his neighbours face the image of his own death What fear and horrour shall then possess them when they shall hourly expect the success and dire effects portended by these monstrous prodigies All Commerce shall then cease the Market-places shall be unpeopled and the Tribunals remain solitary and silent none shall be then ambitious of honours none shall seek after pastimes and new invented pleasures nor shall the covetous wretch then busie himself with the care of his treasures none shall frequent the Palaces of Kings and Princes but through fear shall forget even to eat and drink all their care shall be employed how to escape those Deluges Earthquake and lightnings seeking for places of security which they shall not meet with Who will then value his own Descent and Linage who the nobleness of his Arms and atchievements who his Wisdom and Talents who will remember the Beauty he hath once doted upon who the sumptuous Buildings he hath reared who his acute and well-composed Writings who his Discretion and Gravity in his discourse And if we shall forget what we our selves most valued and gloried in how shall we remember that of others what remembrance shall there then be of the acts of that great Alexander Of the Learning of Aristotle and the Endowments of the most renowned men of the world Their Fame shall remain from thence forward for ever buried and shall die with the World for a whole Eternity The Mariners when in some furious Tempest they are upon the point of sinking how are they amazed at the rage of the watry Element how grieved and afflicted with the ruine which threatens them what prayers and vows do they send up to Heaven how disinteressed are they of all worldly matters since they fling their wealth and riches into the Sea for which they have run such hazard In what condition shall be then the Inhabitants of the Earth when not onely the Sea with his raging but Heaven and Earth with a thousand prodigies shall affright them when the Sun shall put on a Robe of mourning and amaze them with the horrour of his darkness when the Moon shall look like blood the Stars fall and the Earth shake them with its unquiet trembling when the Whirlwinds shall throw them off their legs and frequent and thick flashes of Lightning dazle their sight and confound their understanding what shall Sinners then do for whose sake all these fearful wonders shall happen § 2. The fear and astonishment which shall fall upon mankind when the whole power and concourse of Nature shall be armed against Sinners may be perceived by the fear which hath been caused by some particular of those changes which are foretold to happen in the end of the World altogether and every one in great excess Let us therefore by the consideration of the particular judge how dreadful shall be the conjunction of so many and so great calamities And to begin with the Earth the most dull and heavy of all the Elements Cardinal Jacobus Papiensis Jacob. Papiens In Epist writing what happened in his own time reports that in the year 1456 upon the 5th of December three hours before day the whole Kingdom of Naples trembled with that violence that some entire Towns were buried in the earth and a great part of many others were overthrown in which perished 60000 persons part swallowed by the earth and part oppressed by the ruins of buildings what security can men look for in this life when they are not secure of the earth they tread upon What firmness can there be in the World when the onely firm thing in it is unstable From whence may not death assault us if it springs from under our feet Evarg l. 6. c. 8. Vide Niceph lib. 18.3 c. 13. But it is not much that the Earthquake of a whole Kingdom should cause so great a ruine since it hath done as much in one City Evagrius writes that the night in which Mauritius the Emperour was married three hours within night the City of Antioch quaked in that manner that most of the Buildings were overthrown and 60000 persons remained buried in her ruins If the Earth was so cruel in those particular Earthquakes what was it in the time of Tiberius Plin. l. 2. c. 84. when according to Pliny twelve of the most principal Cities of Asia were overthrown and sunk into the earth Sen. nat q. l. 6. And yet more cruel was that related by Nicephorus which happened in the time of the Emperour Theodosius which lasted for 6 moneths without intermission Niceph. l. 4. c. 46. and was so universal that almost the whole circuit of the Earth trembled as extending to the Chersonesus Alexandria Bithinia Antioch Hellespont the two Phrygia's the greatest part of the East and many Nations of the West And that we may also say something of the fury of the Sea even against those who were far distant from the rage of his waves and thought themselves secure in their own houses Most horrible was that Earthquake related by S. Jerome St. Hier in vita St. Hilarion and Ammianus Marcellinus who was an eye-witness of it which happened not long after the death of the Emperour Julian wherein not onely the Earth trembled but the Sea out-past his limits as in another Deluge and turned again to involve the Earth as in the first Chaos Ships floated in Alexandria above the loftiest buildings and in other places above high hills and after that the Sea was calmed and returned into his channel many Vessels in that City as Nicephorus writes remained upon the top of-houses Niceph. l. 10. c. 35. and in other parts upon high rocks as witnesseth St. Jerome But let us hear it related by Ammianus Marcellinus Am. Marcel l. 20. whose words are these which follow Procopius the Tyrant being yet alive the 2◠of July the year wherein Valentinian was first time Consul with his Brother the Elements throughout the whole compass of the Earth suddenly fell unto such distempers and disorders as neither true stories have ever mentioned nor false feigned A little before morning the Heavens being first over-cast with a dark Tempest intermixt with frequent thunders and horrid flashes of lightning the whole body of the Earth moved and the Sea being violently driven back retired in such manner as the most hidden bottom of it was discovered so as many unknown sorts of Fishes were seen stretched out upon the mud Those vast profoundities beholding then the Sun whom Nature from the beginning of the world had hid under so immense a mass of waters many Ships remained upon the Oase or floating in small gullets and Fishes were taken up with mens hands gasping upon the dry sands but in short time the waves of the Sea inraged to see themselves banisht from their natural seats lifted themselves up with great fury against the Islands and far extended Coasts of the Continent and what Cities or Buildings they encountred
