strictly and how piously she liv'd after the Ascention of Christ till the houre of her death saith Idelphonius is onely knowne to God the searcher of hearts and to the Angels her diligent Visiters The reason which many alledge why neither the rest of her life nor death are penned by the holy Evangelists is this that the Apostles were so busied about the conversion of the Iewes and the Gentiles enlarging of the Christian Church That they had no time to set downe the particular Acts of her life after her Sonnes Ascention nor the severall Circumstances of her death as where when and how she dyed Some Authours peremptorily maintaine upon what ground I know not that she liv'd to her seaventieth yeare and to her last houre dwelt in Ierusalem neare to her Sonnes Sepulchre Others upon no better warrant averre that she went with Iohn into Asia and continued with him at Ephesus till her death and urge the authority of Ignatius who affirmes that she wrote to him in these words I will come with Iohn to see thee and thy friends c. Concerning her death Some avouch that the Apostles and the most eminent of the Primitive Church were present at it Damascen saith that Christ was also there in person and that he thus spake to her Come my blessed Mother into the rest I have prepar'd for thee and that shee thus in way of answer prayed to him Into thy hands O my Sonne I commend my Spirit Receive that deare Soule which thou hast preserved free from all rebuke As I will not justifie all these their Assertions for true so on the other side I will not condemne them as erroneous not being able to convince them of untruth and for ought I know they may have pass'd by unwritten Tradition from man to man I will therefore affirmatively say nothing but this that most assuredly her death was welcome to her in that she had so often both meditated and practised it having many times by austerity and contemplation departed this life ere she left it If that of Seneca be true that to dye well is to dye willingly then certainly she dyed the death of the Righteous She was not ignorant that Death to the just is no other than a delivery from prison a laying downe of a burthen the end of a Pilgrimage the unmanacling of the Soule the discharging of a due debt to Nature the returne into our true Country the dore that opens into a never fading life the entrance into the celestiall Kingdome and the Vsher that was to conduct her to her blessed Saviour with whom she had mentally conversed ever since he left the earth Since which time there be who avouch that she never willingly saw any man The Assumption What honor could to this great Queene be done More then be taken up to heauen high And there haue GOD for Father Spouse sonne The Angells wayte the world stand wondring by The same modesty I have shew'd in treating of her death I shall reserve in discoursing of her Assumption which by many of the Fathers all of the Romish Church and some of the Reformed is held for an undoubted truth though upon no sounder proofes than the former produce concerning her departure hence Bullinger directly backs this opinion We doe beleeve saith he that the wombe of the God-bearing Virgin and the Temple of the holy Ghost that is her sacred body to have beene assumed into heaven Brentius leaves it indifferent to us to beleeve whether or no she ascended in Soule in body or both It might well be saith he that as Enoch was translated in body into heaven and as many bodies of the Saints did rise with Christ So Mary also might in body be assumed into Heaven But most certain it is that she obtained everlasting Felicity And some ther be who demand why God might not manifest his power by her privy to so many divine secrets and mysteries as well as by an Angell or as by Elias who after long prayer was taken up in a Fiery Chariot Some againe who hold that the dead who arose with Christ ascended with him into Glory and were not againe reduc't into Ashes thinke the Assumption of Mary altogether as likely Damascen saith the workes of the Deity are therefore possible because omnipotent and that there are some things which though they are wholly omitted in holy Scriptures yet upon evident reasons they are believ'd and exemplifies his position in the Assumption of the Virgin Mary Dammianus argues thus That as conceiving without sinne shee brought forth her Sonne without paine a curse laid on all other women so might it well be that she who was without sinne might overcome Death the reward of it Some goe about to prove it by the Text Arise Lord into thy rest thou and the Arke of thy Sanctification Nay I have read a moderne Oratour who thus elegantly describes the manner of it When saith hee the Soule of this Sweet one reactuated her body she arose in Triumph from her Sepulcher and was assumed into Heaven In her passage thither the orbes bowed and bended themselves to make her a triumphant Arch through which shee might passe in greater state The Sunne with his brightest beames imbrac't her that it might be said A woman was cloath'd with the Sunne The Moone stooped to her that it might be divulg'd the Moone was under her feet The brightest of the Starres interwove themselves to make her a radiant Crowne c. But this description is no more theologicall than the consent of the orbes is Philosophicall and is no way correspondent to the dignity of our Sacred subject on whose triumphant entry into Heaven having beene a faithfull and reverent Attender I will now returne to vindicate her honour here on Earth and make an Apology to Christians with shame and horrour I speake it for Christs owne Mother It may please then the gentle Reader to understand that two questions arise amongst the Moderne Divines The one whether or no she merited to be the Mother of God the other which way she could deserve that greatest of Glories For the first they affirm that never any Creature merited so great a blessing as the incarnation of Gods owne Sonne For he sent say they his Sonne into the world not urg'd thereto by our merits but out of his owne meere Grace and Goodnesse It was a worke of his Charity and condescending not of retribution or obligation and therefore that he chose not the Virgin Mary to be the Mother of Christ as she was a Virgin humble obedient adorn'd with Faith Charity and other divine vertues but because God had decreed her to beare his onely Sonne therefore his best pleasure was she should be Mistresse of perfections suteable to so high a Calling Wherfore Saint Paul saies Because God hath predestinated us therefore he calles justifies and glorifies us and not because we are just therefore he electeth us
to compose which the East and the West joyned their treasures but a Crowne in the making where of every vertue and all the Graces had a hand Nor did any vaine mortall place it on her sacred Temples but God himselfe who thought nothing too deare nor omitted any ornament that might embellish this goodly edifice wherein himselfe meant to reside Having thus adorn'd and honour'd her he plac'd her in this lower world for the good and admiration of all for the conversation of a few Though borne on earth she lived here like a Native of Heaven As we may guesse at the neatnesse of a house by the entry into it so we may judge of her lifes remainder by the very beginning Sabellicus affirmes that she no sooner saw the light but she ador'd the Creator of it and lifted up her heart and eyes to the great Infuser of all her incomparable excellencies She lov'd God ere she had seene man The defect of her tongue could not hinder the operation of her soule in which ere she could speake she acknowledg'd his unspeakeable goodnesse In her Religion preceded the use of reason and she apprehended Gods mercies long ere she was capable of his nature and wisedome Ere she could utter holy words she made holy signs by which she made knowne the sanctity of her heart The first word she learn'd to lispe was Iehovah She sent forth many a sigh for sinne not having committed any and bewailed that of which she was utterly ignorant The rowling of the cradle put her in minde that she was newly enter'd into the tempest of this life the infinite dangers whereof to escape she made Vertue her Pilot. We will not here with some Writers of her Life dispute whether or no she had the same ordinary Education with other children nor with them affirme that she entred the Temple at three yeares old and lived close by the Altar and was fed miraculously by an Angell as also that it was there revealed to her that she should be deliver'd of the Messias I will not make one steppe out of Gods own path frō which I never yet saw the greatest wit to swerve but it was in danger of sticking fast Yet hath a pious charity often swallowed more than all this If from the hand of an Angell she there received food naturall or supernaturall sure I am the wonder is not so great as that of the Incarnation where the wombe included the Word And why should we with difficulty beleeve that this white spotlesse soule was illuminated with Revelations