I No - '■ +'4 **' ' 
 
 George Cheyne Shattuck, 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 From the Library 
 of the 
 Diocese of Springfield 
 Protestant Episcopal 
 Church 
 Presented 1917 
 
 208 
 T2I 
 
 M.3 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 \ 
 
 https://archive.org/details/practicalworks03tayl 
 
THE 
 
 PRACTICAL WORKS 
 
 THE RIGHT REVEREND 
 
 JEREMY TAYLOR, D.D. 
 
 CHAPLAIN IN ORDINARY TO KING CHARLES THE FIRST, AND SOME TIME 
 LORD BISHOP OF DOWN AND CONNOR. 
 
 A SKETCH OF THE LIFE AND TIMES 
 OF THE AUTHOR, 
 
 BY 
 
 THE REV. GEORGE CROLY, LL.D. 
 
 RECTOR OF ST. STEPHEN'S, WALBRQOK. 
 
 IN EIGHT VOLS. 
 VOL. III. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 JOSEPH RICKERB^Y, SHERBOURN LANE, 
 
 KING WILLIAM STREET, CITY. 
 
 1838. 
 
LONDON ! 
 J'RINTED BY JOSEPH RICKERBY, 
 SHFRBOURN LANE. 
 
THE GREAT EXEMPLAR 
 
 OF 
 
 SANCTITY AND HOLY LIFE ; 
 
 DESCRIBED IN 
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE LIFE AND DEATH 
 
 OF OUR EVER ELESSED SAVIOUR 
 
 JESUS CHRIST: 
 
 WITH 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS AND DISCOURSES UPON THE SEVERAL PARTS 
 OF THE STORY; 
 
 AND 
 
 PRAYERS 
 
 FITTED TO THE SEVERAL MYSTERIES. 
 
 BY JEREMY TAYLOR, D.D. 
 
 CHAPLAIN IN ORDINARY TO KING CHARLES THE FIRST, AND SOME TIME 
 BISHOP OF DOWN AND CONNOR. 
 
 VOL. III. 
 
 Qui sequitur me, non ambulat in tenebris. 
 
 LONDON : 
 p^i-H RICKERBY, SHERBOURN LANE, 
 
 KING WILLIAM STREET, CITY. 
 
 1838. 
 
v/3 
 
 HISTORY OF THE LIFE AND DEATH 
 
 OF THE 
 
 HOLY JESUS, 
 
 BEGINNING AT THE SECOND YEAR OF HIS PREACHING, 
 UNTIL HIS ASCENSION. 
 
 PART III. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page. 
 
 The Epistles Dedicatory . 1 
 
 THE LIFE OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR. 
 PART III. 
 
 Sect. XIII.— Of the Second Year of the Preaching of 
 
 Jesus ...... 5 
 
 Discourse XV. — Of the Excellency and 
 Advantages of bearing Christ's Yoke, 
 and living according to his Institution . 19 
 Discourse XVI. — Of Certainty of Salva- 
 tion 72 
 
 Sect. XIV. — Of tLe Third Year of the Preaching of Jesus 90 
 Discourse XVII. — Of Scandal; or giv- 
 ing and taking Offence . . .117 
 Discourse XVIII. — Of the Causes and 
 Manner of the Divine Judgments . 138 
 
 Sect. XV.— i 
 
 Of the Accidents happening from the Death 
 of Lazarus, until the Death and Burial 
 of Jesus . .... 164 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Sect. XV. — continued. 
 
 Considerations of some Preparatory Acci- 
 dents before the Entrance of Jesus into his 
 Passion 198 
 
 Considerations upon the Washing of his 
 Disciples' Feet by Jesus, and his Sermon 
 of Humility . . . . .213 
 
 Discourse XIX.— Of the Institution and 
 Reception of the Holy Sacrament of the 
 Lord's Supper ..... 229 
 
 Considerations upon the Accidents happen- 
 ing on the Vespers of the Passion . 269 
 
 Considerations upon the Accidents happen- 
 ing from the Apprehension till the Cruci- 
 fixion of Jesus ..... 285 
 
 Discourse XX. — Of Death, and the due 
 Manner of Preparation to it . . 303 
 
 Considerations upon the Crucifixion of the 
 Holy Jesus '339 
 
 Sect. XVI. — Of the Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus 356 
 Considerations upon the Accidents happen- 
 ing in the interval after the Death of the 
 Holy Jesus, until his Resurrection . 362 
 
TO THE 
 
 EIGHT HONOURABLE AND VIRTUOUS LADY, 
 
 THE LADY FRANCES, 
 COUNTESS OF CARBERY. 
 
 Madam, 
 
 Since the Divine Providence hath been pleased to bind 
 up the great breaches of my little fortune by your charity and 
 nobleness of a religious tenderness, I account it an excellent cir- 
 cumstance and handsomeness of condition, that I have the for- 
 tune of St. Athanasius, to have my persecution relieved and 
 comforted by an honourable and excellent lady. And I have 
 nothing to return for this honour done to ine, but to do as the 
 poor paralytics and infirm people in the gospel did, when our 
 blessed Saviour cured them — they went and told it to all the coun- 
 try, and made the vicinage full of the report, as themselves were 
 of health and joy. And although I know the modesty of your 
 person and religion had rather do favours than own them ; yet 
 give me leave to draw aside the curtain and retirement of your 
 charity : for I had rather your virtue should blush, than my un- 
 thankfulness make me ashamed. Madam, I intended by this 
 address not only to return you spirituals for your temporals, but 
 to make your noble usages oi me and mine to become, like your 
 other chanties, productive of advantages to the standers-by. 
 For although the beams of the sun reflected from a marble, re- 
 turn not home to the body and fountain of light ; yet they that 
 VOL. III. B 
 