peeces and he above all remained distracted in his wits raging with despite and madness Let us now consider Antiochus in all his pomp and glory glittering in Gold and dazling the eyes of the beholders with the splendor of his Diamonds and precious Jewels mounted upon a stately Courser commanding over numerous Armies and making the very earth tremble under him Let us then behold him in his Bed pale and wan his strength and spirits spent his loathsome body flowing with worms and corruption forsaken by his own people by reason of his pestilential and poisonous stink which infected his whole Camp and finally dying mad and in a rage Who seeing such a death would with the felicity of his life who with the condition of his misery would desire his fortune See then wherein the goods of this life conclude And as the clear and sweet waters of Jordan end in the filthy mud of the dead Sea and are swallowed up in that noysome Bitumen so the greatest splendor of this life concludes in death and those loathsome diseases which usually accompany it Act. 12. Vide Josephum Behold in what a sink of filth ended the two Herods most potent Princes Ascalonita and Agrippa This who cloathed himself in Tissue and boasted a Majesty above humane dyed devoured by worms which whilst he yet lived fed upon his corrupted and apostumated flesh flowing with horrible filth and matter Neither came the other Ascalonita to finish his dayes more happily being consumed by lice that nasty vermin by little and little bereaving him both of his life and Kingdom 3 Reg. 20. King Achab Conqueror of the King of Syria and 32 other Princes dyed wounded by a chance-arrow which pierced his body and stained his Royal Charriot with his black gore which was after licked up by hungry Dogs as it he had been some savage beast 3 Reg. 22. Neither dyed his Son Joram a more fortunate death run through the heart with a sword his body left upon the field to be devoured by birds and beasts of prey wanting in his death seaven foot of earth to cover him who in life commanded a Kingdom Who could have known Caesar who had first seen him triumph over the Conquered world and then beheld him gasping for a little breath and weltring in his own bloud which flowed from three and twenty wounds opened by so many stabs Who could believe it were the same Cyrus he who subdued the Medes conquered the Assyrian and Chaldaean Empire he who amazed the world with thirty years success of continued Victories now taken prisoner and put to an ignominious death by the Command of a Woman Who could think it were the same Alexander Plut. in ejus vita who in so short time subjugated the Persians Indians and the best part of the known world and should after behold him conquered by a Calenture feeble exhausted in body dejected in spirit dried up and parched with thirst without taste in his mouth or content in his life his eyes sunk his nose sharp his tongue cleaving to his pallat not being able to pronounce one word What an amazement is it that the heat of a poor Fever should consume the mightiest power and fortune of the world and that the greatest of temporal and humane prosperities should be drowned by the overflowing of one irregular and inordinate humour How great a Monster is Humane Life since it consists of so disproportionable parts the uncertain felicity of our whose life ending in a most certain misery How prodigious were that Monster which should have one arm of a Man and the other of an Elephant one foot of a Horse and the other of a Bear Truly the parts of this life are not much more sutable Who would marry a woman though of a comely and well proportioned body who had the head of an ugly Dragon certainly although she had a great Dowry none would covet such a Bed-fellow Wherefore then do we wed our selves unto this life which although it seems to carry along with it much content and happiness yet is in effect no less a Monster since although the body appear unto us beautiful and pleasant yet the end of it is horrible and full of misery And therefore a Philosopher said well that the end of things was their head and as men were to be known and distinguished by their faces so things by their ends and therefore who will know what life is let him look upon the end And what end of life is not full of misery Let no man flatter himself with the vigour of his health with the abundance of his riches with the splendor of his authority with the greatness of his fortune for by how much he is more fortunate by so much shall he be more miserable since his whole life is to end in misery Wherefore Agesilaus hearing the King of Persia cried up for a most fortunate and happy Prince reprehended those who extolled him saying Have patience Plutar. in ejus vita for even King Priamus whose end was so lamentable was not unfortunate at the age of the King of Persia Giving us to understand that the most happy were not to be envied whilest they lived by reason of the uncertainty of that end whereunto they are subject How many as yet appear most happy whose death will shortly discover the infelicity of their lives Plutar. in Apoph Graecis Epaminondas when they asked him who was the greatest Captain Cabrias Iphicrates or himself Answered that whilest they lived no man could judge but that the last day of their lives would deliver the Sentence and give each one their due Let no man be deceived in beholding the prosperity of a rich man let him not measure his felicity by what he sees at present but by the end wherein he shall conclude not by the sumptuousness of his Palaces not by the multitude of his Servants not by the bravery of his Apparel not by the lustre of his Dignity but let him expect the end of that which he so much admires and he shall then perceive him at best to die in his Bed dejected dismayed and strugling with the pangs and anxieties of death and if so he comes off Well otherwise wise the daggers of his enemy the teeth of some wild beast or a tyle thrown upon his head by some violent wind may serve to make an end of him when he least thinks of it This reason tells us although we had no experience of it But we see it daily confirmed by the testimony of those who are already in the gates of death and no man can better judge of life than he who stands with his back towards it Mago Dionysius Carth. de noviss Art 5. a famous Captain amongst the Carthaginians and Brother to the great Hannibal being mortally wounded confessed this truth unto his Brother saying O how great a madness is it to glory in an Eminent Command The estate of the most
