obligd me with deeds and guifts why was it necessary to engage me with thy desires my miseries have bereaud me of all comfort for seing my works to carry but smal proportion with thy benefits it was some relief to endeavour satisfaction by wishes and desires but they also becoming due to thee what now is remnant o Lord how worthily art thou the butt of all desires who desird so desiringly how can I have leasure to fix my desires upon any thing els besides thee the God of desire how can my thoughts or concupiscible powers suspend themselves from the desire of thy most H. Body where the whole man becomes Christ In other Sacraments participations of grace he is made one spirit with God but in this he moreover becomes one flesh with Iesus such a strict union interceding that it is tearmd by the H. Fathers substantial natural and real in so much that now I am wholly thine and one with thee regard and reverence my self as flesh partaking of thy flesh which the most B. Virgin handled and worshipd with so much devotion being jointly two in one flesh I being able to glory and say I am now flesh of Christ a bone of the bones of IESVS This is a great Sacrament in Christ and his Church by that mystery in which we become concorporeal with the king of glory the Son of God and the Virgin Mary Now loving thee o Lord I wil love my self for no body ever hated his own flesh and thou loving thy flesh lovedst me also making both thine mine joynt-sharers of the same favours treating mine as thy own by the priviledg of the resurrection for although other just men both antient Prophets Patriarchs were not to enjoy a resurrection yet those should who dye partakers of this Sacrament of our Lords Body neyther shal this befall them only in regard of the merits of their soul but also for the dignity of their flesh O Lord thou wast desired by all nations that common nature might share of thy communications why do not I desire thee that thou mayst become individual to me one with me by that admirable inconfused conjunction with my particular flesh spirit Therfore o Lord because we do not desire as we ought thou didst vouchsafe to do it least so great a benefit should be deprived of its due love esteem Thou causedst other blessings to be sought and chiefly that of the Incarnation but thou wouldst have the institution of the venerable mystery of thy body and blood to come merely gratis without the expense of the desires of all nations That Sacrament came as an unexpected boon and unlookd-for charity that all our desires might be reserved and employd in a due reception of it and yet for all this we are not enflamed a desire of this mystery is so acceptable to thee that thou wonderfully secondest it and condescendest to a soul that longs to receive thee B. Stanislaus a novice of our Society being more then once in such acondition that he could not satiate his longing desire by feeding on this celestial bread with much ardour of devotion desired what he could not then enjoy and forthwith the Angels brought what he desird and made him eat of that sacred banquet Because the Body of Christ is seldome received with a due desire God would not let this occasion of a worthy reception slip or frustrate it beholding that B. soul in such a spiritual famine and eagernes of appetite Thou taughtst us o IESV teacher of all truth to come to this Sacrament with much tendernes of devotion but we do not imitate the devotion thou exhibitedst towards it by desiring I know not how we can if we love Christ behold this mystery without weeping eyes for a spouse cannot behold the pledg which her fellow-spouse bidding adieu towards a long journy left her for a memorial without a longing desire of his return We must not only endeavour to receive it worthily but even as worthily as possibly we can For besides that an infinite majesty requires all possible reverence and the immense sanctity of IESVS all purity imaginable we shal derive thence a great increase of grace Thou gavest us o Lord 3. documents to make us approach it with greater worthines a fervent love in desiring an exquisite purity a profound humility which thou didst exhibit in washing the feet of thy Disciples What shal I say of purity thou oughtest o lover of Christ in thy access to this table to possess it in such eminency that its beames must be no less refined then if thou wert presently to give up the ghost Thou must endeavour with more earnestnes desire and sollicitude to prepare thy self to the Eucharist then to death nay in some respect of profit more then if thou wert about to enter into the glory of God IESVS washed the feet of his Disciples being to impart his Body to them although they were already clean and notwithstanding when he sent them like lambs in the midst of wolves in such a present hazard of death when he took them along with him to Mount Tabor as eyewitnesses of his glorious Transfiguration he used no such preparative nor when in glory he eat with them after his resurrection One would be pretty wel disposed for death if he were but in the state of grace for although he were not altogether free from tax of paine or venial culpablenes yet before he stood in the presence of God he would be purifyd by cleansing flames I wish with all my hart that a Purgatory did precede the receiving of this Sacrament but because it doth not it imports me to look most narrowly into my self and prepare and refine my self from the least blemish of imperfection or debt of any penalty and supply as wel as I can by diligence and an ardent love the fire of purgatory and although all immunity both from paine and fault be requisite to gain admittance into glory nevertheles no respect is had but to precedent grace and works neyther is the divine indulgence doubled in regard of the disposition as it is distinct from merit but in the Eucharist a more ample clayme and title to glory wil be acquird even in regard of each ones disposal over and above that which is allotted to his merits he that makes it his task to till the soyle of his soul and dispose it better and better the richer Crop shal he reap thence besides the reward of his good works one ought to be much more ambitious of pleasing God and standing gracious in his eyes which is the effect of grace then of joying in the fruition of his glory if the amplenes of his beatitude were not commensurately corresponding to his grace the proportion which God holds All mediums that dispose us to glory by good works distinct from the Sacraments obtaine grace under one only title but preparation to the Eucharist under a double gains afterwards
his own Son so pretious to him The XIII Chapter How Penances and Corporal afflictions help us THorns conserve plants in a garden austerities grace in a just man A fresh vigour of mind flourisheth many times in a tottering and witherd body That Physitians may cure the body they more and more afflict it by bitter potions by abstinence by breathing a veine by searing it and other wayes yet more penal if it be exacted of thee to afflict it in some sort for the good of thy soul no great matter is demanded He that is ill at ease amidst his gripes and paines casts up what annoyd him so the peccant humours of our soul are not purgd by living pleasantly since the maladies of our bodies are not curd without annoiance A flint being beaten yealds flashes of light and the flesh by chastisements illuminates the mind That soul shewes it self a very beast which treats not its body like a beast Even as afflictions and crosses sent by God make men relent think upon him indoctrinate them enkindle fervour increase familiarity with God and raise their harts so voluntary austerities have like effect they make man have a more frequent recourse to God and being voyd of sensible gust they dispose him better for divine illustrations The curbing of nature is a fit disposition for increase of grace this is the ayme and endeavour of grace to divorce us from temporal corporeal and visible things and a penitential life finds this half done to its hand supposing it be accompanyd with divine grace without which nothing is beneficial to us nothing profitable The depth of our humiliation together with bodily austerity is the throne and kingdom of grace and a step to glory and the crucifying of our flesh the exalting of the spirit Thou armest thy self with voluntary afflictions against necessary ones learning thus in the school of patience how thou art to embrace those which are sent thee from God By these skirmishes thou art taught to overcome thy self and consequently disable thy greatest antagonist by whom the rest assaile thee thou also findest a more speedy redress at the hands of God in thy addresses to him Although Christ crucifyd be a sufficient warrant for our penitential austerities yet we might specify many more and principally our innumerable defaults and penalties due for them that we may make amends for what is past and lessen future misdemeanours Thy soul must be the executioner of thy flesh for this end through the great mercy of God it is repriev'd and rescued from the paines of hel fire Sometimes it happens that of two criminals sentencd to death the one partner is quitted upon this condition that he execute the sentence of death upon his companion becoming his hangman for want of another Our soul and body are joynt sharers in sin let the soul be the executioner of divine justice over the body and punish it in a due manner she when she first sinned being repriev'd from eternal damnation Suffer nothing to pass unpunished make thy self formidable to thy self as one that can be cruel against thy self a most impartial and severe chastizer of all the delinquencies and soothings of the flesh all must undergoe their due penalty There 's no citty wel governd unles its penal lawes be in force and vigour nor can that conscience be wel orderd where so many depraved affections are on foot without its courts and sword of justice The punishment thou inflictest upon thy self must be corresponding to thy fault beware God call thee not to an account for contemning corrupting justice Take pennyworths of thy self both because thou pleadest guilty hast playd the naughty judge in acquitting thy self so often by being indulgent to thy self Iustice is exercisd in cityes rather to terrify others by such an example from offending then to lessen the guilt and punishment of him that is nocent but thou reapest more ample fruit by chastizing thy self thou shalt not onely henceforth deter others from offending but thy self that thou mayst not commit new ones and diminish the punishment due for the committed Thy severity is not a piece of justice but indulgence for mans revenge works Gods pardon Yet in all thy proceedings be mindful how prayse worthy is obedience and how profitable discretion least thou practise austerity unadvisedly with decrease of thy own profit and les increase of Gods honour and service for the divel is ready to catch at all turnes Nevertheles be careful above all and at all times rather to chastize thy will then thy body but as far as a prudent circumspection divested of self love and the advice of thy superiour with regard to each ones age condition strength inclination employment and necessity shal permit such austerities thou must without mercy and self-flattery not be sparing in inflicting them O mercyful truth how can I flatter and pamper my self if I call to mind the hardship and torments which my most innocent IESVS sufferd for my sins and the paines that are indured by the soules in Purgatory It would be accounted a huge priviledge if God should permit a soule in those scorching flames to redeem its sufferings as we now may by undergoing voluntary afflictions Let us now make use of this his indulgence If a creditour should remit to one a debt of a hundred talents upon this condition if within a prefixt time he payd him only one would he think you refuse so gainful a bargain What a madnes is it in us to chuse rather to pay a hundred in the other life then one in this But what need of remission of these terrifical paines the gracefulnes and beauty which accrues to our flesh in the life to come is a sufficient incentive Remember how glorious and seemly our bodies will be in the future resurrection which shal share of comelines and splendour according to the rate and proportion of their now-present sufferances The robes which are to vest them in eternity are woven by the home spun temporal afflictions of this life Some not to appear deformed to the eyes of men have sufferd their limbs and bones to be cut and rackd half the tearm of their short life eternal beauty is purchasd at a far easier rate it is not requird that we cut them but only that we do not pamper them a litle vex annoy them Our H. Patriarch S. Ignatius understood this excellently wel who being not as yet converted to almighty God to avoid deformity commanded a bone to be cut out enduring the pain without a tear without a sigh without the least sign of grief or torture but after his conversion he judgd it an act far more heroical upon consideration of a future comelines that is to invest us in the resurrection to undergoe austerities to fast for whole weeks together to disciplin himself thrice a day to make prolix genuflexions lying on the bare ground wearing a rough hair-shirt clad in sackcloth going barefoot treating his
body in the harshest manner he could both for apparrel and rigour of fare The austerities also of barbarous hethens destitute of our hopes may make us blush at our own tepidity they wore shirts of iron which goard their bodies on all sides with sharp pricks they shretchd themselves upon tenter hooks singing the whilst hymnes in praise of their God they cast themselves under the wheeles of the chariots which carried their Idols and sufferd themselves to be bruizd to pieces they abstaind from meat for many dayes together Let it confound us that superstition is more powerful then religion and the phantasticalnes of men then the love of God The XIV Chapter That too much love of our flesh hinders the spirit IF our flesh although it be born with us and the blood which enlivens us be such domestique enemies as to hinder the life of our spirit can flesh that 's only alli'd and consanguinity much avail The spirit ought to blush at the name of alliance how much more at the allies of a fond and disordinate love If the flesh be ashamd of its kindred of the same flesh if it disclaime from obscure kinsfolks and progenitours how much more ought the spirit to be ashamd of all flesh and blood and such like affinity The soul ought to renounce her own flesh which she animates and why doth she disordinately love anothers and that void of life which servd others and perchance serves now only for food and lodging for wormes The noblenes of grace and our alliance with Christ should in all reason be forcible enough to make us forget and blush at our nature without needing the incentives of its basenes corruption and loss of allies O divine truth thou commandest me to hate my kindred that I may become thy disciple If I love them more then thee how shal I become thy spirit adhering to thee one spirit with thee Grant me by thy blood that I may not love my blood but in thine let the blood of Christ obtain so much at our hands that we love not too much the blood of sinful men Christ by his sacred blood would redeem us and become our allie by blood for he was not ignorant of the taintures and defects of our blood and our allies by blood and therfore vouchsafed a reparation The spirit is not bound to follow the lawes and dictamens of the flesh see then o my soul that neernes of blood do not taint thy love God commands thee to hate thy self and thy own flesh and blood how canst thou then love thy friends and kinsfolks otherwise then for God and according to the prescript of vertue Thou mightst with as much reason love gnats or flies as thy allies which nevertheles thou seek'st to destroy Wormes are engenderd by the same carnal parents with thy brethren why adhor'st thou them with such a loathing of stomack more then all and lovest thy kindred with such affection of hart more then God If the ground of this extraordinary love beyond the dictamens of vertue be for that they are engendred of the same Parents wormes have more from them then thy brethren for they gave not these their soul nor are they totally producd by them as the others are Hence kinsfolks and parents love and regard only the bodies of their kindred being little sollicitous for what concerns the good of their soul it being Gods handywork not theirs Yea neither didst thou receive thy body from thy parents but by them from God What lovest thou thy allies because they are parts of thy common progenitours by the same reason thou oughtest to love any of their disseverd members yea though infected with a loathsome canker If thou lovest them for resemblance sake by the same consequence thou mightst love their statua or any other ordinary man What is it to descend from the same family but only to have drawn a litle stenchy matter and corruption out of the same stinking fountain and what is worse sin also Can two with any reason boast because they fel together into the same puddle and were bemird with the same dirt Thy parent begot nasty wormes of a purer nature then thee they being void of sin and thou staind with the filth of original neither wert thou sooner partaker of life then guilty of death He that vainly glories in the nobility of his carnal pedegree seeks to entitle to honour the disgrace of common nature What els is disordinate affection to kindred but a vaunting of that common basenes which we should be ashamd of and a complacence in the ignominy of sin The viciousnes of our nature takes growth and increase by flesh and blood and our misery prospers gaines ground thence the flesh is maximd in principles wholy repugnant to the spirit Our soul no sooner begins to be but by meanes of the flesh it is infected with sin and the contagiousnes spreading still more and more it is the prime cause of all our sinful mortalities We must renounce both blood and kindred that we may be freed from this death of sin by the eross of Christ which we must carry We shal not meet with such harsh encounters as many children and youths have done who by vertue of his cross trampled under foot all flesh blood S. Iohn Goto a Iaponian of our Society at the place of his martyrdome beholding at an equal distance on the one hand the teares and sighs sweet embracements of his weeping parents on the other crosses and gibbets bloody executioners nothing dismaid with such ensignes of cruelty chose rather to cast himself into the armes of the cross then those of his kindred and sleighting couragiously all their enticing allurements â—ann to that which stood prepard for him where dying he purchasd the kingdom of God which is not bought by flesh and blood The XV. Chapter Of the loss of temporal things THe spirit is not much troubled at the loss of temporalities for which it hath more reason to rejoyce One that lies groaning under a heavy waight would he lament if a friend should remove it That which is to be taken away it s much better that God take it then death If divested of all thou be pleasing to God and he pleasd with thee to what purpose seekest thou by the access of creatures and cares to become grateful to him Let himself alone content thee without his guifts and the assurances of temporal commodities God loves not what is thine but thee do not thou love so much what is Gods as God himself Christ dispoild of all mounted the cross dispoild of all he came out of his sepulcher there he left his shrowd behind him naked also he took the citty of heaven and enterd it triumphant For love of thee who art naked he dâ—â—d naked not for love of thy goods and fortuâ—es therfore he seeks thee not them and because he seeks thee he takes these things from thee expecting thee naked in heaven
perswaded himself that to asswage it thou mightest be induced to sin Am I thirsty and so wert thou also and upon the cross neither was their any body that offerd thee a refreshment I am not in such a condition and easily find those who afford me that courtesy Am I cold thou didst quake and shiver when thou lodgedst in the māger Am I disturbed in my repose thy Disciples did also awake thee when thou slept in the ship Am I injured by any one thou pleading innocent wert sentenced to death Am I affronted or suffer reproach thou wert publickly produced by Pilate in the view of all the people he crying aloud behold the man am I weary thou didst sit at the fountain quite tyrd with travelling about Am I falsely accused and so wert thou also in the house of Caiphas Am I rebuked for my good deeds and thou also for curing on the Sabboth Am I slanderd they murmured against thee that thou cast out divels in the Prince of divels Am I mocked and derided thou wert also taunted and flouted at by those who sayd he hath saved others himself he cannot save Do I receive cross and harsh answers thou receivedst far harsher and over and above a villainous servant gave thee a box on the eare Am I forsaken by my friends thou wert abandoned by thy own Disciples Do I depart from my kindred thou departedst from thy Mother to go to thy Passion Am I sleighted in my advice thy doctrine also both was and is contemned Am I annoyd with temptations thou also wert pesterd with them in the desert Am I sorry for my brothers miscarriage and thou didst grieve for the Apostasy of thy Disciple become a runnegate to truth Am I sorry for my own defects thou beheldst them before me ressentedst them Do I feel want of devotion thou didst cry upon the cross my God why hast thou forsaken me what distress then is there eyther corporal or spiritual of which we find not relief in Christ first of all distressed for us This is it which he saith come to me all yee that labour and are burdend and I will refresh you O most sweet and comfortable promise the very hearing wherof is so recreative If Christs labour doth ease ours how much more will his glory do so if his distresses be so effectual what will his power and riches be but I most meek Lord covet only thy helping hand that I may suffer with thee not that thou mayst comfort me in this life in which my soul desires neither corporall nor spiritual joy but onely to suffer for and with thee The VIII Chapter How purity of body helps the spirit HE that dwels in a fenny unwhole some country what wonder if he be often ill disposed as on the contrary he that breaths in a pure and sweet ayre healthful so a soul in an undefiled body is lusty and vigorous in a foggy and corrupted one drooping and sickly The mind in unspotted and Virgin flesh is as it were in a flowry and fragrant mead Chast bodies are the delights of God what wonder if they be healthful to their soules They let their mind attend wholly to God free from the disturbance of temporal things they exhilarate the conscience in a loathsomnes of all sensual pleasures loving God without let or obstacle O my love o most pure and sincere truth I am endebted to thee o God not only for the half of my hart but for the whole I will not onely purify my mind but also sanctify my body We are members of Christ let not one corrupted and unseemly limb defile and mishape a most beautiful body Who would prize the beauty of a graceful spouse if she had a putrid nose or a face and cheeks which were a receptacle of wormes Christs glorified body is a thousand times more pure and refulgent then the Sun O mortal man thou art a member of the immortal CHRIST consider how much thou oughtest to regard the sanctity of thy body and to thy utmost imitate immortality and incorruption least thou be disagreeing from his purity Thou art made one spirit and one flesh with Christ by the communion of his most H. Body do not defile thy own flesh which by a wonderful kind of real union is become the flesh of Christ Thou wouldst deem it no les then a sacriledge if one should clothe the statua of a Saint in a spotted nasty garment why art not thou at least ashamed to defile that flesh which is a part of the living Christ and add an obscene and polluted member to it thou thy self wouldst not weare a piece even of royal purple if it were steept in dirt and clay and why wilt thou weare thy own flesh staind so pittifully with filthy blemishes and make it a part of Christs body As both our soul and body shal in the next life glorify God in unspeakable purity so must we in this also strive to serve him in cleanenes of both Thou must not only seek beatitude by the sanctity of thy soul but must endeavour also to merit the felicity and resurrection of thy body by the sanctity of thy flesh least siding with thy mortal part at the instigation of some pleasant object thou sentence thy self to a perpetual death But learn now so to behave thy self in flesh as that thou mayst resemble the Angelicall spirits who shall neither marry nor be married Learn now the incorruptibility and being of a single nature and life abstracted from all sense Thy body must emulate the purity of the celestial Thrones in whom God hath seated himself since it is the temple of the H. Ghost chosen to be a vessel of honour We are the good odour of Christ Christ breathes purity every where his attendance is Virginity his delight chastity In almost all the calamities of this world chastity was as it were a lenitive to God a repayrer of its dammages he found an excellent way of repayring the ruines of the Angels chiefly principally out of Virgins chast persons by them chusing a Virgin Mother and Precursour having his Disciples and the peers of his Church the more eminent part of his Saints for the most part Virgins or living in continency or without the use of their wives or separated from them and all of them most chast he mitigated the sad disaster of Adams fal with the hopes of a Virgin that was to bruize the head of the Serpent those whom he saved in the deluged world kept chastity while they were in the Ark Christ solaced himself upon the cross with his B. Mother and beloved Disciple both Virgins How can he chuse but love chastity Virginity both his Parents being Virgins he having all his being derived from Virginity Christ had a Virgin Father according to his divine nature and a Virgin Mother according to his humane He would moreover have the type and substitute of his Father to wit S. Ioseph a
he would be touched with a sense of compassion and how much more if he did see his own child in such a calamity o most mercyful Father how can that venial fault be tearmed little which it is unseemly for thee to compassionate though thou seest thy own children by grace whome thou affectest so tenderly so scorched and tortured in that piaculary fornace and yet for them it was thou gavest thy life pretious blood Neither paternal bowels replenished with pitty nor infinite wisdome was wanting in thee thou art not an ignorant God who can be deceived in the estimate of a fault nor a cruel one who takes content in punishing but against thy wil wherfore if thou tormentest him so rigorously whome thou lovest so tenderly it must needs be a vast evil towards which mercy it self is so unmerciful Let us imagin a man void of all knowledg of hel or purgatory and beholding only by revelation the state of some one soul pittifully afflicted by those flames for a venial sin but wholly ignorant what might occasion such a punishment what I beseech thee would he guess to cause it any smal or petty trifle or rather some huge exorbitancy which so benigne a God resolved to chastize with so much rigour Again shal that be tearmed little which he in this life punisheth with the greatest of all punishments death If God cannot err in inflicting penalties since he inflicts so dreadful ones how great must that needs be for which he inflicts them behold for one venial sin he punished his own servants Moyses and Aaron with death for one venial sin also as is probably thought Oza and lots wife were suddainly struck with the like disaster For one venial sin the Abbot Moyses was deliverd over to the divel and for a space possessed by him and in very deed it were a les evil to have a thousand legions of divels in ones body and be vext by them then to have the least venial sin in his soul and take complacence in it The divel laboured tooth and nail for 40 yeares together to make a certain servant of God commit but one venial trespass Is the divel such a fool that he would wait and lie in ambush so long to surprize him for a matter of smal moment why shal not we be watchful at least one day to avoid so great mischief o most pure truth purify my impure spirit from such an evil and illuminate me that I may not esteem it light because I regard it but lightly since the divels themselves take it so to hart but let me esteem that great which is done against a God so great nor let me repute that contemptible and sleight which I a contemptible sleight and inconstant creature commit by sinning upon all occasions and constantly but therfore let me hold it great because I who am vile and contemptible dare do it against a God the best and greatest How great must that needs be which rather then we must but once commit deliberately it is better to embrace a thousand deaths it is better that heaven and earth returned to their first nothing and all mankind were sentencd to damnation If choise were given to the Virgin Mother while she stands at the foot of the cross bewailing the torments and death of her beloved Son whether she would have him released from these paines and disgraces and behold him presently seated at the right hand of his Father and the salvation of a thousand worlds accomplished at that instant or consent to one sole venial sin she would chuse not to do this latter and would also perswade me to do so too nay rather then this she would chuse to see her Son and the Son of God once more naild to the cross yet without any default at all and if it were needful and lawful would strike in the nailes with her own pious hand and sacrifice him with greater charity then Abraham did his Tel me I pray would it be a slender courtesy and comfort to the Virgin her Iesus if some one man were found who would put himself upon the mount Calvary in the room of Christ and be crucified and suffer in his steed perswade thy self for all this that they would rather desire a greater comfort at thy hands which is to eschew all venial sin Consider now whether that would be little which should preponderate such a piece of service nor do thou deny this solace to thy suffering Christ and his compassionate Mother Let us then cancel and abolish this opinion that that evil can be light or little which the Virgin Christ God his Father deem so great and punish so exemplarly That is not little which hinders things orderd to a great and sublime end which lessens the love of God in this life and delaies his vision in the other It is no smal rub which puts as it were a stop and let to the most speedy and powerful mercy of God and his desires Would it be accounted a smal violence that should suspend a millstone falling from heaven in the aire while it were poasting to the earth its center it is therfore no smal sin which suspends the divine munificence and the ardent desires of an enamoured soul that they cannot reach their center God and the promisd holy land of beatitude but detaines it in the flames of purgatory That is not a little displeasing to God which hinders him from giving out of hand what he hath such a mind to give and we so willingly would receive That is not little which stops the current of Gods great favours and even in this life obstructs the outlets of his profuse liberality Let us tremble at such an evil and to the very utmost of our power use all possible diligence to avoid it not enduring to brook the shame and disgrace which the name of a fault imports How can that soul take complacence in the name of a servant or a child or a spouse which is not carefull to please God and comply in all things with his sacred will how naughty a servant would he be thought that would do nothing as he ought unles his master threatning death stood over him with a drawn sword and can upon no other tearms neither by faire meanes nor foul be brought to his duty how untoward a child who is allwaies crossing his parent and seeks to please him no further then meerly to keep himself from being disinherited for the rest is wholly wrechles in accomplishing his wil and desire and is lead in all with a spirit of contradiction how disloial a spouse who should only so far forth shew her self faithfull and loving to her fellow spouse as not to provoke him to take her life in other things perpetually crossing and vexing him and were she never so often corrected shewd no signes at all of amendment what argument of love would it be in a child or spouse to say I really love my parent or fellow spouse
