things and holy is his name And whence is this to me that the grace of Christ should come to me MEDITATION 7. Rebecca conceived Gen. 25.22 23. and the children strugled within her and she said If it be so why am I thus that is if I am heard of God in my request and am with child by his blessing whence is this strugling this painful conflict and strange unquietness of the fruit of my womb And she went to enquire of the Lord and the Lord said unto her Two nations are in thy womb c. So when I look into my self and observe the commotions that are in the womb of my heart I conclude Surely there are two nations within me the flesh with all its motions lucting against the spirit and its grace Gal. 5.17 and the Spirit with its gracious influences alway striving against the sinfulness of my carnal part Now blessed be God that seeing sin will yet keep possession that it hath no quiet abode within me but meets with reluctancy and opposition from my spirituall part But oh wretched creature that I am how often is evil present and prevalent with me how many are those pangs of sorrow those sighs and grones that my mischievous and restless corruptions cause within me But if it be so that the power of the most High hath overshadowed me and true grace be implanted in my soule then I shall seek to the Lord that he would cause the better part in me to be the more prevailing part that he would water and give encrease to these tender beginnings and give me at last a safe and happy deliverance from this body of death MEDITATION 8. If men strive and hurt a woman with child Exod. 21.22 23. so that her fruit depart from her and yet 〈◊〉 mischief follow he shall be surely punished c. Women with child are liable to many dangers A fall a bruise an accidentall stroke a fright a strain the taking somewhat that proves expulsive or the disappointment of somewhat they longed for these and such other contingencies are noxious to them and often-times cause abortion or the mischance of her fruit departing from her Such was the case of the Church when it was with child with many Converts Rev. 12.2 3. the great red Dragon watched the destruction of her and of her fruit And thus is with every repenting soul What security soever there be among those careless women that are at ease Isa 32.9 10 11. how little inward care or sorrow they feel while they forget God how unacquainted soever with the hurt and smart of sin or Satans striving with them before they are acquainted with God yet no sooner do they espouse themselves to Christ and conceive purposes of holy living and begin to be fruitful in any grace but they shall have many adversaries in the world and especially the god of this world striving against them to afright them to tempt them to receive such principles company suggestions as may quench their graces or to deprive them of that Spiritual food they long for or to intice them to straine their consciences or some way or other to cause them to fall that they may be wounded bruised c. and the fruit of grace depart from them But oh my soul hath God such care of the unborn infant as to provide a speciall law in its behalfe and will he not much more take care of that grace which he hath begotten in my Soul Oh my God keep me that the Evill One touch me not MEDITATION 9. In sorrow shalt thou bring forth Children As the first general curse Gen. 3.16 In dying thou shalt dy brought not onely the pains of death but intended also all the miseries of our life so this particular curse upon women brings not only pain in travel but comprehends all the infirmities of Child-bearing I find that the child in my womb brings many weaknesses and aches upon me but oh how sad and deplorable are those deeper sicknesses and maladies which I have brought upon it It s body partaking of my substance partakes unavoidably of my natural pollution It s Soul though it come immediately from the Father of Spirits yet I know not how is upon its infusion into this tender infant subjected to the common misery of the Children of Adam who having lost the image and likenesse of God sinne and corruption must needs follow I am an unclearne vessel Psal 58.3 sa 48.8 and how can any clean thing come out of me Oh my soul what need have I to be sanctified throughout both in Body and Soul and Spirit And Oh my God repair by thy grace what sin hath made so defective in me and mine MEDITATION 10 Our blessed Saviour and Great Prophet Jesus Christ foretelling the miseries that should shortly come on Judea Jerusalem sayes Wo unto them that are with Child Mat. 24.19 Lu. 23.29 and to them that give suck in those days And in another Evangelist Behold the dayes are coming in the which they shall say Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never have and the paps that never gave suck And indeed of all persons none more miserable in the time of