is esteemed in it is vain all is vanity of vanities Let us onely aim and aspire unto the eternal because the just onely as the Prophet sayes shall remain in the eternal memory of God The memory of man is as men themselves frail and perishing What man ambitious of a perpetual memory would not rather choose to be esteemed by ten men who were to live a hundred years than by a thousand who were to die immediately after him Let us therefore desire to be in the memory of God whose life is eternity Our memory amongst men can last no longer than men themselves which shall all die like us and there can be no memory immortal amongst those who are mortal It is therefore very expedient that the end of the World should be accompanied by the universal Judgement of all men wherein shall be revealed their most secret and hidden thoughts and anions That the murtherer who hath slain his neighbour lest he should discover his wickedness may not hope that therefore it shall remain conceal'd and That no man should be bold to sin for want of witnesses since the whole World shall then know that which if any but himself had known here would have burst his heart with shame and sorrow CAP. VII How the Elements and the Heavens are to change at the end of Time LEt us now look upon the strange manner of the end of the World which being so terrible gives us to understand the vanity and deceit of all things in it and the great abuse of them by man for questionless were it not for the great malice and wickedness which raigns in the World the period of it would not be so horrible and disastrous Lib. recognit S. Clement the Roman writes that he learned of St. Peter the Apostle that God had appointed a day from all eternity wherein the Army of Vengeance should with all its forces and as we may say in ranged battail fight with the Army of Sin which day is usually called in the holy Scripture The day of the Lord in which battail the Army of Vengeance shall prevail and shall at once extirpate and make an end both of Sin and the World wherein it hath so long raigned And certainly if the terrour of that day shall equal the multitude and hainousness of sins we need not wonder at what the sacred Scripture and holy Fathers have foretold of it But as it is usual in war res to skirmish and make inrodes before the day of battel so before that dreadful day wherein all punishments are to encounter with all offences the Lord shall from divers parts send forth several calamities which shall be fore-runners of that great day of battel and shall like light Horse-men scoure the Campania which St. John in the Apocalyps signified by those Horse-men which he saw sally forth upon divers-coloured horses one red another black and the third pale so the Lord shall before that day send Plagues Famine Warres Earthquakes Droughts Inundations Deluges and if those miseries do now so much afflict us what shall they then doe when God shall add unto them his utmost force and power when all Creatures shall arm against Sinners and the Zeal of divine justice shall be their Captain-general which the Wise-man declares in these words Sap. 5. His zeal shall take up arms and shall arm the creatures to revenge him of his enemies he shall put on Justice as a breast-plate and righteous Judgement as a helmet and he shall take Equity as a buckler and shall sharpen his Wrath as a lance and the circuit of the earth shall fight for him Thunderbolts shall be sent from the clouds as from a well-shooting how and shall nit fail to hit the mark and Hail shall be sent full of stormy wrath The Waters of the sea shall threaten them the Rivers shall combat furiously a most strong Wind shall rise against them and shall divide them as a whirle-wind Very dreadful are those words although they contain but the Warre which three of the Elements are to make against Sinners but not onely Fire Air and Water but Earth also and Heaven as it appears in other places of Scripture shall fall upon them and confound them for all creatures shall express their fury in that day and shall rise against man and if the clouds shall discharge thunderbolts and stones upon their heads the Heavens shall shoot no less balls than Stars which as Christ sayes shall fall from thence If Hail no bigger than little stones falling but from the clouds destroy the fields and sometimes kills the lesser sort of cattle what shall pieces of Stars do falling from the Firmament or some upper Region It is no amplification which the Gospel uses when it sayes That men shall wither with fear of what shall fall upon the whole frame of nature for as in Man which is called the Lesser world when he is to die the humours which are as the Elements are troubled and out of order his eyes which are as the Sun and Moon are darkned his other senses which are as the lesser stars fall away his reason which is as the celestial vertues is off the hinges so in the death of the greater World before it dissolve and expire the Sun shall be turned into darkness the Moon into blood the Stars shall fall and the whole World shall tremble with a horrid noise If the Sun Moon and other celestial bodies which are held incorruptible shall suffer such changes what shall be done with those frail and corruptible Elements of Earth Air and Water If this inferiour World do as the Philosophers say depend upon the Heavens those celestial bodies being altered and broken in pieces in what estate must the lower Elements remain when the Vertues of Heaven shall faulter and the wandring Stars shall lose their way and fail to observe their order How shall the Air be troubled with violent and sudden Whirle-winds dark Tempests horrible Thunders and furious flashes of Lightning and how shall the Earth tremble with dreadful Earth-quakes opening her self with a thousand mouthes and casting forth as it were whole Volcanies of fire and sulphur and not content to overthrow the loftiest Towers shall swallow up high Mountains and bury whole Cities in her entrails How shall the Sea then rage mounting his proud waves above the clouds as if they meant to overwhelm the whole Earth and shall certainly drown a great part of it The roaring of the Ocean shall astonish those who are far distant from the Sea and inhabit in the middest of the firm land wherefore Christ our Saviour said Luc. 21. that there should be in the Earth afflictions of Nations for the confusion of the noise of the Sea What shall men do in this general perturbation of Nature they shall remain amazed and pale as death What comfort shall they have they shall stand gazing one upon another and every one shall conceive a new fear by beholding in
