Ancients both Greek and Latine they will tell us wonders but let us hearken to Holy Scripture and Fathers First Immisit Deus soporem in Adam cumquè obdormivisset tulit unam de costis ejus replevit carnem pro eá aedificavit Deus costam quam tulerat in mulierem Adam particeps Angelicae curiae intravit in sanctuarium Dei August l. 9. de Genes ad lit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aquila 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Symach 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tertul. Accidentium spiritus in Genesis chap. 2. where the creation of woman is declared it is said that God caused a profound sleep to steal upon Adam and that being asleep he drew woman out of his side These words are very considerable What meaneth it that God before he made woman caused sleep to steal into the eyes of Adam I will not here tell you that some have glossed that he could not have admitted this production of woman in any other manner but I affirm with the Septuaginta this sleep was an extasie with Saint Augustine that it was a repture and with others a trance of spirit For he then had need enough to fortifie himself with consideration since woman came into the world who would bid him many battels Poor Adam fell into an apoplexy into a convulsion into swooning fits as already feeling the cross thwartings passions and afflictions he should receive from woman Moreover who can but admire the phrase which the Scripture useth in this creation where it is said woman was built Good God! what meaneth this thou already hadst erected so many goodly buildings Heaven and earth the high and low stations of the world thou hadst created Adam with a plentiful concurrence of many parts and yet the Scripture saith not thou then didst build but when woman was to be created God built God made his first piece of architecture And why It is because woman is a house wherein the heart of man should inhabit who is alas there but too often captive Or is it that a woman costs as much in making as a fair house To build a house you must have so much sand lime stone timber iron-work manufactures hands strokes of hammers masons carpenters and to dress and attire a woman so many coiffs kerchiefs cawls so many false hairs paintings gowns petticotes chopins verdingals whalebones so many carcanets gold chains jewels gemmes attendants that a house were almost as soon built as a woman furnished What doth she when she is built Saint Augustine saith she becomes the scholler of a serpent the gate of sin the fountain of errour and the rust of pietie Good God! what unhappiness is this If from the side of man a flaming dart or keen sword had been drawn they would have done less hurt than an evil woman which I speak without prejudice of the virtuous The first woman ungrateful towards God a traiteress to her husband a murderess of her race made a bridge for Satan to pass into the world and needs would lodge him in her heart whom God had confined to the deep pit of hell Others who have prostituted themselves to evil for these five thousand sixe hundred and thirtie years that the world hath circumvolved have acted upon this large Theatre of many forms so many bloudy tragedies that they make histories to blush thereat The daughters of Loth the Thamars Athaliaes Jezabels Vasties Helenaes Fredegondaes approve it and their ashes also incessantly produce others into the world Work-mistresses of all mischief Alas Mothers instruct your daughters well whilst they are young breed them up in the fear of God frame them to duty imprint on their tender hearts as with a searing-iron the love of chastity modesty in their behaviour and devotion in their souls And you young men who suffer your selves to be cheated and deceived by impudent women permitting them to bewitch you with love-drinks and wicked attractives open your eyes and behold the precipice before you and then I doubt not you will abhor it Trust not their familiar conversation Efficacissimum est glutinum ad capiendas animas mulieris August and dalliances know they are full of danger and that there is not any can resist them without the particular grace of God Strength little availeth the Sampsons sunk to the ground Wisdom is to seek the Solomons fell Valour therein is short the Davids found it Sanctity is not free from their batteries the Elishaes were persecuted by women and the John Baptists therein lost their heads That venerable face those eyes enflamed with heavenly rays which won reverence from the wild beasts of the desert could not mollifie a female dancer That wise head where the maxims of eminent virtues resided was taken from the shoulders of a Saint carried in a dish to a banquet by the sacrilegious hands of a shameless woman That tongue from whence distilled a stream of honey was pricked and pierced with a bodkin wherewith the wretch used to curle her hair Now according to the counsel of Saint Chrysostom take into your hands this bloudy head ask of it O head which should never die who hath drenched thee into the wanness of death Who hath bathed thee in this bloud Who hath put out thine eyes the torches of the elect and thunder-strokes of the wicked Who hath layed an eternal silence on that tongue which first of all announced the Kingdom of Heaven The love of women Lyons and Tigers reverenced me in wildernesses and women massacred me in a Kings Palace women mingled my bloud with wine and made me as a pompous morsel of their tragical banquets When I say this I not onely accuse women but carnal men who suffer themselves to be allured and surprized with sottish love and trampling under foot the honour of God the presence of Heaven and Angels the conjugal bed and faith promised to their wives wallow themselves in execrable adulteries which fill families with opprobrie confusion and tragedies why say I families nay Kingdomes and Empires and if we will well examine it we shall find the greatest part were turned topsie-turvie by foolish love O you that sigh hearing speech of the furious disorders this unhappy sin brings into the world I beseech you with Saint Paul by the very bowels of our Lords mercy offer your bodies to God as an hoast lively holy and acceptable to the Divinity and you especially who are in the state of marriage entertain your beds honourable and chaste cemented with a perpetual knot of faith love and peace that God may please thereon perpetually to shower down from on high his holy benedictions and after the course of this painful life crown you with comforts in the glory of the Blessed The thirty fifth SECTION That the evils of marriage ought not to be imputed to sex but sin and of the disorders committed in this Sacrament IF the unhappiness of marriages proceeded onely from women we might necessarily conclude they were alwayes unfortunate
can ought avail me Ruffinus notwithstanding insisted protesting he would instantly perswade the Bishop what ever he pleased He failed not to find out the Bishop but the Saint gave him a very sharp reprehension advising him rather to dress his own wounds than intercede for others for he partly understood that he had a hand in this fatal counsel Ruffinus notwithstanding plyed it all he could and endeavoured to charm this man with fair words saying finally for conclusion he would immediately accompany the Emperour to the Church S Ambrose who was ever very serious answered If he come thither as a Tyrant I will stretch out my neek but if in quality of a Christian Emperour I am resolved to forbid him entrance Ruffinus well saw the Bishop was inflexible and went in haste to advise the Emperour not yet on this day to hazard his approach to the Church He found him on his way as a man distracted that had the arrow in his heart and hastened for remedy and he saying he had dealt with the Bishop It is no matter saith Theodosius let him do with me what he please but I am resolved to reconcile my self to the Church S. Ambrose advertised that Theodosius came went Aedicula jaculatoria out and expected him at the door of a little Cell seperated from the body of the Church where ordinarily salutations were made Then perceiving him environed with his Captains Come you oh Emperour saith he to force us No saith Theodosius I come in the quality of a most humble servant and beseech you that imitating the mercy of the Master whom you serve you would unloose my fetters otherwise my life will fail What penance replieth the holy man have you done for the expiation of so great a sin It is answereth Theodosius for you to appoint it and me to perform it Then was the time when to correct the precipitation of the Edict made against the Thessalonians he commanded him to suspend the execution of the sentence of death for the space of thirty days after which having brought him into the Church the faithfull Emperour prayed not standing on his feet nor kneeling but prostrated all along on the pavement which he watered with his tears tearing his Psal 118. Adhaesit pavimento anima mea vivisica me secundùm verbum tuum hair and pitifully pronouncing this versicle of David My soul is fastened to the pavement quicken me according to thy word When the time of Oblation was come he modestly lifted up himself having his eyes still bathed with tears and so went to present his offering then stayed within those rayls which seperated the Priests from the Laity attending in the same place to hear the rest of Mass Saint Ambrose asked him who set him there and whether he wanted any thing The Emperour answered He attended the holy Communion of which the sage Prelate being advertised he sent one of his chief Deacons which served at the Altar to let him understand that the Quire was the place of Priests and not of the Laicks that he instantly should go out to rank himself in his order adding the Purple might well make Emperours not Priests Theodosius obeyed and answered that what he had done was not on purpose but that such was the custom of the Church of Constantinople Yea it is also remarkable that returning afterward into the East and hearing Mass at Constantinople on a very solemn festival day after he had presented his offering he went out of the Quire whereat the Patriarch Nectarius amazed asked him why his Majesty retired in that manner He sighing answered I in the end have learned to my cost the difference between an Emperour and a Bishop To conclude I have found a Master of truth and to tell you mine opinion I do acknowledge amongst Bishops but one Ambrose worthy of that title Behold an incomparable authority which was as the rays of his great virtue and sanctity from whence distilled all that force and vigour which he had in treating with all men I imagine I hitherto have exposed the principal actions of S. Ambrose to the bright splendour of the day and so to have ordered them that all sorts of conditions may therein find matter of instruction It hath not been my intention to distend them by way of Annals but historical discourses proper to perswade virtue So likewise have I not been willing to charge this paper with other particular narrations which may be read in Paulinus Sozomen Ruffinus and which have exactly been sought out by Cardinal Baronius suitable to his purpose I conclude after I have told you that Paulinus his Secretary witnesseth he writing by him a little before his death saw a globe of fire which encompassed his head and in the end entered into his mouth making an admirable brightness reflect on his face which held him so rapt that whilest this vision continued it was impossible for him to write one word of those which Saint Ambrose dictated As for the rest having attained the threescore and Death of S. Ambrose fourth year of his age he was accounted as the Oracle of the world for they came from the utmost bounds of the earth to hear his wisdom as unto Solomon and after the death of Theodosius Stilicon who governed all held the presence of Saint Ambrose so necessary that he esteemed all the glory of the Roman Empire was tied to the life of this holy Prelate In effect when on the day of holy Saturday after his receiving the Communion he had sweetly rendered up his soul as Moses by the mouth of God a huge deluge of evils overflowed Italie which seemed not to be stayed but by the prayers of this Saint Let us I beseech you pass over his death in the manner of the Scripture which speaketh but one word of the end of so many great personages and let us never talk of death in a subject wholly replenished with immortality Oh what a life what a death to have born bees in his first birth on his lips and at his death globes of light in his mouth What a life to be framed from his tender age as a Samuel for the Tabernacle not knowing he was designed for the Tabernacle What a life to preserve himself in the corruption of the world in a most undefiled chastity as a fountain of fresh water in midst of the sea What a life to arrive to honour and dignities in flying them and to have enobled all his charges by the intefrity of his manners What a life not to have taught any virtue before he practised it and to become first learned in examples before he shewed himself eloquent in words What a life so to have governed a Church that it seemed a copy of Heaven and an eternal pattern of virtues What a life to have born on his shoulders the glory of Christendom and all the moveables of the house of God! What a life to have so many times trampled the head of
on thy part what ingratitudes on mine Preserve me in what is thine and wash away with the precious bloud of thy Son what is mine Shelter me under the wings of thy protection from so many shadows apparitions and snares of the father of darkness and grant that though sleep close my eys yet my heart may never be shut to thy love Lastly fall asleep upon some good thought that your night as the Prophet saith may be enlightened with the delights of God and if you chance to have any interruption of sleep supply it with ejaculatory prayers and elevations of heart as the just did of old called for this reason The crickets of the night Thus shall you lead a life full of honour quiet and satisfaction to your self and shall make every day a step to Eternity The marks which may amongst others give you good hope of your predestination are eleven principall 1. Faith lively simple and firm 2. Purity of life exempt ordinarily from grievous sins 3. Tribulation 4. Clemency and mercy 5. Poverty of spirit disengaged from the earth 6. Humility 7. Charity to your neighbour 8. Frequentation of the blessed Sacrament 9. Affection to the word of God 10. Resignation of your own mind to the will of your Sovereign Lord. 11. Some remarkable act of virtue which you have upon occasion exercised You will find this Diary little in volume but great in virtue if relishing it well you begin to put it in practice It contains many things worthy to be meditated at leisure for they are grave and wise precepts choisely extracted out of the moral doctrine of the Fathers Though they seem short they cost not the less pains Remember that famous Artist Myrmecides employed more time to make a Bee than an unskilfull workman to build a house EJACULATIONS FOR THE DIARY In the Morning MY voice shalt thou hear in the morning O Lord In the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee and will look up Psal 5. 3. Thou shalt make thy face to shine upon me and all the beasts of the forest shall gather themselves together and lay them down in their dens Psal 184. 22. My dayes are like the dayes of an hireling Untill the day break and the shadows flie away Job 7. 1. Cant. 4. 6. Beginning a good work In the volume of the book it is written of me I delight to do thy will O my God yea thy Law is within my heart Psal 40. 7. 8. In good Inspirations The Lord God hath opened mine ear and I was not rebellious neither turned away back Isaiah 50. 5. At Church How amiable are thy Tabernacles O Lord of hosts Psal 84. 1. Before reading Speak Lord for thy servant heareth 1 Samuel 3. 9. Speaking My heart is inditing a good matter I speak of the things which I have made touching the King Psal 45. 1. Eating Thou openest thine hand and satisfiest the desire of every living thing Psal 145. In Prosperity If I do not remember thee let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth If I prefer not thee above my chief joy Psal 137. 6. Adversity The Lord killeth and maketh alive 1 Sam. 2. 6. Shall we receive good at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil Job 2. 10. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glorie Luke 24. 26. Troubles Surely man walketh in a vain shew surely they are disquieted in vain Psal 39. 6. Calumnies If I pleased men I should not be the servant of Christ Gal. 1. 10. Praises Not unto us O Lord not unto us but unto thy Name give glorie Psal 115. 1. Against vain hope As a dream when one awaketh so O Lord when thou awakest thou shalt despise their image Psalm 73. 20. Pride Whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased Luke 14. 11. Covetousness It is more blessed to give than to receive Acts 20. 35. Luxury Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ 1. Cor. 6. 15. Envy He that loveth not his brother abideth in death 1 John 3. 14. Gluttony The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink Rom. 14. 17. Anger Learn of me for I am meek and lowly in heart Matth. 11. 29. Sloth Cursed be he that doth the work of the Lord negligently Jer. 48. 10. Rules of Faith God cannot be known but by himself What is to be understood of God is to be learned by God Hilar lib. 5. de Trin. God doth not call us to the blessed life by hard questions In simplicity must we seek him in piety profess him Idem lib. 10. Remove not the ancient bounds which thy fathers have set Prov. 22. 28. Many are the reasons which justly hold me in the bosom of the Catholick Church Consent of people and nations Authority begun by miracles nourished by hope encreased by charity confirmed by antiquity August lib. De utilitate credendi To dispute against that which the universal Church doth maintenance is insolent madness Idem Epist 118. Let us follow universality antiquity consent Let us hold that which is believed every where always by all Vincentius Lyrinensis De profanis vocum novitatibus Acts of Faith Lord I believe help thou mine unbelief Marc. 9. 24. I know that my Redeemer liveth c. Job 19. 25. Hope Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for thou art with me Psal 24. 4. I will be with him in trouble I will deliver him and honour him Psal 90. 15. Charity Whom have I in heaven but thee and there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee My flesh and my heart faileth but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever Psal 73. 25 26. Feed me O Lord thy suppliant with the continual influence of thy Divinity This I request this I desire that vehement love may throughly pierce me fill me and change me into it self Blosius PRAYERS for all Persons and occasions For the Church WE beseech thee O Lord graciously to accept the prayers of thy Church that she being delivered from all adversitie and errour may serve thee in safety and freedom through Jesus Christ our Lord. For the King WE beseech thee O Lord that thy servant CHARLS by thy gracious appointment our King and Governour may be enriched with all encrease of virtue whereby he may be able to eschew evil and to follow Thee the Way the Truth and the Life through Jesus Christ our Lord. For a Friend ALmighty and ever-living Lord God have mercy upon thy servant N. and direct him by thy goodness into the way of eternall salvation that through thy grace he may desire those things which please thee and with his whole endeavour perform the same through Jesus Christ our Lord. For Peace O God from whom all holy desires all good counsels and all just works do proceed give unto us thy servants that peace which the world cannot give that both our hearts may be set