by the divine object of her chaste vowes who undoubtedly deserved to be rapt up if it were possible a story higher than was Saint Paul It is likely enough saith Mantuan God would have the Temple of his Spirit to dwell in the Temple of his service The same Author affirmes that she there liv'd a pretty Nun and Spunne and wove the sacred Vestments till her eleventh or twelfth yeare when her prudency and shame and the care of her Reputation forbade her to accompany even the very Priests themselves men whom God had selected out of the Masse of the vulgar to teach his Will to instruct his people and to sing his praise These curiosities and bold conjectures let us rather beleeve then contest with the broachers for it is wisedome to grant what we cannot confute Let us then imagine that this holy Recluse confined her body to this sacred solitude and a spare diet and warily kept her soule from the surfets to which carnall delights invite all things humane And it is consonant both to reason and truth that her exercise there was pious like the place They who goe about to take away her writing and reading tongue are impiously ridiculous since in evidently appeares that she was well read in the Scriptures by her divine Hymne uttered in Zacharies house On her reading attended Meditation on her Meditation Prayer or her Prayer Action as the louely fruit of the precedent Thus busied the day left her the night found her Her sleeping cogitations we may suppose were sutable to her waking and her very dreames divine She had not a thought that was her owne all belong'd to God She was slow to speake saith Sabellicus but ready to obey all holy advice Her tongue was not so swift as her Wit which made it follow for direction in all the requisites of speech In a word she might well usurpe that of the Church When I was a little one I was pleasing to the most high When upon mature deliberation she left the Temple she still liv'd as if she had beene in it Though in body she was sociable she fetter'd her soule from wandring abroad her true conversation being in heaven This flourishing Vine planted her selfe amongst the Olives She was more choice of her company then of her food or rayment both which God knows were course enough She knew temperancy to be Gods and Natures Favorite in that it conduceth to the service of the former and the preservation of the later She therefore made this heavenly vertue judge of her Appetite lest it should long after excesse the mother of all uncleannesse Her soule gave laws to her body which it could not infringe without the injunction of a strict pennance She devour'd Gluttony it selfe and made the flesh subject to the command of the spirit Her fare saith Cedrenus required no vessell nor need she to wash her hands after her greatest meale Her dyet defide the fire as of no use From the Earths face the Cows dugge and the Fountains brimme she readily fetched her sustinance She was as ignorant of the Persian luxury as the superstition To this her cloathing was correspondent for which her backe was beholding to her fingers Her hands were the purveyours to her other members She had one eye fixed on heaven and the other cast upon the earth being intentive on the Glories of the one and the Necessities of the other and at once acted Martha and Magdalene It is very credible that she sowed and spunne and maintain'd life with labour Hee who gives life to all things suffer'd his then adopted and since naturall mother to gaine her living with sweat and care that her example might give pride the checke and teach Majesty Humility In her he made manifest that mortall felicity is not the parent of the immortall She was not solicitous for the feather the looking-glasse or any outward bravery being onely carefull to cover her shame and at once to expell two deadly enemies to her foule and body pride and cold Her outward simplicitie was in all things answerable to her inward Well now she began to write woman and her fifteenth yeare approached and hand in hand with the increase of time went the acquisition of all Graces Her least perfection would render another most accomplisht In her all vertues were at strife all overcame Nothing was here meane she being no other then an union of
his taking care for his Mother was of his Piety He gives Temperancy the custody of Chastity and commends these to each other who were resolved to live and dye Virgins Saint Bernard sayes these words of Christ to his Mother included much bitternesse for they put her in minde that she was to make a dammageable exchange of Christ for Iohn of the Servant for his Lord of the Disciple for his Master of the Sonne of God for the sonne of Zebedaeus And this was the reason if we give beliefe to Mantuan that he called her Woman not Mother lest the very sound of that deare word should make her more sensible of his approaching losse and force her into an immoderate griefe But sorrow was no Noveltie to her for that saying of Christ In this world you shall have affliction was in her verified whose life contained more miseries then minuts which she patiently underwent knowing that the more distressed she was here the more blessed she should be hereafter And if we shall adde the light of Reason to the Evangelicall Truth we shall soone perceive that a fatall sadnesse haunted her from the birth of her onely Sonne to his buriall When she was great with him and readie to lye downe the inhumanity of the Bethlemites was such that they confined her and the Lord of all things to a Stable and would not supply her with as much as Linnen a Mantle and other necessaries wherewithall she might defend her selfe and her sweet Babe from the moysture of the night the sharpenesse of the winter and other intollerable inconveniences When her Childe was eight daies old she saw him loose bloud in his Circumcision which her divining soule misgave her to be a Type of the deare remainder he was to shed Then againe her minde was infinitely vexed for the butchery of those guiltlesse Children which were murthered for the sake of her owne innocent Infant of the sorrow and miserie of whose Mothers her tender compassionating heart was a most competent Iudge From this bloudy Massacre to save her Saviour she was constrained without taking leave of her friends or disposing of what was hers to take her flight with him through danger darknesse and horrour to make her way into Aegypt When he was twelve yeeres old she lost him an Accident more grievous than any of the former for heretofore her study had been to preserve what she had now her care was to finde what she had not What an Agony her soule suffer'd at the lamentable tydings of the beheading of her Sonnes Forerunner I leave to the consideration of all thankefull soules for she could not without being stayned with ingratitude but mourne for his absence and violent departure out of the world who had received so much joy at her presence before he came into it But above all these the unequall'd Treacherie of Iudas who deliver'd this Lambe of God as a prey to these Wolves the infidelity of his other Disciples the malignity of his Iudges the cruelty of his Executioners conspir'd to make her miserable Nor is it unlikely that she bewailed the ingratitude the obstinacy and impiety of her Nation who revil'd him that blessed them and tortur'd him who came to save them With what amazement and sadnesse was her heart surprised think ye when the newes came of her Sonnes being apprehended But when she saw him forsaken by his friends bound by his enemies accused before the high Priests derided by Herod despis'd by the people scourg'd and tortur'd by the command of Pilate his body trembling torne and pierced besmear'd with his owne bloud and hung between two Theeves then and never till then did the Sword foretold by Simeon passe through her Soule Luther saies this Prophecy of Simcon was spoken to her not to Ioseph for on her alone the whole weight of sorrow was to be laid True it is that many differ about the interpretation of this Sword To cleare all doubts we must take notice that the holy Scriptures mention foure sorts of Swords The first is a Corporall or materiall sword and of this Christ speakes to Peter All that use the Sword shall perish with the Sword The second is a spirituall Sword of which Saint Paul makes mention when he saies Receive the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God The third is a Sword of Scandall or Ambiguity with which the Apostles themselves were strucken when they forsooke their Master The fourth is the Sword of Griefe or Tribulation With this the Prophet David averres the Soule of Ioseph to have beene pierc'd when his death was plotted first by his trecherous Brothers next by his incontinent Mistresse That this Sword whereof Simeon Prophecied could be no materiall one is evident in that we read not of any violent death she suffered That it could not be the sword of the Spirit is manifest for the word of God was her daily delitious food at the same time when Simeon made this Prophecy Origen