditation XLVI Vpon Contentment and Satisfaction IT is our Saviours Maxim that Mans life consisteth
its own concernments If there were but a clear insight into that Blessedness into which Peace of Conscience doth Estate a Believer it could not be but that it being laid in the Ballance with the health of the Body it should as far over-weigh it as a full Bucket a single drop or as the Vintage of Wine a particular Cluster True it is that health of Body is the Salt of all outward blessings which without it have no relish or savour neither Riches nor Honours nor Delights for the Belly or Back can yield the least Pleasure where this is wanting So that the enjoyment of it alone may well be set against many other Wants And better it is to enjoy health without other additional-comforts then to possess them under a load of Infirmities And yet I may still say Quid Palea ad Triticum What is the Chaff to the Wheat Though it be the greatest outward good that God bestowes in this Life it is nothing to that Peace which passeth all understanding Sickness destroyes it Age enfeebles it and Extremities imbitter it But it is the Excellency of this divine Peace that it worketh joy in Tribulation that it supports in Bodily languishments and creates confidence in death Who is it that can throw forth the Gauntler and bid defiance to Armies of Trialls to persecution distress famine nakedness peril and sword But he whose heart is established with this Peace the ground of which is Gods free love the Price of which is Christs satisfaction the Worker of which is the Holy Spirit and the Subject of which is a Good Conscience This was it that filled old Simeons heart with joy and made him to beg a Dimission of his Saviour whom his eyes had seen his armes embraced and his Soul trusted in What a strange thing is it then that there should be so few Marchant-men that seek this goodly Pearl which is far above all the Treasures of the Earth that are either hid in it or extracted from it Many say Who will shew us any good but it is David onely that Prayes Lord lift up the light of thy Countenance upon us Others like the scattered Israelites in Egypt go up and down gathering of Straw and Stubble when he like an Israelite indeed in the Wilderness of this World seeks Manna which his Spirit gathers up and feeds upon with delight and then cries out Thou hast put gladness in my heart more then in the time that their Corn and their Wine increased It is the love of God shed abroad in the heart that doubleth the sweetness of prosperity and sweetens also the bitterness of asfliction A wonder onely therefore it is not that few should seek but a much greater that any in this World should live without it Can any live well without the Kings Favour either in his Court or Kingdom And yet there are many places wherein such Persons may lie hid in his Dominions when the utmost ends of the Earth cannot secure them against Gods frownes But if any be so profligate as Cleopatria-like to dissolve this Jewel of Peace in his Lusts and to drink down in one prodigious draught that which exceeds the World in its price and yet think they can live well enough without it let them consider how they will do to die without it Sweet it is in life but it will be more sweet in death â—t is not then the Sun-shine of Creatures but Saviourshine that will refresh them It is not then Wine that can cheere the heart but the Blood of Sprinkling that will pacifie it The more Perpendicular Death comes to be over our head the lesser will the shadow of all Earthly comforts grow and prove useless either to asswage the paines of it or to mitigate the feares of it What is a fragrant posie put into the hands of a Malefactor who is in sight of the Place of Execution and his Friends bidding him to smell on it or what is the delivering to him a Sealed Conveyance that Intitles him to great Revenues who hath a few minutes onely to live But O what excess of joy doth fill and overflow such a poor Mans heart when a Pardon from his Prince comes happily in to prevent the Stroak of death and to assure him both of Life and Estate This is indeed as health and marrow to the bones And is it not thus with a dying Sinner who expects in a few moments to be swallowed up in those flames of wrath the heat of which already scorch his Conscience and cause Agonies and Terrors which imbitter all the comforts of life and extract cries from him that are like the yellings of the damned I am undone without hope of recovery Eternity it self will as soon end as my misery God will for ever hold me as his enemy and with his own breath will enliven those Coles that must be heaped upon me Of what value now would one smile of Gods Face be to such a person how joyfull would the softest whisper of the Spirit be that speakes any hope of Pardon or Peace would not one drop of this Soveraign Balm of Gods favour let fall upon the Conscience heal and ease more then a River of all other delights whatsoever Think therefore upon it O Christians so as not any longer through your own default to be without the sense of this Blessing in your hearts that so in life as well as in death you may be filled with this Peace of God which passeth all understanding If Prayer will obâ—ain it beg every day a good look from him the light of whose Countenance is the onely health of yours If an holy and humble Walking will preserve it be more carefull of doing any thing to lose your Peace then to endanger your health remember that Peace is so much better than health as the Soul is better then the Body But Grant Holy Father however others may neglect or defer to seek Peace with thee and from thee yet I may now find thy Peace in me by thy Pardoning all my iniquities and may be found of thee in Peace without Spot and blameless in the great day Meditation LV. Vpon a Looking-Glass VVHat is that which commendeth this Glass is it the Pearl and other precious stones with which the Frame that it is set in is richly decked and enammelled or is it the impartial and just representation which it makes according to the Face which every one that beholds himself brings unto it Surely the Ornaments are wholly forraign and contribute no more to its real worth then the Cask doth to the goodness of the Wine into which it is put or the â—ichness of the Plate to the Cordial in which it is administred That for which the Glass is to be esteemed is the true and genuine resemblance which it makes of the object which is seen in it when it neither flatters the Face by giving any false Beauty to it nor yet injures it by detracting ought from it To