they who sow in tears shall reap in joy and be made partakers of the Anthems of Angels and glorified Spirits through Jesus Christ our only Mediator and Advocate Amen The Anthem for Monday The CREATION I. THE Mighty God long in his Palace dwelt Blest without want of other Things E're Time had plum'd his Silver Wings Or Heaven and Earth the powerful Voice had felt For ever happy in themselves alone Were th' undivided Three and One E're sensual Transports or voluptuous Arts were known II. But when the great Prolifick Word went forth Then every Thing began to be The Light broke from Obscurity Light which we use but do not know its worth The spacious Tent of Heaven was smoothly spread Like Curtains to the Earths Green Bed With most Illustrious Torches richly furnished III. The Waters which before made one great Deep And like a deluge did appear Floating confusedly every where Aw'd by th' Almighty Word their distance keep Part into th' Earth's vast hollows did retreat While the rest in Heaven fix their seat But when the Showers fall these distant Brethren meet IV. In Heaven was plac't the Prince of Day the Sun Adorn'd with Beams of strongest Light While over the dull shades of Night The Stars bear rule and over them the Moon Who does not only o're the night preside But guards the motion of the Tide In which the turbulent Whale and all the lesser Fry do glide V. The Earth was in her loveliest Verdure clad Her Fruits and Blossoms kindly grew VVater'd with soft and balmy dew The Forrests smil'd and every Field was glad Anumerous Herd cover'd this Fertile Space The Beasts of a more generous race And those that were for burthens made here found a place VI. In the expanded Air upon the VVing The Fowls did range of which some flew For shelter others did pursue Some hoarsly sereecht others did sweetly sing In that vast Region Lightnings first take Fire There VVinds and Thunders do conspire And Comets do forebode when Princes shall expire VII When all things thus were order'd God made man Whose Ornaments of Soul and meen To Heaven declar'd him to be kin At first view all the Creatures round him ran Lord of the World was Adam at his birth His Territory the whole Earth And nought was in his Kingdom heard but innocent mirth VIII In Eden did this mighty Prince keep house Eden where every thing was gay And all the Year did look like May. There did he fall in love with Eve his spouse But Heavens first blessing straight became a curse Of all his Evils she the source Enticing him to fall who could not fall by Force IX Thus shorter was deluded Adam's Reign Than Persian Kings their Slaves allow Whose three days Royalty's a show Which ended the mock Monarch must be slain The difference lies in this the Persian slave Unwillingly goes to his Grave But man refus'd to live when Mercy would him save Tuesday before EASTER THis Day was called the Holy and great Tuesday or the third Day of the great Week for the more solemn Festivals of the Christian Church never wanted their Appendages they had their Antecedent Fasts as Advent was to Christmas and the Lent to Easter and perhaps this was the Reason why the Rogation week preceeded Whitsuntide whereas else the whole fifty Days ought to have been days of Exultation and rejoicing as also after the great Festivals succeeded the Octaves which were eight days of Gladness attendant on the extraordinary Solemnity when by the Laws of the * Constit Ap. li. 8. c. 33. Church and by the Authority of the ‖ V. Scalig de Emend Temp. p. 730. Epiph. Haer. 70. Empire servants were exempted from Work and all People kept Holyday according to a very Ancient Practice Now as the whole forty days of Lent were a preparation to the Paschal Festival so the Offices suited to that time of self-denial were doubled on this last week that put a period to that Fast and that all such devout and mortified Penitents might not want the ghostly comfort which was requisite on such an occasion on this week * Cypr. Ep. 56. the absent Bishops returned to their Churches whatever had caused their absence that they might give the blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist to their People and that now * Conc. Nic. c. 5. also they might hold their yearly Synods at the time appointed that all disputes might be quieted all quarrels reconciled all abuses rectified and all hinderances removed that might obstruct a general receipt of the Holy Communion And because this Week was called the Passion Week therefore in the Ancient Church as in ours the History of our Blessed Redeemers sufferings as it is recorded by the Four Evangelists was read to the People that nothing relating to that performance on our behalf might be omitted and that the Congregation might be continually put in mind of their obligations to their Saviour The Epistle Rom. 8.1 THere is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death for