glory Do you refuse me A truth doth not gall your ears when you have understood and diligently considered it if it please you not you may reject it But I beseech God the Father of light and mercy may open your heart and eyes to resolve you herein accordingly Importance of the choise of religion matters very considerable to his holy will It is a matter of no small importance to handle the affairs of salvation We well know we have an immortal soul which shall survive to all eternity either in the bosom of the glory of Heaven or in the flames of the damned we well know by what gate it entered into this life and where it at this present sojourneth but we understand not by what passage when or how it shall issue out We have nothing here more certain than death nothing more uncertain than the hour and manner nothing so assured in the other world as to find there a judgement of God a Heaven for virtues a hell for sin nothing so doubtful as the determinate sentence of your process nothing so absolutely confirmed as that one cannot be saved without true Religion and Truth worthy to be embraced De fide ad petrum Diacon c. 48. Qui extra Ecclesiam Catholicam praesentem finiunt vitam in ignem aeternum ituros Quantascumquae elemosynas fecerint si pro Christi nomine etiam sanguinem fuderint nullatenus posse salvari nothing so controverted by the malice of Satan as the verity of religion Notwithstanding if you erre in the choice you make ship-wrack before you weigh anchour and so long as you remain in errour nothing can save nor deliver you from eternal damnation For it is a belief of all Christianitie witnessed by Saint Fulgentius in the book which he composed of faith that all those who shut up the course of their life out of the true Church although they have filled the world with hospitals and shed their bloud for the name of Jesus Christ cannot free themselves from the eternal torments of hel See wretched soul if at this dreadful hour of death and Gods judgement you find your self miserably deceived by your Ministers under the pretext of Scripture whither will you have recourse Verily whatsoever is said to you you well know in your conscience that dying in the faith of S. Lewis S Bernard S. Francis who have directly opposed yours you have all the possible assurance of a good religion nor do I thinke you have so laid downe all shame that you condemn so great and illustrious personages You are not ignorant that all innovation is dangerous Assurance of the Catholick but principally in matter of faith They that follow the main current and generality of a religion ancient and well-grounded cannot perish but by falling from heaven cannot stumble in their belief but by intombing themselves in the ruins of Christianitie which God neither can nor will suffer to be lost according to his promises They which adhere to novelties sail in a sea of monsters and tempests without pole-star without rudder without Pilot without any other guid than their own judgement which cannot choose but very easily deceive them If there be flames in hell employed in the punishment Danger of noveltie in religion of sinfull souls there is no doubt but they shall chiefly be inflicted on them who have laboured to rend the garment of Jesus Christ to break the connexions and seames of the Church to strike at the lawfull powers ordained by God to throw disorder fire and bloud into the state of their Prince What horrour will it be in this great and general day when you shall see your innocencie by association of religion engaged to the enormitie of so many disastrous crimes which you must expiate with paines which shall have no other limits but eternity Enter again into your self a little and afford so much patience as to know your self For if you desire to proceed with all security I advise you three things First to have a spirit throughly discharged of Three things necessary to dispose ones self in religion First to avoid prejudice Mirrour of Smyrna Pausanias anticipations bold animofities and apprehensions which raise mistes even among the most resplendent lights of truth It is said that heretofore at Smyrna a citie of Greece there was a false mirrour kept in the Temple which did represent the most beautiful and amiable faces with notable deformitie and on the contrary gave to creatures ugly and misshapen a lustre of borrowed and wholly imaginarie beautie Your Ministers in the false glasse of their Doctrine represent the Romane Church to you this lovely and chaste spouse of Heaven as a monster composed of all sorts of abominations you have your ears perpetually beaten with the seven hills of Rome with Antichrist with the horned beast with Idolatries and superstitions which they maliciously obtrude to us If you remaine fixed in these perswasions how can you doe other but hate that which you know not On the contrary you are made to behold a sect which you well know to have been begun by a general revolt from superiour powers by scandalous sonsualities and an infinite number of cruelties as a celestiall Doctrine beautifull radiant under the pretext of Scripture which is a meer subject to fancie and considering it under this veyle you love it and as Nero who through an emerald beheld the flames and bloud of his countrie and found it a pleasant mirrour so whilest you view the pretended Religion under a veyle all seemeth beautiful and goodly to you Take away for one hour at least this partiall prejudicate spirit drunke with passion and take another calme reposed settled which hath an indifferent care for each part The second thing is you must not too much Second disposition to avoid the sprâ—it of quarrels and eager contentions Indeflexo motis adversandi studium persistit ubi non rationi voluntas subijcitur sed his quae studemus dectrinam coaptamus Hilarius 10. de Tri. Truth in the calm Non in commotione Dominuâ— In sibilo aurae tenuis Reg. 3. 19. Omnes disputare malunt quam vivere Sence A singular axiom of Chrysol and Tertullian Qui sidem quaerit rationem non quaerit Quid A thenis Hierosolymis Quid Academiae Ecclesiae Nostra institutio de porticu Salomonis est quae monet Deum in simplicitate cordis querendum Chrys serm 58. Tertul. de prescrip stick upon petty curiosities of a thousand controversies and unprofitable disputations Truth ordinarily is therein ill handled under the shadow of cherishing it it is haled this way and that way with such boldnesse that it seemeth every one would dis-member it and each man take his share away with him After so many stabs and stocâ—adoes on this side and that side no other fruit is derived but yea and no and the soul oft-times findeth it selfe as much void of peace and reason as
with lawful and necessary circumstances touch the motive without extravagancies and the intention which hath excited us to do it and continuance of the sin to represent the state of the soul to the life Yet for all this you must not so much think upon this preparation nor the means to unfold your self that thereby the principal part of penance be neglected which is contrition This contrition is a sorrow to have offended God Contrition not principally for the deformity of sin and the fear of punishment for that is nothing but attrition but for that this sin is committed against God infinitely good and infinitely amiable and for that one maketh a firm resolution to be confessed and to preserve himself from sin in time to come Behold the point of contrition which to attain you must seriously and advisedly represent to your self the greatness goodness power wisdom justice love mercy benefits of God opposed to your malice weakness Hostility of sin baseness ignorance presumption misery ingratitude and well figure to your self the hostility of mortal sin to obtain an eternal detestation against it To consider how it ruineth riches honours credit reputation posterity and Empires That it soyleth the glory of an innocent life and leaveth a character of infamy That it overthroweth bodies health good grace that it openeth the gates of sudden and unexpected death That it maketh man blind dumb deaf wicked senseless stupid savage and many times furious and enraged by the remorse of conscience That it dispoileth a soul of all the graces beauties excellencies priviledges love favour of God hope of life and salvation That it killeth it and rendeth it more cruelly than a tiger or panther That a life of God was needful to take away such a blemish and that if a soul be spotted at the hour of death an eternity of flames cannot deliver it and such like In sins which seem least you shall always have great cause of contrition when the benefits of God shall be represented unto you which he particularly and personally hath conferred upon us opposed to our childishness of heart tepidity slackness infidelity negligence ingratitude As for the proceeding Proceeding in confession to confession the preparatives being well made it is needful to choose a Confessour who hath four qualities jurisdiction reputation knowledge discretion and after you have confessed to him entirely faithfully sincerely to accomplish the penance enjoyned you with obedience promptness and punctual diligence afterward to take a new spirit to resist temptations and to busie your self in good works with more courage than ever The eleventh SECTION The Practice of Examen THe practice of Confession is made more easie Necessity of examen by the examen of conscience as well general as particular Think not too much is required of your profession if there be speech used to you of the examen of conscience Not onely the Philosophers have made it as Pythagoras Seneca Plutarch but poor barbarous Indians by the relation of Apulejus took an account every evening of the good and evil they had done each day This is it which is required of you Prepare daily a little Consistory of justice in your conscience see what passeth within your self acknowledge your defects and amend them to prevent the justice of God It is said the eclipse of the Sun causeth the earthquake and the eclipse of reason by ignorance of the interiour man produceth great disorders in the Culielm Pariâ—iens c. 12. Sacro poenite In hoc Tribunali sedet misericordia assidet autem justitia ubi quicquid contra poenitentem inscribit justitia totum delet misericordia acumen styli velut â—igens in corde poenitentis soul For the wicked spirit saith Procopius upon the first of Kings endeavoureth to use us as did the Ammonites the inhabitants of Jabes They seek to pull out our right eye and to bereave us of the sight of our selves to bury us in great and deep confusions But let us make use of all the lights which God hath given us to cast reflections into the bottom of our thoughts The conscience is an admirable Tribunal where Justice pleadeth and Mercie sentenceth All that which the me writes the other blotteth out putting as it were the point of the pen upon the heart of the penitent A good Interpreter of the Scripture relateth the Delrio ser de Conscientia vision of a wise man who on a day sought for the house of conscience and it seemed to him he beheld a Citie built with goodly architecture beautified with five gates which had as many narrow paths ending in one larger way Upon this way stood a Register who took the names of all passengers to record them Beyond that he saw two Tribunes attended by a great concourse of the common people who governed the inferiour parts of the Citie above was beheld a Cittadel wherein a great Princess commanded who had a scepter in hand and crown on her head By her side was a Ladie very ancient and venerable who in one hand held a torch with which she lighted this Queen and in the other a goad wherewith she pricked her if she governed not according to her direction The wise man amazed asked in his heart what all this train meant and he heard a voice within which said unto him Behold thy self ere thou art aware arrived at the house of conscience which thou â—oughtest for These five gates thou seest are the five senses The way where they all meet is common sense All the people which enter in by heaps are the objects of the creatures of the world which first touch our senses before they pass into the soul This Register who writeth down the names is imagination that keeps record of all things These two Tribunes are the two appetites the one is called the appetite of concupiscence which is ever in search after its desires the other the appetite of anger extreamly striving to strike at all obstacles which oppose its good either real or pretended This mass of people thou seest are the passions which make ill work in the inferiour parts of the Citie This Princess in the Cittadel with crown and scepter is reason The ancient and venerable Ladie by her side is conscience She hath a torch to shew the good way and the goad to prick those that wander In a word if Dictamen rationis spiritus corrector paedagogus animae S. Thom. 1. p. q. 79. thou desirest to know what conscience is it is a sovereign notice of good and ill which God impresseth on our hearts as with a hot iron and is very hard to be taken off Happy he who often visiteth this interiour house God hath given him and pondereth all his thoughts his words and actions to adopt them to the measures of the eternal law You know a general examen hath five parts Parts Thanksgiving invocation discussion petition resolution In thanksgiving we thank God
your Baptism which blotteth out all sins according to your maxims I were no sooner washed but I should fear to plunge my self again into an infinity of occasions which might dayly present themselves to my understanding Then would you threaten me with the judgement-day and Hell with terrours able to over whelm my mind Consider whether it would not be more to the purpose to let me persevere in my Sect therein performing all the good I may Can you think that for all this I should be excluded from the mercy of God who will save all men The wise Clotilda replyed thereunto Sir I beseeth your Majesty not to flatter your self with this specious title of mercy for there will be none in the other world for those who have performed it in this without profit Now is the time that God spareth not to stretch out his arms for your obedience if you despise him you will loose him without recovery One can never do too much for eternall life and whatsoever we suffer Paradise may still be purchased at a good penny-worth Alas Sir why do you find so many difficulties in our Religion Think you God doth wrong in desiring to make you believe things which you cannot conceive by humane reason It is he who hath made the soul of man and who accommodateth all the wheels thereof nor is there any one of them which moveth not at his pleasure What marvel is it if man offer the homage of his understanding to God If weakness submit to strength littleness to greatness the finite to the infinite that which is nothing to him who is an abyss of essence goodness wisedom and light If you make a promise to any of your servants although it be unreasonable and almost incredible yet would you have him to believe it without reply and that he take no other ground for this belief but the greatness and infallible word of your Majesty One man exacteth faith of another though both of them are but earth and dust and you think the Sovereign Creatour of Heaven and earth is unjust to make us believe that which our bruitish senses cannot comprehend Is this the submission and obedience we ow Eternal Truth Why should not I believe that three are but one that is to say three persons one onely God since I dayly find my memory understanding and will make but one soul Wherefore should we scorn to adore a Crucified man The Cross is so far from weakening my belief that there is not any thing which more confirmeth it For if the Saviour of the world had come as your Majesty to the conquest of the universe with legions horses treasures and arms he should in my opinion retain that esteem which great Captains hold but when I consider that by the punishment of the Cross he hath reduced the whole world under his laws and planted the instrument of his excessive dolours even on the top of Capitols and the heads of Monarchs I affirm that all is of God in such an affair since there is nothing in it of man Alas Sir if you have a faithful servant who would suffer himself to be tormented and crucified to make you Master of a rebellious Fort would not you find more glory in his loyalty than ignominy in his torments And think you if the Eternal Wisdom having taken a humane body and voluntarily exposed it to extream rigour to wash our offences in his bloud and subdue the pride and curiosities of the earth to the power of Heaven it hath done ought therein reprehensible Have we not much more cause to adore the infinite plenty of his charities than to dispute upon honours which onely consist in the opinion of the world I beseech your Majesty figure not to your self our Religion as an irksome and austere Law when you have submitted to the yoak God will afford you so much grace that all these difficulties which you apprehend will no more burden you than feathers do birds And although it should happen you after Baptism fall into some sin which God by his grace will divert the bloud of Jesus Christ is a fountain which perpetually distilleth in the Sacraments of the Church to wash away all our iniquities Sir I fear least you too long defer to resign your self to the many advertisements which you have received from Heaven If you weigh the favours that God hath done to your Majesty having set a Crown on your head at the age of fifteen years having preserved you against so many factions defended you from so many perils adorned you with so much glory honoured you with so many prosperours successes you shall find he hath reason to require at this time from you what he demandeth of your by my mouth What know you whether he have chosen out yâ—â—r person to make you a pattern to all other Kings and constitute you such in France as Constantine hath been in the Roman Empire which will render you glorious in the memory of men and happy in Heaven to all eternity Verily Sir if you yield not your self up to my words you ought to submit to the bloud of so many worthy Martyrs who have already professed this faith in your Kingdom you ought to submit to so many great Confessours as knowing as Oracles of as good life as Angels who denounce truth unto you You ought to submit to miracles that are every day visibly done at the Sepulcher of great S. Martin which is an incomparable treasure in your Kingdom Sweet-heart answereth the King say no more you are too learned for me and I fear least you should perswade me to that which I have no desire to believe and although you had convinced my soul to dispose it to this belief think you it would be lawful for me so soon to make profession of your faith You see I am King of an infinite people and have ever at my commanda great Nobility who acknowledge no other Gods but those of the Country Do you believe that all spirits are so easy to be curbed and that when I shall go about to take a strange God will it not make them murmur and perhaps forge pretexts to embroil something in my Kingdom For Religion and the State are two pieces which mutually touch one another very near one cannot almost stir the one without the other the surest way is not to fall upon it and to let the world pass along as our predecessours found it Clotilda well saw this apprehension was one of the mainest obstacles of his salvation and she already had given good remedy thereunto practising the dispositions of all the greatest of the Court. Behold the cause why she most stoutly replyed thereunto Sir it is to apprehend fantasies to form to your self such imaginations You are a Prince too absolute and too well beloved to fear these commotions but rather much otherwise I assure you upon mine honour your people are already much disposed to receive our Religion and your Nobility
