the protection of an Hermite and his Reliques with which he had fortified and barricadoed himselfe against the invasions of death but all in vaine Superstition I say which is the Ape and Mimick of Religion having a Dream and fancy of external Holinesse when indeed it is the moth and rust both of true Religion and proper Holinesse the paint and meretricious beauty of a Church or Person the Ivy which by secret and unsensible steps creeps upon and overspreads its supporter Religion stealing away the sap of piety which should be in the heart and inward man in spirit and truth to the pleasing of the senses and fancy onely by nourishing them with externall and pompous formalities It is indeed a heavie Incubus when once it hath seised upon a Church or conscience oppressing it with needlesse scruples and ceremonious burthens which extremely abate if not quite take away that beauty vigour and majesty of true Religion and Holinesse which keeps the medium between superstition and profanenesse Yet must Holinesse have an universall influence upon the whole man all faculties motions and actions inward and outward on the soule and body In the Soule there must be a Holinesse of mind or understanding by seeing and beleeving the saving truth of God of the will by applying embracing and subjecting to it of the affections feare love joy anger hope sorrow zeale c. when they are by Gods Spirit carried to their right objects and moderated in their measure to them thus is truth rectitude and order the Holinesse of the mind will and affections Further Holinesse must have an influence on the externall expressions Truth and purity are the Holinesse of speech so chastity temperance meeknesse humility modesty c. are the Holinesse of our outward manners and comportments As Morality improves the affections and regulates the motions of the will to vertues so Holinesse beautifies and raiseth those vertues to graces and of the Philosophers Alchimy produceth the Christians pure gold while it keeps all our actions desires and affections within those bounds of honour and moderation which Reason and Religion doe require Holinesse is the Soules fitting for God its union and tie to God its communion with him in some sort deifying us and making us partakers of the divine nature What light is to the Sunne and day what clearnesse to the fountain what fruitfulnesse to the earth what beauty and health are to the body that indeed is Holinesse to the soule to the whole man and all our actions Holinesse is the supernaturall and universall beauty of the reasonable creature We are corruption till Holinesse make us sound ruined till Holinesse repaire us we are barrennesse till that make us fruitfull we are deformity till that make us beautifull we are darknesse till Holinesse enlighten us dead till that enliven us depraved till that rectifie us we are sin till Holinesse make us gracious wee are hell till Holinesse make us heavenly we are Devils till Holinesse make us Saints wee are damned wretches till Holinesse sets us in a capacity of salvation and seeing of God whose enimies we are till Holinesse have endeared us from whom sin would seperate us forever being filthy and abominable in his sight till holinesse wash and clense us through faith in the blood of Christ In the sight of the most holy God all beauty is deformity all wisedom folly all honour basenesse all plenty poverty all liberty bondage all happinesse misery all life but a death all our splendid works but dead and damnable without holinesse All words and humane notions are too grosse to set forth to you this spirituall beauty of holinesse like dead colours to paint the light and heat of the Sun one beame discovers it better than all the shadowes of words or Pencils could doe so the best knowledge of holinesse is experimentall in the soule and conscience For it is not only in words in notion fancy or speculation or outward shewes but in reality of effects serious and solid without vanity or ostentation or affectation setled upon indisputable principles and unmovable grounds the revealed will of God who since he is the author of our being nothing is more gratefully just than that his will should prescribe a rule to our actions to which the more we study to apply and conforme our selves in all our actions the more we follow holinesse This this is that frame and temper of our soules and lives which God our Father and Christ our Saviour and the holy Spirit our Sanctifier the Word our Instructer the Sacraments our confirmers the Saints our forerunners the Angels our protectors all with one voice recommend to us Follow holinesse O ye sonnes of men without which yet shall never see the face of God Our most holy faith and profession the precepts promises and hopes revealed all our duties of preaching hearing reading meditating praying receiving fasting almsgiving c. all are to advance this quality of holinesse in us This is one great intent of Christs comming his living with us and dying for us that hee might sanctifie as well as justifie us save us from the power as well as the punishment of sinne that he might give us a most perfect and excellent example and purchase to himselfe a holy people Luke 1.74 That we being delivered from our enemies might serve him without feare in righteousnesse and holinesse all the dayes of our life So Titus 2.11 The grace of God that bringeth salvation to all men hath appeared teaching us that denying c. 1 Cor. 1.30 Christ is made to us wisedome righteousnesse sanctification and redemption This is the fire that inflames and the incense that perfumes