indeed will have it to be the sword of Ambiguity or Infidelity which erroneous opinion of his is refuted by many great Fathers of the antient Church and by Franciscus Lumbertus an accute Protestant Doctor of the moderne in these words Those saith he who will have this to be the sword of Infidelity are not to be hearkened to for besides that they can produce no proofe of this their opinion it is contradictory to the Text most rash and most untrue How can it be that the sword of Infidelity should penetrate the brest of Gods sacred Mother into which infidelity never made the least impression From the beginning her Faith was most firme and intire Let therefore those Blasphemies and wicked slanders of carnall men be put to silence I will attribute nothing to the blessed Virgin but what I reade in the holy Writ where she is pronounced blessed because shee beleev'd We have many testimonies of her Faith but of her Infidelity not one word is extant in the sacred Scriptures Yet this prophane assertion is not a whit strange or to be marvelled at in Origen who held that Christ dyed for the Angels and the Starres and whose soule was indeed no other than a Mynt of Heresies Melancton affirmes that her sorrow was much asswaged by her Faith which assured her of his Resurrection She knew she had borne the Messias whose bloud was to wash away the sinnes of the world Wherefore she might well be amaz'd distrustfull she could not be at all The holy Spirit certified her this was not a destroying death but a triumphing Her Faith the oftner it was tryed in the furnace of affliction the brighter still it shewed She stood with the affection of a Mother the passion of a woman but with the constancy and fortitude of a man in beholding her owne bloud spilt her owne flesh rent and mangled before her face With an unshaken confidence and a true internall valour she beheld his body naked
foot was and ought to be more to mee than the eternall sleepe of Lazarus could be to thee And as thy teares for him were tokens of thy humane nature not signes of thy diffidence in that thou knew'st he would forthwith arise so are mine for thee witnesses of my wretched estate not of my distrust who am assured of thy speedy resurrection Nor doe I onely grieve my owne griefe for as for mans sake I rejoyce in thy Fathers Grace who delivers thee to death and in thy Charity who dost suffer it So likewise in mans behalfe I am griev'd that he should be the cursed cause of those thy extreme torments for as not to joy in the benefits thy death hath brought with it would argue his ingratitude so not to condole for the tortures that attend it would demonstrate his cruelty And here I faithfully promise thee that both I while life and thy Church while the world doth last shall yearely spend this dolefull time of thy Tragicall expiration in Prayer fasting severity of discipline maceration of the flesh and contrition of the spirit as becomes thy mournefull Mother and thy gratefull Spouse to doe Thus condoling thus bemoaning hers and the generall losse she attended his herse to the Sepulchre provided by Ioseph where never man was laid before for it was not fit that Incorruptibility should succeed corruption in the same lodging This fragrant Flower was no sooner set in the ground but she sent many a deare drop after it to fasten it at the root for she knew within three dayes it should spring up againe not to grow in the earth but to be translated into Heaven there for ever to flourish and perfume the celestiall habitation Nor were her eyes saith Damascen closed with his Monument but watched themselves almost blinde with a greedy expectation to see the temple of his body built up againe which three dayes since was destroyed After many a longing looke she espied the Tombe to open and her onely joy to issue forth whom full well she knew by the countenance and figure of his Humanity but farre better by the cleere proofes of his Godhead for the Graves delivered up their dead many of which appear'd to their friends in the holy City Some and those of great authority in the Church affirme that after his Resurrection she of all others saw him first and wheras the Scripture seemeth to inferre that Mary Magdalen first beheld him they thus expound it That the Evangelists would not make his Mother the first witnesse of his Resurrection though indeed she was knowing that her testimony by the Iewes would be more suspected than that of Mary Magdalen I dare not positively conclude any thing herein but I may safely maintaine that this her delight for his Resurrection counterpois'd her griefe conceived for his death In her was now made good that of the Psalmist According to the multitude of the griefes of my heart thy Comforts have rejoyced my soule and that of her Sonne Blessed are they that mourne for they shall bee comforted And who makes question but that she who with such unutterable pleasure discover'd his Resurrection faithfully and closely waited on him till his Ascention She who was as inseparable to him as his shadow without doubt was on the Mount Olivet with other of the faithfull when in the sight of them all he ascended She heard doubtlesse his last words received his last benediction and her sight waited on him till the clowds imbrac't him which it in vaine essay'd to penetrate What Soule not in selfe transported with the view of a heavenly object can suppose much lesse expresse what her contentment was when she saw her owne flesh flye above the reach of Envie into the Armes of Glory When she beheld this high Priest his Sacrifice ended and God fully appeas'd enter Heaven there to sit on the right hand of his Father and to be the uncessant and eternall Mediatour betwixt him and man With bended knees erected hands and eyes she worships him ascending and when her sight failes her adoration continues Her zeale passeth all the orbes betweene him and her with greater facility and subtility then the Lightning shooteth through the Ayre Great is the vigour and force of the Spirit when all things else set apart it is wholly intentive on the Meditation of its Creatour When by contemplation it is separated from the body it thinkes onely on him lives onely to him and is as it were drown'd in an inundation of his love When it hath extinguisht the scorching lawlesse desires of the flesh and kindled the holy ones of the Spirit the body rebels no longer but becomes obedient to it in all things When it hath once fixed its eyes on this beloved object it never removeth them thence When it is once illuminated with the beames of the holy Ghost it is presently turn'd into all Eye all Spirit all Light no otherwise than those things the fire once layes hold on are turn'd into fire it selfe Of those who live in Wedlocke it is said that they are two in one flesh and why may it not be said of Christ and the Soule wedded to him that they are two in one Spirit And if ever it might be reported of any surely of this Holy Virgin who though she was devided from her Redeemer in Body yet in soule she was united to him When her eyes were growne dimme with her so long dwelling on that part of Heaven where they left and lost him she cast them downe on the earth the poverty whereof she commiserated in that it was deprived of this one Iewell in value above all it had left And now She returnes into the holy City not disconsolate and dejected as other women are when they lose their onely childe but with a cheerfull look for her Sons victory who had triumphed not onely over the Iew but death and hell it selfe She made her will lacky Gods and though she desired to be dissolved and be with Christ yet since it was his best pleasure she should continue longer here below she readily assented resolving by her example on earth to furnish heaven with Saints Dammianus sayes that after her Sonnes decease she remained ten daies in Prayer and Fasting expecting with a fervent longing the promised comming of the Spirit Saint Luke witnesseth that sixe score men and women were assembled in one rome and joyned in hearty prayer of the which Mary the Mother of IESUS was one And as he names her last so her wonted Humility perswades me that she had the last and lowest place and sate beneath the other sinfull women of inferiour quality in remembrance of her humble Lord now exalted And it is more than probable that she was present with the Apostles when the Holy Ghost came upon them and that she there received the first fruits of the Spirit After which time we reade no more of her in holy Writ For where and with whom how
