Selected quad for the lemma: love_n
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A59239
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Of devotion By J. S.
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Sergeant, John, 1622-1707.
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1678
(1678)
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Wing S2585A; ESTC R220098
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48,774
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178
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his own holy will and that prayers for Virtue are such makes us firmly hope out petition will be granted and a Hope thus rais'd renders our wish of it far more efficacious as we experience passes in our selvs in other matters when we are assur'd of getting them and as it were just upon the point of attaining them This Hope also fixes and comforts our Thoughts in confidence of having already gain'd some and of attaining yet more by which means they are kept up and continu'd in the pursuit of what we ask for and relapse not into a stupid want of expectation 5ly While out minds are more rais'd by Prayer to an ardent Love of God our Will is proportionably rais'd to a more fervent wish of Virtue which is already known to be the proper means to attain him In the same manner as one who knows certainly a Treasure is hid in such a place and is his if he will go for it is very prompt to wish nay resolute to get and use means to obtain it Whereas on the other side that is when our thoughts are not made lively by Prayer the thoughts of Heaven being so distant and hard to be represented by fancy it seems but a kind of dry speculation and dull in comparison 6ly Since as was said the nature of our soul is such that to know any thing what ever is to have that very thing in our Understanding and that Prayer improving this Knowledg to a Liveliness or expresness it becomes Active to obtain it or which is all one it becomes Will it follows that by much and lively thinking and conceiting the Goodness of Virtue we arrive to have it in our Will I mean we have in our Will a Disposition to Act according to right Reason inform'd by Faith that is indeed we have attain'd Virtue this being its very Nature and Definition Lastly since as was shown before by Prayer the Soul is to some degree inferior indeed but yet truly Deify'd or made one with God that is with him who includes Eminently all Virtues or rather is those very Virtues Essentially it follows necessarily that the soul addicted to Prayer especially when she Prays knowingly and thence raises her self to Love must have all Virtues in her nay be those very Virtues according as her pitch of Love of God advances her and her present state in this life will permit her § 10. From this Doctrine we may draw these Consequences First that though we ought to pray for Temporal Goods always with resignation and conditionally there is no need of adding either of these cautions when we pray for Virtue but we may wish it absolutely without any measure or stint since we are sure 't is alwayes of it self agreeable to Gods Will and our own true Good in asking or desiring which God's Goodness has limited no Man You 'l say then one may wish as high a Pitch of Virtue as the greatest Saints had nay that of our Blessed Lady her self 'T is answer'd Since the means to arrive at so high a Degree of Virtue as others is to wish it with as pure an Intention and as fervently as they do none is to wish the End without the proper means to it but to labour all they can to put the means that is to gain a fervent desire of it from God by Prayer qualify'd according to all the Particulars above-said as that of those Saints was and then they may be sure 't is absolutely God's Will both as Author of Nature and Super-naturals that Effects should spring out of Proper Causes and Immediate Dispositions Nay we know this with a greater Assurance than that any Effect of Nature will succeed For example Fire burn or Rain wet For it becomes God's Goodness sometimes to alter the Course of Nature miraculously for higher Ends even when Natural Dispositions are ready and require to produce Natural Effects but it can never consist with his sweetest Goodness to hinder those from having Virtue who are immediately dispos'd for it Whether those that pray shall attain an Immediate Disposition to so high a Virtue as those had is another Question But it is certain God has laid no Commands upon any to deterr him from doing his best to attain it but has propos'd Saints to our imitation absolutely and not to a Degree only For as the saying is He that aims at the Sun though he be sure he shall never his his Mark yet he will shoot higher than he that aims only at a Bush. But how high Steps every particular Soul ought to take at once belongs to Super-natural Prudence and Discretion of Spirits and therefore 't is the proper Office of a Wise Ghostly-Father to determin it And his only Care must be to be sure the Soul proceeds still by Immediate Dispositions for otherwise the taking great Leaps at once in a Spiritual Progress generally strains the Connaturality of Devotion and ends in Indevotion or Sloth In a word Let him that prayes be only attentive to ask Virtue of God with as much Fervency as he will and then leave the Effect to Him who is a Faithful Promiser and a full Rewarder 11. Secondly Since this Assurance is so great let him that Prayes ask his true and certain Good Virtue without any wavering or doubting but with an absolute Confidence in God's Goodness or Mercy For can we be surer of any thing than that a Miracle shall not hinder the Effect if we put the Immediate Dispositions to it by Prayer And this Security we have of attaining Virtue if we pray for it fervently and as we ought 12. Thirdly The same Certainty is of the Effect if one Prays for the Forgiveness of his Sins For Prayer being a hearty Wish of what we pray for made Fervent by those Advantages we have above enumerated it follows that it moulds as it were and frames the Soul into an absolute and resolute Will of forsaking Sin and warms it with Affection to her true Good But great Care must be had of praying God to pardon our Sins while yet our Wills are ty'd fast to the sinful Objects For that were to require of Him to do more than Miracle Love of God alone finally or the Holy-Ghost in their Hearts being the only Remission of Sins and the Love of any Creature otherwise than in order to that Love being the proper Notion of Sin So that as impossible as it is that we should Love God alone finally and a Creature above or not in order to him both at once which is no less than a direct Contradiction so impossible it is that Sin should be pardon'd till the Inordinate Affection be taken from the Objects of it 13. But what shall those poor Sinners do who have not a Will to leave Sin or at least but a divided Will as was St. Augustin's Case before his Conversion which he so complainingly descants upon in his Confessions I answer They must still take the same Method that is