what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit The Gospel John 14 15. IF ye love me keep my Commandments and I will pray the Father and he shall give you another Comforter that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it sees him not neither knows him but ye know him for he dwelleth with you and shall be in you I will not leave you comfortless I will come unto you yet a little while and the world sees me no more but ye see me because I live ye shall live also The MEDITATION IT is the great Honour as well as the Happiness of the Christian World that the good things which our Religion promises its Proselites stoop not to our senses but gratifie our Reasons for were Pleasure all the Felicity of a pious Man how much better were it to be a Bruit since the greatest Epicure never lived so voluptuously as the Beasts that perish they eat they sleep with an uncontroulable freedom and whenever their inclinations lead them to it they live above the restraint of Laws and whatever they desire they pursue without the fear of being countermanded in the Attempt by reason or scourged afterwards by the lashes of Conscience they are under no necessity of Building Planting or Sowing the liberal Provisions which Nature makes them are both their Palace and their Feast they do not foresee dangers nor make their lives uneasie by studying to prevent them nor do they
World indulg'd to the gratifying their extravagant Appetites then their destruction was at the door they were drown'd first in their full Bowls and then in the Deluge And that Job's children while they were in the height of their mirth and feasting were upon the brink of their graves with many other such Instances And therefore the Christian Church in imitation of the Jews who fasted twice in the week kept also their solemn Meetings on every Wednesday and Friday on which they pray'd heartily and heard the Word of God gladly and at Three in the Afternoon first received the holy Sacrament and then went to their ordinary meals On these days they humbled their souls and sent up strong cries to God for the pardon of their sins and the diverting of the divine Judgments from themselves and all the world But as if those days of Mortification would not be sufficient they appointed the Lent-Fast to be in an especial manner a time of preparation to the blessed Eucharist At that time they inured themselves to all sorts of hardship they abstained * Constit Apost l. 5. c 17 Chrys To. 5 p. 581 c. from their Baths they drunk nothing but water and did eat no thing but Bread and Herbs not changing dull and heavy Flesh for Fish and Wine the Dainties of the Old Epicures as the Romanists do * Nay the present Greeks during Lent will not so much as mention the word Butter Cheese Flesh Fish withour the following Parenthesis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is with reverence to the holy Lent be it spoken Grelot 's Voyage p. 143. they frequently watcht all night and when they slept lay on the bare ground And lest people thorow the weakness that cannot but succeed such severities might fall asleep in the Church they had among the Eastern Christians * Typic Sabae cap. 5. p. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Officer to awaken all drowsie persons and to bid them be intent on the duties of the season Then also they made their frequent Confessions heard Sermons every day and practis'd all the Rules of Self-denial and took care not only that their Diet should be mean but their * Tertul. de Penit. c. 9. de Jejun Habit coarse Their Penitents were covered with rough sackcloath and sprinkled with ashes till their faces were lean and dis-figured with their abstinences For he who pamper'd himself while the Church fasted was look'd on as an Atheist or an Epicure says Tertullian ' That his Belly was his God his Lungs his Church his Paunch his Altar and the Cook his Priest That the steams of his cramm'd Dishes past with him for the blessed Spirit and his poynant Sauces were look'd on by him as the influences of the Holy Ghost and his Belchings as Prophecy that all his Charity was warm'd in the pot wherein his Dinner was boyled his Faith kept alive in the Kitchen and his Hope preserv'd from starving by his divers Dishes They were not to be perswaded that a small degree of penitence would attone for a great Crime and take off the Ecclesiastical Censures Those who were reconciled were not admitted to the Holy Communion till they had addrest to the i◠spiritual Guide and had his benediction and the Prayers of the Church But many Criminals were never admitted to the priviledges of the Altar till the day of their death and some were left wholly to the mercy of God especially if the man had relaps'd * Ambrose de Paenit l. 2. c. 10. For as they never baptiz'd any man twice so they never admitted any man twice to publick Penance For should they have done so the Compassion