a double degree of beatitude Purity is so beseemingly requisite in order to this Sacrament that the divine providence hath ordaind that even as it precedes the sacrifice of Christ it be propitiatory for our sins it having vertu to remit the very pain due to their fault Christ himself whom we receive is pleasd first of all to cleanse us as he did the feet of his Disciples cer he would give himself to us or deliver himself for us He shewd by that washing that not any kind of purity was sufficient but that a special one was necessary for he would not only have the hands of his Disciples clean which sufficeth for ordinary banquets but their feet also which signifyes a very extraordinary diligence God declard hereby that we are to come to the Eucharist not only with clean hands that is works devoyd of all fault but also with clean feet that is to say without so much as any print or sign of fault viz the paine due to tepid actions or sins remitted being quite abolished and in this sort grace proper to this sacrifice is powerful to cancel the penalty due to sin How shal I come worthily o Lord to receive thee what a treasure of sanctity was bestowd upon S. Iohn Baptist that his mouth might figuratively entertain not thee but thy name saying behold the lamb of God and he express the shadow of one of thy Sacraments but what purity ought to invest me who am to approach that venerable Sacrament and receive thee truly and really into my mouth o I wish I could entertain thee with as much reverence as the most B. Virgin Mother did in her sacred womb in that stupendious hour of thy Incarnation or as she embraced thy most H. Body in her bosome when it was taken down from the cross and thy heavenly Father received thy spirit at thy expiring when it was recommended into his hands What thou dividedst o Lord in thy death betwixt thy Father and Mother all that do I here adore in this Sacrament after thy resurrection for thy soul remaynes not separate from thy Body Thou affordest me that body which thou bequeathedst to thy Mother together with thy spirit which thou recommendedst to thy Father O that any one could have applyed his mouth to that of the expiring IESVS and gatherd thence his sacred breath worthy to be gatherd by the hands of God that it might animate and steer my body o that any one could with the effusion of his own blood wash the disfigured Corps of IESVS and make himself the viol of Christs blood shed for my sake to cleanse my soul so ill-favourd and ugly o that any one would hold his mouth to receive and tast the water blood which flowed from the side of Christ that not so much as one drop of it might fall to wast but thou o Lord desirous and desirable complyest with my wishes in this dreadful mystery How great joy did the Angels conceive in thy Ascension when thou entredst triumphant into heaven what longing desires preceded thy return thither o the desired of all the Hierarchyes of heavenly spirits with what jubily of hart ought I to exulâ— when thou entrest into my breast I alone upon many scores owe thee all the reverence which all the Angels exhibited when they entertaind thee returning from this world and passible life for thou frequently enterst into me that thou mayst delight me alone thou who once only enterd into heaven to cause joy to all the Angels Thou frequently dost for me alone what thou didst but once for all the quyres of blessed spirits If this favour were imparted to one alone of all the multitudes of men that once only through all eternity Christ should enter after this most amiable manner into his sole breast what a stupendious benefit would it be deemd whosoever should hear of it ravishd into extasy with this excess of bounty would scarse believe it he that received him absorpt in admiration would stand like one besides himself without voyce without motion yea without life through amazement fear joy and love unles he were miraculously sustaind by reason of such unheard-off benevolence why then do not I worthily reverence and admire a greater benefit conferd not once but often not on me alone but all wherein I acknowledg the favour done me much hightned O that I or any one could entertain thee o amiable IESVS becoming my guest as thy Father entertaind thee entring into heaven after a world of torments and death for the sanctity of all the Angels their devotion their joy pomp and celebrity fell far short I wil not say of thy majesty but even of that humility wherwith thou daignest to shut thy self up in the narrow cottage of my hart grant me grace by so rare an example to humble my self below nothing I that cannot humble my self sufficiently in respect of thy humility how can I do it in respect of thy majesty and glory o how happy is that soul that shal humble it self before this Sacrament what honour will accrew to it how wil the Angels reverence and honour such a one that it may receive its Lord with honour S. Teresa oftner then once beheld the Brothers of our Society when they went to communicate in our Church accompanyd with Angels and these holding a most rich and beautiful canopy over their heads that like royal and consecrated soules they might more honorably entertain their soveraign but when others approachd that heavenly Table she beheld no such obsequiousnes in these B Spirits and the reason was want of humility in their devotions Let us then procure with all humility devotion fervour and charity to receive that supersubstantial daily bread Let us so receive it daily as if we were never more to receive it though we come very frequently let us come so as if it were to be but once in our whole life Let our daily communion be so performd as it ought to be the first day of our life and last at our death The XII Chapter That in time of refection we must not be more indulgent to our body then necessity requires THE Angels expect thee at their supper glut not thy self like a beast with corruptible food He that is invited as a guest to anothers table eats nothing at home thou art invited a guest to heaven do not at least glut thy self upon earth If one that is cloyd with earthly food cannot be a competent guest at an earthly banquet how can he be at a heavenly one fulnes hinders the relish of material meats how much more then of divine the fasting Lazarus who could not so much as feed upon crums is now a constant guest at the heavenly supper but that glutton who cramd himself with exquisit daintyes is shut forth Men at a banquet abstain from several dishes reserving their appetite for some choyse one intending to make their repast upon that o Lord if I shal be satiated at the
not love thee o Lord who gavest us our whole creation are grateful towards robbers who pillage us but in part yea even towards dogs for guarding what is ours we love him that supplies us in our want and we melt not into love of thee who gavest as both essence and life when we were no better then nothing What greater want or penury then to have nothing yea to be nothing if God relieved us then by giving us a life and being why are we not mindful of such an almes since we are grateful to him who affords us but a mean support of life can it be judgd a more signal mercy to give wherewith to live then to give life it self benefits are esteemd much greater for coming in the nick of time when our indigency was most pressing and when what is given comes voluntarily and without paying so much as a begging for it What greater penury then to have nothing which is the greatest of all God then did us a great good turn worthy of the greatest love in relieving so urgent a necessity it is an inestimable benefit that he gave it so freely of his own accord when nothing of ours preceded which could exact it The more pressing ones want is although what is given be but a trifle it is more highly valued then when more is given in a less exigence thou o Lord when we were extremely penurious in our nothing didst not bestow a little upon us but all whatsoever we are Let us sum up all the benefits conferd upon men because it were too prolix to recouÌ„t all let us consider that which in the judgment of all nations is held the greatest and beyond all recompense and let us compare it with the least divine benefit of our creation Nature teacheth and preacheth that we can render no equality of recompense to our Parents and they what have they given us a stenchy body subject to sin and diseases and all the miseries of this life insomuch that they are in a certain manner more benevolent towards loathsome wormes then towards their children for they produced them undefiled with any fault nor lyable to the divine wrath but they bring forth their children accursed wearing the badg of sin worthy of death and imprisonment How o Lord can we be unmindful of thee and impudent in our carriage towards thee since thou gavest us all our being a body at that instant sitly accommodated unblemishd qualifyd with diversity of endowments a soul of a most excellent nature pure immortal spiritual the benefit we receive from our parents cost them but little for they gave us only of their superfluities not a whole body but a smal parcel of most loathsome matter and corruption thou o Lord gavest us all our selves our whol body our whol soul pure and unspotted which benefit cost thee no less then the expense of thy omnipotency Moreover what we have from our Parents they gave it not but thou by their meanes they of themselves gave us only a lyablenes to sin and an ill o men of future miseries What they afforded us was â—ot out of pure love to us but to their own â—mpure pleasure thou o Lord out of an excess of charity to us createdst us Perâ—hance our parents begot us against their wil they having many times a positive desire to the contrary it was not an effect of their affection that they begot us and not some other that being neither in their power nor choyse thy love o Lord created me and no other it was thy election thou o Lord beholding an endles multitude of men which thou couldst have created who would have servd thee much better then I pickt me out a poor miscreant for no merits of my own neither was thy love impeded by foreseing that I would prove more dissoyal then any of the rest and the greatest and wretchedest of sinners more ungrateful then Lucifer the first begotten of sin and Iudas the betrayer of thy Son and Anti-christ his opposite Behold o Lord for one only of thy benefits I stand not only endebted and owing my self to thee but am upon many scores end ebted how then shal I be able to acquit my self of others I owe my self wholly to thee because thou gavest me wholly to my self I owe my self wholly because thou disbursedst thy omnipotency upon me I owe my self wholly because thou gavest me my self not repiningly I owe my self wholly because thou didst it lovingly I owe my self wholly because thou didst it calling me by design out of millions I owe my self wholly because thou didst it foreseing that I would surpass all in ingratitude O Lord since I stand endebted my whole self under so many titles for one sole benefit grant that once at least I may pay my share for thy endles ones grant that I may make by way of discharge an oblation to thee of my whole hart and since thou conferredst not once only this one benefit so variously manifold but art still continuing and daily enlarging it by a perpetuated conservation this debt of my whole self is daily doubled to an infinitude be then endlesly taking my hart not for the good thy benefit works in me but for the good it effects in thee by making thee beneficial to me as also for the fruit I reap from it If therfore this least of thy favours be so great that I owe no les then my whole self upon so many several claymes for it what shal I do for my redemption that excelling my creation as much as God excelleth man in my creation thou gavest me to my self in my redemption thou gavest thee and restoredst me The II. Chapter That Gods benefits are without number BLess yet more and more o my soul our Lord and be not unmindful of his retributions whether towards his enemyes or towards his friends towards his Angels or the beasts of the field whether towards the blessed in remunerating them or the divels in tormenting them all his retributions are so many thy peculiar favours O God how am I engulphd in an Ocean of thy beneficence whatsoever thou dost is a benefit yea and my peculiar benefit The actuations and productions of light are light a light that is exposd for one mans direction illuminates all that stand about him so dost thou o light of truth o nature of goodnes and therfore because thou art beneficial thou canst do nothing which is not beneficial and it is necessarily consequent that the benefit thou bestowest upon one is not only proficuous to him but all Each best guift and perfect blessing is descending from above from the Father of lights because thou diffusest them like unto the diffusions of light thou communicating thy self to all and for all without any decrease or impoverishment A light remaining still intyre divides its beames to all and another without any prejudice to it may borrow some from its flame Whatsoever the sun darts forth is light all may see
OF ADORATION IN SPIRIT AND TRVTH Written in IV. Bookes by IOHN EVSEBIVS NIEREMBERG Native of Madrid S. I. And Translated into English by R. S. S. â— I H S In which is disclosed the pith marrow of a spiritual life of Christs imitation mystical Theology extracted out of the HH FF greatest masters of spirit Diadochus Dorotheus Clymachus Rusbrochius Suso Thaulerus a Kempis Gerson not a little both pious effectual is superadded Printed Anno M.DC.LXXIII The Translatour to the Reader Courteous Reader I Present thee here with a stranger whom I have put in an English vest and if thou deem him not worthy to be naturalizd at least I pray entertain him civilly When thou art throughly acquainted with him hast dived into a discovery of his perfections thou wilt find rich pearles shrowded under a course shel I am confident it wil never repent thee no more then me of his acquaintance One that knowes how to distinguish fruit from leaves pith from bark a solid substance from a superficial show one that delights in truths seeks rather his own spiritual advance then a frothy feeding of his fancy wil here find entertainment right for his purpose that is both substantial and delightful He wil teach thee how to serve God in spirit truth not by an empty sound or canting use of these two words as do our sectaries who when they have named them think all done but by a real practise of Christian vertues in the discharge of our incumbent duty to God our selves and our neighbour To speak without metaphor I offer thee a plain Translation of a Latin treatise a piece in high esteem with me and many and I require only thy perusal therof to make thee esteem it so too That which moved the Author to compile it moved me also to translate it yet with this difference that he sought only his own behoof I my own chiefly others He a Parent of many such issues having labourd long with his pen for the advance of his neighbour in the way of vertue judgd it but meet to a make some provision for himself as a store house of spiritual truths maximes which he might have ready at every turn both for his meditation and practise And I think he was much in the right since charity begins at home it availes very little to perfect others if we be stil truants our selves self-interest ought to be the first concern nor are we to let our family starve at home while our endeavours are labouring to feed others abroad This prudent ceconomy and sage care of his own good is the common case of us all who have a soul to save it being also our task to provide in the first place for its indemnity that being the grand affair of our whole life which if not done all is utterly undone And how can we provide better then by making use of his provisions where the common exigence is the same For by the dictamen of charity it seldom happens that one is so treacherous to himself as not to provide himself of the best if what was best for him cannot be but good for us what he communicates without envy let us make use off with much freedom little cost a harty welcome There is not so much applause in translating as writing but the common benefit no whit the less yea more because no man of judgment wil translate what he deems not more then ordinarily good taking but who can promise so much of his own conceptions amidst so many miscarriages abortions as daily happen This our age kingdome is a little unfortunate in this respect that our best wits are forcd so to employ their pens for the defence of Catholick religion against the common adversaries and their assaults as that they cannot fully attend to what is as necessary in its kind the writing of spiritual treatises for the preservation encrease of piety in the harts of the faithful The former indeed is necessary but is a misfortune it is so upon such a score or that among the children of the same Mother some should be found so rebelliously bent especially with such prejudice to the latter this being the nursery of devotion consequently promoter of vertue and piety Spiritual bookes are the ordinary tongue by which God speakes to our soules the conveyancers of his holy inspirations when he is pleased to knock at the dore of our hart for entrance yea the key which unlocks it How many by reading them receive both light in their understanding love in their wil not only to acknowledg but perform what conduces to a vertuous life How many have quit the filth of sin in which they wallowed by wonderful conversions how many more of better principles found therby effectual incentives to Christian perfection Certainly the benefits redounding thence are unspeakable great pitty it is that we are not better stored with such books for as our appetite cannot feed long upon the same meat without being cloyed though otherwise both wholsome savory no more can our understanding without a nauseousnes employ it self in matter of reading unles there be variety to season it I have heard even spiritual persons bemoan their own the common scarcity in this kind Besides the excellency of the treatise it self this was a motive to me to contribute my mite towards some smal redress of the aggrievance This premisd I must speak a word or two of the Title it carryes which is Of Adoration in Spirit and Truth the which he borrowes from the words of our B. Saviour to the Samaritan is the subject of the whole work In that conference Io. 4. the great master Of Spirit Truth told her the time would come when true adorers should not be confined to Ierusalem or the mountain in Samaria but were to adore God in spirit Truth for God being a spirit covets to be adord in spirit Now what it is to adore him in Spirit Truth he explaines through the whole treatise chiefly in the 4. first Chapters of the first Book where he explicates what he understands both by the one other so clearly that nothing needs to be superadded Only it wil not perchance be amiss to forewarn some les skilful Reader that he be not frighted into a prejudice of the Book by the title it seeming to sound somwhat of the Sectarist who hath nothing so frequent in is mouth as I said above as Spirit Truth nothing les in substance The words indeed are easily named and may serve for canting among the ignorant but if one go to the pith substance of spirit truth as the Authour uses them to a true denial of our selves more then a lipp-love of God here the sectary wil be found as void of spirit as truth in both a nut without a kernel When the reader sees the Authour
condemning its very dictamens and defires Perswade thy self that that is false which God holds not for true which the Angels disapprove which the Doctours impugne Philosophers refute reason disallows nor squares with Conscience All these find this self love this crafty fox ful of wiles guilty of forgery We are ful of deceyt because ful of self love and so much the more perniciously ful by how much it is not onely a domestique cheat but so linkd to us yea so engrafted in us that it never leaves us nor gives us the least respit from errour Hence not onely custome but even prescription in cozenage hath so hardend us that what is done viciously we maintain many times as done very prudently yea and according to gospel and seek to sanctify by the doctrine of Christ what is clearly repugnant to reason The mist of ignorance which man walks in renders him sufficiently miserable he needs not be missed with forgery yet ignorance is but a petty and inconsiderable misery its darknes being easily dispeld as soon as the light of instruction shines but the night of errour is so wilfully and pertinaciously blind that it is incapable of being illuminated with any precepts O it were hartily to be wishd we were onely ignorant and not seduced also This folly and imposture of worldlings raignes in a manner among all sorts and conditions of them Let them account themselves never so wise let them be the prime Doctours and professours of Vniversities they are idiots and ill-maximd and unworthy of such titles unles they be good and vertuous Pick out any one of these such as all the world holds for an Oracle of knowledg if thou shouldst but once see this man voyd his curious cupbords and cabinets of jewells and vessels of gold and throw away pearles and pretious stones to fill them up with dirt and dung couldst thou perswade thy self that this were a wise man who so prizeth the latter and misprizeth the former And how then shall he be accounted wise who not once but allwayes is stuffing his hart with aspirements to honours with desires of riches and pleasures and contemns the love of God the treasures of divine grace the merits of Christ yea God himself All which incomparably more surpass worldly honours treasures pleasures then gold doth dirt as much to wit as God the Creatour surmounts his creature What imports it if thou sayest that this proceeds not from his ignorance in undervaluing things but that this man knew well enough the difference betwixt spiritual things and temporal a thing which no body can doubt of though his proceedings be contrary what I say wil this avail for nether wil he be excused from madnes who should say that he knowes wel enough the value of gold above other things and how base dirt is in comparison of it yet nevertheles keeps dirt courts it embraces it kisses it yea and refuseth no danger nor labour in search of it but if gold be tenderd him he throwes it away and daigns it not so much as a look Certainly this hidden madnes and visible darknes is far more to be admired and thou darst not call such a one a wise man or well in his wits least thou should be houted at by all having lost thine owne How much more will he expose himself to the censure both of laughter and madnes who professing that the spiritual treasures of grace are much to be preferd before all the goods of this world covets nevertheles the latter and rejects the former Could he be accounted a learned man or sound in judgment or a good Christian who should cast the B. Sacrament of Christs holy Body out of a golden Ciborium consecrated to its conservation and place there insteed of it a piece of clay And how deserves he the name of a wise man who expels the Divinity it self out of his soule where it took complacence to reside as in its tabernacle and sets up in its place not dung but more filthy vices and sordid desires as the idols of his licentious devotions Therfore we must conclude that there is no wisdome no truth to be found in a worldly life The dread fullest instruments of revenge which Christ shall make use of to punish the sensles in the day of judgment shall not be the conflict of confounded elements nor the fall of the stars nor the eclipse of the sun nor the conflagration of the world nor the frightful voice of the Archangel nor that shrilsounding trumpet of God nor the countenance of the angry judge but truth alone Truth I say which shall then be rendred illustrious to all though now as it is veyld with our naughty desires we contemne it But although truth be certainly found in a spiritual life yet not altogether refined from the dregs of forgery both by reason of tâ—e subtilty and soothings of self love for soothing and flattery every where corrupts and sophisticates truth as also the wiles and malice of the divel who labours by all meanes to destroy created truth since he cannot the increated Therfore Christ our Saviour recommends to us as the glory of Euangelical perfection that we adore God in spirit and truth The true God ought not to be worshipped with a false life The onely begotten Son of God is truth and he that will be the Son of God must love truth and possess himself of it Wherfore whosoever evading the precipices of the flesh treads now the plaine paths of spirit let him not hold himself altogether out of dangerunles he walk the roadway of truth And to the end thou mayst follow this more securely take these admonitions which will teach thee to adore God and serve him unfaignedly in uprightnes of hart and make thee understand what truth speaks least some deceit mislead thy spirit but rather doing truth in charity we may increase in Christ by all our proceedings The II. Chapter Of the Truth of the Spirit DO not think that thy life will be rendred any whit more unpleasant and tetrical by the fellowship of truth it is a mere aspersion to say that truth is bitter and unsavoury A false imputed nick name must not make us out of conceit with a thing in it self most delicious Do not frame this discourse If the very outward name of truth be so bitter what may we judge of its interiour rellish if anothers discourse concerning it be noysome what will our own study and practise of it be if it sound so harshly to our hart to our conscience to our whole life Make not I say such illations for it is not the fault of honey if it tast bitter to a tainted pallate One that is giddy thinks the earth runs round when it stands stock-still We judge of every one by our own misdemeanours and seek to patronise our humane frailties by ascribing the same to the Divinity Truth is innocent sweet and displeasing to none but the câ—â—nal and such as are displeasing to God