father which was done he remaining unknown in the Citie of Sydon But that he was now returned as from the gates of death to demand his right as being the indubitate and lawfull heir of the Kingdom This Impostour had gained a subtile fellow a servant of Herod's houshold who taught him all the particulars of the Court the better to colour his counterfeiting He led the Bear through all the Citie with good success and great applause of the people who embraced this false Alexander as a man returned back from the other world For besides that the Jews were credulous enough in any thing which flattered them they were ever much inclined to the race of poor Mariamne whose son this man counterfeited to be under this pretext he was very welcome into all the Cities where there were any Jews and the poor Nation freely impoverished themselves to afford some reasonable support to this imaginary King When he saw himself strong in credit and coyn he was so confident as to go to Rome to question the Crown against Heroa's other sons there wanted not those whereof some countenancing him by credulity others through the desire they had of alteration bare him to the throne He failed not to present himself before Augustus Caesar the God of fortune and distributour of Crowns shewing he had been condemned to death by his own father through false rumours but was delivered by the goodness of the God he adored and the mercifull hands of the ministers of execution who durst not attempt on his person beseeching him to pitie a fortune so wretched and a poor King who threw himself at his feet as before the sanctuary of justice and mercy Every one seemed already to favour him But Augustus a Monarch very penetrating perceived this man tasted not of a Prince for taking him by the hand he found his skin rough as having heretofore exercised servile labours Hereupon the Emperour drew him aside saying Content thy self to have hitherto abused all the world but know thou art now before Augustus to whom thou must no more tell a lie than unto God I will pardon thee on condition thou discover the truth of this matter but if thou liest in any one point thou art utterly lost This man was so amazed with the lustre of such majesty that prostrating himself at his feet he began to confess all the imposture Augustus perceived by the narration he was none of the most daring in impostures and said Friend I give thee thy life on condition thou ransom it in my Galleys thou hast a strong body and canst well labour the Scepter would have been too full of trouble I will have thee take an Oar in hand and live hereafter an honest man without deceiving any As for the Doctour who had been Tutour to this counterfeit Alexander the Emperour observing him to be of a spirit more crafty and accustomed to evil practises caused him speedily to be put to death One might make a huge Volume of such Impostours as have been entrapped in their tricks but satisfie your self with experience of Ages and if you dare believe me take in all your affairs a manner of proceeding noble free sincere and true throughly perswading your self what the Wise-man said That he who goes forward with simplicity walketh most confidently XII MAXIM Of REVENGE THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That it is good to reign over men like a Lion and take revenge not permitting fresh favours to abolish the memorie of old grievances That mildness and pardon is the best revenge THis maxim of the prophane Court more properly proceeds from the throat of Tygres and Lions than the lips of men but being harsh in execution it is ever direfull in it's effects The experience How this maxim opposeth common sense of Tiberiuses Caligulaes Neroes Domitians Herodes and so many other who have pursued this with events so tragical and lives so monstrous are fit lessons to convince a heart which yet retaineth some humanity All power imployed onely to hurt is ever pernicious Notable verities and having made havock it resembleth the ruins of buildings which overwhelm not any but such as they oppress by falling on them Man is a creature more tender than any other and must be handled with much respect Nor is there any bloud so base which ought not to be spared as much as justice and reason may permit The most part of men in these miseries and weaknesses of nature seldom hit upon innocencie but by passing through many errours He who cannot tolerate some one banisheth all virtue He must necessarily excuse many things within himself who pardons nothing in another If he think himself a God his nature ought to be mercie and if a man the experience of his own faults should render him more favourable to the like in another It is a strange folly to think greatly to prosper by rigour For all done through fear being forced cannot be of long lasting unless the course of humanity fail The savage beast is then much to be dreaded when he sees the knife on one side and rails on the other There is no strength so feeble which becomes not fierce upon the defensive within the limits of necessity A man who menaceth every one with blows of a cudgel sword or fire should remember he is not a Briareus with an hundred hands and hath but one life Now becoming cruel and inexorable he makes himself an enemy of all mankind which hath so many hands and so many lives Such an one thinks he is well accompanied in revenge who shall find himself all alone in peril Then let us here say there is nothing so Sovereign The scope of the discourse for the government of men as the love of a neighbour clemency and pardon and that the character of an excellent nature is to forgive all other so much as reason may permit and to pardon nothing in himself Love is the first law of nature and last accomplishment Excellencie of love of our felicity Love from all eternity burneth in the bosom of the living God and if he breath with his Word as he doth with a respiration substantial he breaths nought but love He respiteth this love by necessity within himself he inspireth it by grace out of himself and lastly draws all to himself by love The worthy S. Dyonisius in the book of Divine attributes Division of love 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 S. Dyoni distinguisheth three sorts of love one is called circular the other love in a right line and the third oblike Circular love properly is that which carrieth the soul with full flight into the bosom of God and there holds it as in a sweet circle of ravishing contemplations which transport it from perfection to perfection never finding end or beginning in the Divinity Love in a right line is that which tends directly to creatures by wayes not onely lawful and lawdable loving them for God of God and in
river Miser qui porcum esurit defecit in saginam Chrysol serm de prodigo Plato 9. de Rep. such an one there is who hath sold himself for the life of a hog who will never have his fill of hogs draft as S. Peter Chrysologus said of the prodigal child Men covetous of bodily riches would willingly make themselves horns and claws of iron to speak with the wise Plato of purpose to take and defend the one his wealth the other his loathsome pleasures Many times iron gates must be broken to purchase a fruition Inorditate love of health which draweth along with it a thousand disturbances Behold how a man who is excessively enamoured of his own health becomes suppliant and servile to his bodie He fears his proper dyet all kind of airs are dreadful to him nor can he take but with distrust those very comforts which afford him life He makes of his stomach a soyl of drugs he perpetually consulteth with his Physicians he tells his infirmities to all the world he seeks out extraordinarie cures as he often hath imaginarie diseases he lives in an afflicting equality would many times rather transgress Gods ten commandments than fail in one of Hypocrates aphorisms I leave you to think what death were not much sweeter than health so religiously preserved See now on the other side a worldly woman who Slavery of women Cultus magna cura magna virtulis iâ—ria Cato Censorius feeleth her beautie that short tyrannie already in the wain and yet would cherish it in the opinion of men who heretofore adored it or of such likewise who may be taken in the same snare What doth not this silly creature to make her self to be esteemed fair What time wasteth she not to seem slender to wash paint to divide the white well to mingle the red to powder her hair to make her self ey-browes to preserve the whiteness of her teeth to set a vermillion tincture on her lips little patches like flies on her cheeks choose stuffs and think of new fashions What torture inflicteth she not on her bodie with those iron stayes and whale-bones How many turns maketh she dayly before a looking-glass What perplexities of mind what apprehensions least her defects may appear And what discontent when after such torments so miserably ended she sees her self despised by men before she becomes the food of worms What Captain of a Galley was ever so cruel to fettered slaves as vanity and love of the body are to the soul Pursue the track of all other pleasures and you shall find them painful and dolorous and in the end you will be enforced to say there is no worse bondage than that which is afforded to wretched flesh The Prophet Scribe ei super huxum Isai 30. 8. Observation upon Esay Flower of box Esay speaking of punishments due to sinners worldlings saith they are written on box whereupon we may say with S. Hierom it is to shew the lasting of it since characters graven on such kind of wood cannot so easily be taken off But I here consider a secret which teacheth me box bears no fruit onely satisfied to produce a flower which otherwise making a goodly shew killeth bees that suck it The Prophet in this figure presented to us a lively image of pleasure which surprizeth the eyes by a vain illusion whilest it conveieth poison into the heart Rest then assured you shal never meet with solid contentment of mind but by the wayes the Saviour of the world shewed us on earth to transfer us to Heaven The just are here below as Life of the Just little halcyons on the trembling of waters or nightingales on thorns They find their joys amongst holy tears and their delights in austerities of life There is nothing so Sovereign as early to accustom to depend little on your body and quickly to forsake a thousand things by election which you shall be enforced to abandon of necessitie When a manner of virtuous life is chosen and which hath some austerity in it custom makes it sweet grace fortifieth it perseverance nourisheth it and glorie crowns it How many worldlings dayly putrifie in a miserable condition who have from their tender age yielded all submission to their flesh and how many delicate bodies in monasteries have we seen which the whole world condemned to the beer from their entering into religion to go out of hair-cloth ashes fasts as a Phoenix from her tomb A life without crosses is a dead sea which breedeth nought but stench and sterility but austerity is like the Aegyptian thorn which had an excellent grace in crowns We are called to Christianity to bear a God crucified Glorificate portate Deum in corpote vestro on our flesh and as it were impressed with the Characters of Divine love Let us carefully preserve our selves from prostituting members to sensuality made to be the Temple of the living God and the ornament of Paradise Holy Job was in state so lamentable that those who beheld him could scarcely tell whether it were a man reduced into a dunghil or a dunghil into the shape of a man Notwithstanding in the midst of these smarting dolours which over-ran all his body and the afflictions which assailed his mind he received so unspeakable comforts from God that himself confesseth to have nothing so strange in his own person as his proper torments Behold the reason why he exalted Mirabiliter me crucias Job 10. himself on his dunghil as upon a throne of virtue he adorned himself with his wounds as with a royal purple he took the Scepter in hand over all effeminacies of body and pronounced Oracles unto us which to all Ages shew that there is neither evil nor affliction wherein God maketh not his miracles of our pains and his glorie of our rewards The thirteenth EXAMPLE upon the thirteenth MAXIM The Miserable event of Lust AMMON the Son of DAVID IT is not one of the least miseries of the greatest of all evils I mean sin that the ill example which often accompanieth it doth likewise survive it It is to say truly a most bitter fruit of this direful tree or rather a scien which it in growing produceth and which being fed from it's sap stands upright after the fall of it Nor is it strange that when once the mercy of God onely able for this great work hath stifled the monster sin in the soul of parents yet fails it not though wholly dead to infect their families and poison their posteritie with the stench of it's ordure David that great Prince that King according to Gods heart had lost the affections and sweet indulgencies of it by an adultery and an homicide He afterward weepeth he humbly prayeth he lowdly cries and God who is willing to be moved turneth his eyes from his crimes and that he may no more hereafter see them applies the sponge to cleanse them yet behold long after Ammon one
and of our own fantasies to follow the counsel and will of those that are superiour unto us The eleventh an insensibility of the troubles that happen in adversity The twelfth an entire mortification of judgement and will that we follow all the inspirations of God as true dials the Sun He who hath proceeded therein thus far maketh a true annihilation of himself and an excellent oblation of all that he is But if you cannot give the whole tree with such perfection yet give at least the fruits desiring in conclusion to offer up all your faculties senses functions words works and all that you are remembering that saying of S. Chrysostom That it is the most wicked avarice to defraud God of the oblation of our selves Offer to the Father your memory to fill it as a choice vessel with profitable things to the Son your understanding to enlighten it with eternal truth to the Holy Ghost your will to enkindle it with his holy flame Say particularly to the Incarnate Word with the devout virgin Gertrude The ninth SECTION The manner of offering our selves to God O My sweet Saviour illuminate my intentions with thy light and support my weakness by thy mercy I recommend the small service which I shall do this day to the unspeakable sweetness of thy heart and set it from hence forward before thine eyes to direct correct and perfect it I offer it and all that I am to thee with my whole affection both for my self and all the faithfull and I offer it unto thee in the union of that most perfect intention which thou hadst when thou prayedst upon earth to thy Father in Heaven The tenth SECTION Of Contrition The fourth Act of Devotion THis is an Act exceeding necessary in so dangerous an estate and so great frailty as we continually live in Theodoret in his Questions upon the Scripture saith That there are three kinds of life intimated by the three sorts of creatures mentioned in Abraham's sacrifice Gen. 15. 9. There is a Natural life represented by the four-footed beasts a Mourning life figured in the Turtle a pure and innocent life signified by the young pigeon Natural lives are very frequent in the world Dove-like very rare but there is no Dove so pure but always needs the mourning of the Turtle This is the reason why we should not pray almost at no time without stirring up some acts of Contrition Every one knows contrition is a detestation of sin beyond all things most detestable taking beginning from the love of God and hope of his mercy and ought always to be accompanied with a firm resolution of amendment Its first foundation is the belief of a living God of a God clear-sighted of a God dreadfull in all his judgements from whence a servile fear of the pains due to sin is begot even in the most stupid hearts Thunder causeth Doves to fawn and raiseth tempests and earth-quakes in the soul Then Hope ariseth above the horizon scattering amorous beams through the assured confidence we have to obtain pardon for our sins by undergoing the yoke of Repentance Then beginneth the love of God in the soul to free and discharge it self of the interests of earth that it may at last bring forth that heavenly grief which is begot like pearls of the dew of heaven Oh blessed a thousand-fold are they that wash themselves with that snow water which holy Job mentioneth Job 9. 30. and cleanse themselves in the wholesom pool of repentance Stir up acts of contrition often for all sins in general and especially for those defects and imperfections whereunto you are most subject with a firm purpose to oppose them strongly and by Gods help to root them out Say to that end as followeth The eleventh SECTION A form of Contrition FAther I have sinned against heaven and before thee and am no more worthy to be called thy son having paid so great bountie with contempt and so many benefits with ingratitude I grieve not at the pains I suffer for my rebellion but I grieve for having offended a God who ought to be loved and honoured above all things Where can I find punishment enough to be avenged on my self and tears enough to wash away my offences Father from hence forward the face of sin shall be more hydeous to me than hell Make me as one of thy hired servants My God thou art our Father and we are nothing but earth and dust in comparison of Thee Thou art our Maker and we are all but clay in thy hands My God be not incensed against so weak so wicked an object My God have not the sins of my life past in rememberance The twelfth SECTION Of Petition or Request The fifth Act of Devotion A Certain great Emperour coming into Aegypt to shew the zeal he had to the publick good said to the Aegyptians Draw from me as from your river Nilus but what can be drawn from a man but hopes which swell like bubbles of water till they burst It is from God that we must draw for he is a fountain which perpetually distilleth who quenching the thirst of all the world hath himself but one which is saith Gregory Nazianzen that all men should thirst his bounty We must necessarily beg of God seeing our necessities constrain us and his bounty invites us we must beg of him according as he himself hath taught us in the Lords Prayer which is the sum of all Divinity we must ask in his Sons name and with confidence to obtain We must pray for the Church for the Pastours for our King for publick necessities for our selves for our neighbours we must pray for spiritual and temporal blessings according to occasion as far as is lawfull For which purpose it is good to have a collection of prayers for all occasions like a little Fort furnished with all pieces of battery to force even heaven it self with a religious fortitude and a pious violence Desire of God every morning at least That you may not offend him That you may not want Grace Light and Courage to resist those sins whereunto you are most enclined That you may practise those virtues that are most necessary for you That you may be guided and governed this day by Gods providence in all that concerns your soul body and outward things That you may obtain new graces and assistance for the necessities of your neighbours which you may then set before him Say for your self and for all those that concern you this form of prayer used by Thomas Aquinas The thirteenth SECTION A Form of Petition O God give unto me and to all those whom I commend in my prayers an Understanding to know thee an affectionate Devotion to seek thee a Wisdom to find thee a Conversation to please thee a Perseverance boldly to wait on thee a Faith happily to embrace thee My God so order it that I may be wounded with thy sufferings in repentance that in this life I may use thy blessings