reformer of the reprobate All her Visitants were but so many Converts whose bad affections and erronious opinions the sweetnesse of her discourse had rectified The Leprosie of sinne was her daily cure and they whom vice had blinded were by her restored to their inward sight and their prostrate soules adored divine Majesticall vertue residing in this sacred Temple The conference with her rais'd them above themselves and enfranchis'd their soules till then chained to their bodies The knowledge of her humbled the most proud natures for the lustre of her Merits render'd their owne obscure O make the emulation of this chaste Turtle your onely study and not in words onely but in deeds also shew your selves Proficients for Vertues meditated and not acted do but puffe us up the more wee easily beleeving that wee are what we resolve to be On this ground your beliefe that shee amongst you who shall constantly tread in her paths shall at length arrive at the Celestiall Paradice which now she inhabits and shall receive this salutation not from an Angell but from God himselfe Welcome thou faire soule full of Grace enter into the Glory I have prepared for thee To the Masuline READER FOr to you also though of a different sexe this booke belongs to whom the sacred subject of it brought the same eternall benefit shee did to her owne kinde Neither doth she onely require your Gratitude but your Imitation whose meanest perfection farre excels all your so long vanted masculine merits I doubt not but by the more and lesse knowing of you I shall be diversly judged The first will argue mee of indiscretion in that I chose not a Matter of a higher nature whereby to make a demonstration of my sufficiency To these I shape this answer that my Invention could not soare higher for whether wee regard her person or her divine Gifts shee is in Dignity next God himselfe There is nothing of so sublime a straine as Vertue which enters Heaven when Subtility and Curiosity are justly excluded It is vertue must save us for in knowledge the Divell himselfe farre exceeds us There is no Argument as I take it so important or concernes us so much as that of our salvation These men would have mee busie my selfe in the Physicks to finde out of what not wherefore I am made Or in the Mathematickes to learne how farre it is to Heaven not how to come thither Or in Divinity to bee inquisitive whether or no Christs miraculous feeding of so many was by augmentation or multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes Whether or no they who were born with sight afterwards lost it being restored to it againe by Christ saw better after the Cure than they did before their blindenesse And whether or no the Dead who rose with our Saviour ascended with him or were againe reduc't to dust To these needlesse accute follies I aspire not How many are there now in Hell who while they liv'd here were esteem'd the Organs of the Sciences the Temples of VVisedome nay Oracles as if they had beene form'd in Heaven and sent downe hither full fraught with Gods owne secrets yet now detest their former vaine Knowledge as much as the Darkenesse they lived in But in this kingdome of Woe and Horrour none of vertues subiects ever resided Let them therefore censure on they shall not so much as shake my security for I know it fares with universall Learning as with the Vniverse wherein there are more Delinquents then Iudges The opinions of these I can well tollerate because they proceed from Science though erronious But there are some whom I have heard to passe their casting verdicts on the most meriting Authors who deserve themselves to bee hang'd for so often violating their owne mother tongue did not their ignorance pleade their pardon Let these poore wretched things who what they heare in the last company vent for their owne in the next share amongst them my scorne and pitty as being far below my anger I am not ignorant that he who feares the pale meager Family of the Zoili must onely write to his owne Lar. If to the truely vertuous the truely understanding I can approve these my humble indeavours and draw any one soule but one degree nearer to goodnesse my holy ambition and my no small labour shall receive an ample satisfaction It now remaines that as to these latter I seeke to approve all my actions so to them I likewise essay to iustifie this present worke I am the first to my knowledge who hath written in our vulgar tongue on this our blessed Virgin drawne thereto I confesse by the strength rather of affection than of ability Yet withall I professe that I am her admirer not her Idolater and that I no way allow of their profane custome who robbe God of his Honour and bestow it on her But this I will say that though I impute not the late troubles and afflictions of the Protestant party in Germany to the small reverence there paid her many of Gods iudgements according to Saint Austin being secret none uniust yet truely I beleeve that the undervaluing of one so great and deere in Christs esteeme cannot but bee displeasing to him and that the more we ascribe to her setting Invocation apart the more gratious we appeare in his fight I have beene as cautious in the penning of this Treatise as possibly I could and in imitation of Vertues owne selfe have kept the meane But all pretenders to Divinity know that without the helpe of Ecclesiasticall History we can speake little of her life or death so sparing is the holy Writ in the mention of her The scholasticall and Ecclesiastical Writers inserted in this Booke to trust or distruct too much is alike erronious and therefore I referre all to the discretiō of the Reader I will onely adde this that since the finishing of this story I have read a booke of the now Bishop of Chichester entituled Apparatus c. and am glad to finde that I have not digressed from him in any one particular I conclude with this protestation that if I have swerved in any the least point from the tenents received in the English Church I shall bee most ready to acknowledge my selfe a true Penitent Farewell Meditationes poeticae Christianae in annunciationem beatae Virginis W. A. Aue Maria. GAvisa es quondam perque omnia secula gaude Omnia quae gaudI secula tempus habet Stipasti quae laetitia castum aluear alui Aequum est laetitiae mella ut in aure bibas Tu gaudI verbum peperisti dicit Avete Omnibus atque omnis terra revibrat Ave. Sed tu salvificum genuisti in secula Salve Nostra eccho nudum nomen honoris Ave. Gratia plena Quam sunt plena suo distenta alvearia melle Quod flore evario Chymica stillat apis Quam plena est adamante suo teres area gemmae Quae quod non recipit prensat amore decus
this supernaturall gift cannot but evidently appeare to the meanest understanding in that no man is ignorant that without Christ we cannot be sav'd and without Faith we cannot apprehend Christ nor apply his deserts and passion to our polluted soules In this which excells all other perfections did this happy Mother of our Emanuell surpasse all other creatures as here in briefe and hereafter more at large I shall demonstrate S. Austin both in knowledge and authority infinitely exceeds me and therfore I desire you would heare him for me Strengthened by a singular Faith saith he she made Gods Sonne hers more happy truely in conceiving Christ in her minde then his flesh in her wombe Endued with this faith she fear'd and reverenc'd him whom she bore whom as soone as shee brought forth she ador'd and was the first beholder of the glory of his resurrection Would I muster up my forces I could produce many other Champions of the same worth and antiquity that with an indefatigable zeale doe vindicate the faith of this blessed Virgin against some of these latter ages who accuse her as defective in that wherin she was most accomplisht Their objections have beene long since answer'd by Saint Austin Saint Ambrose and divers others of those Primitive times Saint Austin distinguisheth thus betweene Zacharies demand and hers Zachary when he sayes Whence shall I know this or By what meanes shall I know this I and my wife being so aged he spoke this out of despaire not by the way of inquisition But Mary when she askes How shall that be since I know no man shee utter'd this enquiring not despairing Wherefore to Zachary it is said thou shalt be dumbe because thou believest not but to her the cause is expounded because while she doth question she doubteth not of the promise And to the same purpose and almost in the same words speakes Saint Ambrose whose testimony I omit lest I should prove tedious and obscure to the tender sexe to whose profit this weake Essay of mine is chiefly intended Yet my zeale to her whose true admirer I am compels me briefly to deface all those aspertions which the adversaries to her and piety have layd upon her And I am wholly transform'd into wonder as oft as I consider how malice and her spawne can bee so frontlesse as grossely to deprave the meaning of the Text onely to detract from her and should be so audacious as to contradict the holy Ghost himselfe who by the mouth of Elizabeth pronounceth her blessed because she beleeved True it is their expositions give a light to the Scriptures but it is such a one as we receive from lightning which brings with it rather terrour then comfort Here her obedience calls upon me to cut off I cannot say this digression but vindication of her honour Though she deserved soverainty and command yet delighted she in nothing more then in this submissive vertue proper onely to a Subject and was a diligent