O let my soul live and it shall praise thee In way of Thankesgiving Oh God wonderfull art thou in thine holy places Oh Lord how glorious are thy works and thy thoughts are very deep Oh God who is like unto thee The Lord liveth and blessed be my strong helper Lord thy loving kindnesse is better then life it self All thy works praise thee O Lord and thy Saints give thanks unto thee Oh how manifold are thy works in wisedome hast thou made them all Who is God but the Lord and who hath any strength except our God We will rejoyce in thy salvation and triumph in thy Name O Lord. Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodnesse Oh how plentifull is thy goodnesse which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee Thou Lord hast never failed them that seek thee In thy presence is the fulnesse of joy and at thy right hand there is pleasure for evermore Lord what is man that thou art mindful of him Not unto us Lord not unto us but unto thy Name give the praise SECT VIII OCcasionall Ejaculations are such as are moved upon the presence of some such object as carries a kinde of relation or analogy to that holy thought which we have entertained Of this nature I finde that which was practised in S. Basils time that upon the lighting of candles the manner was to blesse God in these words Praise be to God the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost which that Father says was anciently used but who was the Authour of it he professeth to be unknown to the same purpose was the Lucernarium which was a part of the evening office of old For which there may seem to be more colour of reason then for the ordinary fashion of apprecation upon occasion of our sneesing which is expected and practised by many out of civility Old and reverend Beza was wont to move his hat with the rest of the company but to say withall Gramercy Madame la Superstition Now howsoever in this or any other practice which may seem to carry with it a smack of superstition our devotion may be groundless and unseasonable yet nothing hinders but that we may take just and holy hints of raising up our hearts to our God As when vve doe first look forth and see the heavens over our heads to think the Heavens declare thy glory O God When we see the day breaking or the Sun rising The day is thine and the night is thine thou hast prepared the light and the Sun When the light shines in our faces Thou deckest thy self with light as with a garment or Light is sprung up for the righteous When we see our Garden imbellisht with flowers The earth is full of the goodnesse of the Lord. When we see a rough sea The waves of the sea rage horribly and are mighty but the Lord that dwelleth on high is mightier then they When we see the darknesse of the night The darknesse is no darknesse with thee When we rise up from our bed or our seat Lord thou knowest my down-sitting and my uprising thou understandest my thoughts afar off When we wash our hands Wash thou me O Lord and I shall be whiter then snow When we are walking forth Oh hold thou up my goings in thy paths that my footsteps slip not When we hear a passing bell Oh teach me to number my days that I may apply my heart to wisdome or Lord let me know my end and the number of my days Thus may we dart out our holy desires to God upon all occasions Wherein heed must be taken that our Ejaculations be not on the one side so rare that our hearts grow to be hard and strange to God but that they may be held on in continuall acknowledgement of him and acquaintance with him and on the other side that they be not so over-frequent in their perpetuall reiteration as that they grow to be like that of the Romish votaries fashionable which if great care be not taken will fall out to the utter frustrating of our Devotion Shortly let the measure of these devout glances be the preserving our hearts in a constant tendernesse and godly disposition which shall be further actuated upon all opportunities by the exercises of our more enlarged and fixed Devotion Whereof there is the same variety that there is in Gods services about which it is conversant There are three main businesses wherein God accounts his service here below to consist The first is our addresse to the throne of Grace and the pouring out of our souls before him in our prayers The second is the reading and hearing his most holy Word The third is the receit of his blessed Sacraments In all which there is place and use for a setled Devotion SECT IX TO begin with the first work of our actuall and enlarged Devotion Some things are pre-required of us to make us capable of the comfortable performance of so holy and heavenly a duty namely that the heart be clean first and then that it be clear clean from the defilement of any known sin clear from all intanglements and distractions What doe we in our prayers but converse vvith the Almighty and either carry our souls up to him or bring him down to us now it is no hoping that we can entertain God in an impure heart Even we men loath a nasty and sluttish lodging how much more will the floly God abhorre an habitation spiritually filthy I finde that even the unclean spirit made that a motive of his repossession that he found the house swept and garnished Satans cleanlinesse is pollution and his garnishment disorder and wickednesse without this he findes no welcome Each spirit looks for an entertainment answerable to his nature How much more will that God of