composed a brief form of Confession making the penitent say thus Father I accuse my self That I have been disquieted with anger exasperated with envy puffed up with pride and have thereupon fallen into an inconstancy of mind scoffings slanders and excesses of speech I accuse my self That I have been more ready to judge my superiours than to obey them That being reprehended for my faults I have murmured and shewed my self refractory in matters of duty I accuse my self That I have preferred my self before my betters vaunting and boasting with much vanity and presumption of all that belonged to me and despising others with mockery and derision I accuse my self That I have neglected the duty of my own charge and ambitiously aimed at others I have neither had respect to obedience nor modesty in my words nor government in my carriage but much self-opinion in my intentions hardness in my heart and vain-glory in my words I accuse my self That I have been a Hypocrite stiff in hatred and aversion from my neighbour biting in speech impatient of subjection ambitious of honour covetous of wealth slothfull in works of Charity and Devotion in conversation unsociable and many times uncivil I accuse my self That I have been ready to speak of the actions of others rash in censuring contentious in arguing disdainfull in hearing presumptuous in informing others dissolute in laughter excessive in pleasures of tast and in gaming costly in apparel burthensom to my friends troublesom to the peacefull ungratefull to those who have done me any good harsh and imperious to such as were under my charge I have boasted to have done that which I did not to have seen what I saw not to have said what I said not and on the contrary have dissembled and denied to have seen what I have seen to have said what I did say and to have done what I did do I accuse my self of carnal thoughts impure rememberances dishonest motions which I have not soon enough resisted They who live more dissolutely shall find as Hamartolus a Greek Authour saith that they have great accounts to cast up at the audit of concupiscence wherefore they may examine themselves concerning kisses touchings softness pollutions fornications adulteries abuse of marriage and other sins called monstrous adding also impieties sorceries divinations false oaths perjuries blasphemies calumnies contentions disobediences injustices oppressions falsehoods thefts usuries sacriledges and the like You must not think that there can be made a Form of Confession like a boot fit for all legs consciences are as faces every one hath its diversity what Saint Bernard hath said in general may serve for a direction yet must it be particularized with the circumstances expressing the intention quality manner and continuance of the vice The twentieth SECTION An excellent Prayer of S. Augustine for this exercise taken out of a Manuscript of Cardinal Seripandus O God behold the stains and wounds of my sin which I never can nor will bide from the eyes of thy Majesty I feel the smart of them already in remorse of my conscience and other sufferings ordained by thy providence for my correction but all that I suffer cannot equal my demerit I onely wonder that feeling the pain of sin so often I still retain the malice and obstinacy of it My weakness boweth under the burden yet my iniquitie remaineth immoveable My life groaneth in languishments yet is not reformed in its works If thou deferre the punishment I deferre my amendment and if thou chastise me I can no longer endure Whilest thou correctest I confess my offence but after thy visitation I remember my sorrows no more As long as thou hast the rod in hand to scourge me I promise all But if thou withdraw it I perform nothing If thou touch me I crie out for mercy and if thou pardon I again provoke thee to strike O Lord God I confess my miseries and implore thy clemency without which there is no salvation for me O God give me what I ask of thee though without any merit of mine since without any merit of mine thou hast taken me out of nothing to ask it of thee The one and twentieth SECTION Of Communion the chiefest of all acts of Devotion with a brief Advice concerning the practise of it AS for Receiving remember the six leaves of the Lilly which it ought to have I mean desire and purity before you present your self at it Humility and Charity in presenting your self thanksgiving and newness of spirit after you have presented your self And if you desire to know the qualities whereby you may discern a luke-warm Communion from a fervent I say that a good Communion ought to be light som savoury nourishing effectual Lightsom in illuminating you ever more and more with the light and truth of faith which begets in you an esteem of divine things and a contempt of the worldly fading and temporal Savoury in making you to relish in will and sense what you know by the light of understanding Yet if you have not this last in a tender and sensible devotion be not discomforted at it for sensible devotion will often happen to those that have least charity as Richardus observes upon the Canticles Affectuosa dilectio interdum officit minùs diligentem It is sufficient that you have good habits of virtue in the upper region of your soul Nourishing in keeping your self in a good spiritual estate in good resentments of Heavenly things in good affections towards the service of God free from driness leanness and voluntary barrenhess Effectual in applying your self immediately to the exercise of solid virtues humility patience charity and the works of mercy for that is the most undoubted mark of a good Communion It is good to present your self with sincere intentions pondered and fitted to occurrences communicating as Bonaventure observes sometimes for remission of sins sometimes for remedy of infirmities sometimes for deliverance out of some affliction sometimes to obtain a benefit sometimes for thanksgiving sometimes also for the help of our neighbour And lastly to offer up a perfect praise to the most blessed Trinitie to commemorate the passion of Jesus Christ and to grow daily in love toward him To this end before you communicate you may say this Prayer of Thomas Aquinas O Most sweet Jesus My Lord and Master O that the force of thy love subtiler than fire and sweeter than honey would engulf my soul in an Abyss drawing it from all inordinate affections to things heneath Heaven that I might die with love of thee since out of love thou didst vouchsafe to die on the Cross for me And after Communion make these Petitions of S. Augustine O God let me know thee and let me also know my self Let the end of my desires be ever where thou art O god let me hear no hatred but to my self nor love but to thee and be thou the beginning progress and the end of all my actions O God let me humble my self
which desires so earnestly to praise and confess thee everlastingly Alas O eternal Sweetness wouldest thou damn a soul which hath cost thee so much sweat and bloud giving it for ever to those cruel and accursed powers of darkness Rather O Lord pierce my heart with such a fear of thy judgement that I may always dread and never feel them If I forget awake my memory if I flie from thee recal me again If I deferre my amendment stay for me If I return do not despise my soul but open those arms of mercy which thou didst spread upon the Cross with such rigorous justice against thy self for satisfaction of my sins The Gospel upon Tuesday the first week in Lent out of Saint Matthew 21. JESUS drove the Buyers and Sellers out of the Temple ANd when he was entered Jerusalem the whole City was moved saying Who is this And the people said This is Jesus the Prophet of Nazareth in Galilee And Jesus entered into the Temple of God and cast out all that sold and bought in the Temple and the tables of the bankers and the chairs of them that sold pigeons he overthrew and be saith to them It is written My house shall be called the house of prayer but you have made it a den of thieves And there came to him the blind and the lame in the Temple and he healed them And the chief Priests and Scribes seeing the marvellous things that he did and the children crying in the Temple and saying Hosanna to the Son of David they had indignation and said to him Hearest thou what these say And Jesus said to them Very well have you never read that out of the mouthes of infants and sucklings thou hast perfected praise and leaving them he went forth out of the Citie into Bethania and remained there Moralities 1. JEsus entering into Jerusalem went streight to the Temple as a good Son goes to his Fathers house as a High-Priest to the Sanctuary and as a sacrifice to the Altar He doth very lively interest himself in the goods of his Heavenly Father and chaseth out every prophane thing out of that sacred place to give thereby glory to the living God and to put all things in order It is a wicked stain to Religion when Ecclesiastical persons are vicious and when Churches are profaned Saint John Chrysostom saith That Priests are the heart of the Church but when they are wicked they turn all into sin A decaying tree hath always some ill quality about the root so when any people are without discipline the Pastours are without virtue The want of reverence in Churches begets the contempt of God they cannot have Jesus in their hearts when they give him affronts even in his own Temple 2. His house saith he is a house of Prayer but your heart should be the Sanctuary and your lips the door So long as you are without the exercise of prayer you shall be like a Bee without a sting which can make neither honey nor wax Prayer is the chiefest and most effectual means of that Angelical conversation to which God calls us by the merits of his passion and by the effects of his triumphant resurrection It is the sacred business which man hath with God and to speak with Saint Gregory Nazianzen it is the art to make our souls divine Before all things you must put into an order the number the time the place the manner of your prayers and be sure that you pay unto God this tribute with respect fervour and perseverance But if you desire to make a very good prayer learn betimes to make a prayer of all your life Incense hath no smell without fire and prayer is of no force without charity A man must converse innocently and purely with men that desire to treat worthily with God 3. Keep your person and your house clean from ill managing all holy things and from those irreverences which are sometimes committed in Churches It is a happy thing for a man to be ignorant of the trade of buying and selling benefices and to have no intercourse with the tribunals of iniquity Many other sins are written in sand and blown away with a small breath of Gods mercy But the faults of so great impiety are carved upon a corner of the Altar with a graver of steel or with a diamond point as the Prophet saith He deserves to be made eternally culpable who dries up the fountain which should waste himself or poisons the stream which he himself must drink or contanimates the Sacraments which are given him to purifie his soul Aspirations SPirit of God which by reason of thy eminent height canst pray to no body and yet by thy divine wisdom makest all the world pray to thee Give me the gift of prayer since it is the mother of wisdom the seal of virginity the sanctuary for our evils and fountain of all our goods Grant that I may adore thee in Spirit with reverence stedfastness and perseverance and if it be thy divine pleasure that I pray unto thee as I ought inspire into me by thy virtue such prayers as thou wilt hear by thy bountie The Gospel for Wednesday the first week of Lent S. Matth. 12. The Pharisees demand a Sign of JESUS THen answered him certain of the Scribes and Pharisees saying Master we would see a sign from thee who answered and said to them The wicked and adulterous generation seeketh a sign and a sign shall not be given it but the sign of Jonas the Prophet For as Jonas was in the Whales belly three days and three nights so shall the Son of man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights The men of Nineveh shall rise in the judgement with this generation and shall condemn it because they did penance at the preaching of Jonas And behold more than Jonas here The Queen of the South shall rise in the judgement with this generation and shall condemn it because she come from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon and behold more than Solomon here And when an unclean spirit shall go out of a man he walketh through drie places seeking rest and findeth not Then he saith I will return into my house whence I came out And coming he findeth it vacant swept with besoms and trimmed then goeth he and taketh with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself and they enter in and dwell there and the last of that man be made worse than the first So shall it be also to this wicked generation As he was yet speaking to the multitudes behold his mother and his brethren stood without seeking to speak to him and one said unto him Behold thy mother and thy brethren stand without seeking thee But he answering him that told him said Who is my mother and who are my brethren And stretching forth his hand upon his Disciples he said Behold my mother and my brethren for whosoever shall do the will
silver whereof I shall never have use and still be vexed with care how to preserve it O most mercifull Lord suffer me not to be taught by hell fire that which I may have neglected to learn out of thy Gospel I most heartily renounce all luxury and pomp of the world and this carnal life which would always busie it self about my body If thou be pleased to make me rich I will be so for the poor and if thou make me poor I will make my self rich in thee who art the true riches of all thine elect The Gospel upon Friday the second week in Lent S. Matth. 