practitioner of it through her whole life in imitation of him who was obedient even to an ignominious death Her faith and obedience were of equall speed for she no sooner heard the Angell relate that the Almighty had ordained she should beare the worlds Redeemer but she beleev'd and consented that it should be so She had learnt in her infancy that obedience with God is better then sacrifice and therefore she was as swift as thought in agreeing to the divine ordinance that so posteritie might distinguish betweene her obedience and that of others whose Wils and Vnderstandings have a combat before they can bee brought to a consent But this was onely a lovely branch of that beautifull tree her humility on which a perpetual Autumne attended for it continually bore fruit Of this Vertue I must treat more at large then of the rest because it is extensive cleane through all the actions of her life Of this there are many sorts whose severall countenances and shapes we will here draw to the life lest the Reader be impos'd upon and verily beleeve he enioyes the true one when indeed he is onely possessour of the adulterate We will begin with the Naturall Humility which is to be found in many who being basely borne and bred and poorely spirited aspire not to greatnesse but rest fully contented with that sordid calling Fortune hath allotted them This Humility is none of those that vertue doth warrant There is another kinde which we may call sensuall and this makes men refuse honours not that they do not desire them but for the trouble care and danger that attendâ—â— them This Humility is base and degenerate There is a third proud one of the Hypocrite who though he be ambitious of dignities and seeks them by all cunning and undermining wayes yet to be reputed humble he seemes to flie them This Humility is false and fained A fourth there is philosophicall and morall and this consists in the knowledge of a mans selfe and his miserable condition so that by a naturall light he can see to humble himselfe and be serviceable to all men yet no further then the dignitie of his estate allows and humane reason requires So that in this mans opinion it should not be humility but basenesse in a Gentleman to pardon an injury done him or to place himselfe in an Hospitall as a servant to attend the sicke and needy This Humility will not endure the Christian Test A fifth Mosaicall or Iudaicall offers it selfe to our consideration and this hath a neare resemblance of the true one for by the perusall of the written Law we come to know our selves more perfectly then all the Philosophers of the world can teach us To this purpose Saint Paul saith From the Law comes the knowledge of sinne and in another place I had not knowne concupiscence to bee a sinne had not the Law said Thou shalt not covet In this Mirrour we discerne our originall corruption and all our disordinate passions and affections together with our ignorance and frailty By this Touchstone we finde all our moral philosophical vertues to be but counterfeit But this carries with it a very detrimentall discommoditie for it leads us beyond hope of salvation and there leaves us For when a man shall consider that an unattainable perfection and an exact observance of the Law is required at his hands wherein he is commanded to honour God with all his soul and with all his might and to love his neighbour as himselfe and yet withall shall discover in himselfe an utter disabilitie to execute these holy commands a frozen direction wil so benumme all his thoughts that not one of them will be of force to uphold it selfe from sinking into the bottomlesse pit of despaire But with the true Christian Humilitie it is otherwise which having first made a submissive acknowledgement of its owne ingratitude pride avarice injustice impietie and infinite other imperfections by a strong
utterly excluded and that as he was man he was onely made of the pure bloud of the Virgin It is a miracle that the ordinary number of dayes required in the forming of a humane body is not here observ'd but in a very moment without succession of time a body is fram'd and 〈◊〉 mated But a greater miracle 〈◊〉 all these is that at the same instant wherein the soule is joyned to the body the Divinity and Humanity are united in one person and the eternall Word is inseperably linkt with the flesh so that the Son of God and man is the same in the Virgins wombe As for the manner of her conception I doe not more mervaile at the supernaturall strangenesse of it then I doe at the daring inquisition and sensuall expression of some who relate it in words as grosse as their owne understandings I only wish I could free the most learned and ingenious Erasmus from the just imputation of a lascivious folly in the Essaying to unfold this sacred Mystery He compares God to a Woer the Angell to a sollicitour 〈◊〉 Mary to the beloved and proceeds further than either the divine Will or humane modesty permit He treates of this venerable this stupendious encounter betweene the Divinity and Humanity in the same amorous phrase with which the Poets describe the wanton meeting of Dido and Aeneas in the Cave I will not rip up the particulars in which he is faulty this way lest I runne into the same errour which in him I reprehend and imprint a blush on the cheekes of my bashfull Readers This conception was as spotlesse and as cleare from all pollution as is a sweet Odour when it enters the sense Here saith Saint Austin the Word is the Husband the Eare the Wife in this glorious splendour is the Sonne of God conceiv'd in this purity generated Of the same cleare and cleane sense is Rupertus on this very passage When the truely believing Maide saith he opening at once her minde and mouth said Behold the Handmaid of the Lord be it to me according to thy Word in the very instant to make good the words of the Angell the holy Ghost came upon her and enter'd through the open dores of her Faith What part did he enter first the Chappell of her chaste bosome then the Temple of her holy and incorrupt wombe Her bosome that she might be made a Prophet esse her wombe that shee might become a mother Now for the time of this conception whether or no it were precisely on the 25. day of March I will not strive to chaine any mans beleefe to a resolution herein though I finde many old and great Doctors of the Church to have held it for a truth Many questions here arise which I have neither time nor desire to discusse I will onely looke into the deportment of this incomparable creature after that she knew she was become the receptacle of a Deity The meere apprehension of such an unheard of honour in other women would have begotten pride arrogancy and disdaine not onely of all their sexe but of mankinde it selfe They would have repin'd at their breathing of common ayre and scorning the earth they trod on have nourisht an ambition to walke on the battlements of heaven But this Maide above imagination excellent the more she was grac'd and dignified the more she was humbled When all men admir'd and even ador'd her and judg'd her worthy to be presently assumed into heaven she was ready to creepe into the center of the earth and there to hide her thinking that every one pointed at her as undeserving that supreme dignity confer'd on her by God himselfe And whereas others would have studied nothing but rich Tissues and embroyderies to weare and the most costly Persian Carpets to tread on she meditated simplicity in apparell and a good paire of shooes to beare her afoot journey over the steepe and flinty mountaines intending to bestow a Visit on her cousin Elizabeth Lu. 1. The Visitation 39. And Mary arose in those dayes and went into the Hill Country 40. And entred into the house of Zacharias and saluted Elizabeth 41. And it came to passe that when Elizabeth heard y e salutation of Mary the babe leaped in her wombe Many of her kinde and in her high estate and condition would hardly have acknowledg'd or receiv'd their kindred much lesse have trotted over hils and dales to make a tender of their duties to them Here is a rare spectacle Humility climing a thing as contrary to the nature of it as it is to things ponderous of themselues to flie This soveraigne of her sexe having the celestiall Monarch included in the narrow compasse of her wombe made haste to passe those steep stony and rugged hils the willingnesse of her minde enabling the feeblenes of her body And to say the truth whether should she whose worth exalted her above all things else go but to places as eminent in scituation as she in sweetnesse of disposition Whither should this Eagle flie but to the summity of the world Sure I am she could not sore above he pitch of her owne value Shee or sooke the sweet embellisht valies where with ease she might have walked and betooke her selfe to the craggy mountaines which not without infinite labour and â—aine she could ascend By these â—ough and uneven wayes have the holy Martyrs themselues mounted the promontory of vertue and have found the end of their journey