all our duties sacrifices and services to God so as to make them accepted through Christ This sets a value on two mites and a cup of cold water and a handfull of meale without which all externall pompe and cost of services is not only not pleasing but fulsome nauseous and abominable to God Esay 1.12 Offer no more vaine oblations who hath required these things at your hands yet the Law did but not in such a manner with unwashed hands and unholy hearts Prov. 21.27 Even the prayers and sacrifices of the wicked are abomination to God The Heathen saw this well and hath admirably expressed it Quin demus superis Compositum jus fasque animi sanctosque recessus Mentis incoctum generoso pectus honesto Haec cedò ut admoveam templis farre litabo Holinesse is the Ladder of heaven whose lowest step is humility and the highest love and devotion by which the soule descends to men in charity and ascends to God in piety This is that which prepares and disposeth the soule for Heaven without which Heaven it selfe would be no Heaven or not pleasing to us Better be holy in hell if possible than unholy in Heaven though these two are unseparable Holinesse and Happinesse differing only in degree not in kinde For Holinesse is the sparke of
mind of Christ being that excellent paterne and type by which ours must be renewed as the Apostle prescribes Let the same mind be in you which was also in Jesus Christ so holy so pure so heavenly so composed whose spirit in and with your spirits effects this great and happy worke of renewing For Christ is not as other paternes dead and unactive but operative and assimilating those to himselfe who strive to imitate his vertues and perfections Therefore the Apostle Paul a learned and judicious man determined to know nothing as his maine but Iesus Christ and him crucified Other learning and Philosophy may free us from barbarisme in manners and ignorance of the creatures but faith in Christ crucified only is able to redeeme us from our vaine conversation to mortifie our sins to raise up our soules to consider themselves their great and last end and highest eternall good which is God considered in the face of Jesus Christ That Rapsody of humane knowledge or rather opinion indeed but {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} with which men so stuffe and cramb their minds of things that need not be knowne or ought not or cannot fully be knowne whose ignorance were safe and commendable what doth it but as the Apostle tels us puffe up as a false conception breeds only {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} a swelling and abortion of pride and selfe-conceit but brings forth nothing of those {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} noble and generous effects in their lives which become the divine nature of the soule Certainly though a man had devoured all the learning of Philosophers Historians Poets Divines and Humanists yet as Pharaohs lean Kine the mind would be never the fatter or fairer but still empty and unsatisfied in it selfe and ill-favoured in the sight of God as that poore man that dreamed hee eat and drank and was filled but when the soule awakes in that morning of eternity death or the resurrection it will find all without the knowledge of Christ to be but vanity of mind and vexation of spirit In all other learning the mind doth but pick up a few strawes leaves and feathers the notions and scatterings of a dark confused and defective knowledge to make it selfe a small nest of temporary content which will be soon cast downe when death as a whirle-wind overtakes us the mind will be left dubious wandring and distracted not having been truly wise to get by faith a sure mansion for it selfe in that Rock Christ Jesus Now this renewing of the mind is not a work of wit and parts but of grace and devotion It is not strength of reason nor depth of judgement nor acutenesse of invention nor faithfulnesse of memory nor vastnesse of reading nor subtilty of dispute nor heighth of speculation that renewes the carnall and naturall mind all these abilities doe often want most renewing to take off that pride and vanity of mind which commonly attends them to purge out that leaven which puffes them up to vain-glory and selfe-seeking to bring them as the Wise men of the East in all humility and devotion to seek Christ and offer up those treasures of wit and learning to the Honour of God the Giver Beleeve it Small and moderate minds for wit capacity and secular learning yet if sanctified by faith are often raised to more eminent expressions of love joy zeale patience constancy and all good affections for though they cannot formally dispute yet they can suffer dye for Christ and though they bee not learned in humane Arts and Sciences yet they have learn'd the first and hardest lesson in Christianity which is to deny themselves in point of pleasures profits honours and outward contents more than many of the wise and learned whose learning while they nourish proud sensuall and Atheisticall minds is but their crime and burthen serving only to die their sins to a deeper tincture of folly and is as a milstone about their necks that sinks their soules to a farther degree of condemnation And doe wee not often see men of great wits and noble endowments for nature and industry who have no cause to disbeleeve the word of God since hee never yet failed of his promise and hath confirmed the truth of the Gospel by so many infallible witnesses Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessors by Miracles by Sacraments and what ever might induce men morally