2 
 
 EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 
 
 walk below feel the benefit of a doubled heat. So whatever re- 
 flections or returns of your favours I can make, although they 
 fall short of what your worth does most reasonably challenge, 
 and can proceed but towards you with forward desires and dis- 
 tant approaches ; yet I am desirous to believe that those who 
 walk between us may receive assistances from this intercourse, 
 and the following papers may be auxiliary to the enkindling of 
 their piety, as to the confirming and establishing yours. For 
 although the great prudence of your most noble Lord, and the 
 modesties of your own temperate and sweeter dispositions, become 
 the great endearments of virtue to you ; yet because it is necessary 
 that you make religion the business of your life, I thought it not 
 an impertinent application, to express my thankfulness to your 
 honour by that which may best become my duty and my grati- 
 tude, because it may do you the greatest service. Madam, I 
 must beg your pardon, that I have opened the sanctuary of your 
 retired virtues ; but I was obliged to publish the endearments 
 and favours of your noble Lord and yourself towards me and my 
 relatives. For as your hands are so clasped, that one ring is the 
 ligature of them both ; so I have found emanations from that 
 conjuncture of hands with a consent so forward and apt, that no- 
 thing can satisfy for my obligations, but my being, in the great- 
 est eminency of thankfulness and humility of person, 
 
 Madam, 
 
 Your Honour's most obliged 
 
 And most humble Servant, 
 
 JER. TAYLOR. 
 
TO THE 
 
 RIGHT HONOURABLE AND VIRTUOUS LADY, 
 
 THE LADY ALICE, 
 COUNTESS OF CARBERY. 
 
 Madam, 
 
 By the Divine Providence, which disposes all things 
 wisely and charitably, you are, in the affections of your noblest 
 Lord, successor to a very dear and most excellent person, and de- 
 signed to fill up those offices of piety to her dear pledges, which 
 the haste which God made to glorify and secure her would not 
 permit her to finish. I have much ado to refrain from telling 
 great stories of her wisdom, piety, judgment, sweetness, andreii- 
 gion ; but that it would renew the wound, and make our sins 
 bleed afresh at the memory of that dear saint : and we hope that 
 much of the storm of the Divine anger is over, because he hath 
 repaired the breach by sending you to go on upon her account, 
 and to give countenance and establishment to all those graces 
 which were warranted and derived from her example. Madam, 
 the nobleness of your family, your education, and your excellent 
 principles, your fair dispositions, and affable comportment, have 
 not only made all your servants confident of your worthiness and 
 great virtues, but have disposed you so highly and necessarily 
 towards an active and a zealous religion, that we expect it should 
 grow to the height of a great example — that you may draw others 
 after yon, as the eye follows the light in all the angles of its re- 
 
4 
 
 EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 
 
 tirunent, or open stages of its publication. In order to this, I 
 have chosen your honour into a new relation, and have endeared 
 you to this instrument of piety ; that if you will please to do it 
 countenance, and employ it in your counsels and pious offices, 
 it may minister to your appetites of religion; which as they are 
 already fair and prosperous, so they may swell up to a vastness 
 large enough to entertain all the secrets and pleasures of religion, 
 that so you may add to the blessings and prosperities which al- 
 ways dwell in that family where you are now fixed, new title to 
 more, upon the Stock of all those promises which have secured 
 and entailed felicities upon such persons who have no vanities, 
 but very many virtues. Madam, I could not do you any service 
 but by doing myself this honour, to adorn my book with this 
 fairest title and inscription of your name. You may observe, but 
 cannot blame my ambition, so long as it is instanced in a reli- 
 gious service, and means nothing but this, that I may signify 
 how much I honour that person who is designed to bring new 
 blessings to that family which is so honourable in itself, and for 
 so many reasons dear to me. Madam, upon that account, be- 
 sides the stock of your own worthiness, I am 
 
 Your Honour's most humble 
 
 And obedient Servant, 
 
 JER. TAYLOR. 
 
THE LIFE 
 
 OP OUR BLESSED 
 
 LORD AND SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST. 
 
 SECTION XIII. 
 
 Of the Second Year o f the Preaching of Jesus. 
 
 1. When the first year of Jesus, the year of 
 peace and undisturbed preaching, was expired, 
 1 there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up 
 to Jerusalem :' 1 (this feast was the second pass- 
 over he kept after he began to preach ; not the 
 feast of pentecost or tabernacles, both which were 
 passed before Jesus came last from Judea : (whither 
 when he was now come, he finds an impotent per- 
 son lying at the pool of Bethesda, waiting till the 
 angel should move the waters, after which, whoso- 
 ever first stepped in was cured of his infirmity. The 
 poor man had waited thirty-eight years, and still 
 was prevented by some other of the hospital that 
 needed a physician. But Jesus seeing him, had 
 pity on him, cured him, and bade him ' take up his 
 
 1 John, v. I, 6cc. ; Iren. lib. ii. c 10. 
 
6 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF 
 
 bed and walk.' This cure happened to be wrought 
 upon the sabbath-day; for which the Jews were so 
 moved with indignation that they sought to slay 
 him. And their anger was enraged by his calling 
 himself the Son of God, and making himself equal 
 with God. 
 