as sweet as their travell bitter O vertue the minds that travell to thy Indies how rich they returne They come backe laden with those pretious ornaments that beautifie this life and those Panchayan odours that sweeten the deprivation of it and perfume posterity True it is that thy seas an rough to him that lancheth into the deepe appeare at first terrible but if with confidence constancy he plowâ— them up and with a fixed patience endures the frownes of an angry skie he shall at length discover a calmâ— smooth as thy owne forehead on which Fortune Time and vice could never yet imprint one wrinckle Vnder thy sacred safe conduct hath many a superstitiously devout distressed femal pilgrim after the endurance of heat and cold without of hunger and thirsâ— within and other miserable accident innumerable arrived with comfort at the supposed shrine of this our blessed Saint who here having no other guard than thy potent selfe exposeth her dainty feet to the knowne cruelty of flints hard and sharpe alike and her sacred person to labour and infinite hazards incident to the poore Traveller She who meriteth to sit under a cloth of state beset with the earths most precious stones and a presence throng'd with Empresses as happy waiters graced in this attendance doth here commit her self into the hands of solitude and danger Thus did the Spouse of the holy Spirit overcome the narrow and difficult paths of these steepe mountaines Charity leading her by one
hand and Humility by the other And if we diligently peruse Gods sacred Word we shall there finde the Mountaines honour'd with many notable acts Where did that parent of an innumerable issue Abraham prepare the immolation of his only sonne On a mountaine Where did Moses receive the Tables of the divine Law On a mountaine Where did Christ his Humanity concealed transfigure his face into a countenance of eternall glory On a mountaine Where did he shed his purest bloud and lay downe his dearest life as an expiation for our hainous and manifold sinnes On a mountaine But why these famous Acts were performed on mountains rather then in vallies Reason hath not a sight strong and quicke enough to discover But this is evident that God hath not plac'd Heaven it selfe on the one side of us or under our feet but over our heads that we might erect our looks and fixe them on his eternall habitation and aspire to enter the celestiall Canaan indeed our true countrey out of which while we live we leade but a dying and a slavish life and are no other then unfortunate exiles And surely the very sight of sublime places breeds in us high thoughts We commonly looke downe on things despicable the eyes of admiration are bent upward The cause why she tooke this journey I shall endeavour to relate so briefly that I will strive to avoid even long syllables Yet do so many pious doctrines and uses flow from these two Christalline springs that they alone are sufficient to compose an entire booke of a vast volume The Angell that he might beget and strengthen a beleefe in Mary of what he had said confirms this miracle with another and tels her that her Cousen Elizabeth also in her old declining age had conceiv'd a sonne and that this was now the sixth moneth of her being quicke These glad tydings no doubt delighted much our blessed Ladies minde where they could not stay without rendring a faire encrease of fruit first in meditation then in action Questionlesse she no sooner heard them but her soul was delivered of a twinne of vows the first was to praise God that he out of his best pleasure and infinite goodnesse had vouchsafed to crowne her cousens fruitfull vertue with the blessing of a childe she being now in yeares when despaire had chased all such hopes out of her breast and barrennesse as the world conceiv'd had seal'd up her wombe The other was all impediments set apart to give her cousin a visit in her owne Country and habitation Having performed the first her thankesgiving for her she undertakes the latter her journey to her Nor was she long about it but with all speed possible set forward lest she might seeme not readily to obey the incitation of the holy Ghost or be wanting to her cousin in any good office shee could doe her Neither could the consideration of her owne Majesty of the teeming estate she was in of the disasters to which Travellers are subject of the unevennesse of the way or of the length which Melancthon affirms to have beene twenty Dutch miles deter her from undergoing this tedious pilgrimage And as she readily undertakes it so she makes haste in it She well understood that delayes in spirituall affaires were as dangerous as relapses in bodily diseases Behold here a prodigall Charity that hath no respect of it selfe being onely intentive on the good of another It was charity that withdrew her from her beloved privacry into the publike view which till then she had ever shun'd It was Charity that added wings to her feet and armed her heart against all sinister accidents that could happen It was Charity that emboldened her to goe to her cousin without any invitation not being expected by her or happily by face knowne to her and with confidence of welcome to enter her house It was charity that caus'd her to tender service there where it was due to her selfe It was charity that cheer'd her up and sent her on this congratulating Embassy Lastly it was Charity that invited sanctity it selfe enclosed in this happy Maide to hasten to the sanctification of the childe in the wombe of Elizabeth Having patiently passed the troubles and annoyances of her voyage she with joy at length arrives at her cousins habitation into which she no sooner puts her head but the reverend Prophetesse having no other revealer nor prompter than the holy Spirit immediately knoweth the Mother of her Lord to be there present and knowing doth acknowledge it and acknowledging doth magnifie her perfections professeth her house blessed in being graced with her vouchsafing to be in it She at first sight discernes in her so many and so great concealed vertues and mysteries that a man would judge she had beene present at the enterview of her and the Angell Nor did she conceale these her excellencies but did describe them with such skill and zeale that Fame was even proud to repeat them Could the domesticall servants thinke you having heard their Mistresse predicate her divine qualities and transcendent condition containe themselves from divulging a joy which a narrow humane bosome is not capacious enough to receive Could they abstaine from justly boasting that a beauteous blessed Maide resided then in their house which together with their soules were by her glorious presence enlightened But I can no longer with-hold my pen from setting downe the journey it selfe and their mutuall salutations in the same words wherein the Text commends them to us And Mary arose in those dayes and went into the hill-Country with haste to a City of Iuda and enter'd into the house of Zacharias and saluted Elizabeth And it came to passe as Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary the Babe sprang in her belly and Elizabeth was filled with the holy Ghost and she cryed with a loud voyce and said Blessed art thou amongst women because the fruit of thy wombe is blessed And whence commeth this to passe that the Mother of my Lord should come to me For loe as soone as the voyce of thy salutation sounded in mine eares the Babe sprang in my belly for ioy And blessed is shee that believ'd for those things shall be performed which were told her from the Lord. Then Mary said My soule magnifieth the Lord and my spirit reioyceth in God my Saviour for he hath regarded the lowlinesse of his handmaid for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed Because he that is mighty hath magnified me and holy is his name And his mercy is from generation to generation on them that feare him Hee hath shewed strength with his arme he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts He hath put downe the mighty from their seates and hath exalted the humble and meeke He hath filled the hungry with good things the rich he hath sent empty away He hath upholden Israell his servant being mindefull of his mercy As he hath spoken to our