were violently overthrown and evened with the ground in so much as the face of the World changed by the furious discord of the Elements produced many unheard of Prodigies For the vast body of the waters suddenly and unexpectedly returning and entring far into the land many thousands of people were drowned whose dead bodies after the swellings of the waves were asswaged and retired unto their natural and usual bed were found some with their faces downward grovling upon the Earth some upwards looking upon the Heavens and some great Ships the waters left upon the tops of houses as it happened in Alexandria others far from the Sea-shore and as we our selves are witness who saw one as we passed by Methion then old and worm-eaten All this lamentable story is from Ammianus Marcellinus No less fearful is that which is related by Nauclerus and Trithemius that the year 1218. Naucler Gen. 41. sub fin Trit Chron. The enraged Sea entring into Frisia there were drowned in the Fields and in their own houses more than a hundred thousand persons Langus adds that afterwards in the year 1287. the Ocean again reentring the same Province retired not till it had left 80000 persons drowned behind it This mortality is not much in a whole Province in respect of what the Sea hath done in one onely City Surius in his Commentaries of the year 1509. writes that the day of the Exaltation of the Cross in September the Sea betwixt Constantinople and Pera swelled with that rage and fury that it passed over the walls of both Cities and that there were drowned onely of Turks in Coustantinople above 13000. Unto these so certain examples we shall not need to aad what Plato writes Tertul. Apolog. Cap. 39. although Tertullian and many Authors of these times approve it That the Atlantick Island which was seated in that spacious Ocean betwixt Spain and the West-Indies and which was a greater part of the World then Asia and Affrick both together replenished with innumerable people was by an Earthquake and the rain of one onely day and night in which the Heavens as it were melted themselves into water and the Sea over-past his bounds buried in the Ocean with all the Inhabitants and never since appeared But I will not make use of this History to exaggerate the force of the Elements enraged against man The modern Stories which we have related with more certainty are sufficient and by that which happened in Frisia may be seen with what fury the Ocean imprisoned within his proper limits issues forth when God permits it to fight against Sinners What shall be then when the Lord of all shall arm all the Elements against them and shall give the Alarm to all creatures to revenge him upon men so ungrateful for his infinite benefits The Air also which is an Element so sweet and gentle in which we live and by which we breath when God slacking the bridle draws force out of weakness with no less fury ruins and overthrows all it meets It hath been seen to tear up whole woods by the roots and transport the trees to places far distant Ovied In Hist Indic l. 6. ca. 3. Surius in Comment Conrad Argen in Chron. Surius writes that the 28 of June in the year 1507 at midnight there arose such a Tempest in Germany that it made the strongest Buildings shake uncovered Houses rooted up Trees and threw them a great distance off Conradus Argentinas writes That Henry the sixth being Emperour he himself saw great Beams of Timber blown from the roof of the chief Church in Ments as big as the Beams of a Wine-press and that of heavy wood as Oak flying in the air above a miles distance Above all who is not amazed at what Josephus writes in his Antiquities and Eusebius in Praepar Evangel that the Tower of Babylon which was the most strong and prodigious Building of the World was by God overthrown with a Tempest What shall I speak of those fearful Tempests of hail and lightning flying through the air from place to place to chastize Sinners one of which slew all the Flocks and Heards of the Egyptians And in Palestine of another Hail of a strange greatness that slew innumerable Amorites Of latter times in these parts in the year 1524. Clavitellus writes that near Cremona there fell Hail as big as Hens eggs Clav. Fol. 260. Corn. A lap in cap. 9. Exod. Olaus Mag. l. 1. c. 22. Conimb In Meteor c. de grandine Hist Tripart l. 7. c. 22. Ezek. 38. Apoc. 16. and in the Campania of Bolognia in the year 1537. there fell stones or 28 pound weight Olaus Magnus writes that in the North Hail hath fallen as big as the head of a man And the Tripartite cap History that the year 369. there happened such a Tempest in Constantinople that the Hail was as rocks Certainly it is not then much what the Prophet Ezekiel sayes that in the end of the World shall fall huge stones and what St. John writes that they shall be of the weight of a talent which is 125 pounds of Roman weight With what horrible thunder shall that Tempest resound which shall throw a stone of that greatness In Seythia they write that divers persons have fallen dead with the terrible noise of the thunders in those parts What noise then shall those last Tempests make which God shall send in the end of the World All those alterations past of the Elements are no more than skirmishes What shall then be the battel which they are to give unto Sinners when the Heavens shall shoot it's arrows and give the Alarm with prodigious thunders and shall declare their wrath with horrible apparitions Greg lib. 4. dialog Cap. 36. Joan. in Vit. Greg l. 1. c. 37. Zonar in Iren. Plin. l. 1. c. 13. St. Gregory the Great writes as an eye-witness that in a great Pestilence at Rome he saw arrows visibly fall from Heaven and strike many men John the Deacon sayes it rained arrows How shall it the be when the Heavens and Air rain pieces of stars The world was amazed when ill the time of Irene and Constantine the Sun was darkned for 17 dayes together and in the time of Vespasian the Sun and Moon appeared not during the space of 12 dayes What shall it be in the last dayes when the Sun shall hide his beams under a mourning Garment and the Moon shall cloath her self with blood to signifie the wanes which all the creatures are to make with fire and blood against those who have despised their Creator When on one side the Earth shall rouse it self up against them and shall shake them off her back as unwilling to endure their burthen any longer When the Sea shall pursue and assault them within their own houses and the Air shall not permit them to be safe in the fields Certainly it shall be then no wonder if they shall desire the mountains to cover them and the