more agreeable to us taking us as we are thus dispos'd renders the Soul more Operative for it which Active Disposition of the Mind to pursue any thing it judges agreeable or Good we use to call Love § 2. Whence again are seen two considerable advantages in Prayer in which also the sum of our Christian Life is contain'd viz. to beget a fervent and hearty Love of God in our hearts and to enable us to over-come all Temptations both which are perform'd by rendering the Idea's of the Goods of the other Life very Lively and as it were Bright in our minds for this done they will be sure to work Love of Heaven above all things in our Hearts if they be not that very Love it self which will efface or at least dim with their far more resplendent Lustre the gay appearances of false and transitory goods and so preserve the Soul from being deluded by her three spiritual Enemies For which Reason they that are in Temptations are as much bound in Conscience to apply themselves to Prayer as a man in danger to lose his Life by a distemper he feels growing upon him is bound to make use of such helps as Physick assists us with nay rather much more according as the greater concern of the thing and the greater Certainty of the success and Cure are more powerful motives to make them act and endeavour to seek a remedy § 3. Now the Love of Heaven being thus wrought in our minds by Prayer and Love being unitive of the Soul to the Object belov'd according to the common saying dictated by our natural thoughts that if two love one another they are all one 't is farther discover'd how incomparably Prayer dignifies and ennobles the Soul this to a great degree beyond what meer knowledg that is knowledge staying in speculation and not render'd efficacious by considerative Prayer could have effected If then every Power receives a different degree of Nobleness in proportion to the Object it is employ'd about Nay if in our case it becomes It intellectually and be in a more intimate manner united to it by Love and the Object of the Soul while in Prayer is Gods own Infinite Essence it follows that Prayer which being at once Studious and Affective performs both these advances a Soul to so high a Pitch of Dignity that not all the Potentates of the Earth and Learning of the Wise nor Riches of both the Indies conspiring together no not the whole innumerable Host of Angelical Natures joining all their force can raise her to that heighth of Dignity that Vicinity to the Divine Nature as Prayer can do Who then that loves true Nobility and the solid Perfection of his Soul but will apply himself to the means of gaining so high Preferment And how strangely is the indevout part of the World Frantick who look upon Prayer as an idle Bigottery and Fruitless Entertainment of our mind in aiery conceits without any farther Effect or Benefit § 4. For the same Reason a Soul unimploy'd in Prayer and so unconcern'd to frame lively Idea's of the goodness of Heaven's blissful State that is how beautifying and ennobling an Object Gods Essence is but makes some Creature the study of its Affective Thoughts and first Love of its Will becomes that Creature though never so base and wretched and never advances higher She is Married as it were to that mean Object by her giving it her Love and is debased or rais'd to that degree of Vileness or Dignity as is found in the thing to which she is Espous'd if it be Earth she is Earthy if it be Flesh she is Carnal if Money she is no more worth than shining dirt is if Honour she is Empty and Aiery And justly too since she had the means to advance her self by Prayer and rather chose to ly groveling on the ground and wallow in the dirt than raise her head by it to the Glorious Fountain of all true Excellency § 5. From what is said may be collected also What advantage accrues to Souls by their Devotions to Angels and Saints in Heaven First they that intend to benefit themselves by this way ought to frame in their thoughts a most exact Idea of the holy and happy state the Blessed enjoy how full of Conformity to Gods Will and thence how not only Inclinable but unchangeably fixt to follow Right Reason and act according to Highest Virtue in all things how boundlessly their Souls are enlarg'd by Charity to embrace all the World and wish them from their Hearts and unenuiously all the goods they see they can possibly be capable of even though they see it will be greater than their own How their Understanding Power is replenish'd with a most Incomparable Glory or surrounded with Rays of most pure and most bright Light of Knowledge and their Wills most indissolubly united with and immerst most intimately in the boundless Ocean of all Goodness By which means those happy Persons become Deify'd or rais'd to such a Dignity that all the Glories of the World put together are empty beggery and worthless trash in comparison of that noble and close Relation to the Divinity or which is more Union with it § 6. Particularly of the Saints it is fit devout persons first chuse those whose state here was agreeable to their own to some degree then attentively read their Lives soberly writ regarding more their solid virtues proposed there to their Imitation than the Esclat of their Miracles which are but the likely signes of true goodness and need an eminent and constantly practised Virtue accompanying them to make them such since the power of doing Miracles Prophesying and the like has been granted even to Heathens on some occasions as St. Hierom and the Fathers inform us Having thus gain'd a lively Character of the particular Spirit that such a Saint has if we cultivate it in our minds with a high Esteem of it and of the Saint as endow'd with such and such Virtues and so let it sink into our Wills and grow a desire to attain it and all this be heighten'd and made more lively and more Efficacious by applying to the Saint himself by Prayer or invoking him to obtain of God's Goodness that portion of his virtuous Spirit which he sees fitting for us we shall at length be wrought up an endeavour to imitate him going along into the very genius of that Saint and as it were become him and make his Merits ours not by Extrinsecal Imputation as if because we daily ask't Virtue for the Saints sake without any other disposition on our part they are shar'd out to us and as it were extrinsecally apply'd to our Wills and so better our interiour Let none flatter themselves with such Hopes for Catholick Faith admits no Extrinsecal Imputation of Christ's Merits much less of those of the Saints But this is perform'd by proposing their Virtuous Example as an Object which by being penetrated lively and thence desir'd heartily