and scourg'd his hands and feet nailed to the Crosse yet sometimes the strings of her relenting mournefull heart were ready to cracke with the very thought of his cruell tortures and afflictions but as often againe they were strengthened and comforted with a full assurance that he should overcome them all and death it selfe She stood here her Sonne onely excepted the prime patterne of a sollid Faith and constant Patience to all posteritie in that neither the feare of Tribulation of persecution of the wracke of the scourge or death it selfe could divide her from her Christ She committed not that errour most incident to women many of which gentle sexe perish in the midst of their Lamentations and will neither admit of Counsell nor Comfort She did not teare her haire scratch her face batter her bosome seeke to stifle her selfe or gave any other desperate signe of a ragefull sorrow nor did she curse her enemies or make imprecations for Vengeance or so much as murmur against them but attended the sad event with the same calmenesse of minde with which this meeke Lambe did his end Her carriage was beyond the Levell of Censure and in all things sutable to the modesty and gravity of such a Matron She fear'd not at all the fury of the Iewish Souldidiers that environ'd her but stood secure and fac'd danger Though she was an eye witnesse of his passion and saw his Limbs distended and wrack'd yet did not the evils she saw wound her so deep as those she heard The Roman Fencers used to have Wards or Covers to save their Eares She had greater need of such to barre the entrance of blasphemies able to provoke God if his mercies were not above all his workes utterly to deface Nature and reduce the world to its first Chaos She heard him call'd a Drunkard a Blasphemer a breaker of the Sabboth a lover of Publicans and Sinners nay a very Divell who was her and Gods onely delight Yet did not all these killing objects these impious slanders drive her into the mercilesse gripes of despaire for she was confident that the two persons of the Trinity would not forsake the third Melancton commending this dismall story to our sad and serious contemplation adviseth us That when Tribulations and Death it selfe come upon us we should imitate this holy Virgin who mixed a heart killing sorrow for his death with a joyfull assurance of his Resurrection Consider saith he what a Conflict the Faith of Mary had There was in her an extreme griefe linked with Faith and Hope Let us in our death thus comfort our selves and harbour the same thoughts with Mary still fixing on God the Eyes of our Faith And verily we must beleeve that no small measure of Beliefe was required to temper and asswage so great a sorrow If we conceive that she was so without bowels as not to grieve for the death and passion of her dearest and onely Sonne we must withall beleeve with the Maniches that he had a phantasticke body not made of his Mothers flesh No doubt when after man had left and betray'd him she heard him cry out that God himselfe had forsaken him also her teares her sighes her groanes her countenance her very posture her dolefull voyce all united their forces to expresse the greatnesse of her sorrow Listen and you shall heare her thus lament O my dearest Sonne that thou who healest others shouldst thy selfe be wounded That thou who freest others shouldst thy selfe be bound That thou who art the Fountaine of Life and Creator of the waters shouldst thy selfe be thirsty That thou who cloathest all things shouldest thy selfe stand naked O my dearest Master how hast thou trespassed against this obdurate Nation that it should so thirst after thy pretious bloud Thou wouldest have cover'd them under the wings of thy gratious Providence as a Henne doth her Chickens but they chose rather to perish than to come thither for shelter With them the dead are more sensible of thy passion than the living and their devouring Sepulchers more mercifull then they themselves O my Sonne my Sonne that I should see thee suffer and not be able to succour thee O that I were an oblation as spotlesse and as gratious in thy Fathers sight as thou thy selfe that all thy afflictions all thy torments might be mine Were my power correspondent to my will I would rescue thee from Legions of thy enemies But alas I am a weake woman and all my strength lyes in my tongue which will onely serve mee to deplore thy losse and that I truely doe from the very bottome of my heart Thus or to this purpose questionlesse she bewail'd him dying but when she once beheld him dead Love and Beauty being banisht that face and saw withall their malitious cruelty survive him when she view'd his very carkasse pierc't and water together with bloud flowing thence when she had leisure to imbrace his dead body to number his wounds to kisse them and to Essay with the holy water of her eyes to wash away his stripes she then was so wholly oppressed with anguish of soule that she ardently at that instant desired her soule if possibly might transmigrate out of her living body into his dead one True it is that many affirme she felt not those torments which other women endure in Child-birth who are liable to the malediction laid upon Eve But if at his comming into the world she was not sensible of any paine at all certainely at his going out the griefes of all women contracted into one equals not hers alone And assuredly her sorrow was much increased when she saw Mary Magdalen and the other women so vehemently to grieve whom his death not so nearly concern'd as it did her nor were they so able as she to judge of his value Then questionlesse in this or the like phrase she renewed and redoubled her complaints O my sweetest Sonne I bewaile mine owne and the wretched condition of all those whose soules thou hast feasted so many yeares with thy mellifluous Language My griefe is answerable to my affection If Samuel lamented the death of a reprobate King if David wept over wicked Absolon with this exclamation Absolon my Sonne O my Sonne Absolon can my teares be too prodigally powr'd upon thee who art Sonne to me and Righteousnesse it selfe Who shall forbid or hinder me for crying out Iesus my sweet Sonne O my sweet Sonne Iesus If thou didst weepe over Ierusalem as lamenting her destruction then at hand shall I not bewaile thy neere approaching end Thou didst then compassionate the future Ruine of those very stones which now with a silent gratitude seeme to condole and weepe for thee When thou cam'st to the Tombe of Lazarus thou wert so farre from reprehending the teares of others that thou wepst thy selfe for company Thy owne example then warrants the justnesse of my griefe for when thou wert living the small paine thou felt'st in the sleeping of thy
could all the Engines of the world the flesh and the Divell hurt her more then can the vapours arising from the earth reach the holy inhabitants of Heaven And this opinion for ought I know I submit it to better judgements may without or profanation or blasphemy be admitted into all honest bosomes for if beyond the power of nature he preserved Ionas entire in the Whales Belly if he protected Daniel from the ravenous Lyons should not he secure her from Corruption whom he had adorn'd with so many vertues and dignities Next they hold that she was not onely without blemish but her very lookes sent forth such heavenly rayes that whosoever beheld them drew thence a vestall fire that never went out and vowed an everlasting Virginity If this be a truth it is a curious one and it is not materiall at all whether or no it be beleeved or rejected Thirdly that she conceiv'd and bore her Sonne not onely without paine the common Curse annexed to Childe-bearing but with infinite delight This also is a Curiosity and of no importance whether it be swallowed or no. Fourthly and lastly that she had a Frigidity of Soule which quencht in her all heat of carnall concupiscence This last priviledge is implyed in the first and may perchance safely be received The truth is we may securely give her all humane attributes not encroaching on the divine for she was in dignity above all but God himselfe Faith and Charity the fulnesse of the Law were in her at full She was in an active and contemplative life admirable The Tongue esteemed the worst part in a woman was in her the best which well might charme Eares offend them it could not Her Soule weigh'd her Conceptions and gave them a rayment of vertues owne hiew for certainly so cleere thoughts were apparell'd in as faire words She who both after her conception and at other times is commended to us by the sacred Scriptures for laying up all holy Sayings in her heart can we imagine that she could speake amisse Neither could she commit any undecent Act who liv'd in a Light to others inaccessible They who maintaine that for a time the whole Militant Church was in her alone have probability to backe them for I know not in whom else it could remaine when his Apostles Disciples Friends Kindred and all others forsooke Christ she onely excepted who would not leave him who from before his birth had stucke to her I will conclude with this Assertion That if ever the Soule of any mortall enjoyed here on earth the embraces of her heavenly Spouse and tooke from him a kisse sweeter than all the Easterne Odours this was she And here O blessed Virgin J leave to discourse further of thee and direct my speech to thee O thou eternall glory of thy sexe had the Queene of Sheba seene thee as she did Salomon shee had not so soone beene delivered out of the Trance into which her Admiration cast her In thee shee might have discovered all the perfections of which woman kinde is capable who wer 't indeed vertually thy sexe In thee Aspatia might have found her Modesty Livia her Prudency Sulpitia her Majestie and Gravity Cornelia her Patience Lucretia her