if we believe the greatnes of the divine goodnes in it self and his immense charity and inestimable benefits towards us what is the reason I say that we doe not correspond in love fidelity and observance but rather dare offend him though but venialy and do not worship and love him indefatigably with all the extent of our strength who employd all the force of his omnipotency in creating and conserving us and loves us both perfectly and eternally and loves us even to the end yea even unto death what is the reason that we are alwayes senseles to our own good and shameles towards his majesty whether we believe or believe not truly while we remain so senslesly benumd If we have not a firm beliefe what greater folly since men give credit in all things to flatterers because they speak according to their pallat and profit then to disbelieve matters of faith so much importing us to be so and redounding so much to our credit and profit that they be true and undoubted What greater irreverence then to believe a man all men being obnoxious to lying and deceit and not believe God speaking things profitable to us and attesting them by so many miracles But if we believe these things and belye them with our actions what greater absurdity and derision of God then to reject his most amiable goodnes contemn his love his blood his benefits and either not dread the paines of Purgatory and hell or not hope for and most ardently desire the glory of heaven which God esteems matters of high concernment and as such eggs us on both by threats and promises to good works What greater madnes then to expose our selves by our own negligence to the hazard of forfeiting eternal glory or at leastwise enduring a long Purgatory We must be sure to make our works square in all exactly with our beliefe and adhere more tenaciously then if those objects were patent to the eye or any other sense or experiment Thou hast received the sacred body of Christ or art present at the dreadful Sacrifice of the Masse if thou believe that Christ is really there present with thee thou oughst to behave thy self with greater submission and veneration then if thou didst clearly behold him with thy eyes and to pray to him with a livelier confidence then if the heavens were opend to thee as they were to S. Stephen and thou beheldst the Hierachies of Angels accompanying Christ coming to thee to receive thy petitions for thou mayst be more infallibly ascertaind by faith that he is upon the Altar then if thou didst see him with thy corporal eyes Let every one procure after this manner to penetrate the truths of divine faith and strengthen himself in their certainty making his works consonant to his beliefe But how dost thou proceed consequently and not rather cozen thy self when thou sayst thou esteemst the least degree of glory more then the empyre of the whole world and nevertheles to gain heaven thou wilt not deny thy self the least pleasure and art so be sotted upon temporal things that thou toylest and moylest without respit for their purchase This certainly cannot stand good unles thou esteem earthly and perishable goods more then heavenly and eternal The V. Chapter Of the hope of pardon and zeal of pennance THe more vertuous one is the more he hates sin the more he hates it the more he desires its destruction and therfore God desires more to pardon sin then the Penitent himself who begs pardon God is most accomplished in all goodnes and therfore he of all others most hates sin If the sinner who is evill hates his own sin and desires its destruction how much more God who is supremely good Every one seeks his own ends and commodity God alone seeks thine and covets thy salvation doubt not then of pardon and the divine assistance We have a most sufficient suerty the Son of God if we would but resolve upon our conversion There is neither good nature wanting to the creditour nor ability in the bonds man do not then dispaire o sinner by reason of the vastnes of thy debt it is but a trifle in regard of the infinite mercy of God and endles merits of Christ IESVS crucified is our inexhaustible treasure It were a simple thing to think that the exchequer of a vast Empire if it were granted to thy use were not sufficient to defray thy petty debt of a few pounds and it is more simple to make delayes in discharging thy debt to Almighty God hoping he will be content to accept the merits of IESVS for thy payment It will be ridiculous if thou be unjust to thy self who seeks to be profitable and beneficial to others How much content would it cause thee if thou hadst occasiond the conversion of S. Austin or S. Mary Magdalen or S. Paul the Apostle or some other great sinner and drawn him to God and without all doubt thou wouldst endeavour that now if thou thought it lay in thy power to make any one become truly penitent and as holy as Magdalen Remember that it is in thy power mediating the grace of God to operate this in thy self that is to become truly penitent and hartily compunct for thy offences even small ones and very fervorous and devout Convert thy self and glory far more in thy own conversion then anothers What man that 's wel in his wits if he himself were at the point of starving would give a loafe of bread to another who were scarce pincht with hungar and stood but in small need of that merciless courtesy suffering himself in that utmost extremity to perish with famine Admonish thy self exhort thy self preach to thy self nothing is wanting to a remission of thy sins but thy desire thy sorrow thy disposal and this also by a special favour Behold God stands expecting thee ready to give greater supplies if necessary Thou hast already a pledge of his good will thy own will and desire of good which is from God I know not how it comes to pass that thou being compounded of a body like to brute beasts and a soul allied to God thou seeks all wayes and meanes to preserve thy body and sleights and neglects what may make for the health and integrity of thy soul Thy chiefe sollicitude ought to be placed upon the chiefest thing Let thy first care be concerning thy soul for which thy body was framd and moulded and if the first then for these reasons it must be the sole and only The diseases of the soul are greater and more in number and more pernicious its cure is certain and with out all peradventure since they are cured who onely have a real desire to be cured but the cure of the body is deceitful for those that are cured recover not presently but by degrees besides corporal medecines are harder bitterer and more costly not alwayes at hand but must be fetcht from beyond the seas and almost the worlds end but
the remedies of the soul are more easy and obvious and may not onely be had at home but even with in thy self nor needst thou goe further then thy own will Why dost thou not then give redress to so many maladies of thy soul since thou art so sollicitous for any the least indisposition of thy body O supreme truth of God illuminate me for this proceeds out of ignorance for the soul resents and feels the alterations of the body but the body feels not the diseases of the soul they can only be felt and known by the mind but seeing that very thing to wit the soul which ought to judge of them is in such a languishing condition therefore it resents them not as being past all sense nor seeks for redress and by how much the worse it is so much the les sensible it is of the evil how much more sick it is so much the less doth it apprehend its sicknes Even as the members of our body are never worse then when they are past all sense of being ill O Lord in what a languishing state are our soules which ressent not â—o many defects distractions negligences and irreverences towards thee who dwelst in them grant me grace that I may wash away with a torrent of teares even the least fault and that I may sorrow with my whole hart forit nor ever endure in my self the least offence against thee What pretence can man alledge why he delayes his conversion and adheres not to God with all his forces Is it because he is insensible of the evil it being not patent to the eye but now we are taught it by faith which is more certaine then our eyesight Or because our nature is infirme and prone to vice but for this very reason it ought to seek the support and supplies and favour of God least being destitute of all help and redress it lye still in its infirmity exposd to its enemies Is it because there are more incentives to sin It is much mistaken there are both farr more and more forcible ones to justice and to make head against sin If the world exhort us God disswades us if nature incline us grace refraines us if the diveltempt us the Angels inspire us Or is it because the wicked flourish in a prosperous condition O pure madnes to love a momentary prosperity and not feare an eternal calamity Or because thou hopest to have time in thy old age to reform thy self for God hath patiently expected many O senseles life is not promisd thee but pardon is proferd thee o ungratefull thou abusest the grace and patience of God look what thou dost God will not be taxd of injustice if he grant thee not pardon when and how thou wilt since thou wilt not accept it when he makes a profer Or is it lastly because the way of vertue and a spiritual life is thorny and troublesome but will that of hell or the flames of Purgatory trowest thou be any whit more ease full and pleasant The VI. Chapter The model of a sinner is set before our eyes O You Cherubins and Seraphins who veyle your face and feet because you are ashamd that ye love not my good God sufficiently lend me your tongues lend me the voyce of an Archangel and the trumpet of God that I may allarme the whole world and sound a summons to all mortals arise ye dead even while ye live and come to judgment come that ye may give your verdict upon a strange and stupendious fact which happend but very lately Come that ye may be moved to indignation come that ye may be moved to laughter or rather come that ye may be moved to teares I le tell you a lamentable story which I know to be certainly true and you shall judge whether it be not such Certain robbers dragd a woman tyed neck and heeles through foul and stenchy places and would needs cast her into a glowing furnace too too dreadful for its raging flames As they were going they met a king one that for power and other princely qualities was matchles nay he was in all points so accomplishd that nature seemd to have bestowd all her perfections upon him He was more valiant then Samson more wise and wealthy then Salomon more fortunate and bountiful then David He taking compassion upon this poor woman to rescue her out of their bands for he was all alone exposed himself to death and having received many wounds and lost much blood he put the robbers to flight and to cleanse her who was all covered over with filth there being no fair water at hand he made her a bath of his own blood he took her for his spouse though she were a Black a more and very deformed he crownd her queen he built her a magnificent pallace he adornd it most artificially engraving every where his own images which were to be so many memorials of him and incentives of love to her he allotted her a family and gave her a fair retinue of servants and which is more he doated so upon her that he himself would become her servant even in mean offices his sole joy was to be alwayes in her company or thinking upon her desiring no other recompense of so much kindnes but a reciprocal affection lastly he made her heir of his kingdome promising that this should be the least expression of his bounty if she would onely prove kind and loyal Nevertheles as if so many benefits had tended onely to procure treachery and hatred contemning her spouse and king she sollicited his very slaves and grooms of his stable to acts of adultery yet they more loyal to their king did partly fly and partly were murderd out of meer passion for they chose rather to perish then be eye witnesses of such disloyalty to their king and his spouse In a word every one resented with detestation the queens unworthines nor did â—he for all that desist to compel them prostituting her self to all Neyther did she here put a period to her wickednes but seeing him stil kind towards her she hatchd a piece of unparalleld treachery she betrayd him into the hands of his enemies whom he hated even to death this wicked woman made him their slave and compelled him to serve his deadlyest foes who blind-folded him and made him their laughing stock and which was the strangest of all being altogether insensible of so many guifts and curtesies she raignd most impudently in all security and jollity as if she had done a piece of remarkable service Now judge o ye men now give your verdict tel me if there be any one among you who wil not be replenishd with indignation against this woman and wil not say the Lord liveth because the woman that did this is a child of death But the story is not yet at an end hitherto I have shewd her wickednes now I must shew her folly For while she thus hated and scornd her faire spouse and king
behold with my locks least my Lord be forced to fly from the horrour and nastines of my sins I behold them fetterd with sharp irons and that was my doing But if it were a grateful piece of service which Magdalen did to these feet the torment also which was occasiond by my sins could not be ungrateful I o Lord fastned them my malice was more prevalent towards this then the goodnes of all other creatures The Angels grieve and stand amazed creatures tremble and complain all law disavowes it all right cryes against it my sins alone exacted the death of thy onely begotten Son and compasd it I mâ—ke publique profession of this to the end â— mâ—y have some share in the prayer of IESVS He he it was that prayd for those who crucifyd him Behold me here present I was the chiefe Crucifyer the prime executioner I furnishd his hands putting a hammer in his right and a naile in his left I first of all others gave that hand the dint which transpiered those tender feet O how much more heynous was my offence then theirs who executed only Pilates sentence and the will of the Iewes They being commanded crucified him whom they held no more then a man and a malefactour and one so dis-figurd in his whole countenance by that hideous nights work I have again as much as in me lay crucified him being now glorious who for me was heretofore crucified Which of the Iewes beholding Christ as Saint Stephen beheld him at the right hand of God durst cry out aloud crucify him but I have bin so impudently bold as not only to say it but even more then do it I clear and quit the executioners of Christ they will be confounded in the latter day beholding him glorious whom they treated so ignomiously I seeing him that was crucified for my sake glorious am not confounded but have again crucified him What excuse then shal I be able to pretend O Father as often as I call this to mind considering thy infinite mercy by which thou didst patiently sustain my so great in gratitude I cannot but wish thy exemplary justice upon me I cannot detrect the paines of hell as due to my iniquity supposing the paine were voyd of guilt Shal divine love be les forcible then humane or charity more feeble then concupiscence the love of thee then the love of me If my self love could make me contemne God why cannot the love of God make me throughly dispise my self and debase my self even to hel Again again I imbracingly kiss thy justice punish and revenge upon me thy affronts and just indignation for I who prophaned and violated all thy attributes seeking to destroy them by sin as much as I could do now wish such a penance and remission as would make a ful restitution of all and leave them in their integrity They wil remaine so o Lord if out of thy mercy thou give me thy grace and out of thy justice my due punishment Thy servants Moyses and Paul desird to be anathemâ—tizd for their brethren and I wil become accursed and Anathema for my God and the justice of my God as Christ IESVS was for me That skinner of Alexandria wishd others the joys of paradise but allotted for himself the paines of helfire and surmounted in perfection the great S. Anthony S. Christina chose rather to undergo here unspeakable torments for the relief of the soules in Purgatory then to go immediately to heaven and I to render the justice of God which I have violated undamnifyd ought not to refuse the punishments of hel O if I could imitate my IESVS who when he was unseparable from his heavenly Father stoopt to our misery that he might be acure for us and I unseparable from thy charity would become also accursed and anathematizd to the very pit of hel and even there would â— embrace my IESVS I have two armes the one is humility which I would put under him and unite my self to his Humanity the other and that the right is love and by it I would embrace his Divinity O Father prostrate at the feet of IESVS I beg and beseech of thee for his sake that thou wilt cleanse me from the ordure of my sins I hope for his sake to obtain pardon for whose sake thou couldst not obtain of me to forbear sinning Thy goodnes is greater then my malice and thy crucifyd Christ is prevalently powerful to bend and incline thy goodnes though he prevaile not with me to avert and decline my malice The IX Chapter Of the ardent desire of those that desire God IT is not meet that thou o faintharted spirit have but a faint desire of that which is the chiefest good Grace and nature are sisters and they have the same Autour parent God If thou learnst not of thy IESVS how to frame thy desires who desird so earnestly to suffer for thee that thou mayst be ashamd not to desire most ardently to rejoyce with him learn at least of natural things how thou art to covet heavenly Nature affords no good to any creature unles a strong appetite therof did go before and if there be not such a precedent appetency arising from grace thou shalt never be guifted with any signal vertue Natural things ayme at more then they can attaine to fire when it mounts upward covets nothing more then to reach its element and yet it never can reach its home but yet that excess of desire was requisite to carry it to a higher region A stone when it fals covets to descend even to the hart or center of the earth and yet it remaines on the surface or superficies What a vehement affection is inbred to beasts towards their of spring A cow in the absence of her calf bellowes without end and hastens thither as fast as she can where she thinks to find it The same innate love armes other creatures which are of a more fearful and soft disposition and exasperates and renders them fierce and hardy and this strong desire was necessary to make them break through all difficulties in rearing their young ones Perfect vertue and union with God is a busines ful of opposition and how canst thou overcome this unles thou eagarly and earnestly intend it A natural appetite is a disposition to natural perfection and a great and supernatural appetite disposeth a soul to supernatural perfection and to receive the graces and guifts of God in greater plenty Christ compard those that traffique for the kingdome of heaven to marchants bankers and stiled them happy that hunger and thirst after justice combining in the self-same thing two most vehement appetites There is no stint in desiring to please God there is no other meane nor stint but that one alwayes without all meane and interruption wish and imbrace indefatigably the cross never be satiated with suffering So ought thou to serve God with the whole extent and intensenes of thy mind and all this is very
God being proud-harted immodest distracted Learn of Christ in the garden how to pray lying prostrate on the ground each joint as is were shivering and quaking and all bathd in a bloody sweat If he had taken thee a part with him to pray together to his heavenly father the quires of Angels standing amazd and accompanying that Angel who comforted IESVS himself wouldst thou also sleep then as the three Apostles did or employ thy thoughts about the toyes and trifles of worldly commodities beholding Christ in the interim in such a plight for thy sins and the Angels so absorpt in a reverential amazement Thou that art about to intreat for thy own offences with teares why wilt thou busy thy mind with sportive entertainments how earnestly doth a lawyer plead before a man in a cause which concerns anothers life and death be not thou wrechlesly slothful before God while thou pleadest for thy own crimes Consider also what thou askest what parent if his child ask a stone or Scorpion will not be readier to give him an egg or a loafe of bread why complainest thou of God if demanding temporal things which are a poyson wherewith thou wilt intoxicate thy self and play the mad man against him he grant thee spiritual one must not give a sword to a frantick person to hurt another although he demand his own how much les if it be to hurt him that gives it why dost thou judge God so wicked or foolish that asking what is not thy own thou wouldst have him give thee weapons to hurt both thy self and him learn yet further of Christ how to pray o most amiable and loving truth let it not be as I will but as thou thy will be done in all thou knows best what is expedient Even spiritual guifts also are sometimes differd because we ask them not with a due esteem neither are they sought with like ardour and desire that temporal things are He asketh a little unworthily who asketh great things but coldly and remissly God will have us ask seemly what beseems him to give and by differring the guift he enkindles our desire and disposeth us more worthily Men think to draw God to their frivolous ends with any kind of worship and sooth him up with any piece of service and still him as we do a child with a rattle Therfore it behoves God not to be alwaies too facil but give worthily guifts worthy of his hanâ—â— either preventing all our prayers or if he eâ—â—â—ct them expecting worthy ones For when of his own accord he will not impart his guifts unles intreated he does it not for want of liberality but out of a desire of our profit and a trial and exercise of our affection Therfore it is but good reason that he expect complete prayers and seeming desires and not render his grace contemptible by giving it to him who shewes he contemnes it while he begs it so tepidly for we value not sleightly what we compass with difficulty and procrastinated hopes have a more welcome issue God for the most part changeth our petitions into other favours more hidden from us paying us but in another coyne or else he expects a fitter opportunity for if he should impart thâ—m now perchance we should swell a little with pride and sooner be obnoxious to ingratitude Thou must also pray for others he that petitions for another hath the first share and fore tast of the favour obtained He that will anneale another dips fiâ—st of all his own fingar in the oile pot But be sure thou be alwaies mindful of thy own needines thou must like Lazarus beg an almes of God and his Saints and Angels covetting to fil thy self with the crums of celestial blessings Travaile about walk from dore to dore among the ranks of Angels and quires of Saints begging every where an almes of grace and chiefly of the most B. Virgin Mary who has ample power given her to divide it forth who being as it were the mistress of the family in the house of God she carries at her girdle the keyes of mercy Cry aloud shew thy soares thy nakednes and mendicity Be confounded that any beggar should demand more earnestly relief of his temporal necessities then thou redress of thy spiritual and procure to comprize in thy self the importunity of all beggars together in order to obtaine the least degree of grace One must with more eagarnes seek reliefe of the least spiritual necessity then of all temporal ones together were they all pressing upon him Blush to see so many needy souls that groan with thee under the same calamities with how great humility and plenty of teares they beg redress while thou sits with dry eyes rejoycing amidst such want of spirit insensible of thy pressing necessities Humble thy self as beggars do win affection expect patiently urge importunely be only not impudent in wearying God with prayers that at least thy importunity may force an almes The II. Chapter That we must not intermit our practise of prayer AS much as the soul surpasseth the body so much must we prefer prayer before all other corporal conveniences What a deale of care in our lodging bedding apparrel and daily sustenance is requird to preserve life and our bodily health much more will be requisite for the life and safety of our soul which hath more numerous and heavier enemies then the body The body is annoid with the injuries of the weather and the pinching gripes of hungar but the soul hath even these very enemies of the body for its enemies yea and also its commodities and the body it self the whole world moreover hel with all its hoast sometimes the very favours from heaven and its own vertues if it know not how to use and conserve them in humility Against all these it hath but one only help and refuge and that is prayer How then can it be neglected or intermitted at any time since the body being better fencd against fewer enemies will have almost the whole day spent upon it and that custome never omitted Many because they find themselves firme and constant in their good purposes think they can suffer no prejudice by intermitting the exercise of prayer for some laudable employment let them beware let them beware they be not deceived perchance they will faulter although they find themselves strong and able He that is lusty of body if he should forbear eating to gain more time for labour would without all doubt at length decay and find his body in a weak condition so he that experienceth himself constant in the service of God if he detract time from prayer to spend it in other exteriour employments though pious will at length grow faintish and easily discover his own imbecillity We must never omit prayer because we never omit our corporal refection and if at any time it be omitted we are careful afterward to make amends If one for three or fower daies together should refrain from sleep out
to her in the person of his beloved Disciple saying behold thy Son He did it to wit when he was at the very point of death as if he had only desird life that he might be dutiful to his Mother but being not expedient that he should avoid it he left a deputy of his filial care and obedience in Saint John and of observance in the rest of the faithful that by this meanes he might both redeem us by dying and also be grateful to her by leaving so many to supply for him in exhibiting respect as if he confessd himself not to have fully accomplishd his desire in that behalf There at the foot of the cross Mary took us for her children there she brought us forth not of her womb but her hart which is a more pretious member and its filiation more efficacious For each child of the womb is not alwaies beloved but the child of ones hart cannot but be so Ther did she bear us together with Christ amidst throwes and pangs which she felt not in her carnal labour or child bed She took us very opportunely for her children at such a time when her bowels were wholly replenished with an affectionate compassion towards her Son that she might transfer it upon us and by it ennoble her mercy as if IESVS had recommended to his Mother what he said to the woemen Weep not over me but over your children And therfore hanging on the cross ful of anguish and torment remitting as it were to others all compassion due to him he said to his weeping Mother Mother behold thy Son behold each faithful Christian my Disciple is thy child do not so much compassionate and weep over me as over these thy children poor wretches and miserable sinners whom I recommend to thy motherly tuition Christ knew that the misery of sin was a greater object of mercy then any corporal pain whatsoever for his soul did more feelingly resent our offences then his body did its own torments Therfore he would have his Mother transfer her compassion and mercy to the defects faultines and miseries of our soul that she might chiefly assist us in them And because Christ by his sufferings deservd well of the divine justice for his superabundant satisfaction therfore was he worthy of that attribute of being judge of all men according to the prediction of David give o God thy judgment to the king thy justice to the kings Son the Mother of Christ by compassionating and commiserating him deservd well the attribute conferrd upon her of compassion commiseration that we also may say thou hast given o God thy mercy to the queen and thy pious affection to the kings Mother therfore no grace nor mercy is derivd to us but by Mary From henceforward o most pious Mother I take thee for mine will have this to be the first pledge of thy piety that thou imitate thy first begotten Son who as he not only gave thee to Iohn but Iohn also to thee so thou give me to God since thou also gave God to us Therfore since our misery finds no redress but in Gods mercy and the disposal of it is Mary's power to whom her Son denies nothing and she ful of commiseration why are we so slow and backeward in the discharge of our duty and devotion towards her we must for 4. reasons be very officious in the service of the Virgin Mother The first is the necessity and advantage of her intercession for without her intercourse and sollicitation no guifts discend from heaven grace depends far more upon Mary then the showers of heaven did on Elias The second is the will of Christ whose desire is that we honour his Mother and in honoring her we do him a piece of grateful service For he turnes over to her all the debts we owe him and she is our creditrice who must see them cancelld If what we do to the poor be so acceptable to him that he takes it as done to himself and makes them his substitutes in this behalf how much more gratefully will he take what is done to his Mother whose debter he acknowledgeth himself to whome all are endebted The third cause is the excellency of the most H. Virgin to whose worship though neither the tie of necessity nor the explicite will of her son IESVS did move us nevertheles the sole title of her rare prerogatives and perfections ought to endeare us extremely to her She is the glory of all pure creatures and especially of mankind the next in dignity to God himself to whom he granted this priviledg which he alone by reason of the infinitude of his nature enjoies to be together a Mother and a Virgin and Mother of God God is both a father and a Virgin Mary is also a Mother a Virgin And like as Christ according to his divinity was most chastly begotten in the splendours of Saints by a Virgin father without a Mother so according to his humanity he was most chastly begotten in the splendours of sanctity refulgent above all Saincts of a Virgin Mother without a father O double miracle both that a Virgin brings forth and that she brings forth God! and indeed what should a Virgin bring forth but God grace and nature are two sisters the same artificer gave them both a being and therfore their proceeding in their different functions is much a like Even as God after he had created all things made an abridgment of them all in Adam and Eve and all the degrees of life and nature are more eminently in man then in the natures themselves heavens plants and living creatures insomuch that one man is more valuable then the whole world besides and is as it were a little world by himself and all things do him homage and were made for his use so in like manner because Gods workmanship is no les exactly curious in matters of grace he also compendiated in the second Adam and Eve the whole extent of grace that ever hath or shall be imparted to men and Angels And Mary alone containes all kind of blessings and supernatural guifts and degrees of grace in a more singular manner then all the Hierarchies of B. Spirits and quires of Saints in such sort that she alone doth equalize all their sanctity and perfection Not piety only but reason also attesteth this assertion and now it is manifest enough by the revelation made to that B. Man and martir of Christ F. Martin Gutierez whom S. Teresa beheld in heaven adornd with the ensignes of martirdome he dying in prison under the heretiques wearied out with their fetters and il usage The Virgin her self gave many thanks to this her servant for defending her sanctity in these eminent tearmes The very Seraphins themselves and all the other ranks both of Angels and Saints doe homage to her and reverence her as queen of all no otherwise then the brute beasts in paradise to Adam while he stood as yet in the