to accept of his mercy in Christ and live accordingly Yet these men not having minds renewed by faith count all but as the Athenians babling and foolishnesse of preaching continuing to please themselves with momentary and perishing Objects meane time with extreme sin and folly which will bee their misery at last they neglect that great salvation which God hath offered to mankind in Jesus Christ greater than which neither the soule can desire nor God can give since the Author Meanes and End is God himselfe We see in the Gospel till the Prodigall came to himselfe peregrinatur enim omnis inordinatus animus Chrysol. for wicked and inordinate minds are alwayes from home busied about all but themselves till hee returned ad saniorem mentem to consider seriously the necessitous way into which hee was falne and wherein hee maintained himselfe only so farre as to bee sensible of his sordid misery and till hee thought of the plenty both of his fathers affection and provision hee was not resolved to quit his husks and brutish company Primum est compositae mentis argumentum secum consistere it is the first step or signe of a renewed mind to be composed to tarry at home to bee with and reflect on it selfe which faith alone makes it to doe bringing the mind back from the former vanity and extravagancy and making it seriously retire to it selfe and its Author God its Saviour Christ what hee is and what hee hath done for us revealed to us and requireth of us All which the mind by faith considering of assenting to and relying upon is in some degree renewed daily to its primitive beauty and integrity new light in the understanding new objects to the will new motions to the affections new actions in our conversation which are all but earnest and pledges of that fulnesse and perfection which the soule shall at last receive in the vision and fruition of God and Christ in the life to come when both soule and body shall bee renewed to an undecayable perfection The Fourth Part. Thus have wee seene the nature the ruines and way of renewing the mind Give mee leave now in the fourth place to present to you the Idea or Character of a renewed mind which as hee said of virtue if wee could discerne with our bodily eyes it would strangely win upon and ravish our affections There are three Regions of minds as of ayre of heavens 1 The first is of low earthly and debased to senses and the things of this world which covet much
and his pretious name had in honour who first of Princes next after Christ gave that for his word Beati Pacifici And may they be blessed who being heires to his Crowne are also heires to his Princely vertues and peacefull disposition And have we not all causes to blesse God who hath inclined their hearts and to blesse them who have followed those inclinations to re-establish our late dubious and endangered peace and lengthen out our tranquility May the great God of peace crowne their Persons Posterity and Kingdomes with aboundance of mercy and peace so long as the Sun and Moone endure 3 Follow peace with all men for thy own internall and eternall peace with God God is surely an enemy to those that are enemies to peace since they are contrary 1 To his nature which is happy in an unmoved and eternall tranquility 2 To his word which seeks by the message of peace to bring us neerer and make us liker to himselfe 3 A peacelesse and unquiet disposition like troubled waters is lesse apt for the sweet and cleere reflections of Gods love to it or the operations of his Spirit in it which creates that internall and unexpressible peace which no man knowes the price of but he that hath it 4 Lastly they only shall rest with God in Peace who have followed after Peace and in so doing after God They shall dye in Peace and lye in Peace and rise in Peace and reigne in Peace with God for ever The fruit of righteousnesse is sown in Peace of them that make Peace But I have done with the first Object and the Duty Follow Peace with all men we come now to the second 2. And Holinesse Peaceablenesse and Holinesse must goe together and indeed it is pity they should bee separated yet they are oftentimes for many are of sweet soft and calm natures not farre from the kingdome of heaven yet they rise not to the heigth of holinesse which must exceed and amend the best of natures Vae optimae naturae nisi superveniat gratia Good natures like small and shallow brooks may empty themselves and carry us to that narrow lake of humane love honour and approbation but holinesse only is that great and noble streame which conveyes the soule to heaven and looseth it in the Ocean of Gods infinite happinesse O let us not content our selves with the study of Peace and neglect Holinesse Peace will soon corrupt and sowre to troubles inward and outward which is not preserved and eterniz'd with Holinesse There is no Peace to the wicked saith God no true inward and durable Peace we must follow Peace as men and Holinesse as Christians What is it to have Peace with men and warre with God Let us therefore see 1 What Holinesse is 2 Who must follow it 3 How we must follow it 4 Wherefore 1 What Holinesse is Holinesse is a word of various acceptation 1 There is a Holinesse transcendent essentiall and absolute which is in God or rather which is God himselfe who is the eternall first and onely rule to himselfe by his immutable goodnesse unerring wisedome and irresistable power who is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} thrice holy as the Seraphins cry Holy holy holy Lord God of Hoasts c. Holy in his will in his word and in his works in his justice