spirits who is purity it self look to be harboured in a cleanly room Into a malicious soul wisdome shall not enter nor dwell in the body that is subject unto sin What friend would be pleased that we should lodge him in a Lazar-house or who would abide to have a toad lie in his bosome Surely it is not in the verge of created nature to yeeld any thing that can be so noisome and odious to the sense of man as sin is to that absolute and essentiall Goodnesse His pure eyes cannot endure the sight of sin neither can he endure that the sinner should come within the sight of him Away from me ye wicked is his charge both here and hereafter It is the priviledge and happinesse of the pure in heart that they shall see God see him both in the end and in the way injoying the vision of him both in grace and in glory this is no object for impure eyes Descend into thy self therefore and ransack thy heart who ever wouldst be a true Client of
Devotion search all the close windings of it with the torches of the law of God and if there be any iniquity found lurking in the secret corners thereof drag it out and abandon it and when thou hast done that thy fingers may retain no pollution say with the holy Psalmist I will wash my hands in innocence so will I goe to thine Altar Presume not to approach the Altar of God there to offer the sacrifice of thy Devotion with unclean hands Else thine offering shall be so far from winning an acceptance for thee from the hands of God as that thou shalt make thine offering abominable And if a beast touch the Mount it shall die SECT X. AS the soul must bee clean from sin so it must be clear and free from distractions The intent of our devotion is to welcome God to our hearts now where shall we entertain him if the rooms be full thronged with cares and turbulent passions The Spirit of God will not endure to be crowded up together with the vvorld in our strait lodgings An holy vacuity must make way for him in our bosomes The divine pattern of Devotion in whom the Godhead dwelt bodily retires into the Mount to pray he that carried heaven with him would even thus leave the world below him Alas how can we hope to mount up to heaven in our thoughts if we have the clogges of earthly cares hanging at our heels Yea not onely must there be a shutting out of all distractive cares and passions which are professed enemies to our quiet conversing with God in our Devotion but there must be also a denudation of the minde from all those images of our phantasie how pleasing soever that may carry our thoughts aside from those better objects We are like to foolish children who when they should be stedfastly looking on their books are apt to gaze after every butterfly that passeth by them here must be therefore a carefull intention of our thoughts a restraint from all vain and idle rovings and an holding our selves close to our divine task Whiles Martha is troubled about many things her devouter sister having chosen the better part plies the one thing necessary which shall never be taken from her and whiles Martha would feast Christ with bodily fare she is feasted of Christ with heavenly delicacies SECT XI AFter the heart is thus cleansed and thus cleared it must be in the next place decked with true humility the cheapest yet best ornament of the soul If the wise man tel us that pride is the beginning of sin surely all gracious dispositions must begin in humility The foundation of all high and stately buildings must be laid low They are the lowly valleys that soak in the showers of heaven which the steep hils shelve off and prove dry and fruitlesse To that man will I look saith God that is poor and of a contrite spirit and trembleth at my Word Hence it is that the more eminent any man is in grace the more he is dejected in the sight of God The father of the faithfull comes to God under the style of dust and ashes David under the style of a worm and no man Agur the son of Jakeh under the title of more brutish then any man and one that hath not the understanding of a man John Baptist as not worthy to carry the shooes of Christ after him Paul as the least of Saints and chief of sinners On the contrary the more vile any man is in his own eies and the more dejected in the sight of God the higher he is exalted in Gods favour Like as the Conduict-water by how much lower it fals the higher it riseth When therefore we would appear before God in our solemn devotions we must see that we empty our selves of all proud conceits and find our hearts fully convinced of our own vilenesse yea nothingnesse in his sight Down down with all our high thoughts fall we low before our great and holy God not to the earth only but to the very brim of hell in the conscience of our own guiltinesse for though the miserable wretchednesse of our nature may be a sufficient cause of our humiliation yet the consideration of our detestable sinfulnes is that which will depresse us lowest in the sight of God SECT XII IT is fit the exercise of our Devotion should begin in an humble confession of our unworthinesse Now for the effectuall furtherance of this our self-dejection it wil be requisite to bend our eyes upon a threefold object To look inward into our selves upward to heaven downwards to hell First to turn our eyes into our bosomes and to take a view not without a secret self-loathing of that world of corruption that hath lyen hidden there and thereupon to accuse arraign and condemn our