sweat from his body as the press doth wine frō the bunch of grapes If any one should have sufferd all the torments of Martyrs all the diseases and anguish of all men even from the first day of Adams transgression til such time as Christ comes to judgment all this would not be equivalent to his paine which also upon this score that it was spiritual was bitterer in its kind then any corporal affliction whatsoever The fulnes of the Divinity resided in Christ and the clear vision of God did illustrate him which nevertheles obstructed not some effects but it was miraculously so orderd least by it a tyde of joy should over flow his whole body and the inferiour portion of his soul that place might be left for sorrow as it fel out in his sacred Passion But in the hart of IESVS grieving for our offences it did not only give way to extreme sadnes but did extremely augment it by reason of his perfect knowledg of God offended for how much more perfect this knowledg was it causd a sorrow so much greater and CHRIST alone had a more perfect intuitive knowledg of God then all the Cherubins Seraphins then all the other Angels and Saints in heaven Christs love also towards God offended was corresponding to the vision of the divine Majesty wherfore his sorrow exceeds the comprehension either of word or thought for he let no opportunity slip of suffering as much as he could and was beseeming him to suffer yea prodigious miracles were wrought in his most holy soul that sorrow might have its ful effect Why then are we so sollicitous to compass joyes and rack ourwits so much in the search of new pleasures if IESVS sufferd all this in his hart which none ought to think upon without teares and each good Christian ought to make it the theam of his thought How darest thou o my hart slacken the raines to joy consider the cause why thy IESVS sufferd it was for thy offences that he might work thy salvation Because I trespassd therfore he loves me so tenderly and confers blessings upon me Why doth not this lover of me and benefactour to his enemies heap coales of fire upon my head make me blush at my own proceedings why doth he not heap coales of fire upon my hart that I may burn with love of him and a desire of his imitation I wil place the sad hart of IESVS upon my obdurate hart that he may find me at length according to his hart a frend and desirous of suffering Compassionate o my hart with the suffering IESVS and comfort him in his sufferings How wilt thou obtain mercy by the sufferings of Christ if thou hast not compassion over Christ suffering be not unmindful of such a courtesy from thy suerty S. Iames Guisay not to be unmindful of it besides his daily meditation and other devotions to it carried it alwaies about him written in a little Book in token that it was engraven in his hart and faild no day to read it over This memory of his Saviours cross was so acceptable to Almighty God that he vouchsafed him after his entrance into the Society a true conformity with it that is to be crucified for his sake and by his sufferings to adumbrate the death of his B. Son and Christ was not backward in recompensing the devotion of the Saint for upon the place where he and many other Saints were crucified miraculous lights were seen every friday in the ayre approving and attesting the comformablenes of their suffering with that of Christ The memory of his Passion is grateful to him and that we might have a perpetual memorial of it before our eyes he instituted the admirable Sacrament of his most holy Body But if thou be midful of Christ suffering why art thou not unsufferable to thy self and hartily angry at thy own proceedings The king of Moab sorely straitned by the siege of the Israelites being quite out of hope of all relief took his eldest Son who was to succeed him in his throne and offerd him in holocaust upon the wals and it causd such a commotion indignation in the Israelits camp that forth with they raisd their siege and departed Behold the holocaust of the first and only begotten Son of God upon the altar of the cross why art thou not replenishd with disdain against thy self quitting all self will and pleasure we use to compassionate even externs yea even brute beasts why do we not so to our God to our Father to our brother o our shameles obstinacy who insteed of commiserating him crucify IESVS again by new offences remember that God is thy Father not thy foe that he suffers for thee his foe not for the beasts of the field or their salvation for thee not for himself the bitterst of all punishments wounded in all his members not only afflicted with some smal ach of his head or stomack because he did thee and the world a good turne not because he put cities into combustion publickly on a day of solemnity and in a mountain betwixt two thieves as their captain and ringleader not in a by-corner and secretly the object of all mens hatred disgrace and scorne in so much that the mercy of men was wanting to him alone who is mercy it self Nevertheles he suffers willingly and lovingly not forcedly not frettingly not complainingly because it was for thee of his own people not of barbarians and Scythians for the space of 33. yeares not for an hour or two Compassionate then with IESVS and make not all he has done fruitles forbear to offend him begin to imitate him and that his Passion may truly benefit thee make it the model of thy imitation The VI. Chapter How far we are to follow Christ GOD doth not tempt us though he hath made our salvation ful of difficulty Nothing is more acceptable to him he having done and sufferd so much then that we imitate him The words of a man placed in autority are held for lawes and must be fulfild why are the deeds of God less observable he that sets the humble and most sorrowful hart of Christ as a signet upon his own let him set it also upon his arme that he may imitate what he commiserates Love is not soft and effeminate but strong and masculin and the cross of Christ will crucify Gods zealot by compassion and emulation The imitation of Christ is harsh and unsavory some have it in as much hatred as hell it self but for all that we cannot emulate better graces Fear no cosenage when he perswades thee to take the cross for thy delights disgrace for thy honour poverty for riches he is the prime and undoubted truth The eternal wisdome and divine intellect hath so orderd hath judgd it expedient Be not diffident he is the supreme goodnes and highest power by these nevertheles he redeemd thee and by the same thou must complete thy salvation that work is begun accomplished
by the same instruments by these Christ ascended into heaven and the members must not think of going another way then by which the head leads them They are not poyson Christ himself sanctified them and tasted them first of all himself yea that a smal parcel of them might only pass to us he drunk up almost the whole chalice of sorrows and afflictions and yet for all that he lives eternally and sits at the right hand of God How canst thou but be confounded whilst seing Christ accursed by all thou seekest so much to be honoured and praisd beholding him prostrate at the feet of Iudas thou preferst thy self before thy betters seing him thirsty and in want of a little water thou covets plenty and delicate fare It is the greatest glory of a servant to follow his masters footsteps To imitate Christ is a busines not only of necessity but dignity and for this respect the main difficulty is removed and a sufficient reward allotted for others that occur If it be a credit to imitate Christ then it wil not be difficult to suffer contempt and the revilements of men for that wil be a high point of honour and there is no contempt where it is a credit to be contemned It wil be also no hard matter to debar ones self of pleasures and superfluous riches to obtaine true glory for worldlings even heathens did more then this when they abstaind even from necessaries for a seeming only apparent glory Let it confound us that some barbarians have bin found so loyal and loving to their soveraign that if he wanted eyes they would put out theirs if he wanted hands they in like manner would cut of theirs and gave this as a pledge of their fidelity and imitation in others why do not we that are calld the faithful imitate the king of glory in things of far les difficulty If Christ had only told us what we were to do though he had not held forth the torch of example we were to have done it how much more when he did it first himself and did it to the end we might do it after him and not only said so in a word but made large encomiums of the happines of afflictions If a Prophet had but intimated it we could pretend no excuse and how much les can we when the very wisdom of Prophets and Gods own mouth hath exaggeratively recommended it and made himself a model of it IESVS never let fal the least idle word and yet he lest so many prayses and magnifying speecheâ— of the happines of poverty and affliction if it behooud us not to suffer the examplary life of IESVS would be to no purpose and his austerity wholly unuseful to us who should be unsensible of his charity who payd such a vast and superabundant sum for our ransome neither should we be taught by so lively an example to love his imitation and detest all sin and sensual pleasures Would God have needlesly thrust his only begotten Son upon such thornes if it imported nothing at all to do what he did that those whom he preelected and predestinated might be made conforme to the image of his Son that he may be the first begotten among many brethren God is not a God of impiety as who could take complacence in being so cruel towards his only beloved child Fierce and savage creatures are most passionately tender over their young ones and how could God who is most meek and ful of mercy be so tyrannically cruel towards his Son if it were not needful for us to suffer The enormity of our sins exacted not such heavy penalties for their redemption one drop I will not say of IESVS blood but of his sweat was superabundant It was therfore our behoof of imitating Christ and suffering it being the road way to heaven that requird such outragious torments and rigour of life God is either cruel and impious or else it is altogether needful for us to be humble afflicted and needy to have a high esteem of divine charity and a meane one of our selves No body knowes the way to heaven who hath not gone it no body ascends up to heaven but he who descended from heaven Christ Iesus who treads the path which he chalkd forth It was a way wholly unknown nor could any give better directions then Iesus who knew it had gone it Iesus did not as some peasants do who with their fingar or speech point out the way to travellers while they themselves sit quietly at home no whit sollicitous whether afterwards they hit or miss for besides that by word he had taught the path that carries to heaven he goes himself before and leads the way that we may be secure from errour Tel me if we were certainly assurd as now we are that there were such a thing as heavenly joyes and that one were to go thither on foot and no more were requird to compass these joyes but only to know the way which he is wholly ignorant of and another good body should instruct him in that who would not buckle himself to this journey though crabbed and ruggy especially if he that shewd us the way would accompany us and go before why then do we not believe Christ and follow him do we feare the wisdome of God being our guide to go astray do we think we can miscarry our B. Saviour going before no certainly Christ shewd us a secure path and traced it out to us so secure that although we die in it the very danger and death breeds security yea if thou didst love Christ thou wouldst not stick to die with him He loves not Christ who doth not imitate him for the vertue of love is assimilation or resemblance O that one could truly say I live now not I but Christ liveth in me carrying the mortification of IESVS about in my body and implanting it in my soul If then thou lovest the Son of Mary wilt become his tabernacle as she was behold with accuratenes and do according to the pattern which is proposd to thee in the mount Calvary and take a view of the whole life of IESVS He chose to live and die in contempt he was derided and set with the wicked accounted not only an idiot but a fool he was beaten as one would not beat his slave he was punishd as if he had been the worst of criminals of his own accord he shund all temporal honour when it was exhibited ther was no miscalling or slanderous nickname that was not appropriated to him they calld him Samaritan idolater possessd person false Prophet seducer belly God devourer drinker of wine blasphemer and transgressour of the law he was thought to be a traitor and conspiratour against his country a friend and abettour of sinners What creature can be namd to which he did not humble himself He humbled himself to the Angels what need was there that an Angel should come to comfort him who was God
the more they were that sought to be rich and happy the fewer would attain their desire What then shal I now say to thee if thou wilt not imbrace the poverty humility and cross of IESVS or see'st not the incomparable good that is acquird by his imitation but that this is it which he himself saith he that followes me walks not in darknes thou see'st it not because thou walkst in darknes whilst thou followest another guide then IESVS The VII Chapter That necessities and afflictions sent by God are to be born patiently IF thou wilt not follow Christ at least do not shun him if thou darest not imitate him how darest thou withstand sleight his similitude It is an unsufferable impudence and a miserable blindnes since the superabundant charity of God is so singularly beneficial to some that it makes them even whether they wil or no conforme to his Son not expecting that they labour in the busines â—east perchance they faint in the combat and yeald to the difficulties of a voluntary assimilation to the life of Christ but God daines to do all by himself putting them in a condition of poverty of humbling themselves of undergoing labours and afflictions nevertheles they reject this opportunity and are so far from covetting to resemble the only begotten Son of God that they are ashamd of all those things in which the Lord of glory did glory so much and seek by all meanes to shun IESVS whom they are bound in duty to follow They owe many thanks to God for that without any paines or danger to themselves for in that case one is secure from presumption or vain glory they carry the similitude of his only Son in which he takes so much complacence and out of an affectionate indulgence towards them when he only cals others to his imitation he places them already in it But they ungrateful as they are thwart his good intentions that they may resemble the proud Lucifer nay they become more haughty then he for Lucifer never thought himself better then God but they as if they were better and greater when they behold IESVS guiltlesly punished with all their guiltines must remain untouchd and desire that themselves be better thought of deemd less worthy of punishment then the most innocent IESVS the least worthy of all Why do we so fret and chafe when any cross or adversity befals us for if it come through our own default it is a high insolency for one to except against afflictions who his nocent he seing Christ undergo them who is innocent If no default occasiond them let him yet rejoyce more because he more resembles Christ who was crucifyd faultlesly Do not through impatience incur that blame in the sufferance which thou avoidedst in the cause being obligd to be thankful to God on a double score both because thou art afflicted and without desert innocently afflicted When one is punishd for his default he must at least have patience when without default joy also then reaps he a richer harvest of grace there is a stricter similitude with the innocent IESVS hopes of a better advance since this cross is not so much for amendment of what is past as for increase of future merits and to be an antidote against ensuing infections He must acknowledg the great indulgence of God towards him which he used towards his own B. Mother to wit this preserving preservative Christ sufferd himself to be nayld to the cross for thee by the naughtyest of men and why canst not thou brook with patience to be touchd by God a better and more benevolent hand molests thee A child when he is corrected by his parent if he cry too eagerly is wont to be corrected again now he is beaten not so much for the first fault as for the secoÌ„d of his impatient crying so when thou repinest at a cross or scourge which God is pleased to inflict upon thee it happens many times that it is aggravated because thou murmurest because thou complainest because thou art quite out of patience It s â— fault great enough to deserve punishment that thou contemnest the similitude of his B. Son that thou wilt not acknowledg thy own faults that thou art so void of patience O king of glory on whom the Angels delight to gaze thou didst not turn thy face from those that smote thee spit upon thee thy cheeks thou permittedst to them that pinchd them thou exposedst thy body to those that beat it thou expectedst nothing but revilement misery for my sake and why am I so wretchedly averse and a fugitive from thee my God and my Father my chastizer and my benefactour Rejoyce o my soul in conforming thy self to the example of the Son of God in necessary poverty tribulation humility and disgrace The Apostles went rejoycing from the sight of the councel because they were thought worthy to suffer a contumely for the name of IESVS S. Paul Michi a Iaponian of our Society went rejoycing in the sight of the people his eares being cut of for his greater ignominy and he sent from citty to citty to be a subject of derision and infamy to all spectatours he not withstanding laughd first at them and put on such a cheerful countenance so confident so pleasant so little dismayed as if he had triumphed for this sole resemblance with the Son of God and he deserved to have that perfected even to the cross which he embraced with great alacrity If thou wilt not comfort Christ by taking up his cross do not contristate the H. Ghost by rejecting it if thou canst not of thy own accord seek it at least when it is found and profered thee do not in vain refuse it If IESVS when in his journy to Mount Calvary he fel under his burden had willd thee to bear it for him wouldst thou have denied him that courtesy what if he had layd it on thy shoulders with his own hands wouldst thou have withstood him cast it of or rather have kissd that horrid piece of wood and adord those sacred hands that loaded thee certainly thou wouldst not only have been content to bear the cross but have earnestly sought and coveted to be crucified in his place Behold God hath imposed upon thee the cross of this grief of this humiliation of this needines why dost thou reject it it is lighter then the cross of Christ If thou wilt not comfort IESVS by compassionating him comfort thy self in the compassionate IESVS O comforter of soules what can befal me whereof I shal not abundantly find redress in thy necessities If I be ill at ease in thee there was not a whole bit to be found from the sole of the foot to the crown of thy head a man of sorrows and knowing infirmity thou didst truly bear our languours and carry our griefs Am I hungry thou expended thy fast even to 40. dayes together felt such pinching gripes of hunger that the divel
Virgin though he were to beare onely the name and title of parent He made choyse of two Virgins Abel and Isaac for figures of his innocency and obedience The first fruits that were purchased by the blood of the lamb were Virgins and so they follow him whithersoever he goes whatsoever they do or say imitating Christ and his modesty which was so rare that nothing was ever objected against him in that behalf And when the Iewes invented many lyes against IESVS and heaped many aspersions upon him without any shew of probability yet they never taxed him for impurity though they knew him to have held conferences with woemen by reason of his rare modesty and the shamefast composure of his countenance which alone cleard all suspicion and calumny of les exact chastity A meane is chiefly to be observed in the sight for as S. Orontius admonisheth Love like those teares which wrongs do from us wrest Breeds in the eye but passeth to the breast From the eyes to the hart is an easy and obvious passage That venerable Servant of God B. Alphonsus Rodriguez never be held the face of a woman for the space of 47. yeares nor any thing else that was recreative to wit the modesty of Christs eyes in a certain apparition to him made such an impression in his hart all his life long that their very memory was sufficient to compose his and by this meanes he preserved his hart in great purity and joyd only interiourly in God Do thou also shun exteriour effusion if thou desirest internal and external purity The IX Chapter That our practise of mortification must be continual LEt no occasion slip of doing good shunning evil he that borrowes an ass of another is not willing to keep him idle One might doubt whether it were more conducible to tolerate evil or do good but for me I am throughly perswaded that next after God nothing is more regardable then that by which one is made acceptable both to God and his Saints That indeed is the best of all when one joyning these two together does good by treating himself ill Let not o afflicted spirit the difficulties of vertue and importunity of thy passions contristate thee rather rejoyce in the occasion of merit Assaile and overcome that merit is not so highly prized which is acquird by living peaceably as patiently amidst the assaults of our perverse inclinations in the solidity of our service in the violence and sufferance of our selves and the cross of Christ Take it not ill that thou art enriched by God with more numerous and fruitful instruments of merit then the Angels he gave thee a body that thou mightest have so many organs of merit to wit so many crosses as it hath senses and powers of the soul he priviledgd thee above the Angels with that charge of thy body and creditted to thee the carrying of that muddy lump of earth into heaven One only care was committed to the Angels to preserve their spirit which was a single one sincere and intire but a double burden was imposed upon the soul of man though of a feebler nature both to raise it self and its troublesome flesh to an equality with the Angels heavenly glory It seemd somewhat unjust that the Angels who were in a ready equippage expedite free from all clog or carriage and man who was retarded and loaden with the luggage of his body charged over above with a thousand crosses should be called to the same journy of heaven the soul especially being more imperfect and infirme then an Angel but Gods assisting grace can easily recompense the grievances which arise from the society of the flesh in order to merit that it may equalize or surmount the dignity of Angels If thou didst but know how to make use of thy massines to thy advantage it would rear thee much higher dancers to make themselves nimbler assume some weight by holding stones in their hands thy body will help thee if thou do but force it This is no easy task but a busines of great contention and the gain thou reapest from thy endeavour must animate thee against all occurrent difficulties How many engins and how much force is requird to rear a great stone into a toâ—er and thou canst not raise thy massy lump of earth above the stars without violence and the engin of the Holy Cross In this state of mortality after the accomplishment of our redemption by the Son of God Saints are no les eminent then they would have been in the state of innocency wherfore they become equally holy in this shortnes of life as they would have been in the space of many ages had men stil remaind immortal The multitude of afflictions together with the grace of IESVS recompenseth the multitude of yeares The redemption of Christ was more copious then the damage we sustaind by our prevarication and yet for all that he would not free us from the necessities and incumbrances of our flesh nor wholly extinguish the rebellion of our appetites least he might deprive his elect of a very compendious way of meritting that by this meanes he might present them to his heavenly Father in a shorter time loaden with equal or greater merits then could otherwise have been acquired in many ages He who vanquishd the world by the cross will have thee to vanquish thy self by the same The copious grace of Christ triumphs most in a thwart and reluctant nature and it helps it self by that very reluctancy to increase its merits The stronger the enemy is the more glorious is the triumph therfore it must not be burdensome to thee to he burdensome to thy self but enjoy this thy violence and patience upon all occasions of meritting in overcoming in sacrificing in crucifying thy self in all things Let not the grace of Christ be idle and ineffectual in thee Combat and the cross is necessary to make thee good whether thou wilt or no. Some great commanders after they had landed their men burnt or destroid their shipping that all hopes of returne being quite cut of their souldiers might fight more resolutely in the same manner God hath tied an enemy to us Why do we hope to avoid all combat the necessity of combatting must necessitate us to victory and merit Christ redeemd us by his cross and by it we must be saved dying continually that we may live and vanquish by our patience The way of salvation is rightly tearmd the way of perdition destroy and seal up thy senses with the signet of Christs cross and they shal be in security blindfold thy self or rather put out thy eyes and thy sight wil be much better become deaf and thou shalt hear with facility become mute and thou shalt speak wel heep thy self fasting and thou shalt rellish wel be without hands and employment and thou shalt labour wel be odious to thy self and thou shalt love wel be dead to the world and thou shalt live wel be fearful