War than women with child or women that give suck because their care is double and their persons uncapable of flying and shifting for their lives as those who are single may and do And of all murthers none more horrible in all its circumstances 2 Kin. 8.12 Lam. 5.11 then to rip up women with child Wherefore oh my soul let me be thankfull to my God that there is peace in our borders and any quietness and safety in my habitation and that I am free from those terrours and affrights with which many others in a time of common calamity are undone Oh how many Women with their unborn infants have been butchered in many places in ages past and martyred by blood-thirsty Papists in these later ages of which histories are too plentiful And if there be now any in my condition in any place especially among Christians that is exposed daily to the rage of a devouring Sword the Lord be pleased either to restrain the Enemy and the Avenger Psal 8.2 Rev. 6.10 or to avenge the cause of the murthered that according to thy own Law they may not go unpunished but may give life for life Yea Lord hear the crie of the oppressed and give their adversaries blood to drink for they are worthy MEDITATION 11. My little children of whom I travel in birth again till Christ be formed whithin you Where any place is blest with a painfull Minister and Pastour after Gods own heart Gal. 4.19 they have in them much of the Apostle's temper For when I consider their painfull studies their sighes and teares their spending their spirits in ardent Prayers and laborious Preaching their compassionate exhortations passionate supplications and their giving themselves wholly to these things 1
of many And seeing they that sow plentifully shall reap plentifully 2 Cor. 9.6.7 8 9 10 therefore put it not off till your last Will or til your recovery from travell but while you have opportunity do good to all but especially to the houshold of faith Doe something for the poore according as God hath blessed you in your estate and as you can obtain your husbands consent unlesse you have a considerable allowance at your own disposal I say do some such eminent work of charity 2 Cor. 8.24 as may give a proof of the truth of your love to Christ and though it cannot expiate any former sins Christ onely can do that yet may in a sense recompence what hath been defective in this kind and may cause the poore while you live to give you a disciples reward Mat. 10.41 42. and to blesse you in the name of the Lord and may also enable you the better when after the resurrection you shal be examined whether you have cloathed the naked fed the hungrey Mat. 25.35 36 37 c visited the prisoners c. to give up your account with joy and not with grief In the next place alienate your heart and affections from all things below heaven Heb. 1â— â— cast off every weight of worldly desires and begin to part with that in your affections which you may shortly part with in person Look upon all your comforts as dying comforts upon your body as a dying body upon your house and estate as fading vanities which you must shortly forsake Let not your care about any of these take up that time Lamen 1.9 and those thoughts which you had need at this season to imploy otherwise And that you may the more clearly rid your hands of these things let me advise you whenever your are with child if you have any thing considerable of your own to dispose to make your Will betimes Isa 50.4 Gal. 6.10 set your house in order and then commit your Relations to the blessing of God all other things to the pleasure of his providence And if there be any thing in your mind to speake to any whom you love by way of exhortation advice admonition or reproof doe it speedily and with all your might Leave as strict a charge as you can upon all that belong to you to live soberly righteously and godlily Your last words to them if seriously and heartily uttered with prayer to God for his Blessing may stick more in their minds then many a Sermon which they have carelesly heard When the Patriarchs drew near their end they gave many grave and pious instructions to their Relations which are therefore left upon record that those that fear God might imitate them that so they may die the death of those righteous persons Num. 23.10 See the 14 15 16 and 17. cap. of John and their latter end be like theirs Our Saviour Himself when he saw the hour of his sufferings to approach spent his time wholly in comforting teaching and establishing disciples in instituting and administring the Sacrament of his Supper and in prayer for them and all his people to the end of the world Yea thus the Saints and Martyrs in all ages have left us innumerable examples of their pious and mooving Speeches when they were going hence Thus a Candle when t is at the last point and ready to go out gives a sudden flash and a clearer shine