 2. Upon occasion of this offence, which they 
 snatched at before it was ministered, Jesus dis- 
 courses upon " his mission, and derivation of his 
 authority from the Father ; of the union between 
 them, and the excellent communications of power, 
 participation of dignity, delegation of judicature, 
 reciprocations and reflections of honour from the 
 Father to the Son, and back again to the Father. 
 He preaches of life and salvation to them that 
 believe in him ; prophecies of the resurrection 
 of the dead by the efficacy of the voice of the Son 
 of God ; speaks of the day of judgment, the dif- 
 fering conditions after, of salvation and damnation 
 respectively ; confirms his words and mission by 
 the testimony of John the Baptist, of Moses, and 
 the other Scriptures, and of God himself." And 
 still the scandal rises higher ; ' for in the second 
 sabbath after the first/ 2 that is, in the first day of 
 unleavened bread, which happened the next day 
 after the weekly sabbath, the disciples of Jesus 
 pull ripe ears of corn, rub them in their hands, and 
 eat them to satisfy their hunger. For which he 
 offered satisfaction to their scruples, convincing 
 them, that works of necessity are to be permitted 
 even to the breach of a positive temporary consti- 
 tution ; and that works of mercy are best serving of 
 God upon any day whatsoever, or any part of the 
 
 1 John, v. 19, &c. 
 
 2 Suidas, Voc. Sa/3/3aroi/. 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 7 
 
 day that is vacant to other offices, and proper for a 
 religious festival. 
 
 3. But when neither reason nor religion would 
 give them satisfaction ; but that they went about to 
 kill him, he withdrew himself from Jerusalem, and 
 returned to Galilee : whither the Scribes and Pha- 
 risees followed him, observing his actions, and 
 whether or no he would prosecute that which they 
 called profanation of their sabbath, by doing acts 
 of mercy upon that day. He still did so : for en- 
 tering into one of the synagogues of Galilee upon 
 the sabbath, Jesus saw a man (whom St. Jerome 
 reports to have been a mason 1 ) coming to Tyre, 
 and complaining that his hand was withered, and 
 desiring help of him, that he might again be re- 
 stored to the use of his hand, lest he should be 
 compelled, with misery and shame, to beg his bread. 
 Jesus restored his hand as whole as the other in 
 the midst of all those spies and enemies. Upon 
 which act, being confirmed in their malice, the 
 Pharisees went forth, and joined with the Hero- 
 dians, (a sect of people who said Herod was the 
 Messias, because by the decree of the Roman 
 senate, when the sceptre departed from Judah, he 
 was declared king, 2 ) and both together took coun- 
 sel how they might kill him. 
 
 4. Jesus therefore departed again to the sea- 
 coast, and his companies increased as his fame : 
 for he was now followed by new multitudes from 
 
 1 Evangel. Naz. quod S. Hieron. ex Hebr. in Grascum trans- 
 tulit. "KjjLtvv \is teSviike, to d' tjiiktv Xifibg eXsyxei' Sticrov fie 
 fiaoikev, [i&crucbv r'jfiircvov* 
 
 2 Sic Tertullianus, Epiphanius, Chrysostomus, et Theophy- 
 lactus, et Hieron. Dialog, advers. Lucif. uno ore affirmant. 
 
8 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF 
 
 Galilee, from Judea, from Jerusalem, from Tdumaea, 
 from beyond Jordan, from about Tyre and Sidon ; 
 who hearing the report of his miraculous power to 
 cure all diseases by the word of his mouth, or the 
 touch of his hand, or the handling his garment, 
 came with their ambulatory hospital of their sick 
 and possessed ; and they pressed on him, but to 
 touch him, and were all immediately cured. The 
 devils confessing publicly, that he was the Son of 
 God, till they were, upon all such occasions, re- 
 strained and compelled to silence. 
 
 5. But now Jesus having commanded a ship to 
 be in readiness against any inconvenience or 
 troublesome pressures of the multitude, went up 
 into a mountain to pray, and continued in prayer 
 all night, intending to make the first ordination of 
 apostles : which the next day he did, choosing out 
 of the number of his disciples these twelve to be 
 apostles ; Simon Peter and Andrew, James and 
 John, the sons of thunder, Philip and Bartholo- 
 mew, Matthew and Thomas, James, the son of 
 Alphaeus, and Simon the zelot, Judas, the brother 
 of James, and Judas Iscariot. With these de- 
 scending from the mountain to the plain, he re- 
 peated the same sermon, or much of it, which he 
 had before preached in the first beginning of his 
 prophesyings ; that he might publish his gospel to 
 these new auditors, and also more particularly in- 
 form his apostles in the doctrine of the kingdom : 
 for now, because he saw Israel scattered like sheep 
 having no shepherd, he did purpose to send these 
 twelve abroad to preach repentance and the ap- 
 proximation of the kingdom ; and therefore first 
 instructed them in the mysterious parts of his holy 
 
JESUSS PREACHING. 
 
 9 
 
 doctrine, and gave them also particular instruc- 
 tions, together with their temporary commission 
 for that journey. 
 
 6. " For Jesus sent them out by two and two 
 giving them power over unclean spirits, and to 
 heal all manner of sickness and diseases ; telling 
 them they were the light, and the eyes, and the salt 
 of the world, so intimating their duties of diligence, 
 holiness, and incorruption ; giving them in charge 
 to preach the gospel; to dispense their power and 
 miracles freely, as they had received it; to anoint 
 sick persons with oil ; not to enter into any Sama- 
 ritan town, but to go rather to the lost sheep of the 
 house of Israel ; to provide no viaticum for their 
 journeys, but to put themselves upon the religion 
 and piety of their proselytes. He arms them 
 against persecutions ; gives them leave to fly the 
 storm from city to city ; promises them the assist- 
 ances of his Spirit; encourages them, by his own 
 example of long-sufferance, and by instances of 
 divine Providence, expressed even to creatures of 
 smallest value, and by promise of great rewards, 
 to the confident confession of his name ; and fur- 
 nishes them with some propositions, which are like 
 so many bills of exchange, upon the trust of which 
 they might take up necessaries; promising great 
 retributions, not only to them who quit any thing of 
 value for the sake of Jesus, but to them that offer a 
 cup of water to a thirsty disciple : and with these 
 instructions they departed to preach in the cities." 
 