21. Of the Master of a Vineyard whose son was killed by his Farmers ANother Parable hear ye A man there was an housholder who planted a Vineyard and made a hedge round about it and digged in it a press and builded a tower and let it out to husbandmen and went forth into a strange Countrey And when the time of fruits drew nigh he sent his servants to the husbandmen to receive the fruits thereof And the husbandmen apprehending his servants one they beat another they killed and another they stoned Again he sent other servants more than the former and they did to them likewise And last of all he sent to them his Son saying They will reverence my Son But the husbandmen seeing the Son said within themselves This is the heir come let us kill him and we shall have his inheritance And apprehending him they cast him forth out of the Vineyard and killed him When therefore the Lord of the Vineyard shall come what will be do to those husbandmen They say to him The naughty men he will bring to nought and his Vineyard be will let out to other husbandmen that shall render him the fruit of their seasons Jesus saith to them Have you never read in the Scriptures The stone which the builders rejected the same is made into the head of the corner By our Lord was this done and it is marvellous in our eyes Therefore I say to you That the Kingdom of God shall be taken away from you and shall be given to a Nation yielding the fruits thereof And he that falleth upon this stone shall be broken and on whom it falleth it shall all to bruise him And when the chief Priests and Pharisees had heard his Parables they knew that he spake of them And seeking to lay hands upon him they feared the multitudes because they held him as a Prophet Moralities WE have reason to fear all that is in us yea even the gifts of God All his favours are so many chains If they bind us not to do our duty they will bind us to the punishment due for that neglect Our soul is given us by God as a thing borrowed from Heaven we must not be too prodigal of it We must dig up ill roots as we do in land cultivated The time will come that we must render up the fruits and shall we then present thorns Examine every day how you profit and what you do draw every day a line but draw it toward eternity What can you hide from God who knows all What can you repay to God who gives all and how can you requite Jesus who hath given himself 2. How many messengers doth God send to our hearts without intermission and how many inspiratiosn which we reject So many Sermons which we do not observe and so many examples which we neglect Jesus comes in person by the Sacrament of the Altar and we drive him from us to crucifie him when we place the Devil and Mortal sin in his room What other thing can we expect for reward of all these violences but a most fearfull destruction if ye do not prevent the sword of justice by walking in the paths of Mercy Our vanities which at first are like small threeds by the contempt of Gods grace come to be great cables of sin He that defers his repentance is in danger to lose it and will be kept out of the Ark with the croaking Raven since he hath neglected the mourning of the sorrowfull Dove 3. It is a most horrible thing to see a soul left to it self after it hath so many times forsaken the inspirations of God It becomes a desolate vineyard without inclosure The wild Boar enters into it and all unclean and ravenous creatures do there sport and leap without controle God hangs clouds over it but will let no drop of water fall upon it The Sun never looks upon it with a loving eye all there is barren venemous and near to hell Therefore above all things we must fear to be forsaken of God Mercy provoked changes it self into severe Justice All creatures will serve as Gods instruments to punish a fugitive soul which flies from him by her ingratitude when he draws her to him by the sweetness of his benefits Aspiration ALas O great Father of the worlds family I am confounded to see thy vineyard so ill ordered made so barren and spoiled My passions domineer like wild beasts and devours the fruits due to thy bounty I am heartily sorry I have so little esteemed thy graces and to have preferred all that which makes me contemptible before thee I do this day renounce all the abuses of my soul I will grow and prosper under thy blessings I will flourish under thy aspect and fructifie under thy protection Command onely thy graces and sweet dews of Heaven which are as paps of thy favours to rain upon me and water this rotten trunk of my heart Speak to that eye of love that beautifull eye of Jesus that it will shine upon me but once with that ray which doth make souls happy for ever The Gospel upon Saturday the second week in Lent S. Luke 15. Of the prodigal Child ANd he said A certain man had two sons and the younger of them said to his father Father give me the portion of substance that belongeth to me and he divided unto them the substance And not many days after the youngest son gathering all his things together went from home into a far Countrey and there he wasted his substance living riotously And after he had spent all there fell a sore famine in that Countrey and he began to be in need and he went and cleaved to one of the Citizens of that Countrey and he sent him into his Farm to feed swine And he would fain have filled his belly of the husks that the swine did eat and no body gave unto him And returning to himself he said How many of my fathers hirelings have abundance of bread and I here perish for famine I will arise and will go to my father and say unto him Father I have sinned against Heaven and before thee I am not now worthy to be called thy son make me as one of thy hirelings And rising up he came to his father and when he was yet far off his father saw him and was moved with mercy and
running to him fell upon his neck and kissed him And his son said to him Father I have sinned against Heaven and before thee I am not now worthy to be called thy son And the father said to his servants Quickly bring forth the first stole and do it on him and put a ring upon his hand and shoes upon his feet and bring the fatted calf and kill it and let us eat and make merry because this my son was dead and is revived was lost and is found And they began to make merry But his elder son was in the field and when he came and drew nigh to the house he heard musick and dancing And he called one of the servants and asked what these things should be And he said to him Thy brother is come and thy father hath killed the fatted calf because he hath received him safe But he had indignation and would not go in His father therefore going forth began to desire him But he answering said to his father Behold so many years do I serve thee and I never transgressed thy commandment and thou didst never give me a Kid to make merry with my friends But after that thy son this that hath devoured his substance with whores is come thou hast killed for him the fatted calf But he said to him Son thou art always with me and all my things are thine But it behoved us to make merry and be glad because this thy brother was dead and is revived was lost and is found Moralities 1. THis parable is a true table expressing the excursions of a prodigal soul and her return to the mercy of God by the way of repentance Note that the first step which she trode toward her own destruction as Cain did was her departing from God not by changing of place but of heart It departed from the chiefest light which made it fall into an eclipse of reason and so into profound darkness She diverted her self from the greatest bounty which made her encline toward all wickedness being strayed from her sovereign being which made her become just nothing 2. She continued in sin as in a Countrey which was just nothing where she was vexed on all sides with disquiet with cares with fears and discontents All sins toss their followers as the ball is tossed at Baloon Vanity sends them to pride pride to violence violence to avarice avarice to ambition ambition to pomp and riot pomp to gluttony gluttony to luxury luxury to idleness idleness to contempt and poverty and that poverty brings them to all worldly misery For all mischiefs follow a wicked soul which departing from God thinks to find a better condition 3. Affliction opens the eyes of man and makes him come to himself that he may the better return to God There is no journey so far as when a man departs from himself not by place but by manners A sea of Licentiousness interposeth it self between his soul and innocence to divorce her from the way of goodness But Gods grace is a burning wind which dries it up and having brought man to himself takes him by the hand and leads him even to God 4. O what a happy thing it is to consider the effects of Gods mercy in the entertainment of the good father to his prodigal son The one had lost all which he had of a good son but the other had not lost what belonged to a good father The son had yet said nothing when fatherly affection pleaded for him in the heart of his father who felt the dolours of a spiritual labour and his entrails were moved to give a second birth to his son Though he were old yet he went the pace of a young man Charity gives him wings to flie to the embracements of his lost child He is most joyfull of that comes with him even of his very poverty This without doubt should give us a marvellous confidence in Gods mercy when we seek it with hearty repentance It is a sea of bounty which washeth away all that is amiss Since he hath changed the name of master into that of father he will rather command by love than reign by a predominant power No man ought to despair of pardon except he who can be as fully wicked as God is good none is so mercifull as God none is so good a father as he for when you may have lost your part of all his virtues you can never while you live lose the possibility of his mercy He will receive you between his arms without any other reason but your return by repentance 5. The same Parable is also a true glass shewing the life of those young unthrifts who think they are born onely for sport for their bellies and for pleasure They imagine their fathers keep for them the golden mines of Peru and their life being without government their expences are without measure Some of them run through the world they wander into all places but never enter into consideration of themselves They return from forrain parts loden with debts and bring home nothing but some new fantastical fashions cringes and corantoes There are many of them in whom pride and misery continue inseparable after they have lost their money and their brains Their fathers are causes of their faults by gathering so much wealth for those who know not how to use it Yet if they have the true repentance of the prodigal child he must not deny them pardon But mercy must not be had of those who ask it by strong hand or seek it by a counterfeit sorrow Aspirations IT is an accursed wandring to travel into the countrey of nothing where pleasure drops down as water from a storm the miserable consequences whereof have leaden feet which never remove from the heart Good God what a countrey is that where the earth is made of quick-silver which steals it self from under our feet when we think to tread upon it What a countrey is that where if a man gather one bud of roses he must be forced to eat a thousand thorns and be companion with the most nasty filthy beasts in their stinking ordures and be glad to eat of their loathsom draffe for want of other meat Alas I have surfetted and such a misery as this is necessary to make me remember the happiness which I possessed in thy house O mercifull Father behold my prodigal soul which returns to thee and will have no other advocate but thy goodness which as yet pleads for me within thy heart I have consumed all which I had but I could not consume thy mercy For that is as an Abyss which surpasseth that of my sins and Miseries Receive me as a mercenary servant if I may not obtain the name of a son Why shouldst not thou receive that which is thine since the wicked spirits have taken that which was not theirs Either shew me mercy or else shew me a heart more fatherly than thine and if neither earth nor heaven can
adore thy powers The first which torments me by loving thee is so precious that I would not lose it to drink Nectar and I can never quench it but in the streams of those delights and pleasures which proceed from the throne of the holy Lamb. The Gospel upon Saturday the third week in Lent S. John the 8. Of the woman found in adultery ANd Jesus went into the mount O livet and early in the morning again he came into the temple and the people came to him and sitting he taught them And the Scribes and Pharisees bring a woman taken in adultery and they did set her in the midst and said to him Master this woman was even now taken in adultery And in the law Moses commanded to stone such What sayest thou therefore and this they said tempting him that they might accuse him But Jesus bowing himself down with his finger wrote in the earth When they therefore continued asking him he lifted up himself and said to them He that is without sin of you let him first throw the stone at her And again bowing himself he wrote in the earth And they hearing went out one by one beginning at the Seniours and Jesus alone remained and the woman standing in the midst And Jesus listing up himself said to her Woman where are they that accused thee Hath no man condemned thee who said No man Lord. And Jesus said Neither will I condemn thee Go and now sin no more Moralities 1. MEn naturally love better to censure the life of another than to examine their own The Ravens accuse Doves and he sits often upon a Tribunal to condemn vice who doth lodge it in his heart Many resemble the Cocks which crow against a Basilisk and yet bear the seed of it in their entrails Reason would always that we begin to reform others by the censure of our own life No word can carrie such life and vigour with it as that which is followed by action To talk all and do nothing is to build with one hand and destroy with the other The land of the living shall never be for those who have their tongues longer than their arms 2. To what purpose is it to speak good words and yet lead an ill life A man can neither hide himself from God nor himself his conscience is a thousand witnesses Those who were ready to lift up their hands to stone the adulterous woman were diverted and departed with confusion seeing their sins written in the dust with certain figures to express them If we could always behold our own life before our eyes as a piece of Tapistry we should there see so many Serpents amongst flowers that we would have more horrour of our own sins than will to censure those who are like our selves 3. God shews mercy but will not suffer his mildness to be abused sin must not print its steps upon his clemency It is a false repentance for a man to act that which himself hath condemned and after so many relapses to take but one fall into everlasting pain The ordinary Gloss observes that our Saviour bended down when he wrote upon the earth to shew that the rememberance of our sins lay heavy upon him But when he began to pardon he arose up to teach us what joy and comfort he takes in the Kingdom of his mercy Aspirations O Sovereign Judge who sittest upon a Tribunal seat born up with truth and power make me rather judge mine own life than censure the lives of others Must I be full of eyes without and blind within Shew me my stains and give me water to wash them out Alas I am altogether but one stain and thou art all purity My soul is ashamed to see it self so dark before thy light and so smutted over before thine immortal whiteness Do not write me upon the ground as a child of earth write me in heaven since I am the portion which thou hast purchased with thy precious bloud Blot out my sins which are but too deeply graven upon my hands and pardon by thine infinite mercy what thou mayest condemn by justice The Gospel upon Sunday the fourth week in Lent S. John 6. Of the five Fishes and two Barly loaves AFter these things Jesus went beyond the Sea of Galilee which is of Tiberias and a great multitude followed him because they saw the signs which he did upon those that were sick Jesus therefore went up into the mountain and there he sate with his Disciples And the Pascha was at hand the festival day of the Jews When Jesus therefore had lifted up his eyes and saw that a very great multitude cometh to him he saith to Philip Whence shall we buy bread that these may eat and this he said tempting him for himself knew what he would do Philip answered him two hundred penyworth of bread is not sufficient for them that every man may take a little piece One of his Disciples Andrew the brother of Simon Peter saith to him There is a Boy here that hath five Barly loaves and two Fishes but vvhat are these among so many Jesus therefore saith Make the men sit down And there vvas much grass in the place The men therefore sate down in number about five thousand Jesus therefore took the leaves and vvhen he had given thanks he distributed to them that sate In like manner also of the Fishes as much as they vvould And after they vvere filled he said to his Disciples Gather the fragments that are remaining lest they be lost They gathered therefore and filled twelve baskets with fragments of the five Barly loaves vvhich remained to them that had eaten Those men therefore vvhen they had seen What a sign Jesus had done said That this is the Prophet indeed that is to come into the vvorld Jesus therefore when he knew that they vvould come to take him and make him a King he fled again into the mountain himself alone Moralities 1. WHat a happie thing it is to serve God whose conversation is so worthy all love See how he carried himself toward this poor multitude which followed him with such zeal and constancy It seems they were his children that he carried them all upon his shoulders that he had their names their Countries their qualities and the conditions of their small fortunes graven in his heart He is so tender over them he so afflicts himself about them as a Shepherd over his poor flock He instructs them he speaks to them of heavenly things he heals their maladies he comforts their sadness he lifts his eyes up to heaven for them and for them he opens his divine hands the treasures of Heaven and nourishes them by a miracle as they had wholly resigned themselves to him with such absolute confidence O how are we cherished by heaven since God doth bind himself to help us And we should be unfaithfull not to trust him who makes nature it self so faithfull to us It is here much to be observed