So you should endeavour that your last words may be your best words Rev. 2.19 and your last works your best works Having thus eased your heart as much as may be from all other cares and made this faire progresse in your preparation what remains but that you look Death in the face suffering no day to passe without serious thoughts upon your latter end that so by frequent meditation you may make death more familiar and lesse terrible to you Yea that by a right understanding of the nature of death you may be willing to be dissolved with Paul and ready to say with old Simeon Luk. 2.29 Now Lord let thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation Wherefore look upon Death not as represented to a Sinner by blind and fearful Nature but as represented in the Scriptures to a Believer sweetned conquered and altered by the Death of Christ Well then Death hath its harbingers sickness and pain which are commonly more troublesome then Death it self It brings a dissolution of the frame of Nature a putrefaction of the Body in a land of darkness Job 10.22 a departure of the soul into an unknown estate in another world But what is there in all this hurtful All the messengers and forerunners of death which torment and destroy our bodies cannot hinder a Believer from rejoycing and saying with David Ps 119.54 Thy statutes are my songs in the house of my pilgrimage And well may they sing on their sick beds yea on their death-beds whom the Lord himself doth attend Gen. 49.18 to make their beds in their sickness Old Jacob fainting under a three-fold burthen of sickness of age the care of his posterity refresheth himself by turning to the Lord and waiting for his salvation As for the dissolution of the frame of Nature it impairs not your blessedness nor can cause a disunion from Christ Nor life nor death nor any other thing can separate us from the love of God which is in Jesus Christ our Lord. Rom. 8 39 As when Christ died though the comforting influences of his Divine Nature were suspended or less visible yet the hypostatical Union remained inseparable So in our death the local separation between body and soul is not a final disunion much less can there be a cutting off the mystical Union of our persons with Christ Therefore though wicked men die in themselves and die without Christ as they lived out of him yet the servants of God die in Christ Rev. 14.13 1 Thes 4.14 Rom. 14. â— 7 8. Phil. 1.23 they die to the Lord yea into the Lord viz. so as to be more nearly joyned to him then before There is in every member of Christ a divine Nature not subject to death or dissolution Therefore though as the children of Men they die yet as the children of God they live Though as the children of Adam they return to the earth yet as the members of Christ they return to God And though their bodies die because severed from their soul yet it liveth in death because it is still joyned to the Lord. God is the God of Abraham yet not the God of the dead Every Atome and unknown scattered parcel of a believers dust are deposited in the hands of a faithful Creator So that though they be dead yet their life is hid with Christ in God And as for the darkness and putrefaction of the Grave it matters not its putrefaction must be that the garments of
the leaven of Popery for you need not make auricular confession to a Priest nor seek Popish absolution from a Confessor nor expect their injunction of some tedious or ridiculous penance nor esteem penance a Sacrament nor undertake a fruitless or idolatrous pilgrimage or think to satisfie God by some good works for any sin past nor be at cost to purchase an indulgence or to buy a pardon from that man of sinne Onely be faithfull and just in confession to God 1 Joh. 1.9 Psal 38.13.32.5 Isa 33.24 and he will be faithful to forgive Yea as soon as thou resolvest in thine heart with David no longer to conceal thy transgressions but to acknowledge them to God he will forgive Renew this practice as often and with as much sorrow and contrition as you can and the Father of mercies will surely heare thee bemoaning thy self Jer. 31.18 wil remember thine iniquity no more And therefore abound in secret mourning Psal 85.8 Isa 32.6 till thou hearest what God will speak he will speak peace to his people but let them not return again to folly Make it therefore thy chief aim in repenting to be renewed in the inner parts to have a new heart Ezek. 36.26 2 Cor. 5.17 Eph. 4.24 and a new spirit that so all old things may passe away and all things become new Whereas if you spend never so much time and strength in confession lamentation and supplication and yet your heart unchanged you will notwithstanding return with the swine to her wallowing in the mire How many such penitents hath the Church been pestered with many men in sickness many women when neer their travel have seemed