of the Church would have brought her Laws into contempt And tho the Church hath since thought fit to give Transgressors better hopes by an easier Remission of her Censures to let the Novatians know who thought the ancient Discipline indispensible and for that Reason denied the first Paragraph of the Eighth Chapter of St. John's Gospel to be Canonical because it afforded an Example of such Lenity in the Remission of gross sins that she had such a power yet it were to be wish'd that the ancient Discipline could be retrieved to curb the Extravagancies of a loose sensual and Atheistical Age whereby notorious vile and profligate sinners were bound to Ten Twenty or Thirty years Penance and sometimes longer proportionate to their Crimes and the heinous Circumstances that attended them This would repair the Ruins of Religion and restore the lost Reputation of despised Christianity In those best days their holiest men inured themselves to the greatest strictnesses And what extraordinary performances must we think were then required to fit a gross Offender for the Holy Communion For they had learnt that such severities are the proper method to subdue the body and deliver the soul from the drudgeries and impositions of its sensual Appetites That to fatten the body is but to make the Prison of the soul the stronger that the mind is then best enlightned when it is free from the burthen of meat and the cares of the world and that the longer a man fasts while he prays the fatter and more acceptable will be the sacrifice of his Devotion and that when * Acts 10. Cornelius did so then came the Vision that brought salvation to his house But above all they remembred our Holy Redeemer's * Mark 2.19 20. Injunction and that this was the time in which the Bridegroom was taken away from the earth and that therefore the children of the bride-chamber ought to fast Nor will every slight degree of sorrow serve to express the Resentments of such a loss and the sins that caused it For when I look on him whom my Transgressions have pierc'd I ought to mourn as one mourns for his only son and be in bitterness as one that is in bitterness for his first-born And is it not a shame to the Christians of this Age not to follow such an excellent pattern But why do I call my self and others to the imitation of the Vertues of the Disciples of Christ * Simon Coriar Ep. 12. inter Epist Socrat Socratic p. 28. The very Heathens will make us blush at the Day of Judgment who advise their Friends to inure themselves to Hunger and Thirst because those things do wonderfully advance a man in the study and practice of the Laws of Wisdom But here I must observe That every Abstinence is not a Fast For I may be kept from meat either by poverty or business by the Rigor of my Enemies by the Violence of a Disease or the injunction of my Physician But that which makes a Fast in the Ecclesiastical sense of the word is when it answers the ends of Religion and the performance is directed to the good of my soul Nor does every Fast which is voluntarily undertook for the ends aforesaid presently commence an acceptable Sacrifice to God unless it be
beauty All my services are a due Tribute to the most perfect of Beings and yet thou rewardest them with infinite happiness Teach me therefore to love thee for thy Excellencies to worship and obey thee for thy Bounty and to consecrate my powers and faculties my strength and time to my Saviours honour give me that true love that casts out fear that tramples upon dangers and rescues from despair that is the fulfilling of the Law and stronger than death it self that I may taste and see how good the Lord is and that there is no unrighteousness in him that the greatest difficulties may not lessen my affection nor fear nor flattery separate me from thy favour but that I may maintain a Holy Communion with thee till I come to dwell with thee in the habitations of Love and Peace Amen The Anthem The Life of Jesus I. WHen Jesus first appear'd abroad The Divine Man th' Incarnate God In whom both Natures were entwin'd Say my Soul was he not design'd T' eclipse th' accomplishments of all mankind II. A Virgin Mother could lye in Of nothing but what was Divine Destin'd a Miracle from the Womb From his warm Cradle to 's cold Tomb From his first smiles unto his sorrowful Doom III. The beauteous Youth had not yet seen The day that bad him write Thirteen When all the Scribes and Doctors gaz'd And the Pharisees stood amaz'd 〈◊〉 his worst Enemies his acuteness prais'd IV. Such Wisdom shone in his Discourse In all his Arguments such force Such the charms of 's sprightly face So smart his Words so smooth his Grace Moses himself ne're so became the place V. This Essay past he humbly staid Labouring hard at 's Fathers Trade Where mindful in whose stead he stood With sweat he earn'd his daily Food And learn't th' obliging art of doing good VI. Till