tears come from any other than the place of all delight since they issued from a brain and from eyes which were united to the divinity And how should they not water Paradise since for so many ages they have flowed over the Church for producing the fruits of justice The balm of Egypt could not grow without water of that Well which was commonly called the fountain of Jesus because the blessed Virgin had there washed the clothes of her dear Son And we have no Odour of virtue nor good conversation which is not directly barren except it be endued with the merit of our Saviours tears Aspirations O Eyes of my Saviour from whence the sun receives his clearest light fair eyes which onely deserve eternal joyes and delights Why should you this day be moistened with tears Thou dost give me O onely love of my heart the bloud of thy soul before thou shedst that of thy body There are so many things to make me weep and I feel them so little that if they tears do not weep for me I shall always be miserable Water then O my sweet Master the barrenness of my soul from that fountain of blessing which I have opened within thine eyes and heart I have opened it by my sins and let it I beseech thee bless me by thine infinite mercies The Gospel upon Saturday the fourth week in Lent S. John 8. Upon our Saviours words I am the light of the world AGain therefore Jesus spake to them saying I am the light of the vvorld he that followeth me vvalketh not in darkness but shall have the light of life The Pharisees therefore said to him Thou givest testimonie of thy self thy testimonie is not true Jesus answered and said to them although I do give testimonie of my self my testimonie is true because I know vvhence I came and vvhither I go but you know not vvhence I came or vvhither I go You judge according to the flesh I do not judge any man And if I do judge my judgement is true because I am not alone but I and he that sent me the Father And in your law it is vvritten that the testimonie of two men is true I am he that give testimonie of my self and he that sent me the Father giveth testimonie of me They said therefore to him Where is thy Father Jesus answered Neither me do you know nor my Father if you did know me perhaps you might know my Father also These vvords Jesus spake in the Treasurie teaching in the Temple and no man apprehended him because his hour vvas not yet come Moralities 1. THere is in the blessed Trinity a communicating light to which nothing is communicated another light which is communicative and communicated and a third light which is communicated but not communicating The first is the heavenly Father who gives but takes nothing The second is that of the Son who takes from his Father and gives to the holy Ghost all that can be given The third is the holy Ghost which receives equally from the Father and the Son and doth produce nothing in the Trinity But Jesus illuminating from all eternity this state for ever to be adored did vouchsafe to descend into the countrey of our darkness to scatter it by his brightness It is he that hath thrown down the Crocodiles and Bats from prophane Altars who hath broken so many idols who hath overthrown so many Temples of the adulterers and murdering gods to plant the honours of his heavenly Father He hath invested the world during so many ages with the shining of his face He doth not cease to give light nor to kindle in our hearts many inspirations which are like so many stars to conduct us to the fountain of all our happiness You are very blind if you do not see this and much more miserable if you despise it 2. It is most dangerous to do as the Jews did to speak every day to the light and yet love their own darkness Screech-owls find holes and nights to keep themselves from day which they cannot abide But he that flies from the face of God where can he find darkness enough to hide himself When he shall be within the gulf of sin his own conscience will light up a thousand torches to see his punishments It is the worst of all mischiefs to pay for the contempt of the fountain of light by suffering eternal darkness 3. Let us behold the conversation of Jesus Christ as a sea mark stickt all over with lights his life gives Testimony of his Sanctity his miracles publish his power his law declares his infinite wisdâ—m his Sanctity gives us an example to imitate his power gives the strength of Authority to make him the more readily obeyed and from his wisdom faith is given us to regulate and govern our belief Aspirations O My Lord Jesus the spirit of all beauties and the most visible of all lights what do the eyes of my soul if they be not always busied in the contemplation of thy brightness When I find thou art departed from me me thinks I am buried within my self and that my soul is nothing else but a Sepulchre of terrours phantasms and deaths But when thou returnest by thy visits and consolations I am chearfully revived and my heart leaps in thy presence as a child rejoyceth at sight of his dear nurse O Light of lights which dost illuminate man coming into this world I will contemplate thee at the sun-rising above all creatures I will follow thee with mine eyes all the day long and I will not leave thee at sun-setting for there is nothing can be in value near like thee It belongs onely to thee O Sun of my Soul to arise at all hours and to give light at Mid-night as well as at Noon-day The Gospel upon Passion Sunday S. John the 8. upon these words Who can accuse me of sin WHich of you shall argue me of sin If I say the verity why do you not believe me He that is of God heareth the words of God therefore you hear not because you are not of God The Jews therefore answered and said to him Do not we say well that thou art a Samaritan and hast a Devil Jesus answered I have no Devil but I do honour my Father and you have dishonoured me But I seek not mine own glorie There is that seeketh and judgeth Amen Amen I say to you if any man keep my word he shall not see death for ever The Jews therefore said now we have known that thou hast a Devil Abraham is dead and the Prophets and thou sayest if any man keep my word he shall not taste death for ever Why art thou greater than our Father Abraham who is dead and the Prophets are dead Whom doest thou make thy self Jesus answered if I do glorifie my self my glorie is nothing It is my Father that glorifieth me whom you say that he is your God and you have not known him but I know him
and to execute all the decrees of his divine Providence as our chiefest helps to obtain perfection Aspirations OBeauteous garden of Olives which from henceforth shalt be the most delicious object of my heart I will lose my self in thy walks I will be lost with God that I may never be lost I will breathe onely thy air since it is made noble by the sighs of my dear Master I will gather thy flowers since Jesus hath marked them with his bloud I will wash my self in those fountains since they are sanctified by the sweat of my Jesus I will have no other joy but the sorrow of the Son of God nor any other will but his O my sweet Saviour Master and teacher of all humane kind wilt thou be abridged of thine own will which was so reasonable and pure to give me an example of mortifying my passions and shall I before thy face retain any wicked or disordinate appetites Is it possible I should desire to be Lord of my self who am so bad a Master when I see the Authour of all goodness separate himself from himself onely to make me and all mankind partakers of his merits Of the apprehension of JESUS IN that obscure and dolorous night wherein our Saviour was apprehended three sorts of darkness were cast upon the Jews upon Judas and upon Saint Peter A darkness of obduration upon the hearts of the Jews a darkness of ingratefull malignity upon Judas and a darkness of infirmity upon Saint Peter Was there ever any blindness like that of the Jews who sought for the shining Sun with lighted torches without knowing him by so many beams of power which shined from him They are strucken down with the voice of the Son of God as with lightening and they rise again upon the earth to arm themselves against Heaven They bind his hands to take away the use of his forces but they could not stop the course of his bounties To shew that he is totally good he is good and charitable even amongst his merciless executioners and he lost all he had saving his Godhead onely to gain patience When S. Peter stroke the high Priests servant the patience of our Lord Jesus received the blow and had no patience till he was healed If goodness did shew forth any one beam in the garden modesty sent forth another in the house of Anuas when his face was strucken by a servile hand his mouth opened it self as a Temple from whence nothing came but sweetness and light The God of Truth speaketh to Caiaphas and they spit upon his brightness and cover that face which must discover Heaven for us The mirrour of Angels is tarnisht with the spittle of infernal mouthes and wounded by most sacrilegious hands without any disturbance of his constancy That was invincible by his virtue as the willfulness of the Jews stood immoveable by their obduration There are souls which after they have filled the earth with crimes expect no cure of their diseases but by the hell of the reprobate 2. The second darkness appeareth by the black passion of Judas who falls down into hell with his eyes open and after he had sold his soul sold Jesus and both all he had and all he was to buy an infamous halter to hang himself A soul become passionate with wanton love with ambition or avarice is banished into it self as into a direct hell and delivered to her own passions as to the Furies The Poet Hydra had but seven heads but the spirit of Avarice S. Iohn Climacus saith hath ten thousand The conversation of Jesus which was so full of infinite attractions could never win the spirit of Iudas when it was once bewitched with covetousness The tinkling of silver kept him from rightly understanding Iesus He makes use of the most holy things to betray Holiness it self He employes the kiss of peace to begin war He carries poison in his heart and honey in his mouth he puts on the spirit of Iesus to betray him This shews us plainly that covetous and traiterous persons are farthest from God and nearest to the devils 3. The third power of darkness appeared in the infirmity of S. Peter who after so many protestations of fidelity for fear of death renounced the Authour of life One of the Ancients said The greatest frailty of Humanity was that the wisest men were not infallibly wise at all times And all men are astonished to see that the greatest spirits being left to themselves become barren and suffer eclipses which give examples to the wisest and terrour to all the world God hath suffered the fall of S. Peter to make us have in horrour all presumption of our own forces and to teach us that over-great assurance is oftentimes mother of an approching danger Besides it seemeth he would by this example consecrate the virtue of repentance in this fault of him whom he chose to be head of his Church to make us see that there is no dignity so high nor holiness so eminent which doth not ow Tribute to the mercy of God Aspirations Upon S. Peters tears IT is most true saith S. Peter that a proud felicity hath alwayes reeling feet Thou which didst defie the gates of hell hast yielded thy self to the voice of a simple woman All those conquests which thou didst promise to thy self are become the tropheys of so weak a hand Return to the combat and since she hath triumphed over thee do thou at least triumph over thy self Alas I am afraid even to behold the place of my fall and the weak snares of a simple woman appear to me as boisterous chains Yet what can he fear who is resolute to die If thou find death amongst these massacres thou shouldst rather embrace than decline it For what can it do but make thee companion of life it self Our soul is yet too foul to be a sacrifice for God let us first wash it with tears I fell down before the fire and I will rise by water I have walked upon the sea to come to Jesus and I will now return to him by the way of my tears I will speak now onely by my tears since I have lately talked so wickedly with my mouth Since that which should open to speak Oracles for the Church hath been employed to commit foul treason since we have nothing left free to us but sighs and groans let us make use of the last liberty which is left us and when all is spent return to the mercy of Jesus which all the sins of the world can never evacuate I will from henceforth be a perpetual example to the Church by my fall and rising again from death for the comfort of sinners and the fault of one night shall be lamented by me alll the days of my life Moralities upon the Pretorian or Judgement-Hall 1. IN the passion of our Saviour all things are divine and it seemeth they go as high as they could be raised by that Sovereign power joyned with
fearfull maladie 135 His notorious cruelty even in his extreamest sickness ibid. His miserable death ibid. Hermingildus his retreat and conversion 325 His father's letter to him and his to his father 326 He is wickedly betrayed by Goizintha 328 His letter to his wife and his undaunted resolution 330 His death 331 His young son Hermingildus died not long after 332 A notable Observation upon the habit of a High-Priest 93 Hilarion of Costa a reverend Father 388 Hippocrates his desire how to cure the itch of ambition 56 House of the Moth. 25 House of Swallows ibid. A notable Doctrine of Hugo 61 Humility defined 468 Humiliation of Death 350 State of Humilitie 18 All the world teacheth us the lesson of Humilitie 56 The kingdom of Hypocrisie 11 Reasons against Hypocrisie ibid. Baseness of Hypocrisie ibid. Hypocrisie confuted in the great School of the world 42 Hypocrisie condemned by the Law of Heaven ibid. Deformity of Hypocrisie ibid. I JAcques de Vitry his pretty Observation 39 Idleness the business of some Great men 44 Abuse of an Idolatrous spirit 13 Jesus one and the same for Nobles and Plebeians 3 Excellent qualities of Jesus Christ 376 He is the Concurrence of all perfections ibid. Three Excellencies of Jesus in which all other are included ibid. His Sanctity Wisdom and Power 377 Practice of the love of Jesus reduced to three heads ibid. Miracles of the person of Jesus 442 Jesus entereth into his glory by his merit ibid. Suspension of actual glory in the body of our Saviour Jesus ibid. Imitation of Jesus Christ the abridgement of Wisdom 3 Images of Emperours how much reverenced 13 Impietie hath its misery 36 Impietie condemned in the Tribunal of Nature 420 Impietie chastised 451 Against Toleration of Impietie 452 Impuritie of life ariseth from three sources 85 Reasons against Inconstancie 40 Inconstancie of men 236 Indegondis transporteth the Catholick Faith into Spain 323 The persecutions of Indegondis 324 By her mediation there is a Treaty of peace between Levigildus and his son 327 The glory and greatness of that man who knows how to suffer Injuries 40 Observation of Isaiah 30. 8 406 Belief of Judgement most general 430 Judea in what condition before Herod came to the Crown 89 The causes of the corruption of Julian 373 The School of Julian ibid. How he became depraved 374 He is a Christian for policie and an Infidel in soul ibid. Prowess of Julian among the Gauls ibid. His subtility to invade the Empire ibid. His Embassage ibid. His remarkable punishment ibid. He had ill success with the qualities that Machiavel furnished him with 260 Jupiter painting goats in the Clouds what it meaneth 14 Justina an Arian requireth a Church in Milan 206 Justice and Mercy the two Arms of God 22 Necessity of Justice with its acts 89 Justice without favour very remarkable ibid. Justice of Belizarius and Aurelianus 226 Justice defined 468 K KNowledge of good and evil doth make the sin more foul 23 Knowledge of ones self very hard 69 No certain Knowledge of four things 440 L LAcedaemonians practice 381 LAdies excellent in pietie 388 Sordid Liberalitie of Emmanuel Comenus 91 Ignorance and bruitishness of Libertines 449 Arrogancy of Libertinism 450 The Table of Philo of the manners of Libertines ibid. Punishment of God upon Libertines ibid. Evil of a sleight Lie 145 Lying the key of vice 469 A Life led by opinion is ridiculous 8 Condition of this Life well described 65 Man must lead a Pilgrims Life in this world 72 Our Life is a Musick-book 84 Four sorts of Life 137 Opinion of the other Life 403 Life and Death the two poles of the World ibid. Divers kinds of Life ibid. Life was given to Cain for a punishment 414 Disturbances of Life 435 Divers wayes of humane Life according to Saint Gregorie ibid. The choice of conditions of Life is hazardous ibid. Miseries of this present Life 436 Of the Lilie with six leaves 72 Divers kinds of Love 228 229 Love turned into rage 244 The baseness of Love 375 Love of invisible things most penetrating ibid. Worldly Lovers being converted are the most servent in the Love of God illustrated by a comparison 379 Excellency of Love 399 Division of Love ibid. There is a possibility in man to love his enemies ibid. Effects of the Love of enemies in the Law of Nature 400 Loyalty of a wife to her husband 352 Lust ruineth Empires 154 Lust is a fire that burneth the garment of the soul 182 Luxurie the sin of the heel 195 Lycinius his condition 242 His end 242 Lycurgus his greatness 3 M MAgnanimitie 468 MAn a Stage-player upon the Theatre of the world 12 Three sorts of Man in every man 61 Character of the carnal and spiritual Man ibid. Of the nature and dignity of man what he hath been what he is and what he shall be 64 Man hath more non-essence than essence 350 Mans ingratitude towards God 346 Mutability of men ibid. Miseries of an indebted man 352 It is dangerous to disoblige pious and learned Men. 379 Diversitie of Men. 413 Monument of the Empress Marie 418 Five notable things in the mystery of the Mass 74 Mass a sacrifice ibid. Instructions for the Married 96 Mariamne's accusation and pitifull death 124 Martianus of whom a marvellous accident 150 His good success ibid. A great Massacre at Thessalonica 214 Maxims very dangerous used by Hereticks 183 Maxentius acteth a strange Tragedie 240 He is defeated by Constantine 241 Maximian the Baloon of Fortune 239 A remarkable speech of Maximus 79 Maximus overthrown and put to death 209 210 Meditation its definition 75 Necessity and easiness of Meditation ibid. What you must understand to Meditate well ibid. Practice and Form of Meditation consisteth in six-things 76 Seven ways to dilate ones self in Meditating in abundance upon sundry thoughts ibid. Modestie important 87 Modestie of a son of S. Lewis 418 Modestie defined 468 The actions of Modestie ibid. Marvellous contempt of money 227 Monica the mother of S. Augustine her qualities 193 Her death 198 A singular saying of Sir Thomas Moor. 90 Mother of Macchabees persecuted 348 N NAtures evils 355 NAtures voice 370 Nature delighteth in contrarieties 412 Nature the price of time 43 Nebucadnezzar nursed by a Goat 16 Nero his folly 12 Notable action of Noah 414 Nobility the first gift of God 4 Nobility not tied to bloud ibid. Against such as betray their Nobility 5 Nobility of Noah wherein ibid. Nobility of Eleazar and his excellent speech ibid. Priviledges of Nobility 8 Noble-men why ill educated 16 Nobility very much corrupted 17 Noble-mens particular obligation 20 Noble-men examples of great importance in the world 21 Noble-men appeal from the sentence of Labour 51 Disorders in corrupt Nobility 218 219 Novelty in Religion dangerous 31 Novelty ever suspected by the Wise 32 O OAths of Magistrates 90 OBedience defined 468 The qualities of an Officer 272 Onocratalus his instinct 417 Souls in the torrent of Opinion 37