serious converts and have uttered many penitential desires and purposes both to God and man but when once they are delivered they forget their obligations to God and suffer seven Worse devils to enter Mat. is 45 And therefore make as sure work with your deceitful hearts as you can by mournful confession severe mortification more holy conversation c. (a) Thus should good women make amends for their first offence Eve no sooner received an ill motion but she delivers it to Adam so they should no sooner receive good but they should impart it Bish Hall's Contemplation lib. 10 p. 195. Communicate your zeal to others reprove rebuke exhort and warn your family night and day with tears bring forth fruit meet for repentance that others may see you have been with Jesus This do and continue doing while you yet are upon your legs and while you have breath in your nostrils and then you shall find your labour not in vain in the Lord but a means to support you under bodily labour Then you shall see of the travel of your soul when God shall assist you in the hour of travel Therefore gird up the loyns of your mind be intent and sedulous in this great work of making peace with God and he will deliver you in that critical hour Psal 50. â—â— and raise you up that you may glorifie him CHAP. IV. Reading of Scriptures the duty of women with child (a) Qui valt cum Dee semper esse semper debet erare legere Ang de â—emp Ser. â— GOd gave no small gift to the world in giving the light of the Sun which among visible creatures is the highest emblem of his own Essence and glory without which the whole earth would languish and be worse then a howling wilderness But it was a greater to give to our souls understanding and immortality whereby we transcend all sublunary creatures and are capable of communion with God and his Angels without which we could never aspire to Heaven above but must have been slaves to the meanest creatures upon earth And yet it was a far richer benefit to mankind to give us the written Word and the greatest next to Jesus Christ the essential Word which the Father of Lights could have bestowed on the world in comparison of its greater glory the light of the Sun hath no glory By this our understandings are made wise and our immortality made happy The Scriptures are the mysteries of Gods eternal counsel the protraicture of those infinite perfections that lay hidden in his breast from all eternity the written copy of that Law God which was originally written in the heart of Adam the onely supreme rule of good and evil They contain such knowledge as will enlarge ravish and transform a teachable and studious soul In the volumn of this book it is written of Christ that God of Gods Psal 40. â—â— that Head of Angels that King of Kings whose Incarnation is the Mysterie of Mysteries and whose work of Redemption is the summe of all Mercies In a word in them is an exact map of the heavenly Canaan an exact delineation of the way thereunto and a full account of the deeds and evidences of our inheritance therein How abominable then is the blasphemy of the apostate Papists (a) B. Jewels reply to Hard. Art 15. fol. 518. who equal the Pope or a Councel or Traditions with the Scripture and speak dishonourably of the authorityand sufficiency of the sacred Volumn Doctor Jackson on the Creed lib. 2. sect 1. ch 1. pag. 238. ad 405. And how intolerable is that bloudy crew Alphonsus Castrens de punit haeret lib. 3. Cap. 6. which will inflict the most cruel deaths on those of the Laity that procure a Bible in their vulgar tongue (b) Scripta divina haereticorum fraudes convincit furta detegir Tertul. lib. de Trin. unwilling they are that their folly should be made manifest to all men and women knowing that ignorance is the mother of their idolatrous devotions But to leave controversies let me go on and remember those women to whom I speak that it is their duty to read their happiness to enjoy 1 Basil by his Nurse Macrina Bas cp 74. 〈◊〉 Polycarp ad Philippenses Origen in Levit hom 9. August in Psal 33. Heron. in Coloss 3. Chrysost in Joh. â—om 1. â—libi saepiùs and should be their delight to peruse the holy Scriptures Certain we are that God commanded all Parents to teach their children the words of his Law and that accordingly Solomon was instructed by his Mother Apollos by Priscilla Timothy by his Grandmother Lois 2 Both the Greek and Latine Fathers did use with all vehemency to exhort their hearers to get them Bibles and read the Scriptures at home and to talke of them to each other without exception of sex or age Yea saith a Popish writer lest women should be thought to be excluded from the study of the Scriptures there is a tradition that (a) M. Maâ—ulus Spalatens de vitâ per exempla religiose instit l. 2. cap. 5. Trap. on Luk. 1 51. And doubtlesse the elect Lady to whom St. John wrot an Epistle might as lawfully read other Scriptures as that Ep. the Mother of our Lord