 7. And Jesus returning to Capernaum, received 
 the address of a faithful centurion of the legion 
 called " the iron legion," 1 (which usually quartered 
 
 ' Dio. Hist. Rom. lib. lv. 
 
10 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF 
 
 in Judea,) in behalf of his servant, whom he loved, 
 and who was grievously afflicted with the palsy; 
 and healed him, as a reward and honour to his 
 faith: and from thence going to the city Nain. he 
 raised to life the only son of a widow, whom the 
 mourners followed in the street, bearing the corpse 
 sadly to his funeral. Upon the fame of these and 
 divers other miracles, John the Baptist, who was 
 still in prison, (for he was not put to death till the 
 latter end of this year,) sent two of his disciples to 
 him by divine providence, or else by John's desig- 
 nation, to minister occasions of his greater publica- 
 tion, inquiring if he was the Messias. To whom 
 Jesus returned no answer, but a demonstration 
 taken from the nature of the thing, and the glory of 
 the miracles ; saying, Return to John, and tell him 
 what you see ; ' for the deaf hear, the blind see, 
 the lame walk, the dead are raised, and the lepers 
 are cleansed, and to the poor the gospel is preach- 
 ed : M which were the characteristic notes of the 
 Messias, according to the predictions of the holy 
 prophets. 
 
 8. When John s disciples were gone with this 
 answer, Jesus began to speak concerning John, 
 of the austerity and holiness of his person, the 
 greatness of his function, the divinity of his com- 
 mission ; saying, that he was greater than a pro- 
 phet, a burning and shining light, the Elias that 
 was to come, and the consummation or ending of 
 the old prophets. Adding withal, thut the perverse- 
 ness of that age was most notorious in the enter- 
 tainment of himself and the Baptist : for neither 
 could the Baptist, who came neither eating nor 
 
 1 Isaiah, xxxv. 4, 5, 6. 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 11 
 
 drinking, (that by his austerity and mortified de- 
 portment he might invade the judgment and affec- 
 tions of the people,) nor Jesus, who came both 
 eating and drinking, (that by a moderate and an 
 affable life, framed to the compliance and common 
 use of men, he might sweetly insinuate into the 
 affections of the multitude,) obtain belief amongst 
 them. They could object against every thing, but 
 nothing could please them. But wisdom and 
 righteousness had a theatre in its own family, 
 and is justified of all her children. Then he pro- 
 ceeds to a more applied reprehension of Caper- 
 naum and Chorazin and Bethsaida, for being per- 
 tinacious in their sins and infidelity, in defiance 
 and reproof of all the mighty works which had 
 been wrought in them. But these things were not 
 revealed to all dispositions; the wise and the 
 mighty of the world were not subjects prepared 
 for the simplicity and softer impresses of the gos- 
 pel, and the downright severity of its sanctions. 
 And therefore Jesus glorified God for the magni- 
 fying of his mercy, in that these things, which 
 were hid from the great ones, were revealed to 
 babes ; and concludes this sermon with an invita- 
 tion of all wearied and disconsolate persons, laden 
 with sin and misery, to come to him, promising 
 ease to their burdens, and refreshment to their 
 weariness, and to exchange their heavy pressures 
 into an easy yoke, and a light burden." 
 
 9. When Jesus had ended this sermon, one of 
 the Pharisees named Simon, invited him to eat 
 with him : 1 into whose house when he was entered, 
 a certain woman that was a sinner, abiding there 
 
 1 Luke, vii. 
 
12 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF 
 
 in the city, beard of it : her name was Mary. She 
 had been married to a noble personage, a native of 
 the town and castle of Magdal, from whence she 
 had her name of Magdalen, though she herself was 
 born in Bethany. A widow she was, and prompted 
 by her wealth, liberty, and youth to an intemperate 
 life and too free entertainments. She came to 
 Jesus into the Pharisee's house ; not (as did the 
 staring multitude) to glut her eyes with the sight 
 of a miraculous and glorious person ; nor (as did 
 the centurion, or the Syro-phcenician, or the 
 ruler of the synagogue) for cure of her sickness, or 
 in behalf of her friend, or child, or servant ; but 
 (the only example of so coming) she came in 
 remorse and regret for her sins. She came to 
 Jesus to lay her burden at his feet, and to present 
 him with a broken heart, and a weeping eye, and 
 great affection, and a box of nard pistic, salutary 
 and precious. For she came trembling, and fell 
 down before him, weeping bitterly for her sins, 
 pouring out a flood great enough to wash the feet 
 of the blessed Jesus, and wiping them with the 
 hairs of her head : after which she brake the box, 
 and anointed his feet with ointment. Which ex- 
 pression was so great an ecstasy of love, sorrow, 
 and adoration, that to anoint the feet even of the 
 greatest monarch was long unknown, and in all 
 the pomps and greatnesses of the Roman prodi- 
 gality, it was not used till Otho taught it to Nero, 
 in whose instance it was by Pliny reckoned for a 
 prodigy of unnecessary profusion : 1 and in itself, 
 without the circumstance of so free a dispensation, 
 it was a present for a prince, and an alabaster box 
 
 1 Plin. Natur. Hist. lib. xiii. c. 3. Vide Athen. Deipnosoph. 
 lib. xii. c. 30. Herodotus in Thalia. 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 13 
 
 of nard pistic was sent as a present from Cam- 
 byses to the king of ^Ethiopia. 
 