from equals lasteth long by the counterpoise of power evenly balanced and wasteth wretched hearts in the search after a cursed revenge which drowneth pleasure in great acerbities and many times life in bloud We must instantly labour for reconciliation by a just satisfaction of the offended party or stand upon our guard that the enemy may not prevail The hatred of inferiours towards great ones whilst it is spread amongst the confusions of the multitude oft-times long remaineth under silence shut up as the impetuous current of a River kept in by a trench but so soon as it hath liberty it with so much fury overfloweth that it turneth men into Tygers and Leopards So we see in Histories many miserable Princes overwhelmed with the hatred of the people with a thousand inventions of cruelties which force compassion from the most obdurate All books are filled with these disastrous events but I do not think we can behold a more tragicall spectacle of popular hatred then that which is represented by Nicetas in the person of Andronicus Emperour of Horrible example of the hatred of the multitude Constantinople He entred into the Empire like a Fox by tyrannicall usurpation and covered his crimes with a dumb shew of a sophisticate devotion at which time God the avenger of iniquities was pleased to chastise him with an iron rod and to make him as an example of his justice to all posterity He fell alive into the hands of his enemy who having loaden him with injuries and contumelies abandoned him to the people for the punishment of his perfidiousnesse From that time he was entertained with all the despites which Hatred and the liberty of doing all permitted his enemies For he had buffets redoubled one upon another given him with implacable violence his hair was torn off his beard was pulled away his teeth were knocked out and not so much as women but ran upon his wretched body to torture and torment it whilest he replyed not a word Some dayes after his eyes being digged out and his face disfigured with blows they set him on an old botchy Cammel without ought else to cover him then an old shirt to lead him through publick places in the manner of a triumph This spectacle so full of horrour nothing at all mollified the peoples hearts but desperate men were to be seen to rush upon him on every side as thick as in Autumne swarms of flies fleshed with some carrion some covered him all over with dirt and filth others squeezed spunges filled with ordure on his face others gave him blows with clubs upon the head others pricked him with Auls and Bodkins and divers threw stones at him calling him at every stroke Mad Dog And there was a wicked woman of the dregs of the vulgar who threw a pail of scalding hot water upon his head that his skin pild off Lastly they hastned to hang him on a gibbet by the feet exposing him to a shamefull nakednesse in sight of all the world and they tormented him to the last instant of death at which time he received the favourable blow from a hand which thrust a sword through his mouth into his bowels without other complaint then to beseech God to have mercy on him Behold the most bloudy effects of this cruell Passion But we may say if this of the people resemble torrents that of great and powerfull ones is not unlike thunders and lightnings Many Monarchs may be compared to the mountain Mountain of Vesuvius Julius Recupitus Vesuvius near Naples which as it is written is so fertill that it yieldeth unto those who manure it a million of gold in revenue but when it comes to cast forth its all-enflamed entrails it oft-times makes as much a havock in one day alone as it brings profit in a whole Age. How many persons meet we in ancient and modern History raised to flourishing estate and enriched with the spoils of the Universe who in a moment of misfortune have lost the honours and wealth which in so many years of favours they had with full hand amassed together in their houses But most especially imperious women are ardent Hatred of women and exorbitant in their revenges when a great power combineth with Passion to replenish all with disasters Hatred shewed it self fierce and insolent in Eudoxia against S. John Chrysostome furious in Justina against S. Ambrose bitter in Theodora against Narses bloudy in Fredegonda against Pretexatus Archbishop of Roan whom she caused to be murthered at the Altar And when this Hatred is enkindled with the flame of love it self and that they in their dispose have the arms of their Amorists and servants for execution of their purposes they cause cruelties which would make the History of Man-haters and Lestrygons to blush It is good for prevention of this kind of Hatred to Means to eschue and prevent the Hatred of powerfull men have little occasion to entermeddle with such kind of people nor too eagerly to pursue the favour of great ones nor the pompous glories of worldly fortunes since its felicities like as if they were crimes never scape scot-free You must not enter too farre into the intrication of affairs and persons keep your self from slanders and mischievous strokes of the Tongue ill offices and treasons of such as have no soul to make your self recommendable by Piety Justice Liberality Moderation Sweetnesse and so many other virtues which having adorned you in prosperity raise a lustre and consolation in the bottome of adversity To this also you must adde powerfull friends who enlighten with the ray of truth that darknesse which envie ceaseth â—ot to spread over lives the most innocent and which permit not virtue to be ever oppressed by Iniquity As for such as are in charges offices dignities and commands wherein in reason alteration may be expected if they see themselves to be persecuted by publick hatred it is best for them to change their condition to find repose and especially when there are powers which will hate out of humour or levity and who shutting up all passages to Reason do onely open an ear to slander I ask whether in such a case God hath not consecrated a sanctuary for evil fortune in the pitty of a neighbour The Divine Providence never permitted that one sole man should be King of the whole world He who is persecuted in one Province passeth to another and often finds friends who wipe away his tears and gild his fetters Whilest Hatred swayeth in the Consistory of Cruelty to draw down lightnings and dart thunders on his head Joseph sold by his brethren found innumerable favours in Egypt David pursued on all sides by the envy of Saul like a wild Beast met with refuge and employment under Abimelech S. Athanasius sanctified the places of his banishment by the sanctity of his virtues S. Hillary pulled out of his Bishoprick lighted in Phrygia upon a silent repose which gave him leave to write his learned
care for affairs to cure their sadnesse It is the counsel which the Apostle gave to the Thessalonians We 1 Thes 4. entreat you my brethren to profit more and more and to endeavour to be peacefull and that attending your affairs you take pains with your hands as we have appointed you that you by your conversation may edific those who are none of ours and that you may need nothing The fore-alledged Authour notably deduceth this Text of Saint Paul with many other which he citeth shewing that a singular remedy for Sadnesse caused by Idlenesse is the occupation of the mind and body For my part I am perswaded that by this means The serupulous many scruples might be cured wherewith divers minds are now-adayes miserably turmoiled For they no sooner enter into the great representations of Gods judgement of sinnes and of the torments of the damned but they presently bear all Hell on their shoulders The thunders of the divine Justice roars not but for them and for them the lightning-slashes they build scaffolds in their heart whereon their imaginations walk they nail themselves on voluntary Crosses and bind themselves on racks making an executioner of their mind and a continuall punishment of their life All they think in their opinion is sin all they do nought but disorder and all they expect meer malediction They never have made a good Confession they have ever forgotten some circumstance they have not well summed up the number of their sinnes the Confessour hath not well comprised what they would say they must eternally begin again and for trifles of no value they must run and weary all the tribunals of Confession and employ more time then would be needfull for a man who should manage all the great affairs of France It is a pittifull thing and verily tyrants never invented so rigorous torments which superstition witty in the fruitfulnesse of its own tortures surpasseth not It so toileth the mind that the body is extremely weakned which is seen in a face discoloured and wan a brow heavy an eye troubled a heart sobbing a countenance ghastly a losse of sleep and appetite a forbearance of all recreations and pleasures of life To speak truly these poor souls are worthy of compassion for they are perpetually in most painfull Purgatories Remedies for scrupulous minds Efficaciously to comfort them they must be put into the hands of some prudent charitable and resolute man who may enter into their heart and may be as it were the soul of their soul They must be drawn from this indigested and too frequent devotion from all those generall confessions so often reiterated they must not be permitted to accuse themselves of all the vain imaginations of their interiour but of the transgressions which passe to their exteriour They must be made to account their doubtfull sinnes for not sinnes since ordinarily the scrupulous have a mind wakefull and adverse enough to themselves not to doubt of any grievous sinne great conceits must be put into them of the goodnesse and mercy of God their courage must be raised and they instead of sinnes caused to set down in writing or otherwise their good works and the favours they have received from God It is sometimes fit to change meditations into good broths to excite them with some generous thought to stirre them up some difference or suit if it be needfull to hold them in businesse interlaced with honest repose and convenient recreation to handle them sometimes a little severely to teach them to believe and to suffer themselves to be directed and to accustome them to brave this scrupulous conscience and to vaunt to have despised whatsoever it dictateth Lastly to perswade them there one is who hath answered for their soul before God and that if there be any ill in his direction he shall be damned for them and no hurt come to them thereby To commend them for their dociblenesse when they obey to let them see the fruit of their obedience in the consolation of their soul to exhilerate them to heighten them to take them from themselves and to turn them into other personages Many have been absolutely cured by these kinds of proceedings many much sweetned For there are of them who suffer all their life time their thoughts being as devils settled in some possession which never fully forsake them but they must be let to understand the crosses ordained them in this life and that undertaking a good resolution for patience they shall multiply their merits § 3. The remedy of Sadnesses which proceed from divers accidents of humane life HEnce I discover very long dilation of pleasures daily framed in so many divers occasions which makes it sufficiently appear unto us that as of all living creatures there is not any more delicate more sensible and which is waited on with such a train as man so there is none more exposed as a Butt for all accidents which are of power to occasion trouble then he Alas what is man who maketh a crime of his birth a slavery Miseries of Humane conditions of his life and an horrour of his death To salute day-light with his teares to come into the world to be instantly crucified his mouth open to cryes and hunger to bring a barren mind a frail body enraged concupiscences to be a beast so many years then an infant to feel his misery to see his poor liberty fettered to live under the fear of rods in a perpetuall restraint of will then to enter into adolescency followed by youth which causeth loud storms of passions to beare along with them the seeds of all his miseries After that a servitude of marriage an evill encounter of wives and husbands of affairs of cares of poverty of children of slanders of quarrels affronts of contumelies of bodily pains of faintnesse of spirit of ruines of families of poison of punishments of privation of all one loveth of vexations by all one hateth an old age contemptible sick and languishing Death a hundred times invoked to fly from the miserable and to lay hold of the fortunate With all this to see abysses of fire and torments prepared for sins ordinary in worldly life Who is it that trembleth not thinking upon all these objects and who saith not that one must be either well fortified with prudence to divert his evils or have patience to bear them Note that all which may afflict us is reduced to The subjects of our afflictions the losse of goods of credit of friends of incommodities of body or mind and that our miseries which we think to be infinite are confined within three small limits For all the Sadnesses which may arise from these five sources God hath given us five remedies Five remedies for all Sadnesses Sense Reason Time Necessity and Grace There are many dolouts which grow from the senses and are likewise cured by the senses We must not think all Sadnesses have ears patiently to hear the
Saint Paul doth not consist in words To build upon the Promises which were made to David concerning 1 Par. 2. 9. Solomon if there be some favourable there are also others that say That if he leave God he shall be cast away by God for ever To alledge that he was buried in the Sepulchre of his father how many of the damned have had a quiet death and a stately buriall To bring forth all the kindnesses and favours of God towards him are but so many reproaches of his unthankfulnesse The argument which is drawn from the negative which they esteem ordinarily very weak is here too strong for his condemnation For whence comes it that Nathan his Master and Partizan who wrote the Books of the Kings or caused them to be continued by Aziah and Haddo his disciples whence comes it I say that Authours so affectionate to Solomon so zealous for the honour of their Nation having undertaken to give us his story and having forgotten nothing of the least things even to the numbering of Solomons horses after they have so expresly spoken of his sinne have not added his repentance This thing was too much important for the glory of God for the reputation of their Master for the edification of their people for the example of other Kings to passe it over in silence Surely we might well accuse them either of great malice or of grosse stupidity a thing which cannot happen to Prophets which write by the inspiration of God Further who knows not that repentance ought to be followed by outward actions and conformable to the movings of the heart Who will not avouch that it ought to be testified by a renouncing of sins and all things that have drawn us to offend Where is it then spoken that Solomon had dismissed one onely of his thousand women which were those nets of his destruction Where is it written that he destroyed the Temples and beat down the Images which he had erected at the solicitations of his Mistresses We know all the contrary that these Abominations remained standing untill King Josiah who caused them to be overthrown That which causes the more fear is that by how much the more a man comes near the great understanding which they attribute to the Devils by so much also he takes the greater part in their punishment when he falls into any grievous sinne The great lights of these rare Spirits turned themselves into the flames of their punishments and their knowledge serves for nothing but to nourish the more the worm of Conscience Now as Solomon was advantaged by understanding and wisdome aboue other men and that he fell into the sinne of Apostacie and turning from God there is great danger lest God turned from him his Mercy which is used more ordinarily towards those that sinne by ignorance although culpable Adde unto all this that those which in their old age continue in the sins of unthankfulnesse which they have contracted by long habits are very hard to cure because that old men become more hardned in evil more despising all admonitions which are made to them by presuming on the authority which they think is due to their age Further also their luxury is not onely a sinne of the flesh which then lesse feels the violence of great temptations but a spirituall sinne which proceeds from a spirituall and enraged concupiscence which makes them offered professedly rather then by frailty He that shall The conclusion touching Solomons salvation well weigh this shall find that it is better to leave to the secret mercy of God that which one cannot attain by reason and to fear every thing in this life even to the gifts of heaven and ones own surenesse thereby JUSTINIAN CHARLEMAGNE Or CHARLES THE GREAT IVSTINIAN EMPEROVR CHARLEMAINE EMPEROVR AND K. OF FRANCE PRovidence is an excellent work-woman which renews yet every day in the world that which God did in the terrestriall Paradise He took clay to make a Man the most excellent piece of all the Creatures and she takes some men of the earth to make them Sovereigns and Demi-gods in the Universe This Emperour that hath filled the world with his brave Deeds and the Ages with his memory was of a very base extraction which served to him as a cloud of glory and caused a marvellous day to spring out of the deep of his obscurity The beginning of his Nobility came from his uncle Justine who having been born a Cow-herd mounted by the stairs of Virtue and of Valour even to the Throne of the Emperours of Constantinople Nature had furnished him with a good understanding with a body well made and robustuous and God had inspired into him from his most tender years a particular grace of Devotion which rendered him good officious and charitable towards all the world As he was keeping the Cows he saw passing by some men of warre who were going in an expedition against the Infidels he perswaded himself that he was very fit for that employment and stout enough to give good strokes to the enemies of God and his Religion Upon this thought he sold a cow that was his own buyes a sword and the rest of the small equipage of a Souldier bids adieu to his kindred goes and lists himself and suddenly of a peasant becomes a man of war Yet Procopius makes him so poor that he gives him nothing but a little bread in a scrip when he entred into Constantinople He passed through all the proofs of a long and laborious warfare in which he behaved himself with an exact discipline a great dexterity a courage invincible and above all with a discretion that made him lovely and gained the hearts of all the world He came to the office of an Ensign of a Lieutenant of a Captain of the Guard of a Collonel of a Generall and in the end was put amongst the Counts of the Court that were the greatest Lords of the Imperiall house Anastasius at that time was Emperour happening to die Amantius his high Chamberlain who was a very rich and a great monied man had a very earnest desire to make himself Emperour But he was disfavoured by nature having not been born a perfect man he thought therefore that he should never be liked by the Militia in so high a dignity and would needs make it fall upon Theocritus who was his creature that he might reign in him and by him with a full satisfaction of his whole desires To this end he opened his treasures and resolved to make great distributions of money to the souldiers committing the managery of the hors-men to the Earl Justin who he knew was well affected by all the world and very capable to favour his canvasing But the men of warre looking upon the hand that gave the gold and not upon the coffer from whence it came nor the design of him that did it unexpectedly proclaimed Justin Emperour whereto the Senate and the People shewed a strong inclination