I shall now speak in the next place CHAP. V. Meditation the duty of women with child IT cannot be but women with child when they begin to grow big and unweldy must be taken off from such manual imployments in which they were busied before and must allow themselves some rest and retirement therefore they should labour to make a good use of that time they have for prayer and reading and meditation c. Meditation being then most in season when other things are out of season and hath herein the advantage of other duties that it requires onely the inner to be imployed therein Idlenesse is alway dangerous especially the idlenesse of our minds If the Devil find the soul idle hee 'le soon imploy it And therefore were it onely to prevent the incursion of sinfull and troublesome thoughts in our solitary seasons and also as one sayes (a) Bolton Gen. dir p 71. lest our spirits like milstones wanting grist grate themselves with vexation feares discontents and waste themselves in a fruitless endless melancholy I say were it only to avoid this grand inconvenience it were safest to have alway some choice head or other of pious profitable matter to busie our heads and hearts about Nothing being more known among Christians then the precepts and presidents of this kind in Scripture Nothing more frequent in the writings and Sermons of Divines Therefore I shall not meddle with the duty in general but as it properly concerns women with child And for the better direction of those who are willing to make use of the help offered them I shall present them with thirteen Meditations which they may enlarge upon at their pleasure not doubting but that divers of them are able to adde many others as pertinent and profitable as these MEDITATION 1. (a) J. Planâ—avit Floâ—il Rabbinicum Deut. 27.12 Ps 104.28 1 Sam. 2.6 Acts â—6 4 Gen. 30.22 The Rabbines have a notion that there are four special Keyes which the Lord reserveth in his own power 1. The Key of Rain 2. The Key of Food 3. The Key of the Grave 4. The Key of the Heart To which may be added the Key of the Womb. God hath opened my womb oh that my heart were opened also Nature hath locked it against God and my customary sins have caused me instead of opening when Christ knocketh to adde more bolts to keep him out But oh that he who hath the key of David who openeth and none can shut would break open or lift up the everlasting gates of my soul Rev. 3 7. that the King of glory might come in and sup with me Then should I have more cause then yet I have to rejoyce in him for opening my womb and opening to me the treasures of raine and food yea then I should not care how soon a grave were opened for my body if my heart were first opened by the grace of Christ MEDITATION 2. There is a different generation and conception The children of Adam are generally propagated by ordinary generation but Sampson Jephtah c. had wonders accompanying their conception The elect of God who are in due time regenerate are supernaturally born and conceived not of flesh and bloud but of the Will of God Joh. 1 1â— Jesus Christ as to his humane nature was not begotten but miraculously conceived in the womb of the Virgin as to his Divine nature he was not conceived but eternally begotten by the God and Father of all things Though I am not like to be the Mother of a Prophet or a Judge in Israel though I have no miraculous or supernatural conception but am with child through Gods blessing by my husband in a state of matrimony yet I hope defire and pray that God would prepare some singular blessing for the fruit of my womb Oh that it might as was Saint John be sanctified from the womb and be filled with the holy Ghost that we may have joy and gladness Luke 1.14 15. and many may rejoyce at its birth Oh that it might please God so to bless this unborn child that it may grow and wax strong in the Spirit and may become so eminent in holiness of life Luk. 1. â—0 Lu. 11.27 that others may say Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the paps that gave thee suck MEDITATION 3. And this is the sixth moneth with her who was called barren Luk. 1.36 It is most probable she was called by way of reproach the barren wife and therefore not much set by but rather vilified by the mothers in Israel God hath restrained the wombs of some from bearing but hath made mine fruitful Whether the barrennesse of some good women which I know be to them a curse I know not but oh my soul how great a curse is spiritual barrennesse and how cursed a creature do I then deserve to be Jer. 4.22 I am wise to doe evil though none teach me or tempt but to doe good I have no knowledge I have strong affections to love my friends self c. to hate my enemies and to be vext at worldly crosses and fear temporal dangers but how weak is my