selves before that awfull Tribunall of the Judge of heaven and earth both of that originall pollution which wee have drawn from the tainted loyns of our first parents and those innumerable actuall wickednesses derived there-from which have stayned our persons and lives How can we be but throughly humbled to see our souls utterly overspread with the odious and abominable leprosie of sin We finde that Vzziah bore up stoutly a while against the Priests of the Lord in the maintenance of his sacrilegious presumption but when he saw himself turn'd Lazar on the suddain he is confounded in himself and in a depth of shame hastens away from the presence of God to a sad and penitentiall retirednesse Wee should need no other arguments to loath ourselves then the sight of our own faces so miserably deformed with the nasty and hatefull scurfe of our iniquity Neither onely must we be content to shame and grieve our eyes with the foule nature and condition of our sins but we must represent them to our selves in all the circumstances that may aggravate their hainousnesse Alas Lord any one sin is able to damn a soul I have committed many yea numberlesse they have not possessed me single but as that evill spirit said their name is Legion neither have I committed these sins once but often Thine Angels that were sinned but once and are damned for ever I have frequently reiterated the same offences where then were it not for thy mercy shall I appear neither have I only done them in the time of my ignorance but since I received sufficient illumination from thee It is not in the dark that I have stumbled and faln but in the midst of the clear light and sun-shine of thy Gospel and in the very face of thee my God neither have these been the ships of my weaknesse but the bold miscarriages of my presumption neither have I offended out of inconsideration and inadvertency but after and against the checks of a remurmuring conscience after so many gracious warnings and fatherly admonitions after so many fearfull examples of thy judgements after so infinite obligations of thy favors And thus having
but their thanks and prayers rayling on our very profession in the streets and rejoycing in our supposed ruine Father forgive them for they knew not what they did Here we were out of the danger of this mis-raised fury and had leisure to pray for the quenching of those wilde fires of contention ' and causlesse malice which to our great grief we saw wicked incendiaries daily to cast amongst Gods dear well-minded people Here we have well and happily approved with the blessed Apostle that what ever our restraint be the Word of God is not bound With what liberty with what zeal with what successe hath that been preached by us to all commers Let them say whether the Tower had ever so many such guests or such benedictions so as if the place have rendered us safe we have endeavoured to make it happy Wherin our performances have seemed to confute that which Cornelius Bishop of Rome long since observed that the mind laden with heavy burdens of affliction is not able to doe that service which it can doe when it is free and at ease Our troubles through Gods mercy made us more active and our labours more effectuall SECT VI. ADde unto these if you please the eminent dignity of the place such as is able to give a kinde of honour to captivity the ancient seat of Kings chosen by them as for the safe residence of their royall persons so for their treasury their wardrobe their Magazine all these precious things are under the same custody with our selves sent hither not as to a prison but a repository and why should we think our selves in any other condition How many worthy inhabitants make choice to fixe their abode within these wals as not knowing where to be happier the place is the same to us if our will maybe the same with theirs they dearly purchase that which cost us nothing but our fees nothing makes the difference but the meer conceit of Liberty which whiles I can give to my self in my thoughts why am I pityed as miserable whiles their happinesse is applauded You see then how free I am in that which you mis-call my prison see now how little cause I have to affect this liberty which you imagine me to want since I shall be I can be no other then a prisoner abroad There is much difference of prisons One is strait and close locked so far from admitting visitants that it scarce allows the sun to look in at those crosse-barred grates another is more large and spacious yeelding both walks and accesse Even after my discharge from these wals I shall be yet sure to be a prisoner both these ways For what is my body but my prison in the one and what is the world but my prison in the other kinde SECT VII TO begin with the former never was there a more close prisoner then my soul is for the time to my body Close in respect of the essence of that spirit which since it's first Mittimus never stir'd out from this strait room never can doe till my gaole-delivery If you respect the improvement of the operatiōs of that busie soul it is any where it is successively every where no place can hold it none can limit it but if you regard the immortall and immateriall substance of it it is fast lockt up within these wals of clay till the day of my changing come even as the closest captive may write letters to his remotest friends whilest his person is in durance I have too much reason to acknowledge my native Jayle and feel