Ammonites and of the Moabites that were in his army with him to know what forces that people might have that were disposed to make an opposition Then Achior Prince of the Ammonites rose up and made him a long narration of the originall and qualities of the Jews telling him by piece-meal how that Nation came from the Chaldeans and separated themselves from them by reason of Religion despising all the Gods of the Gentiles and believing but one God the Maker of Heaven and Earth He added how they went into Egypt when there was a great famine and that they were there so exceedingly multiplyed that they began to give terrour to the Egyptians who ceased not to torment them But that God revenged their injuries by horrible plagues from Heaven that made havock of all Egypt so that their Land-lords were constrained to let them go whithersoever it seemed good unto them But Pharaoh the King having made a resolution to pursue them and to destroy them utterly was burried with all his Army in the red-Sea through which that people had passed on dry-foot From thence they journeyed through the barren deserts of Arabia where their God miraculoufly nourished them giving them food from heaven and commanding the Rocks to open to them springs and fountains Furthermore he advertised Holophernes that when things were well between their Master and them they were invincible which visibly appeared by the victories they obteined over the Amorites the Jebusites and the Peresites and other Nations which they had devoured as fire would do the chaff possessing themselves of their Lands and estates But if it happened that they were defiled with some iniquity there was nothing more weak then they by reason that they were then forsaken of heaven and left to their own selves and therefore he advised him not to hazard any thing against them before he knew the condition wherein they were at present because that if they were well united to the Deity which they worshiped he should carry away nothing but confusion Holophernes Captains hearing Achiors discourse loaded him with reproches for that he had so much as a thought that so small an handfull of people and ill trained should be able to resist a Royall Army of Nabuchadonosors The Generall holds him for a mad man and commands him to be delivered to the Jews since he was a Jew in heart and affection And indeed the souldiers having taken him and bound him to a tree left him to the discretion of those of the City of Bethulia who carryed him away and having presented him to the Priests that governed and to all the Assembly of the City enquired of him of all that had passed about him He straightway made them a long discourse and exalted the Testimonies that he had given to the Majesty of their God whereat all betook themselves to weep for joy and praised the Divine Goodnesse prostrating themselves on the ground and promising all favour to their Prisoner In the mean while Holophernes causes his Troops to advance to surprize the little Bethulia but he saw himself combated by men invisible hidden in the mountains that much gauled his Army being coop'd up in very narrow passages His Captains counselled him not to torment his souldiers unprofitably but to seize onely upon the Channels of the fountains that carryed the water to the City and that would be a means to take it without putting himself to much trouble This was performed and it proved very effectuall for the people seeing themselves deprived of the commodities of those fair sources that gave them drink begin to murmur aloud against the Priests who by their rashnesse had resisted so prodigious a power against the example of so many Nations and cry out that they were better render themselves to the Assyrians then see their wives and children buried in the same tomb Ozias in the absence of Joachim appeased them by his tears and caused them to resolve on a patience of five dayes This City of Bethulia had within the circuit of its walls a great Treasure whose merit it was not yet sufficiently acquainted with It was the valorous Judith in whom Heaven had put rare qualities and God had chosen her to give safety to her countrey She was of an high extraction of the Tribe of Reuben three years and an half a Widow beautifull even to perfection of a chastity and reputation inviolable extream rich but above all devout and virtuous Shee had built on the top of her house a little Solitude whither she with her maids retired themselves to be vacant to things Divine there was her Oratory there her intercourses with God and from thence mounted to Heaven her prayers that carryed up the groans of her people even to the throne of the most High The holy Lady had her innocent flesh loaden with a rough hair-cloth fasted every day except the Saturdayes and the solemn feasts that were amongst the Jews her heart was inflamed with an incredible zeal of the glory of God and touched to the quick with the miseries of her people When she understood what had been resolved on at the Assembly and that the City was to be yielded in five dayes if it had no other relief she spake to Ozias the Prince of the people and to the Priests that governed and made them a most excellent advertisement upon what had passed at their last convention She told them That it was to tempt God to prescribe to him the time of his mercies and not to expect it of his Providence that it did not belong to men to dispose of heaven who are reserved to the disposall of their Sovereign Master that they ought onely to think upon the performance of an exact repentance for the sinnes of their life past and imploring the divine clemency with the effusion of tears which well knew how to find a remedy to so great necessities She made them understand that good men are necessarily proved by divers Tribulations and that those that bear them with patience are at last glorious before God But those that disquiet themselves and murmure have no profit by their afflictions and provoke wrath from on high that redoubles scourge upon scourge to punish their rebellion In the end she perswaded them that seeing they were the Heads of the People and that so many souls breathe not but by their breath they would not fail to exhort them to a further patience The principall men of the City were ravished with a mouth that spake so divinely and the words that issued from so fair a source had a grace incomparable to subdue the most obdurate hearts They all avowed that she was a woman according to the heart of God that had spoken worthily and that there was nothing deficient in her discourse But she submitted her self by a great humility to their judgements and beseeched them to leave one of the city gates free for her to go out at that very night accompanied with her
will if they might have had but the permission given them He saw that he subsisted not but by his favour which he abused so basely He resolved to pick a quarrell with him and asked him instantly What might a Great King do that would honour a Favourite to the highest Point Haman thinking that that Question was not made but in favour and Consideration of him Answers with an Immeasurable Impudence That to honour worthily a Favourite and to shew in his Person what a great Master can do that Loves with Passion He must clothe him with his Royall Cloak put the Kings Diadem upon his Head set him upon his own Horse and command the greatest Prince of the Court to hold his Stitrop and his Bridle and lead him through all places of the City and to Cause an Herald to Proclaime before him That it is thus that Ahasuerus honoureth his Favourites The Prince was astonished at this Insolence and to make him burst with spite said to him that his Opinion was very good and therefore he commanded him to render all those honours presently to Mordecai the Jew that was at the Palace Gate This Divel of Pride was seized with so great an amazement at that Speech that he had not so much as one word in his mouth to Reply and as he was Vain-glorious and Insupportable in his Prosperity so there was nothing more Amated or more Base in Adversity He extreamly racks his spirit to dissemble his discontent The fear of Death and Punishments due to his Crimes if he did resist the Pleasure of the King made him swallow all the bitternesse of that Cup. A strange thing Poor Mordecai that was all nasty covered with Sack-cloth and Ashes is fetched is washed is trimmed up and clad after the fashion of a King Haman presents himself to hold the Stirrop of the Horse and to lead him by the Bridle while his Enemy was shewed in Triumph to the eyes of the whole City of Shushan How much Resistance do we think he made not to accept this Honour What thoughts came into his head whether it was not a Trick of Haman that would give him a short Joy to deliver him to a long Punishment He could not believe his Eyes nor his Reason he thought that all this had been a Dream In the mean while the whole City of Shushan beheld that great Spectacle and could not be sufficiently amazed at so extraordinary a Change Haman after the Ceremony was over returns very sad unto his House deploring with his Wife and friends the sad sport of Fortune The Confusion of their troubled spirits suggests nothing to them but Counsels of despair and they say That since Mordecai hath begun sure he will make an end He was very loath to go to that Feast of the Queens he feared that it would prove a sacrifice and that he should be the offering Hester that saw that her sport was spoiled if he was not present caused him secretly to be engaged and pressed by the Eunuchs of the King who under colour of Civility conduct him to his finall Misery He enters into the Chamber of the Feast The King dissembles all that had been done there was nothing talked of at the first but of passing merrily the time away Every thing flourished every thing Laughed but Poyson was hid under the Laughter and Venome under the Flowers At the end of their Repast the King Conjures the Queen to tell him at last what it was that she desired of him because he was fully resolved to divide his Crown and Sceptre with her Then sending forth a great sigh she cryed Alas Sir I do not sue to your Majesty for any of all the Honours or the Riches of your Empire but I desire of you onely my own and my poore peoples Lives which some would overthrow Destroy and Massacree by an horrible and bloody Butchery Sir I ought no longer to disguise any thing to your Majesty God hath made me be born of that Nation which is given for a Prey under your Authority and destin'd to the Shambels It is me that they aime at If they had gone about onely to make me and my People Slaves I would have held my peace and stifled my groans But Sir what have I done that my Throat should be cut after I shall have seen the Bloud of my nearest Kindred shed before mine Eyes to be thrown as the last Sacrifice upon a great heap of Dead Bodies and Buried in the Ruines of my dear Countrey Alas Sir shew us Mercy You that are the Mildest of all Princes restore me my soul and the lives of my whole Nation The King entered into an Admiration of Extasie upon these Words and said to the Queen I know not to what this Discourse tends or where the Man or the Authority is that dares do this without my command Then she replyes He to whom your Majesty hath given your Seal that Traytor and perfidious Haman It is he that hath caused bloudy Letters to be written through all the Provinces to deliver me and my People up to Death and know Sir that his cruelty rebounds upon your head Haman quickly perceived that he was a lost man and the Palenesse of Death came at the same instant into his Face The King rises from the Table and walks into the Garden that was hard by to chew upon his Choler The Queen that had put her self into a Melancholy casts her self down upon the Bed Haman throwes himself at her feet and as a man that is drowning layes hold on what ere he meets with He beseeches her he Urges her he Conjures her to shew him Mercy and in saying so bowed himself down upon the Bed and approached very near unto her The King entring at the same time into the Chamber and finding him in that Posture How sayes he will he also violate the Queen my Wife in my Presence and in my House Let some body take him away Instantly they come and cover his Face as they were wont to do to those that were carried away to Punishment and one of the Eunuchs thought of saying That he had prepared a pair of Gallows of fifty Cubites high for Mordecai the Preserver of the Kings Life It is that which is his Due answered Ahasuerus and let him be hanged suddenly upon the Gibbet that he hath set up This was executed without delay there being no body that was not extream joyfull of his Ruine Mordecai was called to the Palace to take his Place and to Govern all the Houshold of the Queen that now acknowledged him in the presence of the King her husband for her Uncle Hester afterward beseech'd the King to command Dispatches to be sent through all the Provinces to countermand and to make void the Letters of Death which cruell Haman had caused already to be spread through all the Kingdome This was found very reasonable and they were forthwith Expedited in these Termes Artaxerxes the Soveraign Lord and King of
and the Cup was found in the sack of the youngest The brothers are seized with a profound astonishment and the poor child so amazed that he hath not a word to defend himself They begin all to afflict themselves and to rent their clothes and return to the City as Thieves taken in the fact to render an account to the Governour As soon as he saw them he reproched them of ingratitude and said to them that they were much deceived to come to him to steal seeing there was not a man in the whole world that had more news of secret things then he All prostrate themselves on the ground and do him Reverence Judah takes the word and sayes That they came not to excuse themselves that they had nothing to say since God had rendred their iniquity so visible that they were come all to offer themselves to him to be his slaves with him that had done the deed Nay it shall not go so saith Joseph but the culpable shall stay with me and ye shall return all of you at liberty to your house Then Judah drew near desired audience with a profound humility and declared how that child was his Fathers heart and life and that having received order from his Excellence to pluck him out of the arms of the old man and to bring him they had given him battells to make him resolve on that Voyage to which he would by no means hearken But the desire they had to give all possible satisfaction to his greatnesse had made them presse that businesse so farre as to oblige themselves life for life body for body and to deliver their little children to death in case that they brought not back their brother Benjamin that thereupon the goodman rendred himself with much difficulty and that to go and tell him at present that his dear sonne in whom he lives and by whom he breathes is stayed prisoner in Egypt for a case of theft would be to give him a double death and to send him to the Grave with inconsolable griefs And therefore he beseech'd his Greatnesse to shew them mercy and to take him for a slave in the place of his brother Benjamin Joseph could hear no more so much love and pity did he feell in the bottome of his heart He caused all the servants to withdraw not being willing that any of the Egyptians should be witnesse of this action and then he lifted up his voyce with a great sigh and a torrent of tears that glided from his eyes and said I am Joseph is my Father yet alive At that speech these poore men stood so surprised and in such an extasie that they made him no reply By how much the more he saw them astonished by so much the more did he make much of them and making them approach very near him he said again I am Joseph I am he that ye sold to the Ishmaelites to be carried into Egypt Trouble not your selves God permitted this for my good and for yours Two years of Famine are past there are yet five remaining and I have been sent from on high into Egypt to nourish you and to preserve you in the rigour of the time It was not by your counsels but by the ordinances of God that I came into this Kingdome And now behold I am as a father to Pharaoh the Superintendent of his house and the Prince of Egypt Go haste ye to return to my father carry him the news of my life and of my dignity relate to him all the glory and all the magnificence that invirons me and tell him that I expect him here and that it is the will of God that he should come to sojourn in the land of Goshen where he shall have all that he can desire for his children and for his flocks This said he embraced them weeping begining with the little Benjamin and then they took the boldnesse to speak to him with open heart about all that had passed thinking themselves obliged above all measure to his goodnesse The fame of this acknowledgement ran in the house of Pharaoh who ordered Joseph to cause his Father to come and sojourn in Egypt with his brothers dispatching many charriots to carry all his baggage The children returned Triumphing and gave him the news that his sonne Joseph was alive and the second person of the Realm of Egypt that had the managing of all The Good-man thought that it was a dream and the admiration of it held him so seized that he could not come to himself again at length when he saw that it was all in good earnest and that the Chariots that were to carry away all his family were at the gate he said that now there remained nothing more for him to desire if his sonne Joseph was alive and that he would see him before his death Some time after he departed being encouraged by an heavenly Vision that promised him all good successes in that journey and when he was arrived at Goshen he dispatched Judah to give the newes of it to his sonne Joseph who at the same instant went up into his Coach to go to meet him and seeing him embraced him with close enfoldings weeping for joy and tendernesse upon his neck His Father holding him between his arms said My son It is at this houre that I shall dye content since God hath shewed me the grace to see you and to leave you alive after me The holy man was also presented to King Pharaoh who made him a great enterteinment and demanded of him his age to which he answered that he was but an hundred and thirty years old that those dayes were few and evil and were not extended to the age of his Fathers He blessed the King and his place of abode was assigned in the land of Goshen where he lived in a most full content And now I demand of my Reader if there be any thing more magnificent more sweet and more benigne then the heart of Joseph in all the circumstances of that Reconciliation with his brethren We see many Histories wherein the Grandees of the earth that mount up on their Thrones after they have been offended who have nothing so ordinary as to make Furies and Vengeances with squadrons of Hangmen march with them by their side to Ruine those that have done them any displeasure But this man after he had been so cruelly used after he had been stripped of his cloathes cast into an old pit of water domineered over and sold to Barbarians by his own brothers with an intention to keep him in an hard slavery the rest of his dayes not onely forgets all that had passed but pardons them with a profusion of Charity he does them good he over-whelms with good offices those ungratefull men and in obliging them he hath but one trouble which is to see them shamefull of their crime He weeps while he embraces them one after another He would not that that fault should be imputed to them