mercy and power and therefore {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} infinitely great and powerfull because infinitely good and holy The Father is holy and the Son holy and the Spirit holy in their essence in their relations and in their operations This Holinesse wee must follow Mat. 5.48 Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect 1 Pet. 1.15 Be ye holy as he that hath called you is holy Here is the rule patterne Idea and Prototype of Holinesse the fountain Sun and Sea of Holinesse from whence it derives it selfe in the second place to reasonable creatures Angels and men who onely are capable of Holinesse in a strict and proper sense 2 All creatures have a goodnesse of nature and being by creation onely the reasonable are vessels of Holinesse which properly is or at least ought to be in us A full and exact conformity of the Soul in all its motions and operations to the will and mind of God In the blessed Angels it is and was in man at first a gift of creation whereby they and wee were made in the Image of God in righteousnesse and true Holinesse Since our fall Holinesse is a gift of free grace a supernaturall quality or habit infused into the Soule by the Holy Spirit which by degrees reneweth us to a conformity or an unfained study at least of conformity to the will of God doing all out of conscience to his command regulating all by to his word and directing all to his glory This Holinesse we must also follow as the true and onely beauty honour riches pleasure and perfection of the soule For as much as men by reason exceed beasts so much doe Christians by Holinesse exceed meere men in their unholy and unregenerate state By Holinesse wee recover our station and neerenesse to Angels our claime to heaven our kindred and relation to God not only as his creatures but as his Sons regenerate by his holy Spirit 3 There is yet a Holinesse in a low and inferiour sense not of vertue or grace but of use and relation which is in Scripture and common speech applied to things unreasonable and inanimate too This is a Holinesse of dedication when things are devote and consecrated to the worship and service of the most holy God set apart from common and civill uses to sacred This likewise we must follow not as conceiving any inherent quality of Holinesse to be in those things whereby they are able to work on thy Spirit or recommend thee and thy service to a greater degree of acceptation by conferring a greater degree of Holinesse except in respect to Gods speciall appointment and promise as of old but only so farre we must follow this relative Holinesse as to a decent use and reverentiall comportment such as becomes the gravity majesty and solemnity of Christian Religion and those outward services God requireth of us Sancta sanctè Holinesse becomes the house and worship of God for ever But take heed that thy superstitious mind doe not impute to nor expect to find any active or virtuall Holinesse in or from times places pictures reliques garments or postures when that must be as it onely can be in thy heart There is that Sanctum Sanctorum the immediate residence and operation of Gods holy Spirit It is preposterous and vaine to imagine or seek it in other things if thou hast it not there thou maist profane them they cannot sanctifie thee nor thy services Yet here it is that superstition is prone to dote and flatter it selfe in its outward formalities of Holinesse as Lewis the eleventh did in his leaden gods pardon and
consecration used for Bishops O let us make good the holinesse of our titles and function by the holinesse of our conversation Let not the world reproach us as some doe the vanity and arrogancy of the Popes who challenge to themselves the title of his Holinesse by way of eminency or emphasis when indeed it is say they by Antiphrasis or contrariety being for the most part solecismes and contradictions to their names as he said of Probus vir minimè probus O let us never vainely imagine that there is a neerer way to the Clergies honour than by the Clergies Holinesse Though Holinesse even despised as a Jewell under foot hath its true and internall honour and value still But O let not our preaching our writing our living any way decry damp and discountenance Holinesse which is Gods honour and the Churches honour and must be our both honour and happinesse O let us not vainely contend for an imputed and relative Holinesse in Churches and tables and vestures and gestures and neglect it in our hearts and lives Our word must be that of Saint Paul Be ye followers of me as I am of Christ that is of Holinesse which was Christs way This not onely the better world which are extreamely ashamed and grieved for the contrary but even the worser dissolute and debauched sort of people exact of us whom we harden extreamly against our doctrines by our contrary manners and who are glad by the faults and scandalls of Ministers holy men as they should be to justifie or excuse their owne vitious and unholy lives The higher our calling raiseth us the neerer should it bring us to God and the more should the face of our lives like Moses his shine with the beames of holinesse while we daily converse with God Nothing more justifies and assures the truth of our faith and doctrine than the sutable holinesse of our lives let not that be verified of us which Ieremy complained of in his time From the Prophets is prophanenesse gone into all the Land But rather let us take Saint Pauls good advice to Timothy Thou O man of God flie these things and follow after righteousnesse godlinesse faith love