endeavouring conformity in all his proceedings O what a comfort it is to one that loves thee o IESVS to operate not only to please thee but because it is pleasing to thee this is the prerogative of obedience that so the obedient may not be frustrated of any part of the reward which he expects not only from the work but which he finds in it he obtaining his end in the beginning which is to please God and this depends not on any future thing it being anticipated by obeying O most welcome task of obedience why do any complain or seek to be excused from it for this reason that if they obey with humility and promptitude more is enjoind them for superiours are wont to be more forward in commanding them that are most prompt in complying with their commands It is a very fond complaint when we complain of what we ought to wish for A king is thought to do one a favour if he commit any businesses to his trust and the more and weightier they are the greater is the favour esteemd if God proceed after this manner with us why do we complain masters for the most part employ those servants about their commands who are most deare and intimate with them and of whose fidelity they have good proof why do we resent that God treats us as such o God of my hart if thou heldst this favorable manner of proceeding with thy own Son in this world who was obedient even unto the death of the cross shal I dare presume that any favour wil be shewed me of a higher strain o IESVS thou who becamest obedient in all grant that I may never refuse any compliance with obedience Thou atchievedst all by being obedient from thy nativity to thy very death thou wert no les subject to Caesar and Pilate then to it There was also a time when thou wouldst subject thy self to the powers of darknes giving way to the divels and permitting thy self with great obedience to the fury of hel in the executioners and malice of the Iewes and because thou couldst not become Incarnate by it thy Humanity being not as yet existent thy Mother supplied for this she conceiving thee by that rare act of obedience and submission of mind O most welcome task of obedience since it is most certain that nothing is better or more grateful to God Adam with drawing himself from it knew good and evil obedience is most innocent it not only knowes not good and evil but is also ignorant of good and better for all the works of obedience are in the superlative degree that is best in comparison of which the acts of other moral vertues carry no comparison in this that none of them is to be preferred before commands for though one practise all the rest but yet do against obedience they all avail nothing yea he does evil But if he omit them for it he shal have the merit of them all The obedient man knowes no such comparative discourses as it is better to do this then that but that it is best to do what is commanded He that hath obedience hath all other vertues in a compendious abridgment he that is obedient wil be both chast and a lover of poverty Adam after he became refractory felt presently the stings of the flesh and sought a garment to conceal them while he was obedient he was most chast and remained a Virgin being content with his own nakednes he stood in an exact poverty O most welcome obedience to him that is emulous of vertue and makes God the sole object of his love Comfort thy self o my soul who covetest longest so much to see his face which the Angels love to contemplate comfort thy self in the interim and reverence thy superiour whosoever he be as an apparent Christ and visible God God is not worshipped in himself only but in every superiour also Perswade thy self that the divine goodnes in its eternal love and providence hath ordained and decreed thee this Prelate that by him and no other he might communicate his grace and enrol thee one of the predestinate Gods autority resides in him enquire not why he commands this or that Gods wil stands for a reason and so it must be in him who is here his vice-gerent Why demandst thou a reason for putting thy self into the hands of God Tell me what was the reason he created not another man who perchance would have been better when he created thee and gave thee to thy self if thou canst not assigne any why demandest thou one for resigning thy self to God with all the latitude of thy will it is an unspeakable glory and content to the heavenly spirits to be alwaies praysing God but it is far more considerable that it is a property inherent to him inbred then if it proceeded only from their mouth The XIII Chapter How great harme proceeds from daily and light defects VVHy dost thou contemne in thy own soul what men affect so much in their bodies they providing not only for lifes maintenance but also for health and comelines It would be held an unsufferable misery to be alwaies sick and a horrid deformity to have ones body composed of man and beast Thou must not only stand in horrour of great sins but also dread the very desires and thoughts that are culpable yea any imperfection How unseemly an object would it be if a serpents mouth stood upon thy face and yet every smal word whether but lightly detractive or offensive or idle is far more deformed O truth o immense goodnes I beg of thee by the merits of Christ that thou wilt remove this veile from before my eys that I may throughly know how stupendious an evil is involved in the malice of the least default o man how monstrous a creature wouldst thou seeme to the eyes of men if thou shouldst at any time appeare with the head of an oxe or horse in thy humane body and yet it is far worse if before God and his Angels thou conceive in thy soul deified by divine grace disproportioned and idle thoughts of terrene things a brutish longing after thy own commodity nay there is more proportion betwixt a mans body and that of a beast which are in the same degree or order of things then there is betwixt grace and any sin even the smallest Wherfore the deformity of the least venial defect exceeds all monstruosity and corporal mishapednes whatsoever not only what is now extant but also imaginable or possible I beseech thee o zealot of Christ by his most sacred blood pause here a while and ponder what I say with an unbiazd judgment and thou who wouldst not have the least blemish in thy body permit not to thy utmost these monsters in thy soul the spouse of IESVS Employ all the faculties of thy mind set all the inventivenes of thy imagination on work and frame a deformity as ugly as thou canst such a mishapdnes as
the very thought of it will fill thee with dread and horrour this will be small in comparison of the deformity of a small offence The more excellent a thing is the more we ressent its corruption and crookednes proves there the greatest eye sore where straightnes is most requird what more excellent then our minds and will which is in an eminent degree above any other creatures wherfore it s least defect is very ugly neither can understanding humane or Angelical penetrate to the ful the harme it causeth to a soul What a prodigious thing would it be if thou carriedst thy hart in thy belly and not in thy breast it is a greater prodigy that a soul made to love God should covet pleasures or deforme it self with the intemperance of gluttony or neglect in any other depraved affection Thou must have a horrour not onely of enormous sins but also of all venial which are esteemd little material and faslely tearmd petty ones That is not justly stild light and little which only hath above it another which is great A venial defect is not little which hath only above it another greater that is a mortal one yea for this reason it is to be thought great because it hath above it but one evil which is greater Men esteem not only death evil and dread it as such but also a feaver or a deadly wound That must needs be a vast evill which is only less then one evil a vast evil which is greater then all others wants disgraces sicknesses torments and hell it self it is a vast evil greater then which or equal God neither knowes nor can inflict although he should heap all the punishments of the damned upon thee Thou wouldst think it unsupportable to have a canker which rotted and consumed thy limbs what if other diseases much greater were added to this leprosy stoppage of breath the palsey dropsey loathing of the stomack the gout blindnes phrensey dumbnes extinction of natural heat One sole venial sin is more hurtful then all these Venial sin is a canker it spreads insensibly even to death inducing many others and at length a mortal unles the depraved affection be cut off It is a leprosy debarring the scabby and loathsome soul of the embracements of her spouse it is a stoppage causing difficulty of breathing after heavenly things and admitting divine inspirations grieving and contristating the H. Ghost it is a palsy retarding the nimble motions of our mind towards God and making us dul and stupidly insensible in the divine service it is a dropsy begetting a thirst high conceit of temporal things and a neglect of divine and wholsome ones it is a loathsomnes of stomack causing aversion from spiritual affaires it is a gout impeding us in the advancement of a vertuous progress it is a blindnes making us dim-sighted in the knowledg of truth heavenly goods veyling our eyes with fond worldly principles as if a thick mist were cast before them it is a phrensy making the soul go out of her right wits what greater phrensy imaginable then that he whom the king to honour him to have him his courtier yea and adopt him for his Son had clad in royall purple should go dip it in a dirty pudle and then ridiculously appear in his presence in like manner one that is vested with divine grace and the purple of God defiles himself with venial sin and though he be not stript of that pretious robe yet he pittifully bedaubs and misuseth it and dares in this pickle appear before the Angels and come into the presence of God Venial sin is also a deprivement of speech rendring our praiers so ineffectual that we deserve not to be heard nor obtain redress at the hands of heaven it is a wasting consumption disabling the mind to resist the divel it is a decay of vital heat much diminishing the fervour of charity Can that be little which is the cause and source of so great evils how can a soul in this equipage desire to repose in the bosome of her spous stench of breath alone is a sufficient cause of divorce in order to marriage bed how then dares she that is struck with a leprosy palsy dropsy she that is miserably bleer-eyd presume to aspire to a kiss of her spouses mouth if we should spoil our apparrel with spittle or dirt yea though it were only wet with fair water we would presently put it of and lay it aside refraining to appeare in it before company how then can we have patience not with our apparrel but our selves who are nasty sordid defild diseasd and yet even thus we covet the embracements of God never thinking of being first cured or putting our selves in better array if thou wouldst be content on condition of being cured of any of the afore said diseases suppose it were the canker alone nay out of hopes of being cured though with hazard to have some limb cut of how much more to be cured of them all o the stupidity of man I who is so insensible of so many maladies that befall his soul and procures not what in him lies an easy and obvious remedy in order to a certain and invaluable recovery of its health from so many dangerous diseases since for the uncertain recovery of his body he spares neither limbs nor any kind of torment Go too silly fool be sure in the first place to provide for thy soul and use as much caution as thou canst by avoiding venial sins not to incur so many diseases and for that end be sparing neither of care nor industry Thou maist conjecture the greatnes of the malady by the difficulty of the cure Behold what a medecine purgatory which is the hospital of such diseasd soules applies to them can it be little which must be cured with that fire and such bitter torments would one suspect that fault little for which he sees a nice and tender woman tormented in a flaming furnace for an houres space and that by the command of her most indulgent and affectionate spouse certainly either her spouse might be thought some furious fellow or the fault was highly displeasing Why do we esteem venial defects of smal concern for which God who is so loving and merciful towards men wil have soules so dear to him to lie daies and yeares in scorching flames without the least resentment of compassion either God is very unjust and cruelly bent or the least offence is a fearful irreverence vast ingratitude Thou o Lord art no tirant but an humble lover of soules and thy mercy is above all thy works this is â—y impudency too too enormous and stupenlious which thou who art most just most meek and humble of hart who wouldst be glad to remit much of that pain art forced to correct with so much severity least thou prove defective in point of justice If one should behold a dog struggling in the midst of flames and perishing in a burning pile
but little regard notwithstanding what affront I put upon him besides death or a deadly wound I will uncontroulably do what I think good nor ever labour to humour him further then may serve to save my life and secure my inheritance Who could have patience with one that should speak thus do accordingly Iust thus proceeds he who contemnes venial sins and serves God meerly to avoid the death of his soul or forfeiture of heaven by a mortal Is there think you any master of a family to be found who would give house room to such a servant or Son or spouse this is the prodigious patience of God who tolerates us even while we abuse his toleration Let us then not misprize these faults as little which although they were so yet are they many and God is great and but one Grains of sand are smal yet they may be so multiplied that they wil overwhelme one sooner then a great stone One locust is an inconsiderable creature yet what greater destruction to the fields then their multitude great citties are delugd by smal drops of raine If we had so many little wounds or pricks in our body so many pushes or blisters in our face so many rends or holes in our garment as we commit venial sins we should be halfe dead loathsome to the eye and almost quite naked and why do we suffer those miseries in our soul but because we are less ressentive of its harmes then what concerns our body and apparrel O how dare we appear before God so replenished with confusion but why do I insist upon the number one sole fault is to be dreaded because one cannot think any thing little who thinks God to be infinite nor will he account it smal whose love is great what love resides in him who makes no reckning of displeasing God he that displeaseth him in a little really displeaseth him he that displeaseth him transgresseth the lawes of an ardent love The XIV Chapter Of exactnes in small things GOd is immensly great in his service thou must esteem nothing little he were not great enough unles he exceeded all littlenes If thou lovest him true friendship is tried in the least duties Art shewes it self in little things the perfection of vertue is no les polite and therfore it stands not altogether upon ample subjects Nature is most admirable in the least things it is most tender over the minutest creatures Grace is no whit more dul nor ought to be more backward Those things which seem more minute are to be more nighly regarded Since God is so great nothing is little which eyther pleaseth or displeaseth him In good evil there is no minutenes Whatsoever is good for that very respect is great whatsoever is bad upon that very score is not little An infinite goodnes exacts by claime all our forces he that owes all doth an injury if he deny any thing Vse not these manners of speech what makes matter for this this imports but little this is of no moment at all Yea this which thou deemst nothing is a busines of great concern because what thou thinkest much or of great moment is nothing in comparison of Gods greatnes and thy obligation O immense truth how can any thing be thought little or great if the measure of my obligation diligence be thy immensity where there is no little nor great but an excess of all meane How can I say this is little if whatsoever I do for thee is nothing It is not little which is held the least since perfection consists in the least Little things are not to be sleighted because greater are contemned If thou let a spark of fire fal into a pile of dry sticks which thou keepst under thy roof a great flame will be raisd which will consume the whole edifice Our corrupt nature is as apt to take the infection of malice as a little dry flax to take flame If thou sleightest smal things by little and little thou wilt be perverted Regard not the littlenes which appeares at first but by the beginning measure the end Seeds are allwaies extreme little and yet there is more vertue and efficacy in them then in any part of the whole plant The parting of two high waies insensibly protracted into length ends at last in a great interval of distance and may proceed to an infinitude though at first les then a step would have concluded the difference If thou once swarve from thy good purposes and remit that vigour of mind thou wilt by degrees find thy self very remote from thy former fervour Great things take their beginning from little wherfore a little is not the least if it be but the beginning The beginning of every thing is its chief and principal part yea it is not calld a part but the half of the whole Our H. Father S. Ignatius did with reason hold that it was more dangerous to contemne little things then greater the dammage of these latter is more patent and may forthwith be remedied but the prejudice we sustain by the former is not perceived but by length of time when being inveterated by custome it is scarse capable of redress The very nature and enormity of sin makes us abhor detest great ones but little defects because they seem little for this very reason are contemned and this being so our mind is not bent against them Our concupiscence is sharpend and set on edge by little things as thinking that it may wander in them without any great danger when it is not so venturous in great ones it being curbed and kept in by the apprehension of a patent ensuing harm but when our desire is once enkindled a little traind up how wil it then lash forth what wil it not encounter and for this reason we must sometimes proceed with more warines and sollicitude against smal defects then great Custome which gaines prescription upon vices breeds from little things not from great because they are less frequent nor shal we find it an easier task to resist custome then nature One shal sooner have an action in law against a publick invader and forcible seizure of our goods then one that hath had them by long prescription Those things which seem light take from us all remorse and shame of committing them that towards God being once cast of what good can be expected from us past shame past grace Be ashamd to refrain from great things and yeald to little for it is disgraceful and a sign of a coward to be foild by a dwarf or weak enemy That little is not to be sleighted in which great worth may be comprized A pearl is not contemned by reason of its littlenes nay for this respect it is valued the more as containing great worth in a little body why dost thou sleight that little wherin perchance thou maist do God a piece of better service then in greater Obsequiousnes and diligence in small things gaines greater
inspirations from heaven all these concurr in no body besides my self If any one perchance have committed fewer sins then I he hath received also fewer inspirations and had les obligation if any be found more calld upon favoured by God he find les and corresponded more faithfully but if perchance which I can scarse believe some one may be found who sind more heavily had a profounder knowledg of his duty I do not for all this deem him worse then me because such a one wil not know nor ressent such obligations as I do and although another had in very deed greater tyes though I think it cannot be yet acts of vertue are to be weighd by the conscience they proceed from and since I am perswaded that my obligations to serve him are greater then all others and yet serve him les I may wel be held the vilest and ungratefullest of all Although the sins of Anti-christ exceed mine in number yet his knowledg light and obligation wil not exceed mine for he shal not obtain pardon of his trespasses so often as I have done nor wil he be urged with such efficacious and present benefits and inspirations nor preserved from so many occasions of offending Although Lucifer had greater light communicated to him yet he was damned but for one only sin nor had he so many tyes upon him as I the Son of God became not man for his sake nor shed his pretious blood Iudas also had fewer obligations from Christ then press me for as then he had not felt the stings of death O humble and meek immensity of God how canst thou tolerate me for not being confounded and swallowd up in the gulph of my own basenes Let me not I beseech the prefer my self before any one since I find no ground to suspect any body worse then my self Acts which render one sinner greater then another are but of a limitted number how then am not I worse then any of them who can without any stint adde sin to sin and have poyson enough in me to infect the whol world for after so many benefits received after such an excess of Gods love so many divine inspirations I am still extreme wicked what if he by his grace in me others had not curbed the unbridlednes of my malice I am daily by addition of new sins more and more disposed to deprave both my self and others more perniciously If one sin of Adam was able to infect his whole innocent posterity if one theft of Achan could render all Israel liable to divine vengeance such an infinite multitude as mine are what must they needs effect I see not o infirme spirit how thou canst chuse but be confounded considering thy own despicable meanenes together with the vast multitude of thy offences if thou confrontest these with Gods immensity with the excess of his benefits the incomprehensible work of Christs redemption with his ineffable love and loialty towards thee in comparison of which last all the stupendious things he hath done for thee are little regardable by which alone he was as it were forced to do what he did But all this is nothing and much short of truth whatsoever can be conceived concerning thy basenes and infamy yea esteem it nothing for thou wouldst still find thy self more and more contemptible if thou wert but throughly enlightned by God O most pretious truth if the case stand thus with me why do not I dispise my self disdaign my self abhorr my self so far as not to know what either to do or think of my self I wonder that I endeavour not to reverence God more profoundly I am amazed that I seek not my own contempt more fervently One sole crime renders him that commits it infamous even among sinful men who cannot penetrate the malice of sin nor conceive a worthy detestation of it How then must so many defaults of mine so many culpable neglects disgrace and deforme me before the sanctity of God his pure Angels and glorious Saints For although I may wel hope that many sins through the mercy of God are forgiven me what I was once of my self I am allwayes nor shal ever of my self be more If I had once of my self for what I might account my self contemptible why not allwaies for of my self I never have more rather shame must increase in me and how much the more I have received so much ought I to humble my self for my sins past Since I have learnd by experience the divine mercy shame ought I say to increase for having contemned so good a Lord and stil persisting in my ingratitude O most vile and wretched spirit why in so great ingratitude dost thou not deem thy self unworthy of all grace how darest thou be so bold as to beg any why if it were voluntarily given thee without thy demanding it dost thou not tremble so far as almost to doubt whether it were not better to want that guift of God then be exposed again to a hazard of abusing what thou hast so often contemned but hoping in thy mercy o Lord I wil be bold and forward yea importune to the whol court of heaven discovering to it my basenes and ulcers neither will I cease to cry to all and each Saint in particular till I be even troublesome to them s at least by my importunity since I have no better title of my self I wil obtain greater grace mercy of my IESVS that he desert not me for deserting it The XX. Chapter VVhat it is to stile ones self nothing and a great sinner THou wilt abuse others by tearming thy self nothing and a great sinner if thou really thinkest not so but thou wilt deceive thy self if thou thinkest so and proceedest not accordingly treating demeaning thy self as such What thinkest thou is it to be a nothing to be no more sollicitous over thy self that thou maist atchieve Gods greater glory then thou art over those things which are not touched at all nor moved for wholly relinquishing and evacuating themselves Wouldst thou fret at him that should beat the aire or chafe at another who being placed in those vacuities of the imaginary spaces should spend his tongue and fists in chiding striking that empty nothing So thou if thou esteemst thy self also nothing and hast evacuated thy self of thy self thou must not as much as may be resent any injuries otherwise by so doing thou wilt esteem thy self something It will be as ridiculous and childish for thee who tearmest thy self nothing to seek thy own repute and interest as if thou shouldst be extremely anxious how to wish honour prosperity enough to one that is not as yet created nor ever shal be Wherfore thou must be no otherwise affected towards thee and thine then if thou hadst not as yet a being But by truly and seriously holding thy self nothing thou dost wonderfully purify thy self and puttest thy soul in a fit disposition to receive without stop or let
first fruits of life to the Authour of life presenting thy self in the morning before him We must prevent the sun to thy benediction and adore thee o Lord at the rising of the same in the midst of our sleep it being as yet night when the pulse of the bel or some inspiration calls us to rise and behold thou our spouse comest and it is requisite to go forth to meet thee To make this encounter fruitfully it conduceth not a little to prepare oyle over night least the lamp of thy love o my soul want fewel to feed its flame and thou like a foolish Virgin be shut out which is too terrible Premeditate what language shal deliver thy first salutes to thy spouse and what affaires thou art to negotiate in time of prayer this being done if thou betake thy self to rest with sorrow thou wilt rise with cheerfulnes if thou hast a loathing of sleep thou wilt covet watching with much alacrity How can a soul enamoured upon God chuse but grieve that it must cease to love him prayse him improve its stock of merits and that all advantages of increasing his glory and its love towards so dear a spouse must be suspended how can it endure to see it self sustained by God loved by him and regaled in this interim with innumerable benefits and not to be able to relove him or as much as be thankful for such high favors Wherfore it is requisite both before and after sleep to make amends for that suspension of love and merits with more ardent affections and celestial desires supplying that loss of life wherin we cannot power out our whole harts upon God and be absorpt in him We must procure by this very cessation of merit and love to merit as much if it were in our power as if we were awake Vsurers even while they sleep increase their mony and thou wilt do the same if conforming thy self to the disposals of heaven with obedience and resignation thou make an ardent oblation of thy self and beare with patience this misery and the incident necessities of mans life He that embraceth patiently a necessary death whether it proceed naturally from some disease or be violently caused by another man he merits by it and so shalt thou if it be harsh and noisome to thee to repose and sleep as it is to those that serve love God fervently if I say thou accept of this necessary burden with equanimity it being wisely so ordained by the author of all wisdome Perchance if thou consider things in themselves and how much more burdensome sleep is then death to a true lover of God thou maist merit by sleeping patiently for his sake as by dying for patience Merit resides amidst great patience and patience is there greatest where greatest aggrievances are born most patiently Among all the burdens of mans life and all the annoyances which besiege it so closely none is greater then that of sleep or more worthily to be repented sin being excepted Other calamities are only tormentours of life sleep for its interim bereaves us of it other calamities are only opposite to the commodities of life sleep for a time impugnes its substance other calamities are in such sort noisome to our temporal life that they exceedingly conduce to eternal by affording matter of merit by raysing our minds towards God and drawing our affections as by an attractive quality sleep in it self during its raign is an enemy both to corporal and eternal life for as much as it causeth a vacancy both from merit and all thought of heavenly things other calamities are most welcome to Gods zealot because in them he doubles his spiritual advantages love is put to the rest God is glorified but sleep hath nothing at all desirable a cessation both of loving and honouring God attending it step by step wherfore sleep is more noisome and for a two fold yea manifold reason more burdensome then death it self to one that is enamoured upon God Death tyrannizeth only over the body sleep over both body and soul sleep on this behalf seems so much worse then death by how much the soul is better then the body nay much more to wit as much as the whole man soul and body is better then the body alone for death only deprives thee of thy body but sleep of thy soul also as wel as of it Death aymes only at the destruction of our body a thing frail and corruptible sleep at the soul also a thing eternal immortal which gives life to the body it being wholly insensible but for it death destroies a man sleep doth as much for a space of time as annihilate him Death is not to be dreaded for it leaves the best part of man untouched to wit his soul which makes him a man by which he loves God and apprehends his mercy and goodnes which is the glory of a man and ought to be his sole content and joy yea it leaves it more refined without impediment that it may honour love God more expeditly sleep overwhelmes and enters the noblest part of man unsouling as it were the soul it self Tel me I pray which wouldst thou resent most to die or to be annihilated if thou give glory to God by dying because such is his B. wil wilt thou not do the same if thou covet upon the same motive to be annihilated therfore if a patient acceptance of death be meritorious so wil also a patient acceptance of sleep if thou relish it as an equal burden If thou merit by embracing with patience the vexatious incumbrances of this life why shalt thou not also merit by sleep if it be the greatest incumbrance of all yea it being the sole and only thing which living and dying we must deem cumbersome for neither in this life nor after death is there any thing sin being set aside more burdensome to one that is feelingly devoted to the service of God What are accounted the burdens which press so heavily upon this life but its sufferings and miseries but one should be so far from esteeming sufferance a burden that it ought to be the scope and but of his desires next after God there is nothing more expetible then to suffer for God exhibiting this as the credentials of our love for by so doing we perfect the knot of true charity being more straitly united to him we dilate the confined raies of his glory and merit to be partakers of the same No body knowes throughly how burdensome sleep is to us besides him who is able to make a true estimate of the immensity of Gods glory the invaluablenes of his love and the least degree of grace in order to all which for this interim there is a dead surcease a suspension of all traffique for new merits After the cloze of this life what is noisome to the just besides purgatory but if thou be then in a condition of suffering it ought not to be resentive at all