love to God hatred of sin and fear of his all-seeing eye I have done many things for my credit profit health ease c. but how barren am I 2 Pet. 1.8 and unfruitfull in the work of the Lord and how little affected with the concernments of my soul I have plenty of words for carnall company and can without study or help vent my passions with much fluency and readinesse if my servants or inferiours displease me but the Lord knows and my foul is confounded to remember that when fit occasion and opportunity have been offered yea a necessity laid upon me of reproving or admonishing my relations or acquaintance of inciting and quickning my family to true godliness I have many a time said little or nothing I have quenched the fire of zeal that burned within me I have by my needless silence seemed to own what my soul abhorrs yea when I have purposed and resolved to speak with serious earnestness in Gods behalf my heart hath been barren of fit matter my tongue hath wanted words and I have stood mute and silent as if possessed with a dumb devil Now whence is this If I be married to Christ and implanted into him Mic. 2.7 why is it thus surely I am not streightned in him but in my self Wherefore oh my soul go to him who onely worketh both to will and to doe of his own good pleasure And never cease importuning him till he quicken me by his Spirit and cause me know and enjoy the vertues and powers of my Saviour Then shall I bring forth my fruits unto holinesse Rom. 6.22 and my end shall be everlasting life MEDITATION 4. Hast thou not poured me out as milk Job 10.10 and curdled me like cheese Miseres â—â—que etiam â—udeâ— aestiâ—â—antem â—â—am fiâ—â—rivola aâ—antium
Tim. 4.15 Coloss 2.1 I conclude that surely they have many agonies and conflicts in their hearts for us Wherefore Oh my soul while I carefully expect the hour of my own travell how much am I to blame that I so little so seldom or never consider the travell of my Ministers soul often have I been pricked in conscience by his goad and nails Eccl. 12.11 often wounded by the sword of the Spirit bruised and smitten down by the hammer of the word and surely his stimulating reproofs his keen admonitions and knocking terrours proceeded from his longing desire of my conversion But when he hath after long striving been in hopes of my returne how have I by relapses and fresh miscarriages vext his righteous soul and quencht his new conceived hopes of me yea like those inconstant Galatians I have caused him again and again to travell with me in birth How just were it with God to plague me with a tedious painfull and fruitlesse travell and to make me read my sin and feel its bitternesse in so suceable a punishment But Oh my God remit the evills I have committed work in me what thou hast required and compleat in me what thy grace hath begun Let not the guide of my soul labour in vain but let him see of the travell of his soul and let me be among those children of whom my pious teacher shall hereafter say Lord here am I and the children which thou hast given me Then also shall I with more confidence expect to have benefit by his prayers for me when my body is in travell if God shall thus blesse and answer him in his prayers and travell for the new birth of my soul MEDITATION 12. I find it frequent in Scripture that the most dreadful judgements on the wicked are thus exprest Psal 48.6 Isa 23.4 Jer. 48.41 c. 49.42 c. 50.43 that Anguish shall take hold of them as of a woman in travel and that sudden destruction shall come upon them as upon a woman in travel and they shall not escape Wherefore oh my soul as Abraham when he had promise of a child Gen. 18.14.22 did presently intercede as far as he durst in behalf of wicked Sodom so let me ever remember to pray for the worst of men though perhaps they scorn and despise me and my Prayers Oh my God deale not with them after their sins but cause the wickednesse of the wicked to come to an end Psal 7.9 that the wicked themselves may not come to a sad end So persecute them with thy tempest make them afraid with thy storm that they may seeke thy face Oh Lord. Psal 83.15 And in whatever place or nation thy judgments shall enter yet if there be but a few righteous persons among them spare them from totall destruction and let not thy wrath come upon them to the uttermost MEDITATION 13. I find also that the sorrows of the people of God when God seemes to forsake them John 16 21.22 Jer. 6.24 c. 22.23 c. 30.6 Isa 26.17 18. c. 37. 