patience meeknesse c. 3 We come now to the third particular how we must follow Holinesse 1 For the measure how farre to the heigth aime at perfection anticipate thy Heaven as much as may be here on earth emulate and strive to equall thy patterne for parts though not for degrees Be ye holy as your heavenly Father is holy he hath nothing of true holinesse who thinkes he hath enough or may have too much Nimietates excessus affectuum Deo debentur All the excesse of our vehement and unsatisfied desires should run this way after God and Holinesse 2 For the manner how I answer 1 Follow it universally in all points the same tie lies upon thee in any one action which doth in all Holinesse is the salt which must season all so farre as humane infirmity can attaine Thou wouldst not have some sparkes of Hell mixt with thy joyes of Heaven O strive that no sin if possible may allay thy Holinesse and integrity Be ye holy in all manner of conversation and perfecting holinesse in the feare of the Lord 2 Follow it earnestly with vehement affections not cold languishing lukewarme and indifferent content not thy selfe with a few posting and perfunctory prayers easie and lazy formalities of duties obesae animae like fat and pursie soules that cannot follow either fast or farre But rise to that intensivenesse in following Holinesse with which the Covetous man followes his gain the Ambitious his honour the Voluptuous his pleasure follow it with the same eagernesse wherewith thou hast formerly followed sin the world and the Devill Follow Holinesse with the same flagrancy and contention as wicked men doe persecute and oppose it They have their {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} so must thou but sancta pia persecutio a sacred and commendable prosecution 3 Follow it cheerfully not in a tedious drooping and dejected manner which brings an ill report on Gods wayes no man hath more right to moderate mirth which is the only true than he which is in the way of Holinesse and indeed of happinesse O let not that be a burthen to our Spirits here which must be the joy and crowne and constant disposition of our soules in heaven The deadnesse and indispositions from within which we are Subject unto are not to be imputed to the wayes of holinesse but to the weaknesse of our natures as the lothnesse to use exercise proceedeth from the ill humors which oppresse the Spirits in a diseased body and not from the inconvenience of exercise which is the way to dispel those ill humours and to recover health and agility For the difficulties and discouragements from without they are not much to be considered by any but those that know not what is the worth of a Soule the weight of Eternity the comfort of a good conscience and of the hopes of Heaven in the sight and fruition of God 4 Follow it exactly closely not at large and at distances a far off as the Disciples followed Christ to be crucified Ephes. 5.15 walke {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} strictly and precisely in a sound and Apostolicall sense There will be rimulae leakes and flanes of infirmities and daily incursions in all our lives but let there not be hiatus wide breaches and gapings of presumption keep not willingly any distance or dissimilitude from Christ be not ashamed or discountenanced to come neere to him and to be like to him in all points Follow holinesse not timidè pudibundè it is pudendus pudor a shame infinitely to be ashamed of that any Chistian should be ashamed to be or to be thought too holy but that he must now and then dare to sweare and ly and talke obscenely prophanely or live riotously that he may not seeme too precise Canst thou be too fit for heaven or too far from sin and hell 5 Follow Holinesse speedily begin betimes all life is lost that is not spent in a holy course of living it is a dead life nay a damning life without amendment All our life is too little to live well the Sun cannot rise too early except to a sluggard nor can holinesse be too soone begun in thy heart except thou love to sleepe in thy sin It were happy if with Ieremy and Iohn Baptist we were sanctified from the Wombe and Font from the dawning and morning of our lives but O jam clarum mane fenestras intrat Rom. 13.12 It is high time to rise from sin and follow Holinesse the day of our short life is farre spent in following vanity and things that cannot profit the night of death is at hand ô make haste to live and to live holily that thou mayst not come short of dying happily Breve sit quod
nor a lye hee will not an oath This customary swearing is not more vaine and needlesse than a spreading and epidemicall evill such as the Land mournes under being growne to that which Salvian complaines of in his time Non criminis sed sermonis genus per Deum per Christum jurare consuetudine jurandi videtur Swearing seemes to most not a hainous and weighty sin but a formality and complement of speech through the custome and commonnesse of swearing {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Truth is of it selfe cleere enough and needs not the vehemence and asseveration of an oath Which renders it more suspected and the hearer more diffident when he sees one fears not an oath nor makes conscience of vaine swearing which is a sin as well as lying As wee need but speak it so speak it plainly and cleerly Truth like the Sun joyes most in it selfe it s owne opennesse simplicity and cleerenesse as wee ought not to sweare it so wee must not with multitude of words clog and cumber it studying rather to cloud and involve it than to cleere and explaine it