thou being therby refined and purified thy spouse trimming thee up in such a dress as may wel beseem his bedchamber If he leave it then wholly in thy power to love God what cause of tergiversatioÌ„ since he leaves arbitrary to thee what thou wishest and desirest where thou hast opportunity to suffer and love there is no just ground of complaint If it were put to thy choise whether thou wouldst sleep or die for half an houres space a soul truly inflamed with the ardours of charity would of it self prefer death that it might not be reduced to a cessation of love yea it would not thirst more after the resurrection of the body then after avoiding all unnecessary excess of sleep though but for a quarter of an hour as much as might be without impairing its corporal health For the mean of discretion is every where to be observed and we must take a necessary repose though against our will that the functions of our mind may be vigorous and masculine fitly disposed for all enterprizes to Gods glory as also for praier least if we indiscreetly deprive our selves of it we be heavy at our devotions too drowzy and languishing and so by little and little quite benumd and what then wil be the issue but that we perform them with little fruit But to be too indulgent to sleep beseems the dead rather then the living and a soul weighing things in themselves that is with an impartial ballance and siezd with the heat of divine love to avoid this inconvenience all acts of love and prayse surceasing for that interim it would perchance rather make choise of a perpetual death of the body because in that case one may love enjoy God which alone sufficeth and is the chief desire of an enamoured soul but being so charmed and stupifyd it cannot although one wil not easily conceive this who doth not experience in himself the avaricious incentives of divine love and its restles longings and motions nor how contemptibly an enflamd hart spurns at all self commodity But we must not measure the ardour of true love and a devoted affection by the ell of our lukewarmnes rather by what we behold in those that fondly doat even to madnes upon a perishable beauty we may guess at the feelings and flames of a pretender to an eternal and never fading one But if thy breast harbour not fuel for such a heat shun at least as much as thou canst the chilnes of tepidity and sleepines If it were intimated to thee that forthwith thou must be annihilated such tydings would fil thee with horrour why then wilt thou so joy in sleep it being all one as if for such a respit thou wert annihilated Apprehend the incommodities of sleep which is an evil manifold death it being very opposite to a 4. fold life for sleep deprives us of the chief life of our body in which it is equivalent to death it self it takes away the life of our soul which is then as if it were not at all in this it surpasseth death sleep is also in some sort injurious to the life of grace and the eternal life by causing such an interruption of merit What then can be more prejudicial to us wherfore one that burnes with the true flame of divine love and is siezd with an ardent desire of praysing so great a good is hugely covetous of the least advantages of time and deems any unnecessary expense in that kind an irreparable loss and consequently he goes to sleep with much regret accepting with patience this necessity imposed by God upon life and making to him an oblation of it taking in good part since his holy wil is such to be deprived for this interim of what he much more covets which is to love prayse God and be restles in his service and as much as in him lyes he covets not to sleep but rather busy himself in the former actuations thinking every hour a day til he return to his wonted employment Thou also must put on this disposition of wil and offer it to God compose thy self like one ready to give up the Ghost saying with Christ into thy hands o Lord I commend my spirit By thus behaving thy self thou shalt after a manner merit by that death and vacancy of sleep so untoothsome and distastful to thy rellish Conceive also ardent desires of that ever during life when without interruption thou shalt enjoy God and bewail the miseries of this life since thou must seek repose and relaxation for thy exhausted spirits in a thing of all others most burdensome to thee and prejudicial to all to wit sleep How can life it self chuse but be noysome its very rest being so restles and its advantages so disadvantageous it is a lamentable thing that life must be repaird at the very charges and expenses of life since the lover of God esteems somtimes a short sleep more dammageable then the loss of a long life When thou art laid to repose endeavour to seal up thy eyes and hart with the ferventest act of love which ever thou didst make in thy whole life and even before thou fallest a sleep desire to rise as soon as may be purposing at thy first waking to unseale thy hart and actuate it in more fervent eâ—aculations then hitherto thou hast done so to compass in that instant a new purchase of grace It wil not a little conduce to this to beg the concurrence of thy Angel Guardian as also to use a spare and frugal diet Strike up this bargain with thy body in the meane while repose take thy penny-worths but be sure to rise as soon as the bell calls thee to work Like as the soul for the good of the body dies as it were by night and is buried so must the body die by day for the good and benefit of the soul while it is awake let the body be dead to this world as when the soul is a sleep it is dead for that respit to heaven that is to meritorious actions and pious thoughts Procure in the meane while that thy body as much as may be supply the elevations and obsecrations of thy soul the which not being as then in a capacity to pray the body must do it by lying modestly in a be seeming posture and for more decency not right upward We compose coarses and embalm them against corruption though they must shortly be the food of wormes and spoile of time so let us compose and dispose our selves in this death of sleep that we may be fit for the chast embracements of Christ Lye with thy armes or fingars a cross such treasures as these must thou coffin up together with thy self till the morning revive thee for treasures were wont to be buried and deposited with the dead Be sure thou never desert the cross but whilst thy mind cannot cling to it thy body must carrying alwayes about with it the mortification of IESVS Christ when
he was dead would bequeath to us a pledg of his love by receiving a wound with a speare thou also in this short death must give such an earnest-penny of thy affection And by this meanes as Christ in his sleep of death merited at thy hands by shedding water and blood a special pledg of love at his harts wound so thou also in thy death of sleep shalt even then merit at the hands of Christ for such a precedent desire and disposition Let this be an argument that while thou sleepest thy hart wateheth not unlike cranes who while they sleep carry a stone in their tallon the fall wherof forthwith awakes them The IV. Chapter That we must rise fervorously to our morning prayer IF with loathing thou didst betake thy self to rest thou wouldst with a cheerful alacrity rise in the morning to thy task neither would it be necessary for the master of the family to hire so early his workmen Thou wilt shew thy self too effeminate if thou be not valiant against sleep but suffer thy self to be vanquishd by a thing of all others the most unmanly being chaind hand and foot like a captive without tye in such sort that thou canst neither help thy self nor others but must be content to sit in the shadow of death It would not be needfull that the voice of thy beloved knocking at the dore of thy hart should rouze thee conceive the sound and pulse to be the noise of thy spouse calling and inuiting thee with most sweet and amorous language to open the dore and he cals thee his sister his love his dove his unsported Open to me saith he o my sister my love my dove my unblemishd Love makes him call thee so often his neither can he be satiated with calling thee so O Lord what beholdst thou in me that can so transport and enamour thee can it be reasonable that I disgust thee for a little ease but if thou hasten not o my soul to open because thou art his and for love of him do it at least out of mere compassion To move thee more forcibly he presently adds because my haire is full of dew and my locks of the drops of the night Thou wouldst not demur to open even to a stranger and an enemy in this pitteous plight and why not to thy God thy lover who does it all for thy sake Beware he depart not if thou linger What can be imagind more attractive and comfortable then this voice of the spouse knocking so friendly that he may bannish all lazynes from a pious soul who will not be more confounded then was Vrias to lye in bed while Christ stands expecting not under a pavillon but in the open ayre exposed to the injuries of the night Robbers stick not to rise by night to make their booty and massacre others and wilt thou when the good of thy soul and Gods glory lyes at stake be so tardy the Angel caling Peter when he was a sleep said rise quickly Thou art more then dead when thou art buried in sleep imitate at least the dead in rising In the twinckling of an eye in a moment shall the dead bodies arise at the command of an Angel IESVS will not have thee be flower when he cals then when an Angel The heavenly spirits take it ill they being by nature most quick and agile to see any one whom they awake any whit sluggish or fearing themselves with stretchings and yawnings and they waken us most willingly beâ—â—use the very sight of this drowzines so opâ—osite to their agility is not a little offensive to â—hem A certain servant of Christ one of our society by name Iohn Carrera was every morning before day called by his good Angel to go to praier but this heavenly monitor once absented himself for many dayes till being appeased with continual praiers and long fasts he returned at length to his charitable office admonishing Iohn that for this reason he with drew his comfortable presence because being once overcome with the drowzy wearines of the precedent dayes labour he had not risen with such speed to his accustomed devotions So inconsiderable a fault if it were a fault so highly offended the Angel although it were not perceived by his conscience which was so tenderly nice and delicate They esteem the fervor and prayers of us miscreants so much that they deem not their own officiousnes to equalize the others worth and give us a gentle correction that there may not be so much as a false shadow of idlenes where we traffique in such real goods Therfore be not slow at the hour of rising labour with great speed to overtake any one that is before thee that thou maist be the first that our Lord coming loaden with his guifts shal light upon so to have the first choise and handsale of his graces he disburdening himself upon the first he meets Thou shouldst run towards Christ charged with his cross to ease him of it and be crucified in his place run to him fraught with grace to be enriched by him What soul can be so sensles and prodigal as not to rise with all speed to receive so many guifts and impart kisses to her spouse how can she be said to love God if she return not swifter then any thunderbold to love her beloved whom over night she desired so vehemently One must rise more expeditly then if the bed and bed clothes were all in a flame one will rise more expeditly if the fire of love be enkindled in his hart Procure at that instant to make amends for the vacancy of sleep wherin thou couldst not actuate thy self in the love of God by a most fervorous elevation of mind by a most flagrant charity and a total holocaust of thy self the perfectest that hitherto thou ever didst offer upon the altar of thy hart Suppose thy self in such a condition as if in that moment of thy awaking thou wert newly created by God to love and serve him for that day alone for that sole end is this daies life granted to thy use If one that is in a state of beatitude were annihilated by God and forth with created anew with all his qualities and former perfections with what impetuousnes of will in that very moment would he engulph himself in the abiss of the divinity do thou endeavour to put on a like fervour after this thy annihilation by sleep and resuscitation by awaking How deep a sense and profound reverence did Adam and the Angels conceive â—â—wards their Creator in the first instant of â—â—eir perceived creation imitate the B. Virâ—â—n who being in the first moment of her conâ—â—ption created in grace and priviledgd which â—e perfect use of reason with what intenâ—â—nes of affection did she cast her self into the â—â—mes of almighty God what thanks did Christ our Lord render to his heavenly Father â—â— the first instant of the hypostatical union yea with how great love did he then particuâ—arly think
live with thee teach me how I may truly live to day Thou must o remiss spirit daily arme thy self to combat and awake with great chearfulnes as one would do to battail the sign of falling on being given as it were by this trumpet thou shalt love thy Lord God with all thy hart with all thy soul with all thy mind with all thy strength Let this precept allarme thee in the morning perswade thy self that each day of thy life is not only a day of warfare but a set day for combat How cheerfully do soldiers rise that morning wherin they receive orders to prepare for batail a soldier is not found unarmd in the day of combat thou must make account thou art to fight every day arme thy self early in prayer with a most fervent charity with a most profound self contempt with patience mortification all the stratagems thou canst invent The sole suspition of a batail armes a souldier and makes him continue so for many dayes because he expects to fight one day what ought the certainty and belief of a daily conflict to operate in us dispose all thy actions in the morning and depose them in the hands of God and purpose to be twice as good to day as thou wast yesterday least in the day time the divel interpose himself and prevail so far as to make thee abate of thy fervour Rise wel animated against all the difficulties which attend this life and if any of them â—ccost thee or thou become slouthful be not faintharted but rather joyful For why â—n occasion is presented of a greater victory assaile them undauntedly like one valiant souldier encountring another who is not dismaid at his presence nor seeks a starting hole but stands his ground and joyes to have met him whom otherwise he would have sought Fight stoutly all day long and at night expect to die The life of man is a warfare in which life is allwaies hazardous and labour certain As often as thou art but a little foild fight more eagerly and perswade thy self that such foiles wil be frequent for the just man is foild 7. times a day but rise forth with with redoubled courage as a souldier who having received a wound flies more keenly at his adversary Where thou perceivest any breach make it up incontinently and fortify it more strongly by calling a squadron of reasons to thy assistance which must be at hand like a valorous and approved reserve mustered from thy morning meditation repentance and humility leading them up And delay not to repair that negligence for otherwise thy vigour of spirit wil easily slacken He that receives but a sleight wound will faint unles he stop the effusion of blood and by delay that which is otherwise but an inconsiderable hurt wil become mortal Apply a remedy out of hand differr it not till night or another day for although it seem nothing it will hinder the progress of thy other actions If any one have got a thorn in his hand or foot he puls it out immediately he lets it not alone till night or some few daies after otherwise he will be able neither to walk nor do any thing else and the delay may be such that by festering it may prove a canker and cannot be cured but by cutting of Yet for all this be not so contristated for any smal defect as that it smel rather of pride then repentance and thou be hinderd thereby from performing thy other exercises which require a great deal of alacrity B. Aloysius Gonzaga had reason to say that those who were too anxious over their smal defects did not sufficiently know themselves Thou art all misery but thou hopest one day to be happy be les contristated and more humble If thou acknowledg thy misery a fixt hope in almighty God will lessen thy anxiety and dispair of any good will increase humility in thee Many are therfore dejected because they grieve not so much for having offended God as for their own infirmity and vilenes while they find themselves so impotent and faint harted and because this affection naturally sympathizeth with self love it is more resented and sometimes occasioneth no smal harm Grieve only for having offended God but rejoice forth with by a confidence in IESVS and congratulate with thy self for thy own vilenes for thou art nothing of thy self but only by God which is much better for thee By this meanes the defect it self wil more animate thee and render thee more confident by putting thy trust in God since thou dost actually experience and as it were by groping palpably perceive that by thy own strength thou canst do nothing but only by God and with God on whom thou maist much more securely rely for he is far greater in goodnes then thy good will can be in constancy Perswade thy self that perchance each hour thou wilt faulter a hundred times but purpose Gods grace assisting thee to rise again a thousand By how much more frequent thy lapses are rise so much more confidently because thou art more conscious of thy own insufficiency Then is our hope more purely and sincerely fixt in God when we dispair totally of our selves and then experience it self will teach us this when we see our selves without end to fail in our good purposes God permits that because we do not sufficiently humble our selves If thou wert truly humble thou wouldst redress many inconveniences and speak nothing but victories Humble thy self in the presence of God mistrust thy self and trust in him and being armed with this live this day with much circumspection diligence and desire as if the whole multitude of men were created this day and of all that world one only were to be saved he who attaind to the highest pitch of charity and most resignd indifferency of will for which end though to others were alloted the space of a hundred years yet thou shouldst have but this dayes respit Thou art obligd to do more now to honour and pleasure God then in any contingency and supposition whatsoever for any other respect even that of salvation The VI. Chapter Of maintaining our fervour OVr spiritual life depends no les upon the hart then our corporal our hart being kept untainted and wel guarded our spirit will be in safety Mans hart is the consecrated altar of God and the throne of the H. Ghost Thou must preserve it with all sollicitude that it may be free from this world not defiled with the images of terrene impertinent things with which the world and the divel by the windows of thy senses batter thee as with so many engins Thou must be more careful of thy hart then of an altar an Oratory and consecrated chalices where we offer sacrifice worship and keep the very Body of Christ in the Sacrament With how much diligence and under how many locks do usurers keep their mony and the instruments of death with how much nicenes do those that delight
in rarities keep any choise jewel or forraign noyelty making presently a cabinet for it that the least grain of dust may not tarnish it canst thou think that the gemm of the Divinity and the H. Ghost can be preserved with requisite decency without an exquisite carefulnes If thou didst carry the most H. Sacrament of the Eucharist in thy hands how sollicitous wouldst thou be not to let it fal and if thou carry God in thy hart why wilt thou be less attentive The hart is a most delicate member any little offence to it is extream prejudicial any trifling wound is mortal to the body and in like manner any negligence in the custody of our hart doth much prejudice the spirit The kingdom of God is within us why do we beg miseries abroad by our senses an unblemishd hart is the oracle of God he speaks within us how can we harken attentively if we be gazing and wandering abroad while thou conversest with one thou givest not eare to another that interrupts thee how canst thou hear God being distracted with so many affaires Why dost thou desire to gaze abroad upon any beautiful object to tickle thy eares with pleasing sounds to feed thy fancy with forraign newes since thou hast God within thee in whom all beauty is comprizd all pleasure resides as in in its center and a perpetual newnes is discoverable even to the B. Angels themselves though they be in a perpetual fruition even from the very infancy and nonage of the world they beheld him before the prevarication of Adam and stil he is new to their eyes Which of the blessed would relinquish the vision and conversation of God and separate from him to behold any curiosity upon earth or who that is placed but at the gates of heaven would for that end recede thence o how much also is he to be pittyed who in expectation of this earthly trumpery hinders his progress in spirit forsaking the portal of heaven which is a wel guarded hart leaves God alone and sometimes his own hart too expelling God from it in such sort that he can neither know him perspicuously nor hear him expeditly that thou mayst be able to contemplate thy self in a myrrour thou first of all wipest off the dust how canst thou hope to see God in thy hart if thou daube it over with the clay of terrene affections If one should tel thee that S. Paul the Apostle newly come from the third heaven were in the streets explaining and unfolding hidden mysteries thou wouldst leave all though never so pleasing and profitable wouldst run with much speed though far distant to hear see him Behold thou needst not go one step to hear God inculcating things salutiferous and teaching hidden secrets while he comes to thee and sejourns with thee why dost thou not leave these exteriour things so fruitlesly burdensome overcoming all itch of novelties and vain curiosities by which thy fervour doth so evaporate this ought to be so highly prizd that the servant of God F. Francis Villanova was wont to say that although it were told him that an Angel were come from heaven and stood in the market place disclosing wonderful and stupendious mysteries and that great concourse were made thither he would not stir one foot only to overcome curiosity And certainly it were much better not to see an Angel then to be overcome by it if that were the only motive of seing him What retainest thou now of all the vanities thou hast beheld besides some impediments perchance of contemplating God thy mind being burdend with vain fancies and images of things both false and frivolous The les thou seest the more thou lessenest thy desire and occasions of errour A hart shut up to the world is the open gate of truth which gate is shut by giving free scope to our exteriour senses they are these material things that shut it Wherfore thou must alwayes keep within at home and not go forth to externs but with leave from God and for obedience and his glory Then they wil cause no hindrance but forthwith as soon as ever thou hast done thy busines retire home again resaluting and speaking to God who is there expecting thee yea recolect thy self now and then privily in the very dispatch it self steal thy self from thy employments and put thy self in the presence of God Whatsoever thou art to enterprize weigh it wel before hand offer it up to God and as much as thou canst have perpetual recourse to him visit him in thy hart ask his advice and implore with humility his favorable assistance But the chief gate which man must set a guard upon is his mouth least its words prove the outlet of devotion O how often do many sel God at a lower rate then did Iudas since they sell him for one word Simon Magus was cashierd for covetting to buy the H. Ghost with mony others loose him not for mony but a little breath and ayre of their mouth O most holy spirit who utterst nothing but Oracles of truth how can I relinquish thee to attend to the forgeries of men or my self to speak vanities conduct me with my IESVS into the desert of my hart that there thou mayst instruct illuminate and streng then me to beare thy cross O God o Christ of my hart grant me grace to follow thee out of the world and worldly crowds that I may dye with thee out of the city Thou chargd with thy heavy cross didst walk out of Ierusalem to dye for me and accomplish my salvation in the solitude instructing me how I am to go out of this world and seek thee in my self and bear thy cross and be crucified to the world in the solitude of my hart I wish my life could be sayd to be like a warfare upon earth a souldier forsakes parents allyes friends country commodities and embraceth as it were a voluntary bannishment in a forraign land exposing himself both body and soul to most evident danger for a little base pelfe why will not a soul desirous of Christ in order to gain the chiefest good and lock it up in the cabinet of its hart with draw it self from the tumults of men and quit the miseries which attend their affaires so to evade more present dangers both of body and soul be replenished with heavenly consolations The VII Chapter How constant one ought to be in the practise of good works MEN toil many years with great constancy for the inconstant and fleeting goods of this world why then are we so variously sickle in the pursuit of a constant and eternal glory which never wil fade men though they cark and care toile and moile their whole life long cannot get temporal goods albeit they pursue them without respit how can we presume to gain eternity since we are as changeable as any weather cock what paines do robbers usurers and the lecherous undergo to compass their wicked designes though they
lives and most remote from a soul endowed with reason how much more from a spirit which breaths God A dog will hear his masters call so will not an oak or fig tree the husbandmans nor he that over feeds himself the voyce of God He to keep Adam to his duty enacted the first law of fasting the only one of that most happy state so to recommend more earnestly to us the vertue of abstinence as if it alone were sufficient to preserve innocency and other vertuous endowments putting man in a fit disposition to hear and adhere to God Our Lord would commit the tuition of his beloved child Adam and his Benjamin of creatures to no nurse but fasting into whose faithfull hands he entrusted him that it might be the foster-Father of man and his instructer to obedience But this precept being violated Adam forth with fled from the voice of God caring so little to adhere to him that he would not only not seek nor approach him but sought to avoid God who sought him He renders himself wholly unfit for all who is not abstemious he will resist Gods holy inspirations and withdraw himself from his familiarity being weand as much from the divine breasts as he yealds to these sensual appetites What commerce betwixt God and ones belly how can God affect him who affects only his gut as his God How canst thou endure o divine truth to dwel in him who is such an arrand idolater it was anciently held a high strain of folly for men to kneel by way of worship to those things that were the handy-work of men and how fond a thing is it for thee an intemperate man to set thy hart upon that which thou destroiest and wil destroy thee towitt meat and its rellish How intendest thou to feast with God to lead a celestial kind of life to fly with him upon the wings of the winds to immortality if thou takest complacence in the life of those things which stick to the earth and are rooted and half-buried in it The life of self-pamperers is extremely mortal for such is the life of plants which are in part overwhelmed with earth Those that feed their belly increase their mortality by fatning what is mortal in them becoming more mortal by hindering eternal life by defiling their mind and so contracting their soul as to render it only corporeal Adam by breaking his fast became forthwith mortal thou becomest every day more mortal by stuffing thy self with dead things and feeding greedily on slaughterd creatures and seasond for this end that they may be entombed in thee but so much more happy shalt thou be by how much thou partakest of immortality and thou shalt partake so much the more of it if thou inure thy self to a spare dyet and to feed on unsavory meats All our life in this world is bitter full of labour and afflictions wherfore it is impertinent to go about to repayr maintain it with sweet things Eat only that thou mayst live let thy meat be such as is the rest of thy life Thou livest not to eat but to dye and thou eatest that thou mayst not dye quickly Death assailes him sooner that feeds too plentifully and delicately Food must be the medicine of life not its poyson and destruction Let thy own hunger and the gall and vinegar of Christ be all thy sauce and seasoning who for that end drunk it upon the cross because whosoever combats against sin must not seek after savory meats and the adjoyning of hyssop with a spunge signifyes the vertue of cleansing that we might have a model how to purge our soules By frugality and untoothsome meat the divine character which is engraven in us becomes more resplendent and the holy purity of our mind is refind that it may be united to God made more capable of divine impressions for if fasting drive out the stubbornest dive is from anothers body much more forcibly wil it attract God so facil and benign into our own If such be the vertue of fasting that by it thou canst purify others much more wil it sanctify thy self He breaths somewhat divine who breaths abstinence and hunger the body it self is in a certain manner elevated by the force of a disengagd spirit Iron is ponderous but it becomes light by the spirit and vertue of the loadstone and if thou also fasten and hang thy self upon God he wil sublimate thy body by the vigour of thy spirit rendring it intellectual and incorporeal The composition also of thy body is rarefyed by abstinence in such sort that divine irradiations penetrate more easily into the soul and she more dextrously steers the other squard more fitly to it by a proportionable demolishment as being disbarked of that fat rind that environd it for a great weight is no wayes weildy or commodiously mannageable Lastly abstinence containes so great a good that there is nothing to which it is not extreme beneficial Other vertues adorne the soul but abstinence is salutiferous both to body and soul Both Saints Philosophers by embracing it protracted their life to a faire old age We men designd to be immortal had contented our selves in that most happy state of innocency to feed only upon hearbs the fruits of the earth now temperance also restores to man that golden age Spare diet conduceth to the health of the body it is a natural restaurative an universal medecine fit to be applyed to al kinds of diseases The skilfullest Physitians prescribe it for the first recipe in all maladies for oppletion is the metropolis or head-city of diseases and deaths chief sergeant All the untimely deaths of yong people are in a manner caused by excess in diet But if frugality be effectual against all the indispositions of the body it wil also give redress to those of the soul Hunger makes the proud to stoop the covetous to disburse the lazy slouthful it forceth to work it renders the luxurious chast the angry man calmely patient If then frugality even when it is forced makes head against all vices if when it is no vertue it can engender vertues what remaines when it is a true and sincere one but that must needs associate God to a soul and make him its constant sejourner God took complacence in conversing with Moyses and Elias when they were both in a long fast But after the same manner that it expels puts the divels to flight saturity bereaves us of God Vnles thou resolve to banish this vice and establish in thy soul the vertue of temperance thou maist wel dispaire of the rest It wil be the same as if one being desirous to beat away a troublesome dog should in steed of a stone throw at him a crust of bread A domestique enemy must first be vanquishd ere we can fal abord with a foraign The XIII Chapter That one must take account of his proceedings by a frequent examen of himself MEN do seldome cast a