3 the calamities of the church when God is pleased to correct them and the miserable disappointment of a Church hoping for reformation and endeavouring in vain for a deliverance from idolatry and oppression are also expressed by the pain and misery of women in travell Now Oh my soul how can I but observe two things from hence The one is that 't is surely the will of God that I should not confine my care to the concernments of my private condition but should labour for a publick Spirit such as was in that good woman 1 Sam. 4.19 20 21. the wife of Phinebas who was with child and near to be delivered and when she heard the tidings that the Ark of God was taken and that her father in law and her husband were dead she bowed her selfe and travelied for her pains came upon her And about the time of her death the women that stood by her said fear not for thou hast born a son but she answered not neither did she regard it And she named the child Jchabod saying the glory is departed from Israel because the Ark of God was taken and because of her father in law and her husband And she said the glory is departed from Israel for the Ark of God is taken Blessed woman worthy of everlasting fame and imitation She took no comfort in her deliverance though she had a son while the Church of God was not delivered Oh that the same mind might be in me that I might learn also to be more affected with the affairs of the Church That if women may not be common actors of publick affairs yet we may be specially mourners for publick miseries Alas what is my danger to the universall danger my travell to the travell of the Church what comfort to me to have many children except I might see the good of Gods chosen Psal 106. â— what content have I in being delivered from my pains unlesse God deliver Israel from all its troubles Psal 37.40 what delight had Abraham in all his mercies while he went childlesse or I in all my children if the children of God be comfortlesse Oh my God blesse me out of Zion and thus let me be blessed as those are that feare the Lord Psal 128 3 4 5 6. let me not onely be a fruitfull vine but let me see the good of Jerusalem all my dayes Let me not only see my childrens children but peace upon Israel But from the manner of holy Writ to compare almost all miseries whether inward or outward whether of good men or of bad to the pains of women in travell as the fittest embleme of extreme conflicts and agonies I must needs conclude that there is no sorrow like unto that sorrow and no evill like that sin that caused it no danger like that danger and therefore no Saviour like him who can deliver from it Wherefore while my life hangs in suspense my soul is distracted between fear and hope my mind is appall'd my heart melts and is even faint when I consider that hour of torment approaching Let me yet further inquire Oh my soul what duties are yet behind in order to making my peace with God and let nothing hinder or divert my present religious and heavenly imployment till I have brought my mind into some setled posture ready to abide whatever shall happen So much for the duty of Meditation now to the rest CHAP. VI. Resignation to the will of God the duty of Women with child TO submit and resign our wills to the will of God in all things is a most desirable and comfortable temper in any man or woman T is indeed the sum of most duties and a compendium of many virtues He that can thus receive the Kingdome of God as a little child Mark 10.15 with Selfe denyal and humble dependance on our Father in heaven he shall in time by thus subjecting himself
bearing it was burned quick I have set down these memorable instances in the very words of the Historian and I say the pains there mentioned are such as do well night equal the pangs of travel But those blessed women suffered for God Object and therefore had both his assistance acceptance But my pains are the meer fruit of sin of the curse And therefore what are these instances to the purpose What do they concerne women in travel All afflictions of whatever kind are the fruit of sin Answ T is sin that caused the emnity in the seed of the Serpent against the seed of the Woman 'T is by sin that we are born to trouble are of few dayes and full of evil 'T is sin that fills the creature with vanity under which the whole Creation grones and travells in pain together untill now Sin is the Mother and Nurse of our miseries So that if it be a sufficient reason for you to be dejected and impatient under your pains because they are the fruit of sin then there is the like reason for every afflicted person to complain and desponde and refuse to be comforted even Martyrs themselves for no crosse could befall us in life nor any violent death have been inflicted upon us if sin had not made so wide a gape at which all calamities do enter upon us Hence it is that the Church did alway acknowledge Gods justice in all the evils that came upon them And the Emperour Mauricious when bloody Villianes came and kil'd his wife and children before his face and then came to murther him also uttered no other words but these Righteous art thou O Lord and just are thy judgements But the main thing you speak of wherein they had the advantage is this