the true Symptomes of it to my pain what darkness of sorrow have I here found what little-ease of melancholick lodgings what manacles and shakles of cramps yea what racks of torturing convulsions And if there be others that finde less misery in their prison yet there is no good soul but findes equall restraint That spirituall substance which is imprisoned within us would fain be flying up to that heaven whence it descended these wals of flesh forbid that evolation as Socrates cal'd it of old and will not let it out till the God of spirits who placed it there shall unlock the doors and free the prisoner by death He that insused life into Lazarus that he might call him from the prison of the grave must take life from us when he cals us out of this prison of flesh I desire to be loosed and to be with Christ saith the Apostle as some versions expresse it whiles we are chained to this flesh we can have no passage to heaven no free conversation with our Saviour Although it was the singular priviledge of that great Doctor of the Gentiles that he was in heaven before his dissolution whether in the body or out of the body he knew not How far that rapture extended whether to both soul and body if he knew not how should we But this we know that such extasie and vision was in him without separation of the soul from the body which another should hope for in vain And for him so he saw this glory of Paradise that he could not yet enjoy it Before he or we can be blessed with the fruition of Christ vve must be loosed that is freed from our clog and our chain of this mortall body What but our prison wals can hinder us here from a free prospect What but these wals of flesh can hinder me from a clear vision of God I must now for the time see as I may Nothing can enter into my soul but what passes through my senses and partakes in some sort of their earthlinesse when I am freed from them I shall see as I am seen in an abstracted and heavenly way so as one spirit apprehends another I do now at the best see those spirituall objects darkly by the eye of faith as in a glasse and that not one of the clearest neither Alas what dim representations are these that I can attain to here of that Majesty whose sight shal make me blessed I shall once see as I am seen face to face the face of my glorified soul shall see the face of that all-glorious Deity and in that sight be eternally happy It is enough for a prisoner in this dungeon of clay to know of and fore-expect such felicity vvhereof these earthly gieves render him as yet uncapable SECT VIII WOE is me how many prisons do we passe so soon as ever this divine soul is insused into this flesh it is a prisoner neither can any more passe out of this skin till this frame of nature be demolished And now as the soul of this Embryon is instantly a prisoner to the body so the body is also a prisoner in the womb wherein it is formed what darknesse what closenesse what uneasinesse what nuisance is there in this dungeon of nature There he must lie in an uncouth posture for his appointed month till the native bonds being loosed the doors forced open he shall
mankind Mortality is as it were essential to our Nature neither could wee have had our souls but upon the tearms of a re-delivery when they shall be called for If the holiest Saints or the greatest Monarchs sped otherwise wee might have some colour of repining Now grieve if thou wilt that thou art a man grieve not that being man thou must die Neither is the benefit inferiour to the necessity Lo here the remedy of all our cares the physick for all our maladies the rescue from all our feares and dangers earnestly sued for by the painfull dearly welcome to the distressed Yea lo here the Cherub that keeps the gate of Paradise there is no entrance but under his hand In vain do we hope to passe to the glory of Heaven any other way then through the gates of Death The second is the Conscience of a well-led life Guiltinesse vvill make any man fowardly unable to looke danger in the face much more Death whereas the innocent is bold as a Lion What a difference therefore there is betwixt a Martyr and a Malefactor this latter knows he hath done ill and therefore if he can take his death but patiently it is well the former knows he hath done well and therefore takes his death not patiently onely but chearfully But because no mortall man can have so innocently led his life but that he shall have passed many offences against his most holy and righteous God here must be Thirdly a finall peace firmly made betwixt God and the soul Two powerfull agents must mediate in it a lively Faith and a serious Repentance for those sins can never appear against us that are washed off with our tears and being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ Now if we have made the Judge our friend what can the Sergeant doe The fourth is the power and efficacy of Christs death applyed to the soul Wherefore dyed he but that we might live Wherefore would he who is the Lord of life die but to sanctifie season and sweeten death to us Who would goe any other way then his Saviour went before him who can fear that enemy whom his Redeemer hath conquered for him who can run away from that Serpent whose sting is pulled out Oh Death my Saviour hath been thy death and therefore thou canst not be mine The fifth is the comfortable expectation and assurance of a certain resurrection and an immediate glory I doe but lay me down