nothing pass unpunished and he most faithful to thee will exhibite nothing but mercy Reduce first of all into thy mind the matter wherof thou art to give account to witt all the benefits heaven hath conferred upon thee next examen in what thou hast abused them together with thy ingratitude lastly humble thy self be sorry bewail even thy least defects and purpose firmly by Gods assistance never to fall into the same Strengthen this thy purpose as men are wont to strengthen their contracts first before witnesses renew it in the presence of the Angels and Saints and then security for performance being given call the B. Virgin and thy special Patrons and appoint them suerties adding also a penalty of forfeiture Impose upon thy self in case of relapse some voluntary affliction by way of pennance strive allwaies to advance in goodnes for if the Angels conceive joy for one sinner becoming repentant why will there not be much more jubily for the just in his progress from vertue to vertue wax not negligent in this search into thy self it being the key which unlocks all the treasures of fervour Many religious men become tepid by reason of their remissnes in this exercise hence many grow lukewarm hence diverse old souldiers in the service of piety have forsaken their colours after a lamentable manner because contenting themselves with a sleight and superficial search and sorrow what they seemd to bemoan this hour they committed the next Thou neglectest not daily to renew and reenforce the decayd spirits of thy body twice a day by corporal refection it imports thee to be no les industrious in recruiting the forces of thy soul and good purposes by sifting into thy actions yea not twice but at the end of each work whether thou hast performed it wel or no God who was no way obnoxious to errour considered examined all his works as soon as he had made them He created light and presently taking a view of it saw that that fair creature was good He made the luminary bodies and forthwith contemplating them perceived they also were good He daily entered into examen of each work in particular and then a general survey of them all and found that they were very good So must thou view each of thy actions apart then all of them together If thou hast not performed them well thou wilt by the line square of a due discussion of thy conscience discover what is amiss to amend it for the future Moyses in the bosome-retirement of his breast cleansd that hand which he found coverd over with leprosy This serious examen of ones self is the storehouse of vertues there the fear of God there humility self-knowledg compunction perseverance fervour there prudence is minted to a currant coyn Lay wait chiefly to intercept some one vice which thou must with importunity both prosecute and persecute till thou hast utterly vanquishd it and after this manner by little and little must thou endeavour to subdue them all The XIV Chapter How we must be affected towards others LET this be thy employment all the day long in all thy own actions even those that are commendable to accuse thy self and in thy neighbours though discommendable to excuse others It fares not with our conscience as it doth with our countenance we see other mens faces not our own but we behold our own conscience not anothers wherfore we ought and are only able to judg and condemn our selves If thou thy self who art only able to discerne thy own conscience findst it a difficult busines to pass verdict upon many of thy actions whether they be good or bad whether thou hast given consent or no how darest thou judg others whose harts are unfolded to none but God If thou canst not discover thy own mind why dost thou judge of anothers if thou art unable to discern thy own how darest thou pass sentence upon thy neighbours If thou weighest not thy own proceedings why dost thou draw others into thy ballance but for the most part those that stand idle in the market-place are the people which busy themselves in murmuring and slandering others so he that neglects his own soul spends his censure more freely upon his neighbours We might long ago have learnd by experience how lyable our judgments are to errour Even in corporal things and those which have but an extrinsecal appearance and colour our senses are very frequently deluded how much more obvious is it to err in judging the harts of men of which they have no perceivance at all whose motions are swaid by free will and in which Gods grace works secretly so many miracles Although one seem to have clear arguments to ground a sinistrous suspicion yet one ought not to judge sinistrously because he may easily judge amiss While the companions of S. Boniface were busy in his search they suspected not without ground according to the tenour of his former behaviour that he was in the company of some lewd harlot but he in the meane time burning with a far different flame of the love of God was suffering cruel torments for the faith of Christ So fallacious was a probable judgment how much then wilt thou miscarry in thy groundles and improbable suspicions he that is in superiority over another and is by office to judge must not condemn him unles he prove evidently faulty in things doubtful the criminal is absolved how darest thou of thy own uncertain and erroneous brain condemn him who is better then thy self by whom thou art to be judged If thou didst love others as Christ commands thee thou wouldst not judg them charity covers a multitude of sins â—or this reason thou forbearest to judg thy self because self love inclines thee to excuse thy self and if thy love towards thy brethren were such thou wouldst not censure but excuse them Christ being to judge mankind he himself became man and vested himself with our nature and thou also if thou wilt judg or reprehend another must put on his person and proceed with him as thou wouldst be proceeded with all Let this be the first feat of thy charity not to be scandalized or offended with thy brother the second not to offend him the third to help and assist him in what thou art able nevertheles because thy love is but lukewarm thou art often defective in thy duty and takest offence unjustly even at the innocent disdaining them many times that are acceptable to God Where is thy charity towards him where is thy love to IESVS if those be a displeasing eye sore to thee who are so pleasing to him so deep in his favour and do him better service then thou a sinner if thou lovedst God and his immense goodnes thou wouldst love all for his goodnes the good because they are good the bad because they may be good Not only an elaborate piece of workmanship but the very materials of which it is made are had in no smal request
Of evill many become good we must not disdain them this is to love all for goodnes this is to love all in God when we love for that which cannot be loved without God as goodnes justice vertue and the like If thou didst love the goodnes of God thou wouldst love all in God and covet that all loved him and wouldst put to a helping hand and be sollicitous in this behalf Of a much different strain is the zeal of humane and divine love Humane goodnes is finite and narrow bounded not suffising for all nay not even for many but les wil fall to each ones share therfore men endeavour what they can that none els love what 's dear to them but because the goodnes of God is infinite and more then abundantly sufficient for all and our love of such a limited condition that it cannot correspond to so great goodnes therfore Gods desire is that each one love it and approve our love and cooperate towards it to the end they may discharg and satisfy for that goodnes which we are not able with any love of ours to equalize Thou lovest God imprudently unles thy desire be that all love him for thou must love him more then thy self thy desire is that all love thee though thou be so very bad why are thy wishes on Gods behalf more barren and bounded he being so extremely good O infinite goodnes of God who loved me so much the meanest and very outcast of sinners that being not content to love me thou wouldst moreover that all should love me and commanded it too why shal not I covet that all love thee and procure it to the utmost of my power yea thou hast obliged all by thy precept blood that they should love me no less then thou lovedst me and every one loves himself Give me grace that I also may observe these examples of love that I may love all Thou saidst this is my precept that you love one another as I loved you And again thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Thou o Lord lovedst me eer I loved thee thou o Lord lovedst me not for any commodity redounding to thee but to me thou lovedst me with an immense love for none hath greater charity then this that one give his soul for his friends thou didst love me with a perseverant love thou art he who when he loved his who were in the world he loved them to the end These are the conditions with which thou lovedst me and must be the rule conformably to which I must love others O my soul learn love from the love of Christ love them as thy own life whom Christ loved more then his and wil in then be loved and worshipd If Christ lay sick in bed thou wilt not deem it indecency that he be supposed languishing for our good who for our salvation took really upon him our languours or pinchd with hunger and some other poor body lay also sick in another bed and were pressed with the same want and thou shouldst demand of Christ whether of the two he would have thee to relieve first himself or that other party I believe he would piously answere that other for Christ himself would defraud his own mouth of meat to asswage a poor mans hunger Serve then and reverence Christ in such a one if thou canst not do it in fact do it at least by prayer and compassion not only in corporal necessities but much more in spiritual God prizeth so highly an almes bestowd on the body that he promiseth heaven for its reward nor assignes any other cause of acquitting them in the dreadful day of doom how much more wil he esteem an almes bestowd on the soul for which he daignd to dye o the infinit charity of God o most loving Saviour who gavest thy soul for sinners grant that I may love their soules as thou lovedst them I wil take a pattern from thy love to know how I am to love those whom thou lovedst and not from my own neyther wil I love my neighbour as I loved my self for then I shal love him but untowardly I knew not how to love my self how can I love others How could I love my self who loved my own wil who loved iniquity but I wil love my neighbour as I ought to love my self desiring thy wil may be accomplishd in him and he more plentifully enrichd with thy grace that all may serve thee most fervently and adore thee in spirit and truth THE IV. BOOK The I. Chapter How ungratefull we are to God HOW unhappy is our hart in thy benefits o happines of Saints since a slender courtesy afforded us by some poor miscreant yea even by a savage creature stirs us up to an act of benevolence and yet we are not struck through love into an amazement of the immense beneficence of thy benefical nature how comes this to pass that if a man had done it we should deem it a huge favour and for this very reason that God does it though he do incomparably more we sleight the benefit and seek not to shew our selves grateful doth water loose its nature because it is in its center the sea and not in some sorry vessel shal it forfeit the nature of a benefit because God is the authour of it whose nature is to be beneficial we should rather argue thus it is water because it is drawn out of the sea Can heat because it is in the fire be thought not to becalefactive and that only to be so which is in a forraign and violent subject the ardour of fire is more effectual and warmes more intensely then heat in wood so the blessings from God are more benefical then those from men because God sourceth them It is the nature of gâ—â—â—nes to be benefical as it is of fire to heat â—â—neficence in men is nothing so vigorous or taking because it is not so proper to their nature indigence only being connatural to them Water is purer in the fountain then in the stream and benefits derived from God are more refined then those from men who for the most part mar the nature of a benefit Why then shal blessings loose their prerogative and respect because they are imparted by God which though much meaner if they proceeded from any contemptible man unles we expressed our gratitude for them we could not have the face to appear before men but should blush with confusion so far as to be ashamed of ourselves and become infamous in our own conceit and yet because they are from God we hold our selves priviledgd to be ungrateful and dare without blushing appear before him and his Angels Why are guifts les valuable and of an inferiour rank because they come from God since in them alone are verified all the conditions of being truly beneficial and giving us relief in our greatest distress is a benefit more unhappy for flowing from the fountain of all happines Why do we
by meanes of it unles they wilfully seale up their eyes All the effects which God produceth are so many benefits and by them each one may help and profit himself unles he wil be foolish and perverse Thy ardent love doth alwayes o Lord accompany thy guifts as heat doth light this is an immense priviledge concomitant to them that they are so many pawns and pledges of thy love although this be not patent to the eye yet it discovers it self in the benefical effect For though we see only the light which the sun communicates not the heat yet this doth still attend the other O Father of lights what thanks am I endebted to thee for the university of thy benefits conferd upon all those credentials of thy love which love I chiefly embrace and adore in thy works who wil not stand amazd at the inventivenes of thy goodnes making the benefit of all the benefit of each one and the benefit of each one the benefit of all private ones publick publick private all the works of nature all the wonders of grace all the predestinate all the blessed are my benefits all the prosperity all the calamityes that befall man are so many favours which thou lovingly bestowest upon me O ungrateful man wouldst thou not love God with the whole impetuosity of thy hart if he should exempt thee from damnation thou carrying the guilt of hell fire by dying in some damnable sin but should create another much better then thee deputing him in thy place to suffer for thee that hell of torments God did much more then this I omit that he fatherd our faults upon himself daigning to dye for our sake this now amazeth me although it be incomparably less that he would shut the gates of mercy against many sentence them to damnation to save thee for if thou didst see but few condemned thy fear would be much less thou perchance thy self make one in that heap if two onely or three thy fear would yet be more lessend and thou mightest presume with more certainty one of them would be thy self if none at all thy fear would be none and mayst wel think that thou alone wouldst incur that misery or which is worse be much more frequent in sinning and less observant towards God Therfore the torment and damnation of so many soules is to me a great benefit O light of my hart with how bright beames doth thy love shine towards thy elect thou madest other creatureâ— for man and him thou damnest for other men whom thou hast elected to salvation Angels become servants to men yea thou thy self being made man what if thou wouldst have one man serve another If for some respects of temporal life thou permittest man to serve man and a slave his master for the attainment of eternal life and increase of glory a reprobate must serve an elect Behold o ungrateful spirit if an evil so prejudicial as that of punishment is proves thy advantage the advantages also of others wil turn to thy benefit With such skill doth God mannage his works that each one redounds to the good of all the very paines of the damned are so beneficial to all that they are beneficial even to them themselves for in that height of misery their cup is not temperd merely with malice but hath some mixture of divine justice which is very savory God is so bountifully good such a skilful Alchymist that he turnes dross into gold that is our very miseries into mercies and which is yet more out of the worst minerals of sinfulnes they alone being only bad he extracts pretious mettals and sometimes even the most pretious Thou o Lord conferrest thy benefits with such a strong and open hand that even from sin where thou hast neyther power nor activity thou being both impotent to act in it or concur to anothers acting thou both drawest and art able to draw great good Thy skil knowes how to extract immense blessings and vertues out of sin Light reverberating upon a condense and obscure body uncapable of its operations is so far from being eclipsed that it doubles it self by reflection neyther is thy beneficence ever defeated or renderd ineffectual Out of sin where nothing is but preposterously bad thou rectifyest all to my good decreeing thence thy beloved sons Incarnation As well from my own sins as those of others thou knowest how to take an occasion of being beneficial on my behalf when I hear of a crime committed by another I am sorry for the misfortune of my brother but take an occasion thence of thanking thee because I hope for mercy at thy hands eyther for him or me I yeald thee thanks because thou wilt derive thence no smal good to me unles I wil become quite blind and shut my eyes against the light Sing prayse once more o my soul to the Father of lights and be not forgetful of all his retributions for they all are his guifts even those that seem to flow from men and thou receivest immediately from them for if thou must perswade thy self that all the cross aggrievances which befall thee from men come from God why wilt thou not also be of the same mind concerning good his nature being goodnes it self and he so prone to communicate it all the light which beautifies the heavens though some little star or the moon by night do dart it forth proceeds from the sun though he the Author be not seen in like manner each blessing benefit though receivd from man flowes from God and is but a ray of his goodnes This is the main comfort which sustaines mans life amidst such a world of miseries as attend it that nothing can happen but by Gods permission and whatsoever he permits can be no other then a benefit according to the nature of his goodnes and what benefit soever befalls us proceeds from him and whatsoever proceeds from him is my benefit and orderd to me and my good Corporal afflictions and the miseries of this life whether I or any other tolerate them general dearths diseases pestilences all these are my benefits o Lord thou afflicting others for my good O God how deeply am I endebted to thee who to the end I poor miscreant may receive thence some good inspiration stickst not to strike the very kings and Monarchs of the world dead being little or nothing moved with the teares and calamities of so many kingdomes that I may draw thence some good document A congruous thought of some poor peasant becoming contrite is more prevalent with thee then the diadems of some kings and sometimes whole nations of people Grant o Lord that I may be thankful for these and both in my own behalf and others love thee in all thy works as thou lovedst me in all thy benefits The III. Chapter That Gods love in our Redemption appeares infinite O Immense love how dost thou exhaust thy self in deserving wel at my hands since thou hast left
of the divine honour thou oughtst in all reason to be more immeasurably cruel against thy self then against any enemy or the whol camp of hel although in effect and in the exteriour maceration of thy body a discreet mean is to be held according to the direction of thy superiours and ghostly Father and the prescript of right reason to the end that in this also thou maist seek Gods greater glory for whose sake it is expedient not to be immoderate in chastizing thy self as for the same reason and our own salvation we are forced to pardon our other enemies and afford them a place in the list of our charity for that which God exacts chiefly of us and wherein we ought to take revenge of our selves is the death of our will not of our body And according to this I say it is most evident that thou hast more reason to be displeased with thy self then all thy enemies and ill-wishers whatsoever Suppose a man who had many capital foes who sought his life were delivered into a strong and safe castle there to be kept and defended by his intimate friend one assured to him by all the tyes of alliance and friendship who alone were both esteemd and should be most faithful to him and that there were no sanctuary elswhere for that man nor place of refuge and that it were in his power to let no enemy hurt him nor wrong the least haire of his head unles that friend did introduce him thither and deliver to him the keyes of the castle giving his consent by subscribing letters with his own hand If he who ought to be both faithful and friendly should prove so perfidious as to unlock â—he gate to all his persecutours and give â—hem entrance with intent to let them abuse him wrong him and exercise the utmost of their cruelty upon him and he himself moreover who were to shield him should be more raging and malicious then the rest should impede any benevolence that were intended him permitting nothing good nor conducing to his health to come to his hands which he intoxicated not first with poyson or some other noxious ingredient against whom then ought this miserable man to conceive a spleen against some one of his enemyes or that friend and allye who proves so treacherous whose malice alone is equivalent to all the rest it being certain that without him all their hatred would have availed nothing at all What an incredible brand of perfidiousnes cruelty in humanity would fall upon that man he would incur the detestation of all as being much more blame worthy then all O most beneficent truth thou hast committed my safety only to my own trust as who would be trustyest to my self but I prove most dangerous above all others divels men hell the world all of them are my sworn enemyes but they all remain disarmd if I my self do not arme them they all wil be innocent if I to my self be not nocent All the prejudice I can receive is within the reach of my own power neyther can any body really hurt me but by my permission unles my wil be such unles I betray my self I alone am the Architect of all the injuries which befal me from others though I impute them falsely to others I stop the influences of Gods beneficence I hinder the effects of his guifts I infect his graces and corrupt his vertues abusing both the one and the other how then shal I flatter my self who am so burdensome to my self how shal I cherish and sooth my self who am such a mortal enemy to my self All the hatred I can vent is not equivalent to my own injuriousnes How often have I cheated my self how many faults have I contracted I have defrauded my self of heaven I have neglected the blessings of Gods grace and not to number up all my spiritual losses which are without number what pensivenes of hart what affliction of mind what disasters in my goods what losses in my temporals how many bodily diseases contempts revilements derisions have I brought upon my self by the disordinatenes of my passions by my little circumspection and following the gust of my appetite If just occasion being given any one contristate me I am highly offended and why am I not so with my self since upon alloccasions I am injurious to my self If thou o lying man hadst but once catchd one in a lye thou wouldst never trust him afterwards and having so often belyed and cozend thy self thou yet trusts thy self and art not at all suspicious of thy proceedings But why do I recount my own injuries it is a sufficient motive to make me abhor and prosecute with a pious hatred whatsoever is mine for that all have proved as so many obstacles to retard my endeavours in loving God O most holy faithful truth I ought to loath and hate my self for being so wicked and disloyal to my self how much more for being wicked and perfidious to thee for my own sake it behoovd me to detest my self how much more o Lord for thine because I loved not my self orderly I should in reason have hated my self how much more because I loved thee not at all who alone should be loved in all I loved not thee because I knew not how to love my self yea I loved not my self because I loved not what in reality I was but some what else les considerable I loved not my soul which is my chief and noblest portion but only my body as if I were nothing but it which is absurdly false for I have also a soul for whose ransome the Son of God by way of exchange gave his To love a part of my self I loved not my whole self and what is more to be lamented I loved not that which to me is all in all God my Saviour If thou be carried with a zeal towards God o perfidious man thou canst not but be fraught with hatred towards thy self I permit that so far as thou hast prejudiced or wrongd thy self thou be indulgent to thy self there remaines yet sufficient cause of selfrevenge for not loving God and transgressing his commands Thou art not a litle moved when thou hearest the perversenes of Caiphas and the treachery of Iudas and the very naming them puts thee into chollar why then wilt thou be partial and soft-natured to thy self tel me o proud spirit if thou hast but one dram of true humility that is of truth dost thou not hold thy self the worst of all sinners nay this is nothing extraordinary since S. Paul framed no better conceit of himself Wherfore thou must deem thy self the perversest of creatures when thou hast done so thou proudly rankest thy self above thy degree Nevertheles I demand of thee if thou holdst thy self such then by consequence worse then Iudas or Caiphas or any other but if thou judgest so in very deed proceed consequently lest thou be taxed and derided by the Angels and either out of