 10. When Simon observed this sinner so busy 
 in the expresses of her religion and veneration to 
 Jesus, he thought with himself that this was no 
 prophet, that did not know her to be a sinner, or 
 no just person, that would suffer her to touch him. 
 For although the Jews' religion did permit harlots 
 of their own nation to live, and enjoy the privileges 
 of their nation, save that their oblations were re- 
 fused ; yet the Pharisees, who pretended to a 
 greater degree of sanctity than others, would not 
 admit them to civil usages, or the benefits of ordi- 
 nary society ; and thought religion itself, and the 
 honour of a prophet, was concerned in the interests 
 of the same superciliousness. And therefore 
 Simon made an objection within himself ; which 
 Jesus knowing (for he understood his thoughts as 
 well as his words) made her apology and his own 
 in a civil question, expressed in a parable of two 
 debtors, to whom a greater and less debt respec- 
 tively was forgiven ; both of them concluding, that 
 they would love their merciful creditor in propor- 
 tion to his mercy and donative. And this was the 
 case of Mary Magdalen, to whom, because much 
 was forgiven, she loved much, and expressed it in 
 characters so large, that the Pharisee might read 
 his own incivilities and inhospitable entertainment 
 of the Master, when it stood confronted with the 
 magnificency of Mary Magdalen's penance and 
 charity. 
 
 11. When Jesus had dined he was presented 
 with the sad sight of a poor demoniac, possessed with 
 a blind and dumb devil ; in whose behalf his friends 
 entreated Jesus that he would cast the devil out : 
 
14 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF 
 
 which he did immediately; and the blind man saw, 
 and the dumb spake, so much to the amazement 
 of the people, that they ran in so prodigious com- 
 panies after him, and so scandalized the Pharisees, 
 who thought that by means of this prophet their 
 reputation would be lessened, and their schools 
 empty, that first a rumour was scattered up and 
 down, from an uncertain principle, but communi- 
 cated with tumult and apparent noises, that Jesus 
 was beside himself. Upon which rumour his 
 friends and kindred came together to see, and to 
 make provisions accordingly ; and the holy virgin- 
 mother came herself, but without any apprehen- 
 sions of any such horrid accident. The words and 
 things she had from the beginning laid up in her 
 heart, would furnish her with principles exclusive 
 of all apparitions of such fancies : but she came to 
 see what that persecution was, which, under that 
 colour, it was likely the Pharisees might com- 
 mence. 
 
 12. When the mother of Jesus and his kindred 
 came, they found him in a house encircled with 
 people full of wonder and admiration. And there 
 the holy virgin-mother might hear part of her own 
 prophecy verified, That the generations of the 
 earth should call her blessed : for a woman wor- 
 shipping Jesus cried out, * Blessed is the womb 
 that bare thee, and the paps that gave thee suck/ 
 To this Jesus replied, not denying her to be highly 
 blessed who had received the honour of being the 
 mother of the Messias, but advancing the dignities 
 of spiritual excellencies far above this greatest 
 temporal honour in the world ; ' Yea, rather, blessed 
 are they that hear the word of God, and do it.' 
 For in respect of the issues of spiritual perfections 
 
JESUS's PREACHING. 
 
 15 
 
 and their proportionable benedictions, all immuni- 
 ties and temporal honours are empty and hollow 
 blessings ; and all relations of kindred disband and 
 empty themselves into the great channels and 
 floods of divinity. 
 
 13. For when Jesus being in the house, they 
 told him, ' his mother and his brethren staid for 
 him without/ he told them those relations were 
 less than the ties of duty and religion. For those 
 clear names of mother and brethren, which are hal- 
 lowed by the laws of God and the endearments of 
 nature, are made far more sacred when a spiritual 
 cognation does supervene, when the relations are 
 subjected in persons religious and holy : but if 
 they be abstract and separate, the conjunction of 
 persons in spiritual bands, in the same faith, and 
 the same hope, and the union of them in the same 
 mystical head, is an adunation nearer to identity 
 than those distances between parents and children, 
 which are only cemented by the actions of nature, 
 as it is of distinct consideration from the spirit. 
 For Jesus, pointing to his disciples, said, ' Behold 
 my mother and my brethren ; for whosoever doeth 
 the will of my Father which is in heaven, he is my 
 brother, and sister, and mother.' 
 
 14. But the Pharisees, upon the occasion of the 
 miracles, renewed the old quarrel : ' He casteth 
 out devils by Beelzebub. Which senseless and illi- 
 terate objection Christ having confuted, charged 
 them highly upon the guilt of an unpardonable 
 crime; telling them that the so charging those ac- 
 tions of his, done in the virtue of the divine Spirit, 
 is a sin against the Holy Ghost : and however 
 they might be bold with the Son of Man, and 
 prevarications against his words, or injuries to his 
 
16 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF 
 
 person might, upon repentance and baptism, find 
 a pardon ; yet it was a matter of greater considera- 
 tion to sin against the Holy Ghost; that would 
 find no pardon here nor hereafter. But taking 
 occasion upon this discourse, he, by an ingenious 
 and mysterious parable, gives the world great cau- 
 tion of recidivation and backsliding after repent- 
 ance. For if the ' devil returns into an house 
 once swept and garnished, he bringeth seven spi- 
 rits more impure than himself ; and the last estate 
 of that man is worse than the first.' 
 