hills to hide them within their Caverns But all this is rather to be imagined then expressed and the very thought of it is enough to make us tremble The creatures now groan to see themselves abused by man in contempt of his and their Creator but they shall then shake off their yoaks and shall revenge themselves of the agrievances which they suffer under him and the injuries he hath done unto the Creator of all The violences of the Elements and disturbances of Nature which have and may happen hereafter are nothing in respect of those which shall be in the last dayes the which St. Augustine sayes shall be much more horrible and dreadful than those which are past And if those single and alone were so terrible as we have already seen what shall they be when they come all together and from all parts when the whole world shall rebel against man when all shall be confusion when Summer shall be changed into Winter and Winter into Summer and no creature shall keep the prefixed law with them who have not observed the Law of their Creatour that so they may revenge both God and themselves §. 3. But that this most fearful alteration of the creatures which shall happen may be yet more apparent we will specifie some of them out of the Apocalyps of St. John Very dreadful is that which he mentions in the eighth Chapter of hail and fire with a rain of blood so general and in such abundance that it shall destroy the third part of the Earth of trees and green herbs How horrible an amazement shall so general a rain cause amongst men But it is not so to end For immediately shall appear in the Air a huge mountain of fire which shall fall all at once into the Sea and dividing it self into several bodies shall burn the third part of the Fishes the third part of Ships and of what else shall be in the Ocean The like effect shall proceed from a flame or prodigious Comet which falling into the Rivers and Fountains and there dividing it self into several parts shall turn the waters bitter as wormwood and make them so pestilential as they shall infect those who drink them and many shall die with their taste An Angel shall then smite the Sun Moon and Stars Apoc. 9. and deprive them of a third part of their light But mote horrible than all is that which follows that after so many calamities the bottomless pit which is hell shall burst open and out of his profound throat belch forth so thick a smoke as shall wholly darken the Sun and Air from which smoke shall sally forth a multitude of deformed Locusts which in great swarms shall disperse themselves over the face of the whole earth and leaving the fields herbs and what is sown fall upon such men as have been unfaithful unto God and shall for five moneths torment them with greater rage than Scorpions Some Doctors understanding those Locusts according unto the Letter Lessius de Perf. div l. 13. c. 18. Cornel. in Apoc. that they shall be a certain kind of true Locusts but of a strange figure and fierceness others that they shall be Devils of hell in the shape of Locusts and it is no marvel that in the destruction of the world Devils shall appear in visible forms since in the destruction of Babylon they appeared in divers figures of beasts as was prophesied by Isaias But after what manner soever St. John sayes that this Plague shall be so cruel Isa c. 34. 13. that men shall seek death and shall not find it and shall desire to die and death shall flye from them Many other plagues shall happen in those last dayes For as before that God drowned the Aegyptians and delivered his people he sent such plagues upon Aegypt as are recorded in Exodus so before the general destruction of Sinners in that universal Deluge and Sea of fire which shall cover the whole Earth and out of which the Saints are to escape free so much greater plagues shall proceed as the whole World is greater than Aegypt For not onely the Rivers and Fountains shall then ce turned into blood but the whole Sea shall be converted into a most black gore The Lord shall also in those days send horrible botches and sores upon men and the Sun shall scorch them in that manner as they shall lose their senses and some of the wicked shall turn against God and blaspheme as if they were already in hell The Earth also shall tremble and that not being the greatest which is recounted in the sixth Chapter of the Apocalyps yet the Apostle relates such things of it as are able to strike a fear and amazement into those who hear it His words are these There was a great Earthquake Apoc. 6. and the Sun became as sackcloth and the Moon at blood the Stars fell from Heaven as a Fig-tree cast off its green siggs when it it shaken by a violent wind The Heavens were folded up as a book or as a roll of parchment and all Mountains and Islands moved from their places I leave unto the consideration of every one what shall then become of those who remain alive in that conflict St. John sayes that Kings and Princes the Rich and Strong Slaves and Free-men shall hide themselves in Caves and Rocks and shall say unto the Mountains and Hills Fall upon us and cover us And the same S. John sayes further that there shall be yet a greater Earthquake which shall be the greatest that ever happened since the foundation of the World was laid in which the Islands shall sink and the Mountains shall be made even with the Plains Horrible lightnings and thunders shall affright the Inhabitants of the Earth and hailstones shall fall of the weight of a Talent which is of 5 Arrobas an Hebrew Talent weighing 125 Roman pounds This Plague joyned with so strange an Earth-quake how shall it astonish those who are then alive § 4. But how shall it then fare with Sinners when after all shall come that general fire so often foretold in holy Scripture which shall either fall from Heaven Vide P. Grana De novissi Alb. Mag. in comp or asseend out of Hell or according to Albertus Magnus proceed from both and shall devour and consume all it meets with Whither shall the miserable flye when that River of flames or to say better that Innundation and Deluge of fire shall so encompass them as no place of surety shall be left where nothing can avail but a holy life when all besides shall perish in that universal ruine of the whole World What shall it then profit the wordlings to have rich Vessels of gold and silver curious Embroideries precious Tapestries pleasant Gardens sumptuous Palaces and all what the world now esteems when they shall with their own eyes behold their costly Moveables burnt their rich and curious pieces of Gold melted and their