not to make thee the subiect of my action but not so much as the obiect of my memory O most loving God how could I behave my self worse towards my capital enemy then I do towards thee not so much as daigning thee a look when thou meetest me and meetest me so often though thou be stil ingratiating thy self by new favours and services O how continually o God art thou present in me and yet I so little present to thee and take so little notice of thee thy essence penetrates each part of me much more intirely then the sun beames penetrate each part and parcel of a transparent christal more perfectly then our soul is diffused through our body The presential assistance of thy wisdome provides for me and playes it self the purveyer that nothing may be wanting and if I do any good that it may impart a reward thou committest not this to the intercourse of thy Angels only and their relation but thou thy self becomest my overseer Thy power carryes me in thy bosome as a nurse or motherdoth her dearest child and because these duties of being in me of seing me of preserving me in my being are necessarily annexd to thy divinity thou wouldst have me engaged to thee o good IESV for a voluntary presence and there being but one way wherein thou couldst necessarily be absent thou didst invent a meanes even in that to be also present in thy most holy body that thou mightest be present with me both corporally and spiritually O ungrateful soul why wilt thou not be thankful to so loving a Lord and if thou canst not bodily be present with this divine Sacrament be not forgetful at least in spirit and thought of so benefical a soveraign who hath made thee his tabernacle and place of residence Carry o soul respect to thy self and the Altar of thy mind where God dwels by grace which thou perchance now partakest of and woe be to thee if thou dost not the divinity being there communicated We reverence inanimate things and deservedly which are imbrued in the blood of Christ but why do we not the same to a part of our soul spirit where the H. Ghost diffuseth himself we dare do no unseemly action before an Altar where the sacred body of Christ our Lord is kept nor darest thou do les before thy self because thy mind as thou maist wel hope is by grace the Altar and throne of God he residing in it with greater pleasure then in a Pix of gold How dost thou compose and recollect thy self when thou art to receive the Body of Christ habituate thy self allwayes in such a modesty such a decency since God is thy guest lodging not in thy body only but within thy soul If the Body of Christ being thy guest thou compose thy self with such decency thou must stil retain the same since the spirit of God becomes resident in thy spirit since the Father and the Son come to thee and take up in thee their dwelling place Whether in publick or private comport thy self allwayes after the same manner God beholds thee God is nigh thee God is with thee God is within thee If Christ should come visibly to thee when thou art all alone in thy chamber wouldst thou in his presence put thy self in any les seemly posture or rather stand in a reverend submissive composd manner trembling at the aspect of such an awful majesty Behold the divinity is allwayes present with thee and we owe it no les dutyes of respect The divinity is present not after one manner but many by filling and surrounding thee with his boundles essence as the ocean doth a spunge by carrying thee in the eye of his all seeing providence by sustaining thee by his power by cherishing imbracing and adopting thee for his child by his heavenly grace O soul why sendest thou thy desires in so long a pilgrimage since God is so nigh at hand why dost thou aspire to other joyes he being present thou hast a speedy redress for all thy miseries why art thou contristated a refuge sanctuary against all thy calamities is close by what needst thou fear let all thy affection spend it self in embracing and kissing this thy most loving parent in whose bosome thou art nurturd and brooded up Consider thy self more neerly allyed to God then to thy brother then to thy Father then to thy mother for the kindred and allyance betwixt thee and God is greater then betwixt a child and his parent Let him then be allwayes present to thee who is present after so many wayes As a mirrour becomes the image of that which is present to it so a holy soul in some manner will become divine if it have the divinity present with it This presence of God is the vital action of grace a holy soul is so long in an actual and waking exercise of life as it loves God and is mindful of him whether it be employd in the contemplation of his perfections or seek actively to advance his greater glory For as God is not only present to us by his essence knowledg but also by his power and activity so the best method of framing the presence of God is to consider him playing the good Operarius and directing his actions to our behoof Who wil not become active on Gods behalf since he works all in all for ours but yet though a soul surcease from this she shal not therfore dye by sin but wil be like one that is a sleep not dead but yet scarse alive as not enjoying the use of life so a soul that is in oblivion of her God though she be not voyd of life yet she is in so sound a sleep that she reaps no benefit of her spiritual vitalityes O how long-lifd wil one be that is stil mindful of God! o how many ages wil he complete which even those that otherwise are held spiritual do ordinarily forfeyt this presence of God is also the sense of grace for without it the soul lyes like one in a palsey The palsey is a disease not a death but it deprives ones limbs of all sense and vital motion life and grace are then to smal purpose when the memory of God is benumd and obstupifyed whether it be in action or contemplation One palm tree becomes fruitful merely at the presence of another and the soul at the presence of God is loaden with all variety of fruit Without the presence of the sun all is buryed in obscurity nothing doth partake of beauty by the presence of God a soul is illustrated and is made most comely to the eye The elements cannot brook to be absent from their center and no les is a soul carried to her center of repose God As a stone if it be detaynd in the ayre keeps alwayes a propension to the earth and if it be left to it self tends thither without any more adoe so a soul enamoured upon God even when it is detaind from its
which is perfect as also of Gods simplicity wherfore the Trinity of Persons is an authentical testimony of the divine Vnity What complacence doth a soul take in knowing this not as I have rudely explicated it or as it can be explicated for this is only felt by an inexplicable manner for as there are no natural species which can bring us to this knowledg so neyther are there words significantly expressive of what is manifested to some pious soules concerning the word eternal Therfore the soul of a creature is so over joyd when the mutual proportion and harmony of the increated Trinity and Vnity and the necessity of both to the accomplishment of the divine perfection is communicated to it that it is all in jubily and exultation transported besides it self and quite spent through amorous desires and the languishments of true charity thirsting earnestly to discover in the other life this stupendious goodnes of the Trinity Why longst thou o my soul to see any thing else besides this great spectacle of the world for whose sight alone the Seraphins and all the Hierarchies of Angels and Saints were created and introduced into heaven as so many spectatours Where is thy curiosity where thy desire of knowledg if thou covet not to be dissolved and contemplate that mystery and to dive into this hidden secret but thy longing must remit thee to the other life and not put thee upon inquiry in this how he is three and one Thou must not search the cause why he is so since thou art not able to give the cause of what he is Thou seekst in vain a cause in him who hath no cause God were not to be stiled great if he were not greater then our capacity Thou must not â—nquire after what manner he can be so who never could be before he was so Philosophers could never sufficiently penetrate into the nature of divers wormes and no body knowes himself throughly how then canst thou hope to make a ful discovery of the divine nature thy Author wherfore thou must captivate thy reason to the simplicity of faith in this supernatural mystery for that perspicuity which the divine indulgence daignes sometimes to insinuate belongs not to all but only to whom God calls out of the number of those who dwel with his Son in the mount Calvary and in a totall ejurement of themselves who denying self wil have taken up their cross followed IESVS to that mount and wil have them follow him thence to the mount Olivet glory those he priviled geth somtimes in such sort as to make them partakers of his majesty Where I am saith IESVS there also shal my servant be He that shal partake with Christ in suffering shal also partake of this extraordinary light and joy So when our Holy Patriarch Saint Ignatius had wasted exhausted himself with corporal pennances and austerities it was more copiously and clearly imparted to him then one is able to express So that mirrour of fervour F. Didacus Martinus did almost allwayes behold himself environed with a glorious light of the Trinity or some one of the three Persons Nevertheles it appertains to all to covet with most ardent desires the sight of this ancient and eternal novelty in the life to come It was reveald to that holy servant of God F. Iohn Fernandius that a certain religious man of our society was long detaind in purgatory because he had omitted to wish with ardency the sight of the most B. Trinity O my soul why art not thou more enamoured upon the sight of this theatre of the blessed to whose spectacle all minds are summond allrational creatures are invited What a joy wil it be to behold that which now by reason of the narrownes of our thoughts or ignorance through an excess of jubily and love we are not able to comprize how exultingly shall we rejoice while we contemplate these first fruits of the divine perfection that fore-tast and new expression of the divine goodnes where it communicates it self to the Son and that primitive bounty of God what a pledg and assurance wil a soul receive of the divine benignity towards it self when it beholds this profusenes of benevolence if God without deliberation gave all that he is wil he not by the advise and vote of his goodnes grant that we may at least see what he is if he permit us not to be what he is he wil permit us to admire what he is if not to possess him at least to enjoy him if not to live by the same life at least by such another and that eternal of which a soul hath a pawn when it beholds a generation excluding death How can we chuse but love God with all our mind and strength considâ—ring that purple morning of ardent charity which he displaid where the first and Virgin dew of his guifts is the furnace it self of charity love it self in the same substance so that the love is as great as God in the same guift of love he gives his own infinite essence for love it self is the first guift and all that infinite being which is in God What assurances of benevolence wil a soul take hence beholding such a happy and ominous essay of Gods future bounty and such a promising beginning of his goodnes insomuch that it takes huge complacence in being loved by that unparalleld love and doth what it can to love him reciprocally by imitating so great goodnes by giving it self to God by leaving it self nothing since the Father leaves himself no parcel of his substance which he communicates not to the Son and both of them to the H. Ghost In the excess â—â— this consideration and the consideration of this excess by means of a mysterious darknes there passeth an ineffable communication and intimate union betwixt God and a soul The soul passeth into God by grace love which though she remain in herself by nature yet not by affection and God passeth into the soul by indulgence and charity though he still remain in his majesty O immense goodnes of the Father immense wisdome of the Son immense sweetnes of the H. Ghost grant that I may reverence thee in thy Vnity adore thee in thy Trinity admire thee in thy goodnes imitate thee in thy love grant that I may humble my self to thy â—uperexcellency that I may enjoy thy Vision â—dhering to thee through all eternity becoming one spirit with thee and in this interstice â—n adorer of thy majesty In spirit and truth â—et me desire truth spirit to contemplate face to face the more then most true the more then most spiritual and superessential excellency of thy Trinity and Vnity To the honour of the ever B. Trinity the word Incarnate and his V. Mother S. Ioseph and all Saints FINIS A TABLE OF THE CHAPTERS Contained in the I. Book 1. THe deceitfullnes of a secular life fol. 1. 2. Of the Truth of the Spirit fol. 8. 3. Of Purity
attempt things both unknown and uncertain why can we for love of vertue and the honour of God sustain nothing with constancy he that hopes for a continual and eternal good unjustly shuns labours in its pursuance he that is to be alwayes happy must be alwayes good for Each day condemns mans irreligious facts All seasons open are to vertues acts as saith S. Prosper The greatest grace of all other is to preserve the grace which is given thee and thy chief work not to surcease from doing works As a creature would be very deformed without head and life such a monster is a good life without a corresponding end We have received grace without any paines but we must conserve it both by grace and paines The beginning of a thing is accounted half its accomplishment but unles it end wel all comes to nothing In the matter of perseverance the end is all in all for nothing is done so long as any thing remaines undone It imports little to have laboured hard all ones life long if he faulter in the end The sole last moment of perseverance is more available then all the years by past for all their fruit proves rotten if it did not borrow thence a preserving soundnes Thou wilt think it a hard task to persever but it is much harder to begin again and much more then that to begin often Wherfore it is both more easy and more conducible to persever once then to begin often Horses force themselves les in a continued course of drawing a chariot then after having stood stil when they are to move it again Water which hath been once heated being taken of the fire becomes more cold then at first If fervour be wanting in thy proceedings thou also perchance wilt be more tepid then in the beginning Many grow faint-harted in the course of perseverance because they find difficulty in doing good but they do not therfore evade that difficulty for it is only perseverance that makes all easy If thou hadst the courage to begin a hard task thou mayst wel continue it that being much more easy Thou hast found so long by experience that it is neyther disproportioned to thy strength nor grace why then contrary to so long proof art thou now diffident thinking thy self unable to bear it what is eyther past or to come is not burdensome for the present do not grasp the difficulty all at once for it comes not so but by piece meale cōmensurate to the parts of time As thou wast able before to support it so art thou now and wil be henceforth It wil not be more noysome then it was but the heat of the difficulty wil remit by length of time and custome Accustome thy self to do wel and thou wilt forget to do ill Custome overcomes difficulty because it overcomes nature and what then wil grace do if custome overcome nature much more wil a wel-orderd charity in thee overcome the deordinations of nature It is better many times to fulfil a good purpose or consummate a work already begun then to begin another though otherwise more perfect because by inuring thy self yealding to a ficklenes of mind neither wilt thou performe that other Seldome can any work occur which is better then constancy in fulfilling a good purpose Good purposes are to be kept although they be not of any great regard because albeit in themselves it imports but little whether they be kept or no yet it is extremely important to be constant no wayes changeable Who is more constant in making good purposes then he who least intends to keep them If thou learnst a firm perseverance in one good against another thou wilt learn it more firmly against evil wilt not vary like time in this time of serving God O eternal truth grant me grace to serve thee eternally help o Christ my weaknes thou who with such indefatigable love tookest upon thee all our infirmities thou who never art weary with tolerating my impudent negligences grant that I may never be negligent any more nor desist impudently from thy service but may learn to brook swallow all morsels of difficulty Let me learn o Lord perseverance by thy love who when thou lovedst thine thou didst love them even to the end thou who didst persever hanging upon the cross and wouldst not desert it though the Iewes promised upon that condidition to believe in thee the Son of God who being ful of irksomnes anguish and a bloody sweat didst persist nevertheles and seeke redress by red oubling thy prayers Go too o remiss spirit tel me what must thou covet to do for thy IESVS who persevered for thee amidst the sorrowes of death and the cross who when he loved thee loved thee even to death what I say must thou covet but to do good and suffer evil These are the chief ambition of a soul that loves IESVS that which makes most for perseverance A good work presents it self what hinders thee from doing it but the trouble which accompanies it but mark wel that here concurs a second commodity of suffering evil and attend now that the good is doubled ther is superadded to this work both to suffer evil and do good Thou canst pretend no excuse for thy non-perseverance because that only hinders thee which ought to be the sum of thy desire to suffer for thy beloved If the love of IESVS were enkindled in thee all backwardnes tribulation and extrinsecal impediments would no more oppress thee then fire is with wood which forthwith more inflames it But if thou be so coldly chil that the love of God finds no fewel to feed on let thy own advantage and hope of future joy incite thee Dispair of coming off with life is wont to add valour to souldiers make them way through the thickest dangers divine hope of eternal life is yet more forcible and wil make thee more valiant and daring With this hope attempt thy enterprizes and persever cheerfully A cheerfull acceptance feels neyther labours nor trouble though otherwise the thing be laborious enough He that exerciseth himself in military games or at ball is wont to take more paines then one that hires himself forth to day-task and yet he feels it not because he takes it by way of pleasure and content If thou wilt conclude happily in the last hour be sure to begin each hour if thou intend to persever begin alwayes a new Excuse not thy negligence by indisposition of body self love for the most part deceives thee and makes thee do thy actions remisly Thy body is able to do more then thou thinkst if thy fervour of mind were but vigorous its force infusing strength even into weak and feeble limbs A lunatique person though exhausted with sicknes can do more then 4. that are sound the vigour of our mind sometimes communicates it self to the body If the infirmity of a malady can make one strong how much more the strength of grace and
health of soul when he loves God and confides in him The VIII Chapter How sollicitous we must be to increase grace GO to the covetous man o remiss spirit and learn sollicitude and arts of industry No great matter is demanded of thee if to become the best thou be set to imitate the worst No greater diligence is exacted of thee to please God then many use to please no body yea to displease all Be confounded not to do for the kingdom of heaven what is ordinarily done for a trifle of money No more is required of thee to obtain great grace and glory then the sinner of his own accord undergoes for vice hell Thou maist with credit be covetous of grace and canst not be too minutely attentive in improving thy spiritual stock studious habits incline to action for which reason it is proper to vertue to reflect not what is don but what is to be done not what is acquired but what is behind and therfore it never is in a stable possession but allwayes in pursuit and sollicitude It delights not in things past but takes incentives from things to come It is covetous it thirsts it burns seeming still to it self more indigent the more it gets Those that hunger after temporal things incur the hatred of all men because they are profitable neyther to themselves nor others yea they endammage others either by usurping or hindering or denying them transitory goods and depriving themselves of eternal Contrary wise those that hoard up spiritual treasures are deemd harmles they are in the favour esteem of all because they enrich themselves without the prejudice of another True goods are of this nature that they are able to satisfy all parties without fear of consuming or causing impeachment to anothers wealth In spiritual goods avarice is commendable in temporal it is detestable for the first are to be hoarded up the latter to be distributed abroad otherwise they are not goods unles they be emploid after a good manner but spiritual avail not unles they be conserved yet nevertheles they are not diminished but rather augmented by communication Disdain not then to do that with credit and profit which others forbear with the general dislike disadvantage both of themselves and all The miser prizeth one half penny as dearly as his life and if he chance to loose it he takes on pittifully and so must thou if through thy negligence thou sustain any detriment of grace or slip any opportunity of improving it The covetous rack their brains to invent new wayes of gain thou must employ thy wits in devising how to advance in grace Esteem nothing little but have a most high conceit of all that stands in the rank of heavenly goods Even as reason corrects the eye judging the stars to be as little as they seem and convinceth it that each of them is much greater then the whole globe of the earth so must thou rectify thy dictamens in a false estimate of these things and perswade thy self that the least improvement of grace is more valuable then the soveraignty of the whole world Let thy eye lids all wayes precede thy steps that thou maist be able to distinguish and pick up the little Margarits of merits amidst the dung of humane employments Let this be thy chief care next to good works in the frequent and fervent use of the Sacraments O immense liberality of God which hast left those immense treasures of thy Church unlockt that every one might take as much as he listed Let us rate the treasures of the Sacraments duly and let the appetite of our avarice discharge and disburden it self upon them for they are the mines of grace A miser that looseth whole nights sleep for a trifle of money that sets so many engins on work for that end that puts himself upon the tenter hooks of a carking pain if he should see the exchequer of a most wealthy king standing open and the king himself begging of him to take thence as much and as often as he would and should still importune him to carry away more and more would he let slip this fair opportunity of enriching himself this is Christs proceeding with thee in the institution of the Sacraments Thou must not only dispose thy self in such sort as not to be frustrated of their effect but thou must love them and frequent them often and dispose thy self worthily to receive more copious grace Disposition is the vessel that receives it and the greater that is and more ardent thy affection the larger portion shal befall thee the least grain wherof is more to be valved then all kingdomes and natures universe The blood of Christ distils into these vessels as did the oyl from the widowes oylpot neyther wil it stop its current til they be all fully replenished Vse also this little craft in thy holy avarice and procure by all thy works to gain if thou canst a double grace offering them to beg a worthy access to the Sacraments and by so doing thou shalt both receive grace for the merit of thy work and thou mayst hope to receive yet another in regard of thy better disposition which God wil give beholding thy affection and sollicitude for a good preparation Beg likewise of thy Ghostly Father that all thy works may be enjoynd thee for satisfaction of thy sins Be also devoutly affected towards all the sacrifices of Christs sacred Body and blood that are offerd through the whole world covetting if it were possible to be present at them all however offer them up to God being thus disposed thou shalt reap more ample fruit Carry also a semblable devotion to all the general prayers of the Church for her children as also to those of the faythful that being thus piously disposed thou mayst partake more plentifully of them Yea he that is in mortal sin which cannot be thought on without horrour must not omit to do all this in token of the reverence he carryes to a worthy reception of the Sacraments with a good purpose and earnest desire of confessing his sins By this meanes his good works which otherwise are barren of grace in respect of merit wil afterwards in some manner be fruitful in the Sacrament by reason of the disposition to which they conduce for although grace shal not be given for their regard yet it wil for the good disposal which he may hope for by so diligent a preparation This soare being thus cured covet also to dispose thy self worthily towards the Sacrament of Extreme-Vnction that thou mayst have it in store when thou shalt chance to stand in need of being anneald The servant of God must be attentive over such smal nyceties and not permit one crum of grace to fall which he may save using this industry all his life long he shall gather a vast treasure neyther must be suffer that instrument of gain a desirous wil to lye idle let him be desirous to do what he
appearance of thy glory I reserve my self for it and wil refrain from these grosser meats of the earth Vpon hopes to feed more savourly at a wel furnishd table the guest is content to protract his fast it is but meet that upon hopes of the divine supper we at least keep abstinence Remember that Christ hath made thee equal with the Angels and wil it not then be a shame to do like a beast he that cannot wholly wipe off an infamy lessens and dissembles it as much as he can let it confound us to renew daily the brand we received by gluttony in our first fall from a state of happines and that with so much gust and savour If we had heaven eyther in esteem or hunger we should loath earth and earthly things where when we are to eat for as much as concerns gust we must carry our selves as if there were none at all God himself invites thee a guest to the supper of eternal glory in the interim sitting down to table let Christ be thy fellow-guest and thou wilt be abstemious if thou suppose thou art to divide with him What soever thou subtractest from thy necessary sustenance offer it to IESVS The Pharisees and Publicans invited IESVS thou being a Christian must not think much to do the same He that invites another labours not so much to please his own palat as his guests for whom he carves the best piece so when thou sittest down at table strive not to content thy own rellish but study how to pleasure Christ and the only way to please his gust is to take no gust at all Consider him where he refreshed those 3. dayes when his Mother lost him in the Temple prepare a banquet for him together with Saint Mathew Contemplate Christ his disciples when through want of necessaries they pulled cares of corne call him making him share of thy provisions prepare him a feast together with Zaccheus Behold him fasting 40. dayes for thy sake and if thou wilt not minister to him with the Angels invite him with Simon and he will be as much refreshed with thy abstinence as if a table were furnished for him by the Angels He begd a draught of water of the Samaritan do thou give him of thy cup. I thirst cryed he from the cross let him tast of thy Chalice O that any one would give me gall vinegar I would exchange cups with Christ relieving his thirst with my drink how could I chuse but relieve thee o Lord in such extreme necessity now I am able to do it and undoubtedly thou wilt rellish my good will and desire of abstinence more savourly then if I offerd thee a most delicious draught How unnatural were he that would not relieve thee now I may do it if I drink not more then is necessary Why shal I not refresh thy thirst behold o soul thy IESVS desirous to eat his Pasch with us accompany the Apostles that thou maist partake of so desired a table Carry thy self there with modesty and humility seek the lowest place but chuse not for all that the place of Iudas Thou art not worthy to sit at such a table place thy self at the feet of thy companion the betraier the most humble IESVS will even there also find thee out Contemplate how he fed so many yeares with his most H Mother and S. Ioseph she perchance sometimes eat very sparingly and defrauded her own mouth of many bits purposely to give them to her most loving Son their poverty not sufficing for both deprive thy self of some parcel give it as an almest to the Virgin wherewith to feed her dearest child Remember how this Mother of love gave suck to her Infant IESVS how the Son of God even then would fast for thy sake abstain sometimes from these sweet breasts do thou also for his sake refrain at least from some particle and offer it to Christ with a most ardent charity with such to wit as she nursed him imitate to thy utmost her love In this manner thou shalt stifle with pious meditations and forestail thy appetite by an affection to things divine One desire wil drive out another and one rellish drown another Perchance gluttony wil be no les extirpated and thy mind by ruminating what is read at table and such pious employments more purged then by fasting it self If the motive of doing a thing acceptable to Christ do not urge thee the dignity of abstinence the profit which redounds from it ought in all reason to prevail Nothing is more contrary to the spirit then an unmortified appetite Eat to refresh thy body not to overcharge it Many when they eat do rather oppress then nourish their bodies making that which ought to be the refection of life its oppression Is it not very absurd to load and stuff ones belly as one would do an asses pack since our flesh is elevated above the Cherubins if the kingdome of God and tabernacle of the H. Ghost be within us why are we so base-minded as to make our stomacks the charnel-house or Sepulcher of dead beasts he that ought to be the Temple of the living God cald to a divine life why doth he debase himself to the meanest of all lives to wit ' a dead life and the very dregs of all life Plants having only a nutritive life are void of all sense We loose so much of our mind as we bestow of it upon meat what more unworthy then the loss of an Angelical life mind if thou feedst too greedily sensually thou hast reason to fear least thou degenerate not so much into a beast as into a tree or a stock Adam being overcome with gluttony clad himself with leaves like a tree as if he meant to become one carrying its shape in his flight from God Gluttony and nutrition is not only a life proper to unreasonable creatures but to the very insensible plants nutrition being only peculiar to them Therfore a full belly obstructs all sense it evacuates the mind it disposeth one to insensibility by hindring the use of reason which after dinner is dull and sluggish it induceth sleep in which a man differs nothing at all from an elme or plain tree save only that this at set times affords the benefit of a shade but the life of gourmandizers is the life of sleepers and the life of sleepers the life of a gourd which is allwaies in a lying posture Hence it followes that he who is les abstemious is les obsequious to reason as being more insensible the sole life of trees is uncapable of command Nutrition it self is not in the power of a creature When we check our desires or curbe savage beasts they become tame and pliable to their keepers but plants which regard nothing as I may say but their belly that is to feed themselves they harken to no body nor regard reason This kind of life is the scum and refuse of all