Chastity Porcia her Fortitude Tanaquill her Industry Plautina her frugality and all these in eminency But why talke I of the Heathen to thee who didst not onely outstrip in manifold vertues all the Femall but the Masculine Saints themselves Thou didst excell Abel in Innocency Abraham in Faith Isaac in Obedience David in Gentlenesse the Prophets and Apostles in Piety and the Martyrs in Patience O thou whom Heaven would have of the same constancy purity and sublimity with it selfe thou art so farre from having an equall that all thy sexe cannot afford a worthy witnesse of thy Excellencies O thou Mother of the true Moses who never put on the yoke of Pharaoh but stood free in the middest of Egypt Thou rodde of Iesse alwaies straight who broughtst forth the fruit of life thou wert here a terrestriall Paradice whereinto Serpent never entred on which Gods malediction was never impos'd and hast no doubt now in the coelestiall Paradice a conspicuous seate above all the Angelicall orders and next thy glorifi'd Sonne himselfe For if Christs promise to all his fellow feeling members that if they suffer with him they shall raigne with him if they dye with him they shall live with him what eminent place in Heaven shalt thou have assigned thee who in soule didst suffer for him more than all his Martyrs O thou bashfull Morne that didst prâ—cede and produce our Sunne Thou Circumscription if J may so say of the uncircumscribed Thou roote to this Herbe of Grace Thou Mother of our Creatour Thou Nurse to him by whom all things are fed Thou Comprehender of the incomprehensible Thou bearer of him whose word sustaines the Globes Thou who didst impart flesh to him who wanted nothing else Thou Sarah thou Mother of many Nations who brought forth our Isaac our Laughter when a just sorrow conceiv'd for a losse esteem'd irreparable had clouded this inferiour world O pardon gratious Princesse my weake endeavours to summe up thy value which come as short of thee as my head does of Heaven Nothing that is not it selfe glorified can expresse thy glory to the height Thou deserv'st a Quire of Queenes here and another of Angels in Heaven to sing thy praises Were all the Earths brood the droppes the sands of the sea and the starres of heaven tongued they could not all expresse thee so well as silent extasie I confesse O my sweetest Lady that now I have said all I can of thee I have but but done like Timanthes a great Master of his Art who being to expresse the vastnesse of a Cyclops in a small table drew onely his Thumbe by which the spectators might judge of his large proportion To give thee an estimation answerable to thy merit is a thing impossible J must therefore be content to doe by thee as the antient Heathen did by the Images of their Gods on whose heads when by reason of their height they could not place the Crownes offer'd to their Deities they humbly layd them at their feet FINIS A Table of the principall things handled in the foregoing History HEr externall Beauty pag. 2 Her internall Beauty 6 Her Birth 11 Her Infancy 19 Her Betrothing 27 The salutation 29 Her Prudencie 52 Her opportune silence and caution of speech 54 Her faith 58 Her obedience 62 Her humility 64. 77. 160 Her conception 84 Her visitation 93 Her charity 102. 161. 173 Her Delivery 129 Her Purification 152 Her motherly care together with her conjugall faith and obedience 174 Her demeanour at her Sonnes death ibid. Her passive Fortitude and paience at the death of her Sonne 184 Her Lamentation 190 Her Assumption 209 Apostrophe Authoris 243 LONDON Printed by Thomas Harper for Iohn Waterson and are to be sold at his Shop
in Pauls Church-yard at the signe of the Crowne 1635. Plinius secundus in Epist * Austin Baronius and others hold that she was descended from the Tribe of Levi which the now Bishop of Chichester opposeth * The opinion of Mantuan how true I know not Her externall Beauty Galatinus Her internall Beauty Her Birth That Ioacimus and Anna were her parents is an undoubted truth receiv'd by the Church as wee find both in Baronius and Bishop Montacute in his Booke called Apparatus c. Her infancy * Sabellicus sets downe how shee dispos'd of every particular hour * Ancient and eminent Authors affirme her to have beene learned in the Hebrew tongue all which you shall finde quoted in Cedrenus Her betrothing The saltuation * That the Angell appeared to her in the form or shape of a man is the opinion of S. Hierome in Epist ad Eustoch de cust Virgin and of S. Ambrose lib. 1. offic cap. 18. And that which Damascen hath lib. 2. de fide orthod All the learned approve of to wit that the Angels are transform'd and appear to men according to the pleasure of the Lord and reveale his divine Mysteries And that Angels appear'd in the old Testament in the shape of men is certaine and for many reasons it is very probable that Gabriel assumed the form of a man when he came to the blessed Virgin Chrysologus serm 140. is of opinion that the Angel appeard in a shape and habit most pleasing and gentle and that the Virgin was not troubled at his person but his speech in that it is said shee marvelled what sayings those should be Many ancient Writers bold that she had the gift of prophecie Hom. 34 in lect Evang. Serm de Virginis assump In 1 cap. Luc. In parvis-serm Gen. 24. Hom. de incomprehensibili Dei natura Serm. 142. Serm. 1. de nat Virgin Her prudency The common sort when the Moone was eclipsed thought her to be enchanted and with basons and other things made a hideous noyse to barre her from hearing the charmers voyce Her opportune silence and caution of speech Her Faith Lib de sanct Virg cap. 3. Lib. 16. de civit cap. 24. Her obedience Her humility Natural humility Sensuall humility Hypocriticall humility Philosophicall humility Mosaicall or Iudaicall Humility The true Christian Humility Hieron in Epist ad Celant Her humility Her conception * This point is much coÌ„troverted and I leave it to the discreete Reader what to beleeve Lib. 18. Moral ca. 27. De Symbol ad Catechum Serm. 2. infesto Annun Domin This conception was predestinated before Time from all eternity Eras in Annotat Lei in Appendice ad Antapologiam Sutoris Serm. 11. in natal Domini Lib. 1. de operib spiritus sancti cap. 9. Her visitation In concione de visitat Moriâ—e * From Nazareth to Ierusalem where that Elizabeth dwelt not many moderne Divines but S. Austin and Beda affirme Her Charity S. Bernard saies that if an Infant was so over-joyd at the sound of her voyce what will the joy of the Celestiall inhabitants be when they shall see and heare her Serm. 1. de assump Mariae Ioh. 14. Gen. 18. Gen. 19. Gen. 30. 4. Kin. 4. Sess 43. Concil Basileen Her delivery Ps 118. 22. * The Iews when ever it lighteneth set open their windowes for they hold their Saviour shall come in lightening On this reade Buxdorfius Her Purification In serm de Purif B. Mâ—ar Virg. Iohn 12. Acts 2. 8 Her Humility Her charity * This is the observation of Dammianus Dammascen many more Timoth. presb â—ierosol in orat de Propheta Simeone Luke 2. Her charity Her motherly care together with her coniugal Faith and obedience Her demeanour at her Sonnes death * Vernulaeus saies that those who flye from danger travaile most by night and therefore it is likely our blessed Lady did so Psal 33. Ps 105. Gen. 37. In exposit Evang Lucae cap. 2. Her passive Fortitude and Patience at the Death of her Sonne Melan. in cap. 27. Matth. Melan. in loco praedic * Sophronius ser de Assump Beatae Virg. maintains that she suffered more than all the Martyrs in that the passion of the minde is greater than that of the body and shee in soule felt most because her love to him was above all others Her Lamentation is also expressed by S. Bernard Serm. qui incipit Signum magnum * S. Bernard cals this Hebdomadam poenosam the weeke of pennance and the high Dutch Die Martyr Wocken the Martyrs weeke * Epiphanius contra haeres libel Aetij * S. Bernhard In serm de verb. Apocalyp Signum magnuÌ„ Serm. 5. de Assump Virg. Damascen ser de dormit Virg. Serm de dormit Virg. Her assumption Lib. de origine erroris cap. 16. Homil. 1. in Die Assump Virgin See Athanasius on this very point a Father of great repute both with the Latines and the Greekes in his serm in Evang. de sanctissima Deipara And Iohannes Rivius in his Booke de abusibus Ecclesiae though hee dares not maintaine her corporal Assumption yet hee will not deny it as being a thing probable enough Ps 131. * J have both heard these irreverent speeches and read them censurd in a Manuscript of a most learned Doctour of the English Church And this is very credible to al such as heare and peruse their illiterate Sermons full of invectives against the antient Saints and Fathers of the Church and abounding with predications of their owne ignorant Brethren S. Austin lib. de nat grat cap. 36. * Thogh Erasmus was not a Reformer of our Church yet he is much suspected by the Romish Church and most serviceable to the Protestant in the setting out of the Fathers 1 Priviledge 2 Priviledge 3 Priviledge Apostrophe Authoris