 15. After this, Jesus went from the house of the 
 Pharisee, and coming to the sea of Tiberias or Gen- 
 nesaret, (for it was called the sea of Tiberias from 
 a town on the banks of the lake,) taught the people 
 upon the shore, himself sitting in the ship. But 
 he taught them by parables, under which were hid 
 mysterious senses, which shined through their veil, 
 like a bright sun through an eye closed with a thin 
 eyelid ; it being light enough to show their infi- 
 delity, but not to dispel those thick Egyptian 
 darknesses which they had contracted by their ha- 
 bitual indispositions and pertinacious aversations. 
 By the parable 6 of the sower scattering his seed 
 by the way-side,' and ' some on stony, some on 
 thorny, some on good ground/ he intimated the 
 several capacities or indispositions of men's hearts ; 
 the carelessness of some, the frowardness and 
 levity of others, the easiness and softness of a third, 
 and how they are spoiled with worldliness and 
 cares, and how many ways there are to miscarry ; 
 and that but one sort of men receive the word, and 
 bring forth the fruits of a holy life. By the para- 
 ble of tares permitted to grow amongst the wheat, 
 he intimated the toleration of dissenting opinions 
 
JESUS S PREACHING, 
 
 17 
 
 not destructive of piety or civil societies. By the 
 three parables of the seed growing insensibly, of 
 the grain of mustard-seed swelling up to a tree, of 
 a little leven qualifying the whole lump, he signi- 
 fied the increment of the gospel, and the blessings 
 upon the apostolical sermons. 
 
 16. Which parables when he had privately to 
 his apostles rendered into their proper senses, he 
 added to them two parables concerning the dig- 
 nity of the gospel; comparing it to ' treasure hid in 
 a field/ and ' a jewel of great price/ for the pur- 
 chase of which every good merchant must quit all 
 that he hath rather than miss it : telling them 
 withal, that however purity and spiritual perfec- 
 tions were intended by the gospel, yet it would not 
 be acquired by every person; but the public pro- 
 fessors of Christianity should be a mixed multitude, 
 ' like a net enclosing fishes good and bad.' After 
 which discourses he retired from the sea-side, and 
 went to his own city of Nazareth ; where he 
 preached so excellently upon certain words of the 
 prophet Isaiah, 1 that all the people wondered at the. 
 wisdom which he expressed in his divine discourses. 
 But the men of Nazareth did not do honour to the 
 prophet, that was their countryman, because they 
 knew him in all the disadvantages of youth, and 
 kindred, and trade, and poverty ; still retaining in 
 their minds the infirmities and humilities of his first 
 years, and keeping the same apprehensions of him, 
 a man, a glorious prophet, which they had to him a 
 child in the shop of a carpenter. But when Jesus, 
 in his sermon, had reproved their infidelity, at 
 which he wondered, and therefore did but few mi- 
 
 VOL. III. 
 
 1 Isaiah, lxi. 1 
 
 C 
 
18 THE SECOND YEAR OF JESUSS PREACHING. 
 
 racles there in respect of what he had done at Ca- 
 pernaum, and intimated the prelation of that city 
 before Nazareth, f they thrust him out of the city, 
 and led him to the brow of the hill on which the 
 city was built,' intending * to throw him down 
 headlong.' But his work was not yet finished, 
 therefore he, f passing through the midst of them, 
 went his way.' 
 
 17. Jesus therefore, departing from Nazareth, 
 went up and down to all the towns and castles of 
 Galilee, attended by his disciples, and certain wo- 
 men out of whom he had cast unclean spirits; such 
 as were Mary Magdalene; Johanna, wife to Chuza, 
 Herod's steward ; Susanna, and some others, who 
 did for him offices of provision, and ' ministered to 
 him out of their own substance/ and became part of 
 that holy college which about this time began to be 
 full ; because now the apostles were returned from 
 their preaching, full of joy that the devils were 
 made subject to the word of their mouth, and the 
 empire of their prayers, and invocation of the holy 
 name of Jesus. But their master gave them a leni- 
 tive to assuage the tumour and excrescency, inti- 
 mating that such privileges are not solid founda- 
 tions of a holy joy, but so far as they co-operate 
 toward the great end of God's glory and their own 
 salvation ; to which when they are consigned, and 
 ' their names written in heaven/ in the book of 
 election and registers of predestination, then their 
 joy is reasonable, holy, true, and perpetual. 1 
 
 18. But when Herod had heard these things of 
 Jesus, presently his apprehensions were such as 
 derived from his guilt: he thought it was John the 
 
 1 Vide Discourse of the Certainty of Salvation, Num. 3. 
 
EXCELLENCY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 19 
 
 Baptist who was risen from the dead, and that 
 these mighty works were demonstrations of his 
 power, increased by the superadditions of immorta- 
 lity and diviner influences, made proportionable to 
 the honour of a martyr and the state of separation: 
 for a little before this time Herod had sent to the 
 castle of Macheruns, where John was prisoner, and 
 caused him to be beheaded. His head Herodias 
 buried in her own palace, thinking to secure it 
 against a reunion, lest it should again disturb her 
 unlawful lusts, and disquiet Herod's conscience. 
 But the body the disciples of John gathered up, 
 and carried it, with honour and sorrow, and buried 
 it in Sebaste, in the confines of Samaria, making 
 his grave between the bodies of Elizeus and Abdias 
 the prophets. And about this time was the pass- 
 over of the Jews. 
 