which is the end of speech The contrary is but the cunning and artifice of many who though they dare not {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} flatly and with open forehead fight against Truth yet with their {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} as Socrates speaks fetches dresses ambages circles labarynths perplexed and purposely intricate termes and discourses they obliquely fight against the Truth with its owne armes Eloquence studying to confound and lose the capacities of simpler minds by using a sea of words to a drop of truth Such tongues and men like Ignes fatui intend not to give light to a matter but only to amuse and lead out of the right way ignorant and well meaning minds Which is indeed but a more subtill fine and sophisticall way of lying An injury of justice and truth with applause and ostentation which they hope to steale away in that mist and obscurity of words which by their voluble and jugling tongues they cast upon them The practice and fault not so much of private men as of those Tertullusses many publike Orators whose profession cals them to the barre and pleas to be Vindices veritatis Advocates of truth and justice whose unhappy tongues and pernicious eloquence oft times so darken and entangle truth and a just cause which they know to be such that they gaine it with as much injustice as eloquence whose mercenary and venall soules and tongues count their greatest fee and reward to come from the purses of their clyents not from the conscience of asserting a truth and vindicating a just cause Certainly it had been a blessing to these men to have been dumbe better not speak at all than not the truth or with applause and vaine glory to speak nothing but specious and plausible lies These are not Pleaders but Seducers as Bernard Bonorum ingeniorum insignis est indoles in verbis verum amare non verba It argues a minde not lesse ingenuous than pious to make words subservient to truth not to subdue and captivate truth to words To count the clearing and prevailing of truth the noblest reward of speaking not to make truth the booty and prey of speech Veritas saepe offuscatur eloquentia That power and prevalency of speaking that some men have should be as bellowes {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to blow up and resuscitate to a flame and splendor the sparks of an obscured truth not to damp and oppresse them by casting the ashes and soot of dry and empty words upon them This then is our common duty to speak the truth a knowne at least a beleeved truth freely and sully without feare or partiality Simply and nakedly without swearing and imprecations Candidly and ingenuously without artifice or studied obscurity 2 Who Every man No man hath a Patent or priviledge to lie or a dispensation for truth speaking in any cause whatsoever Not for himselfe or any advantage may accrew to him Mendacium semper inutile A lyar is alwayes a loser for he sels the truth and his soule into the bargaine when the whole world cannot countervaile either of them Not for his friend which is as his owne soule Nemo potest esse veraciter amicus hominis nisi qui fuerit primitus veritatis Hee will easily prove a false friend that will falsifie the truth for his friend Magis amica veritas must bee a good mans Maxime Hee that is false to God cannot bee firme to mee as Constantine the Great said That friend that will bee lost by truth speaking or not lying is not worth the keeping Hee values his friendship far too deare that will have mee purchase it with the waste of my conscience and hazard of the love of God and losse of my soule Not for Parents or kindred Our neerest alliance and cognation is to God {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} whose essence and will is Truth His off-spring wee are we must not break our respects to Him to pleasure any relations which are infinitely below Him Not for the Magistrate or his Prince A good Prince will not require it an evill doth not deserve that a man should so far injure his soule by rebelling against the most High whose Kingdome is over all even Kings themselves Not for his Countrey By lying to banish a mans selfe from heaven which is a Christian soules true dearest and eternall Countrey Not for his Religion A lye cannot advance true religion no more than water enflame fire or darknesse illustrate light or hell promote heaven It is a lame religion or a halting heart at least which professeth it so as to stand in need of the crutches of lying and equivocation Not for God himselfe and his glory Whereof hee is so vigilant and powerfull a maintainer that hee needs not the Devils ayde Will yee accept the person of the Almighty or lye for him Doe you think to serve him by sinning against him or please him by offering an abomination This is as if one would pretend to secure a Prince by treason or defend him by striking at him For every lyar doth strike at the face of God which is Truth by which hee appeares to us and is seene by us Nay not for Truth it selfe which cannot be strengthened but enfeebled and hindered by the addition of a lye as a strong and sound arme or leg by needlesse splinters and bands or wholesome meat by mixture and infusion of poyson Mendaciorum natura est ut cohaerere non possunt Lies cannot easily bee so glued or sodered together but their flawes and gapings will bee detected much lesse Truth and Lies which are more heterogeneall than iron and clay old bottles and new wine a new piece and an old garment What agreement hath light and darknesse God and Beliall So that it is every mans