that they suffered for God and so do not you But let me tell you that neither the punishment be it never so bitter nor the cause be it never so good do make a compleat Martyr without Patience If this patience be wanting that they be unquiet murmuring and clamorous under the hand of God I doubt they shall not be soon cannonized in Heaven as here upon Earth Their sufferings are not accepted if not patiently endured They do not dy to the Lord unlesse they lay down their lives and offer themselves a wiling sacrifice dying out of love to God not out of unwilling subjection to the violence of Man Want of Patience shewes want both of Faith and Love And if want these we are but as sounding brasse and rinckling Cymballs If there be any thing we keep from God and resign not up all readily and intirely to him we give him nothing but we love something more then him But if we part with a little willingly if we be chearfull givers of our money to the needy and honour the Lord with our substance this is thank worthy with God because 't is supposed that the mortified mind is alike ready when God requires it to part with the whole for Christ The same principle if a right principle act us that inclines us to give a penny must prompt us also to yield up all even life it self when God requires it And were there is this habitual forsaking of all in affection out of acknowledgement of Gods right to all we have this mental resolution is with God interpretative Martyrdom So then observe that in all our Actions or Sufferings for God we must not lay so much stresse on the thing it self as the principle and end aimed at by the doer or suffererer God alwayes accepts the will for the deed when impossibilites are the only bars to our per formance but he never accepts the most costly actions or sufferings without a willing minde The upshot of all is this that if we are sick with any naturall or adventitious malady pained with any hurtful or accidental casualty when we suffer any loss in our Estates or torments in our flesh if then our patience have its perfect work if we submit to the will of God and ly down under his hand as Isaac under the hand of Abraham trusting in his name and saying with Job though he kill me yet will I trust in him if we bear all cheerfully out of obedience to him who disposes and sanctifies all to his people this is acceptable with God this is suffering for God this is glorifying God in the fires and the Spirit of God and of glory shall rest upon such Therefore lift up the hands that hang down and the feeble knees and be not wearied nor faint in your minds remembring that if you thus suffer in obedience to him you suffer for him and may lay hold therefore of Gods promises to the afflicted which do equally concern you with any other sufferers Again you have strange examples among the Papists what the women of that sect will inflict on their own tender bodies in their times of pennance Take but one instance Elizabeth Dutches of Turaine was wont at certain times Spalath 〈◊〉 lib. 3. c. 10.129 to provide most cruell scourges and taking three or four of her maids with her shut her self into her closet and gave to each of them a scourge in their hands and stripping her selfe naked commanded them to lay her on with lusty stripes and this she endured with such willing patience that she would never groan or cry under their lashes Now if those delicate Ladies can so patiently bear any the most unmercifull chastisements they lay upon themselves how much more should you bear the chastisement of your heavenly Father who is not insensible of the smart he puts you to and will not be unmindfull to give you an expected end Consider further how gracious our God is in his readinesse to support his people under all afflictions I have read of one a Theodorus a Martyr put to extreme torments Socr. Schol. lib. 3. c. 16. by Julian the Apostate and dimissed again by him when they saw him so invincible The historian sayes (b) Ruffin hist Eccles lib. 1. cap. 36. he met with this Martyr a long time after and asked him how he could bear such unsufferable pains he answered that at first it was grievous but after a while there seemed to stand by him a young man in white who with a soft handkercheif wiped off the sweat from his body and bad him be of good cheer insomuch that it was a punishment rather then a pleasure to be taken of from the rack sith when the tormentors had done the Angel was gone Thus when our friends can do little for us God can send his Angells who excell in strength to suggest comfort and minister help to us But however he himself will alwayes be with us to make our beds in our sicknesse to support our tyred bodies with his everlasting Arms and to uphold our souls with his free Spirit Thus our Saviour promises to all his people in whatever condition they be I will not leave you