overwhelmed and themselves compell'd to escape the burning of their Country to struggle with the water and that which way soever they turned they perceived death still to follow them and were certain to perish What shall be then the streights and exigences of that general burning when those who shall escape Earthquakes Inundations of the Sea the fury of whirlwindes and lightning from Heaven shall fall into that universal Fire that Deluge of flames which shall consume all and make an end both of men and their memories Of those who lived before the Flood and were Masters of the World for so long a time except it be of some few which the Scripture mention we know nothing Those heroical actions which certainly some of them performed and gained by them incomparable fame lye buried in the waters and there remains no more memory of those who did them than if they had never been born No more permanent shall be the fame of those which now resounds in the ears of the whole World Cyrus Alexander Hannibal Scipio Caesar Augustus Plato Aristotle Hippocrates Euclid and the rest no more World no more Fame This Fire shall end all that smoke Nor is the World without convenient proportion to end in fire which is now so full of smoke There are few comparisons as hath been said in the beginning of this work which express better what the World is than that which St. Clement the Roman learned of St. Peter the Apostle who said the World was like a house full of smoke which in such manner blinds the eyes as it differs not those within it to see things as they are and so the World with its deceits so disguises the nature of humane things as we perceive not what they are Ambition and humane honour which the World so much dotes after are no more than smoke without substance which so blinds our understandings that we know not the truth of that we so much covet It is no marvail that so much smoke comes at last to end in flames The smoke of the Mountains Vesuvius and Aetna when it ends in fire and bursts forth into those innumerous flames hath amazed the World and rivers of fire have been seen to issue from their bowels Zon. In Tito Proc. l. 2. Vesuvius is near unto Naples and the fire hath sometimes sallyed forth with that impetuous violence that as grave Authors affirm the ashes have been seen in Constantinople and Alexandria And St. Augustine writes St. Aug. l. 3. de Civit. c. 31. that the ashes of Mount Aetna overwhelmed the City of Catanea and in our time when Vesuvius burst out the very flame of it terrified places far distant and secure And now lately in the year 1638. the third of July near the Island of St. Michael one of the Terceras the fire bursting out from the bottom of the Sea 150 fathomes deep and over-coming the weight of so huge a mass of water sent up his flames unto the clouds and made many places although far distant to tremble With what fury shen shall the general Conflagration of the World burst forth that part which shall issue forth of Hell and from beneath the Earth shall fill the World with ashes before it be involved in flames and when a crack of thunder or a flash of lightning amazes us so much that fire which falls from heaven what violence and noise shall it bring along with it Lot the Nephew of Abraham being secure in conscience and promised by the Angel of God that for his sake the City of Segor should not be burnt but that he might rest safe in it was notwithstanding so affrighted with the fire which fell upon other Cities in that Valley of Pentapolis that notwithstanding he saw it not yet he held himself not late but retired unto the Mountains What counsel shall sinners take in that extremity when their own Conscience shall be their accusors and when they shall behold the World all on fire about them whither shall they flye for safety when no place will afford it Shall they climb unto the Mountains thither the flames will follow them Shall they descend into the Valleys thither the fire will pursue them Shall they shut themselves up in strong Castles and Towns but there the wrath of God will assault them and that fire will pass their Fosses consume the Bulwarks and make an end both of them and their fortunes Besides the contempt of all things which the world esteems which we may draw from this general destruction of it by fire we may also perceive the abomination of sin since God to purifie the World from that uncleanness wherewith our offences have polluted it is resolved to cleanse it with fire as he anciently washt it with the waters of the Deluge Such are our sins that for being onely committed in the World the World it self is condemned to die what shall then become of those who sinned Less de perf div l. 13. c. 10. But from this so terrible a fire the Saints then alive shall be free that it may appear it was onely prepared for Sinners and that nothing can then avail but vertue and holiness The rich man shall not be delivered by his wealth nor the mighty by his power nor the crafty by his wiles onely the just shall be freed by his vertues none shall escape the terrour of that day by fast sailing ships or speed of horses the Sea it self shall burn and the fire shall overtake the swiftest Post onely holiness and charity shall defend the Servants of Christ unto whom the tribulations of those times shall serve to purifie their Souls by suffering that in this life with reward which they should otherwise have done for a time in the other without it Albertus Magnus observes the convenience of the two Elements by which God resolved twice to destroy the World The first by water against the fire of the flesh and heat of concupiscence which so inordinately tytannized over all vertue before the general Flood The second he hath appointed to be by fire against the coldness of charity which in those last dayes shall raign in the aged and decrepit World And as in the Deluge of waters onely the chaste Noah and his Wife who were most continent in Matrimony and his Sons and Daughters who observed chastity all the time they continued in the Ark escaped drowning so in that general fire of the World onely the Just who shall be replenished with charity shall be free from burning The Deluge of waters overwhelmed not him who was not burnt with the heat of carnal love neither shall the Deluge of fire destroy them who are enflamed with divine charity CAP. VIII How the World ought to conclude with so dreadful an end in which a general Judgment is to pass of all that is in it TO be subject to an end as hath been said were sufficient to breed in us a contempt of all things temporal for what is