he unto the age attain'd VVhen Priests before the Altar stand Then at his Baptism th' holy Dove In State descended from above To crown him with the marks of 's Fathers love VII Jordan thy streams that smoothly flow Till now were never hallowed so Not when Joshua travell'd through The fertile Canaan to subdue Jordan thy streams are sacramental now VIII Jesus next to the desert goes To combat there the worst of 's Foes There Satan us'd his utmost skill To stoop our Saviour to his will But the lov'd Jesus is victorious still IX He to th' Infernal Powers gives law Nature of him too stands in awe At his command water turns wine Wild Tempests do their rage resign And winds and seas to peaceful calm encline X. He cures the blind recalls the dead Feeds thousands with celestial Bread What can oppose his word or will VVho multplies by Miracle Five Loaves till th' Fragments do twelve Baskets fill XI How useful was he and how good Yet never was well understood Not when his sacred Lips dispence Strong Reason urg'd with Eloquence And every word does Oracle commence XII Not when his time and strength were spent To rescue man from punishment Nor when his beauteous Eyes and meen Powerful incentives should have been T' endear him unto all that had him seen XIII Despis'd but useful Virtue how Durst profligate man treat thee so Must scorn and torture be thy meed My soul 't is often thus decreed The innocent do for the guilty bleed XIV Jesus by Judas is betray'd Whom Jesus an Apostle made Seiz'd by the rabble of the Jews Who this great Prince with scorn do use While perjur'd Witnesses the truth abuse XV. Pilate tho much inur'd to blood Rapine and fraud the Jews withstood Till tir'd with noise and aw'd with fear Lest his ill menage should appear Condemns the Saint and quits the Murtherer XVI Thus this illustrious Sun did rise With Beams that dazled weaker eyes Did sometimes shine and sometimes shrowd His bright Rays in a gloomy cloud Setting long ere his course was done in blood Thursday before EASTER THe Day on which our Blessed Master was apprehended was justly stiled the great and holy fifth day of the Passion-Week on which the Saviour of the World having his Crucifixion in view preach'd his last most Passionate and Heavenly Sermon to his Disciples in which he earnestly recommends them to God's Love Protection and Favour and as earnestly recommends to them the Love of God and of one another And because this was the Day when the Son of God was seized on in order to his paying a Ransom for our Offences * P. Innoc. Ep 1. ad Decent c. 7. Ambr. li. 5. Ep. 33. Hier. Epit. Fabiol and compleating our Redemption therefore did hte Church on this day solemnly reconcile Penitents not all that were under censures for some were never admitted to intire Communion till after Twelve Fourteen or Twenty Years Penance and some not till they lay on their Death-beds But such who having past through those methods of Repentance which the Church prescribed were thought fit to be admitted to the Sacrament of God's Table whereas now on the contrary in the Church of Rome on this day they anathematize and ourse all the Enemies either of their Faith or Grandeur and among them not only the Protestant Hereticks as they call them but even the King of Spain himself And whereas the Holy Eucharist was on the Evening of this Day instituted to be a lasting Rite in the Christian Church therefore the Day was stiled by way of Excellency * Aag Ep. 118. Caena Domini the Lord's Supper the day of mysteries and the birth-day of the holy Chalice to denoto besides the Original Appointment of the Sacrament the Mystical Sacrifice that is made on the Altar of our Blessed Saviour who was the Prince of the Martyrs the days of whofe sufferings were called their Birth-days for the sufferings of our Lord began the Evening of the Thursday tho they were not compleated till the Evening of the Friday and for this reason this day is called the day before the Preparation and the Evening is called the Vigil of the Passion which among ‖ Dr. Smyth of the Gr. Ch. p. 42. the Greeks is wholly spent in reading the History of Christs sufferings and meditating thereon in severe Fastings intense Devotion watching all night in the Church and other acts of mortification no one unless in case of absolute necessity eating or drinking any thing till after Sunset on Friday others not till Easter Eve after midnight ‖ Euseb hist li. 2. c. 17. and this acccording to the Primitive Practice It was of old time observed ‖ Chrys to 5. p. 547. that those indevout and careless Persons who slighted the Holy Eucharist all the rest of the Year would in great numbers on this day when that Holy Ordinance was first instituted come to the Holy Table And then the Church contrary to her usual Custom of receiving these My steries in the Morning did every ‖ Chrys Aug. ub supra c. where communicate in the Evening because