to my rest I shall sleep quietly and rise gloriously My soul in the mean time no sooner leaves my body then it enjoys God It did lately through my bodily eyes see my sad friends that bade me farewell with their tears now it hath the blisse-making vision of God I am no sooner lanched forth then I am at the haven where I would be Here is that which were able to make amends for a thousand deaths a glory infinite eternall incomprehensible This spirituall Ammunition shall sufficiently furnish the soul for her encounter with her last enemy so as she shall not only endure but long for this Combat and say with the chosen Vessell I desire to depart and to be with Christ SECT XVIII The miseries and inconveniences of the continued conjunction of the soul and body NOw for that long conversation causeth entirenesse and the parting of old friends and partners such the soul and body are cannot but be grievous although there were no actuall pain in the dissolution It will be requisite for us seriously to consider the state of this conjunction and to enquire what good offices the one of them doth to the other in their continued union for which they should be so loth to part And here wee shall finde that those two however united to make up one person yet as it fals out in crosse matches they are in continuall domestique jars one with the other and entertain a secret familiar kind of hostility betwixt themselves For the flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary the one to the other One says well that if the body should implead the soul it might bring many foul impeachments against it and sue it for many great injuries done to that earthly part And the soul again hath no fewer quarrels against the body betwixt them both there are many brawls no agreement Our Schools have reckoned up therefore eight main incommodities which the soul hath cause to complain of in her conjunction with the body whereof the first is the defilement of Originall sinne wherewith the soul is not tainted as it proceeds alone from the pure hands of its Creator but as it makes up a part of a son of Adam who brought this guilt upon humano nature so as now this composition which we call man is corrupt Who can bring a clean thing out of that which is unclean saith Job The second is a pronenesse to sinne which but by the meeting of these partners had never been the soul if single would have been innocent thus matched what evill is it not apt to entertain An ill consort is enough to poyson the best disposition The difficulty of doing well is the third for how averse are we by this conjunction from any thing that is good This clog hinders us from walking roundly in the ways of God The good that I would doe I doe not saith the chosen Vessell The fourth is the dulnesse of our understanding and the dimnesse of our mentall eies especially in the things pertaining unto God which now we are forced to behold through the vail of flesh if therefore we mis-know the fault is in the mean through which we doe imperfectly discover them The fift is a perpetuall impugnation and self-conflict either part labouring to oppose and vanquish the other This field is fought in every mans bosome without any possibility of peace or truce till the last moment of dissolution The sixt is the racking solicitude of cares which continually distract the soul not suffering it to rest at ease whiles it carries this flesh about it The seventh is the multiplicity of passions which daily bluster within us and raise up continuall tempests in our lives disquieting our peace threatning our ruine The eight is the retardation of our glory for flesh and bloud cannot inherit the kingdome of God wee must lay down our load if we would enter into Heaven The seed cannot fructifie unlesse it die I cannot blame nature if it could wish not to be unclothed but to be clothed upon but so hath the eternall wisdome ordered that we should first lay down ere we can take up and be devested of earth ere we can partake of Heaven Now then sith so many and great discommodities doe so unavoidably accompany this match of soul and body and all of them cease instantly in the act of their dissolution what reason have we to be too deeply affected with
free inwardly from the galling stroaks of a self-accusing Conscience here is no remurmuring of the heart for guilty subornations no checks for the secret contrivances of publique villanies no heart-breaking for the failings of bloudy designes or late remorse for their successe but quiet harmlesse thoughts of seasonable frugality of honest recreation with an un-interrupted freedome of recourse to Heaven And if at any time by either hostile or casuall means he be berest of his little he smiles in the face of a theef and is no whit astonished to see his thatch on a flame as knowing how easie a supply will repair his losse And when he shall come to his last close his heart is not so glewed to the world that he should be loth to part his soul is not tyed up in bags but flies out freely to her everlasting Rest Oh the secret vertue and happinesse of Poverty which none but the right disposed minde knows how to value It was not for nothing that so many great Saints have embraced it rather then the rich proffers of the vvorld That so many great Princes have exchanged their Thrones for quiet Cels Who so cannot be thankful for a little upon these conditions I wish he may be punished with abundance SECT XIII Considering