no wayes hinder them they shall therefore in the same manner walk or stay upon Water Air Heavens as upon Earth It was miraculous in St. Quirinus Martyr St. Maurus and St. Francis of Paula that they walked upon waters passed rapid rivers and seas without Vessels but the glorious bodies shall not onely be able to traverse the seas mount into the air but enter into flames secure and without hurt It is said of S. Francis of Assisium that in the fervour of his prayers and contemplations he was seen lifted up into the air and the great Servant of God Father Diego Martines of the Society of Jesus was lifted up in prayer above the highest trees and Towers and hanging in the air persisted in his devotion If God vouchsafe so great favours to his servants in this valley of tears what priviledges will he deny to the Citizens of Heaven To this so notable gift of Agility shall be annexed that of Penetration by which their glorious bodies shall have their way free and pervious through all places no impediment shall stop their motion and for them shall be no prison or enclosure They shall with greater ease pass through the middle of a rock than an arrow through the air It shall be the same thing for them to mount unto the Moon where they shall meet no solid body to oppose them as to pierce unto the center through rocks mettals and the gross body of the earth We wonder to hear that the Zahories see those things which are hid under the earth Let us admire that which is certain that the Saints cannot onely see but enter into the profundity of the earth and tell what minerals and other secrets are contained in its entrails Metaphrastes writes that a certain Goth a Souldier of the Garrison of Edessa fell passionately in love with a Maid of the same City and sinding no other way to enjoy her demanded her in marriage but the Mother and Kindred gave no ear to the treaty trusting little to a Barbarian and a Stranger who carrying her into a Country far distant as his was might there use her at his pleasure The Souldier notwithstanding persisting still in his suit with many promises of good entertainment gained at last the consent of the Maid and her Friends onely the Mother would not be satisfied before they had entred all together into the Temple of the holy Martyrs St. Samona Curia and Abiba and that there the Souldier had renewed his promises by solemn oath and called the holy Martyrs as witnesses which done the Maid was delivered unto him whom he not much after carried into his own Country where he was formerly married and had his Wife yet living There better to conceal his wickedness he fell into a greater and like a wild beast without pity enclosed the poor woman alive in a Sepulcher and there left her She thus betrayed had recourse unto the Saints whom she with tears invoked as witnesses of the Souldiers treachery and breach of faith At the instant the holy Martyrs appeared in a glorious equipage and casting her into a gentle sleep conveyed her the Sepulcher still remaining lockt without hurt into her own Country where they left her The Barbarian ignorant of what had happened and perswading himself she was long fince dead returned a second time to Edessa where convinced of the crime he satisfied it with his life If the Saints then have power to make the persons of others pass through distinct bodies much more are they able to make their own to penetrate them without impediment Finally the Servants of Christ shall be there so replenished with all goods both of soul and body that there shall be nothing more for them to desire And every one even during this life hoping for those eternal goods may say with St. Austin What wouldest thou my Body what is' t thou defirest my Soul There ye shall find all which you desire If you are pleased with beauty there the Just shine as the Sun and if with any pure delight there not one but a whole sea of pleasure which God keeps in store for the Blessed shall quench your thirst Let men then raise their desires unto that place where only they can be accomplished Let them not gape after things of the earth which cannot satisfie them but let them look after those in Heaven which are onely great onely eternal and can onely fill the capacity of mans heart CAP. VII How we are to seek after Heaven and to preferre it before all the goods of the Earth LEt a Christian compare the miseries of this life with the felicities of the other the weakness of our nature in this mortal estate with the vigour and priviledges of that immortal which expects us and let him excite and stir up himself to gain a glory eternal by troubles short and temporary Justinus lib. 1. Cyrus when he intended to invade the Medes commanded his Persians upon a certain day to meet him with each one a sharp Hatchet They obeying he willed them to cut down a great Wood which performed with much toyl and diligence he invited them for the next day unto a sumptuous Banquet and in the height of their mirth demanded of them whether they liked better the first dayes labour or that dayes feast The answer was ready all cried out That dayes entertainment With this he engaged them to make warr upon the Medes assuring them that after a short trouble in subduing an effeminate Nation they should enjoy incomparable pleasure and be Masters of inestimable riches This served him to make the Persians follow him and conquer the Kingdom of the Medes If this motive were sufficient to make a barbarous people preferre a doubtful reward before a certain and hazardous labour why should not a certain reward and infinitely greater than the labour suffice us Christians Let us compare that Celestial Supper of the other life with the troubles of this The greatness of the Kingdom of Heaven with the littleness of our services The joyes above with the goods below and our labours will seem feasts our services repose and the felicity of earth misery and baseness What is the honour of this life which is in it self false given by lying men short and limited in respect of that honour the Just receive in Heaven which is true given by God eternal extended through the Heavens and manifested to all that are in them Men and Angels What are the riches of the Earth which often fail are ever full of dingers and cares and never free their owners from necessity in comparison of those which have no end and give all security and abundance What are their short pleasures which prejudice the health consume the substance and make infamous those who seek them in respect of those immense joyes of glory which with delight joyn honour and profit What is this life of misery to that full of blessings and happiness and what those evil qualities