 DISCOURSE XV. 
 
 Of the Excellency, Ease, Reasonableness, arid Advan- 
 tages of bearing Christ's Yoke, and living accord- 
 ing to his Institution. 
 
 I. The holy Jesus came to break from off our 
 necks two great yokes ; the one of sin, by which 
 we were fettered and imprisoned in the condi- 
 tion of slaves and miserable persons ; the other 
 of Moses's law, by which we were kept in pu- 
 pilage and minority, and a state of imperfection : 
 and asserted us into ' the glorious liberty of the 
 sons of God.' The first was a despotic empire, and 
 the government of a tyrant : the second was of 
 a schoolmaster, severe, absolute, and imperious ; 
 
 c 2 
 
20 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 but it was in order to a further good, yet nothing 
 pleasant in the sufferance and load. And now 
 Christ, having taken off these two, hath put on a 
 third. He quits us of our burden, but not of our 
 duty ; and hath changed the former tyranny and 
 the less perfect discipline into the sweetness of pa- 
 ternal regiment, and the excellency of such an 
 institution, whose every precept carries part of its 
 reward in hand, and assurances of after glories. 
 Moses's law was like sharp and unpleasant physic, 
 certainly painful, but uncertainly healthful : for it 
 was not then communicated to them by promise 
 and universal revelations, that the end of their 
 obedience should be life eternal ; but they were 
 full of hopes it might be so, as we are of health, 
 when we have a learned and wise physician. But 
 as yet the reward was in a cloud, and the hopes in 
 fetters and confinement. But the law of Christ is 
 like Christ's healing of diseases ; he does it easily, 
 and he does it infallibly. The event is certainly 
 consequent, and the manner of cure is by a touch 
 of his hand, or a word of his mouth, or an approxi- 
 mation to the hem of his garment, without pain 
 and vexatious instruments. My meaning is, 
 that Christianity is, by the assistance of Christ's 
 Spirit, which he promised us, and gave us in the 
 gospel, made very easy to us : and yet a reward so 
 great is promised, as were enough to make a lame 
 man to walk, and a broken arm endure the bur- 
 den ; a reward great enough to make us willing to 
 do violence to all our inclinations, passions, and 
 desires. A hundred weight to a giant is a light 
 burden, because his strength is disproportionably 
 great, and makes it as easy to him as an ounce is 
 to a child. And yet if we had not the strength of 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 21 
 
 giants, if the hundred weight were of gold or jewels, 
 a weaker person would think it no trouble to bear 
 that burden, if it were the reward of his portage, 
 and the hire of his labours. The Spirit is given to us 
 to enable us, and heaven is promised to encourage 
 us: the first makes us able, and the second makes 
 us willing ; and when we have power and affec- 
 tions we cannot complain of pressure. And this 
 is the meaning of our blessed Saviour's invitation : 
 1 Come unto me, for my burden is light, my yoke 
 is easy.' 1 Which St. John also observed: ' For 
 this is the love of God, that we keep his com- 
 mandments ; and his commandments are not 
 grievous ;' for ' whatsoever is born of God, over- 
 cometh the world : and this is the victory that 
 overcometh, even our faith that is, our belief of 
 God's promises, the promise of the Spirit for pre- 
 sent aid, and of heaven for the future reward, is 
 strong enough to overcome all the world. 
 
 2. But besides that God hath made his yoke 
 easy by exterior supports, more than ever was in 
 any other religion, Christianity is of itself, accord- 
 ing to human estimate, a religion more easy and 
 desirable by our natural and reasonable appetites, 
 than sin, in the midst of all its pleasures and ima- 
 ginary felicities. Virtue hath more pleasure in it 
 than sin, and hath all satisfactions to every desire 
 of man in order to human and prudent ends ; 
 which I shall represent in the consideration of these 
 particulars: 1, To live according to the laws of 
 Jesus, is in some things most natural and propor- 
 tionable to the desires and first intentions of nature. 
 2, There is in it less trouble than in sin. 3, It 
 
 * Matt. xi. 28, 30. 
 
 2 John, v. 3, 4. 
 
22 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 conduces infinitely to the content of our lives, and 
 natural and political satisfactions. 4, It is a 
 means to preserve our" temporal lives long and 
 healthy. 5, It is most reasonable ; and he only is 
 prudent that does so, and he is a fool that does not. 
 And all this besides the considerations of a glorious 
 and happy eternity. 
 
 3. Concerning the first, I consider that we do 
 very ill, when, instead of making our natural in- 
 firmity an instrument of humility and of recourse 
 to the grace of God, we pretend the sin of 
 Adam to countenance our actual sins, natural 
 infirmity to excuse our malice ; either laying Adam 
 in fault, for deriving the disability upon us, or God, 
 for putting us into the necessity. But the evils 
 that we feel in this are from the rebellion of the 
 inferior appetite against reason, or against any re- 
 ligion that puts restraint upon our first desires : 
 and therefore, in carnal and sensual instances, 
 accidentally we find the more natural averseness, 
 because God's laws have put our irascible and con- 
 cupiscible faculties in fetters and restraints. Yet 
 in matters of duty, which are of immaterial and 
 spiritual concernment, all our natural reason is a per- 
 fect enemy and contradiction to, and a law against 
 vice. It is natural for us to love our parents, and 
 they who do not are unnatural ; they do violence 
 to those dispositions which God gave us to the 
 constitution of our nature, and for the designs of 
 virtue : and all those tendernesses of affection, 
 those bowels and relenting dispositions, which are 
 the endearments of parents and children, are also 
 the bands of duty. Every degree of love makes 
 duty delectable; and therefore, either by nature 
 we are inclined to hate our parents, which is 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 53 
 