how little will suffice Nature NEither will it a little avail to the furtherance of our Contentation to consider how little will suffice Nature and that all the rest is but matter of Opinion It is the Apostles charge Having food and raiment let us be therewith content Indeed what use is there of more then what may nourish us within and cover us without If that be wholsome and agreeable to our bodily disposition whether it be fine or course Nature passes not it is meerly Will that is guilty of this wanton and fastidious choice It is fit that Civilitie should make difference of clothings and that vveaknesse of body or eminence of Estate should make differences of diets Else why not Russet as well as Scarlet Beef as Phesant the Grashopper feeds on dew the Chameleon on air what care they for other Viands Our Books tell us that those Anachorets of old that went aside into Wildernesses and sustained themselves with the most spare diet such as those deserts could afford out-lived the date of other mens lives in whom Nature is commonly stifled with a gluttonous variety How strong and vigorous above their neighbour Grecians were the Lacedemonians held of old who by the Ordinance of their Law-giver held themselves to their black broth which when Dionysius would needs taste of his Cook truly told him that if he would relish that fare he must exercise strongly as they did and wash in Eurotas Who knows not that our Island doth not afford more able Bodies then they that eat and drink Oats And whom have wee seene more healthfull and active then the children of poor men trayned up hardly in their Cottages with fare as little as course Doe I see a poor Indian husbanding one tree to all his houshold uses finding in that one Plant Timber Thatch Meat Medicine Wine Honey Oyle Sawce Drink Utensils Ships Cables Sayles and doe I rove over all the latitude of Nature for contentment Our appetite is truly unreasonable neither will know any bounds We begin with necessaries as Pliny justly observes and from thence we rise to excesse punishing our selves with our owne wilde desires whereas if wee were wise we might finde mediocrity an ease Either extream is a like deadly he that over-afflicts his body kils a Subject he that pampers it nourishes an Enemy Too much abstinence turns vice and too much ingurgitation is one of the seven and at once destroys both Nature and Grace The best measure of having or desiring is not what we would but what we ought Neither is he rich that hath much but he that desires not much A discreet frugality is fittest to moderate both our wishes and expences which if we want wee prove dangerously prodigall in both if we have we doe happily improve our stock to the advantage of our selves and others SECT XIV Considering the inconveniences and miseries of discontentment THe next inducement to Contentation shall be the serious consideration of the miserable inconveniences of the contrary disposition Discontentment is a mixture of anger and of grief both which are wont to raise up fearfull tempests in the soul Hee teareth himself in his anger saith Bildad concerning that mirrour of patience And the sorrow of the world worketh death saith the chosen Vessell so as the Malecontent whether he be angry or sad mischieves himself both ways There cannot be a truer word then that of wise Solomon Anger resteth in the bosome of fools What can be more foolish then for a man because he thinks God hath made him miserable by crosses to make himself more miserable by his own distempers If the clay had sense what a mad thing were it for it to struggle with the Potter and if a man wil spurn against strong Iron-pikes what can he hope to carry away but wounds How witless a thing it is for a man to torment himself with the thoughts of those evils that are past all remedy What wise beholder would not have smiled with pity and scorn to have seen great Augustus after the defeat of some choice Troops to knock his head against the wall and to hear him passionately cry out O Varus restore me my lost Legions Who would not have been angry with that cholerick Prophet to hear him so furiously contest with his Maker for a withered Gourd What an affliction was it to good Jacob more then the sterility of a beloved wife to hear Rachel say Give mee children or else I die yea how ill did it sound in the mouth of the Father of the faithfull Lord God what wilt thou give mee seeing I goe childelesse Yet thus froward and techy is nature in the best if we may not have all we would have all that we have is nothing if wee bee not perfectly humoured we are wilfully unthankfull All Israel is nothing worth to Ahab if he may not have one poor Vineyard How must this needs irritate a munificent God to see his bounty contemned out of a childish pettishnesse How can he forbeare to take away from us his sleighted mercies How can he hold his hand from plaguing so ingratefull disrespects of his favours As for that other passion of grief what wofull work doth it make in ungoverned mindes How many have we knowne that out of thought for unrecoverable losses have lost themselves how many have runne from their wits how many from their lives Yea how many that out of an impatience to stay the leisure of vengeance have made their own hands their hasty executioners And even where this extremity prevails not look about and yee shall see men that are not able matches to their passions wofully macerating thēselves with