added to their other torments Hell is the Prison of God a most rigorous Prison horrid and stinking wherein so many millions of men shall for ever lye fettered in chains for chains or something answerable unto them shall not there be wanting Whereupon St. Austin sayes and is followed by the Schoolmen Aug. l. 1. de Civit. Cap. 10. that the malign spirits shall be fastned to fire or certain fiery bodies from which the pain which they receive shall be incredible being thereby deprived of their natural liberty V. Less de Perfec Divin l. 13. c. 30. as it were fettered with manicles and bolts so as they are not able to remove from that place of mishap and misery It were a great torment to have burning irons cast upon our hands and feet but this and much more shall be in Hell where those fiery bodies which are to serve instead of shackles and fetters are as grave Doctors affirm to be of terrible forms proportionable unto their offences and shall with their very sight affright them Besides the bodies of the Damned after the final Judgement past shall be so streightned and crowded together in that infernal Dungeon that the holy Scripture compares them to grapes in the Wine-press which press one another until they burst Most inhumane was that torment inflicted upon three Fathers of the Society of Jesus by their Enemies at Mastrick They put certain rings of iron stuck full of sharp points of needles about their arms and feet in such manner as they could not move without pricking and wounding themselves Then they compassed them about with fire to the end that standing still they might be burnt alive and if they stirred the sharp points pierced their flesh with more intolerable pains than the fire What shall then be that torment of the Damned where they shall eternally burn without dying and without possibility of removing from the place designed them where whatsoever they touch shall be fire and sulphur into which their bodies shall at the latter day be plunged as their souls at present swim in the middle of that lake or pond of fire as the Scripture calls it like fishes in the Sea which enters into their very substance more than the water into the mouth nose and ears of him who is drowned Neither shall unsavoury smells so proper unto Prisons be wanting in that infernal Dungeon For first that fire of sulphur being pent in without vent or respiration shall send forth a most poisonous sent and if a match of brimstone be so offensive here what shall such a mass of that stuffe be in Hell Secondly the bodies of the damned shall cast forth a most horrible stench of themselves and that more or less according to the quality of their sins It happened in Lions that a Sexton entring into a certain Vault where the body of a man not long before dead lay yet uncovered there issued forth so pestilential a smell that the dead man killed the living If one mans body then cause such a stink what shall proceed from a million of bodies which though alive for their further evil yet are dead in the second death besides as hath been said all the uncleanness and filth of the World when it is purified must fall into that eternal Sink which shall infinitely encrease this noisome quality Paulus Jovius writes that the Enemy of mankind Actiolinus the Tyrant had many Prisons full of torments misery and ill smells insomuch as men took it for a happiness rather to die than to be imprisoned because being loaden with irons afflicted with hunger and poisoned with the pestilential smell of those who died in Prison and were not suffered to be removed they came to end in a slow but most cruel death The Messenians also had a most horrible Prison under earth full of stench and horror into which offenders were let down with a cord never after to see the light But what are these Prisons to that of Hell in respect of which they may be esteemed as Paradises full of Jessemy and Lillies Victor Afric l. 2. de Persec Vandal Victor Africanus relating the torments which the Arian Vandals inflicted upon the holy Martyrs accounts the stench and noisomness of the Prison to be the most hidious and unsufferable of all the rest There were saith he in one Prison 4996 Martyrs which was so straight and narrow that they flung the holy Confessors into it one upon another who stood like swarms of Locusts or to speak more piously like precious grains of Wheat In this want of room they had not place to comply with the necessities of nature but were forced to ease themselves where they stood which caused so horrid a savour as exceeded all the rest of their afflictions One time saith the Author giving a good summe of money to the Moors we had leave whilest the Vandals slept to see them and at our entrance sunk up to the knees in that filth and loathsomness It seems that the stink of Hell could not be more lively expressed than in the uncleanness and stench of this Prison but without doubt all this was but a rough draught and a dead image of that which shall be there in respect whereof this here was Perfume and Amber If one were cast into some deep dongeon without cloathes exposed to the inclemency of the cold and moysture of the place where he should not see the light of Heaven should have nothing to feed on but once a day some little peece of hard barley bread and that he were to continue there six yeares without speaking or seeing of any body and not to sleep on other bed but the cold ground what a misery were this one week of that habitation would appeare longer than a hundred years Yet compare this with what shall be in that banishment and prison of Hell and you shall finde the miserable life of that man to be a happiness There in all his troubles he should not meet with any to scoff and jest at his misfortunes none to torment and whip him but in Hell he shall finde both The Devils shall not cease to deride whip and cruelly torment him There should be no horrid fights no fearefull noyses of howlings groanings and lamentations In hell the eyes and eares of the damned shall never be free from such affrights There should be no flames of fire to scorch him In hell they shall burn into his very bowels There he might move and walk In hell not stirr a foot There he may breath the ayr without stink In hell he shall suck in nothing but flames stink and sulphur There he might hope for coming forth In hell there is no remedy no redemption There that little peece of hard bread would every day seem a dainty But in hell in Millions of yeares his eyes shall not behold a crum of bread nor a drop of water but he shall eternally rage with a dog-like hunger and a burning thirst