 against all reason and experience, or else we are 
 by nature inclined to do them all that which is 
 the effect of love to such superiors, and principles 
 of being and dependency : and every prevarication 
 horn the rule, effects, and expresses of love is a 
 contradiction to nature, and a mortification ; to 
 which we cannot be invited by any thing from 
 within, but by something from without, that is vio- 
 lent and preternatural. There are also many other 
 virtues, even in the matter of sensual appetite, 
 which none can lose, but by altering in some de- 
 gree the natural disposition : and I instance in the 
 matter of carnality and uncleanness, to which pos- 
 sibly some natures may think themselves apt and 
 disposed : but yet God hath put into our mouths a 
 bridle to curb the licentiousness of our speedy 
 appetite, putting into our very natures a principle 
 as strong to restrain it, as there is in us a disposi- 
 tion apt to invite us : and this is also in persons 
 who are most apt to the vice, women and young 
 persons, to whom God hath given a modesty and 
 shame of nature, that the entertainments of lust 
 may become contradictions to our retreating and 
 backward modesty, more than they are satisfactions 
 to our too-forward appetites. It is as great a mor- 
 tification and violence to nature to blush as to 
 lose a desire : and we find it true, when persons 
 are invited to confess their sins, or to ask forgive- 
 ness publicly, a secret smart is not so violent as a 
 public shame ; and therefore to do an action which 
 brings shame all along, and opens the sanctuaries 
 of nature, and makes all her retirements public, 
 and dismantles her inclosure, as lust does ; and the 
 shame of carnality hath in it more asperity and 
 abuse to nature, than the short pleasure to which 
 
24 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 we are invited can repay. There are unnatural 
 lusts, lusts which are such in their very condition 
 and constitution, that a man must turn a woman, 
 and a woman become a beast in acting them : and 
 all lusts that are not unnatural in their own com- 
 plexion, are unnatural by a consequent and acci- 
 dental violence : and if lust hath in it dissonances 
 to nature, there are but few apologies left to ex- 
 cuse our sins upon nature's stock : and all that 
 system of principles and reasonable inducements 
 to virtue, which we call the law of nature, is 
 nothing else but that firm ligature and incorpora- 
 tion of virtue to our natural principles and disposi- 
 tions, which whoso prevaricates does more against 
 nature than he that restrains his appetite : and, be- 
 sides these particulars, there is not in our natural 
 discourse any inclination, directly and by intention 
 of itself, contrary to the love of God ; because by 
 God we understand a fountain of being which is 
 infinitely perfect in itself, and of great good to us; 
 and whatsoever is so apprehended it is as natural 
 for us to love as to love any thing in the v orld ; 
 for we can love nothing but what we believe to be 
 good in itself, or good to us. 1 And beyond this, 
 there are in nature many principles and reasons to 
 make an aptness to acknowledge and confess God ; 
 and by the consent of nations, which they also have 
 learned from the dictates of their nature, all men 
 
 1 Eyo> yap 8/c av ids dXKo TTfpt 3*68 o, ri dv eiTroifii 
 i] on ayaOoQ re iravrd ttclgiv sir], k> %vfjnravra kv ry eZ&crig, 
 ry avTH £%€f Xeysru) dk w(77r£p yivuxjKSiv sicaaroQ virkp 
 avrojv oltTcti, § Upevg Kj IdiuriiQ. — Procop. Gothic, i. — Ci This 
 is all I would say concerning God, namely, that he is good, 
 and all in all, and that he ruleth over all. Let every one speak 
 of him, both priest and private man, according to his know- 
 ledge." 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 26 
 
 in some manner or other worship God ; and there- 
 fore, when this our nature is determined in its own 
 indefinite principle to the manner of worship, all 
 acts against the love, the obedience, and the wor- 
 ship of God, are also against nature, and offer it 
 some rudeness and violence : and I shall observe 
 this, and refer it to every man's reason and expe- 
 rience, that the greatest difficulties of virtue com- 
 monly apprehended, commence not so much upon 
 the stock of nature, as of education and evil habits. 1 
 Our virtues are difficult, because we at first get ill 
 habits; and these habits must be unrooted before 
 we do well, and that is our trouble. But, if by the 
 strictness of discipline and wholesome education, 
 we begin at first in our duty and the practice of 
 virtuous principles, we shall find virtue made as 
 natural to us, while it is customary and habitual, 
 as we pretend infirmity to be and propensity to 
 vicious practices. And this we are taught by that 
 excellent Hebrew, who said, ' Wisdom is easily 
 seen of them that love her, and found of such as 
 seek her. She preventeth them that desire her, in 
 making herself first known unto them. Whoso 
 seeketh her early shall have no great travail; for 
 he shall find her sitting at his doors.' 2 
 
 4. Secondly, In the strict observances of the law 
 of Christianity there is less trouble than in the 
 habitual courses of sin : 3 for if we consider the ge- 
 
 1 Siquidem Leonides Alexandri paedagogus quibusdam eum 
 vitiis imbuit, quae robustum quoque et jam maximum regem ab 
 ilia institutione puerili sunt prosecuta. Quintil. lib. i. c. 1.— 
 " Leonidas, the instructor of Alexander, imbued him with some 
 vices, which thence infected him when he was become a great 
 and powerful king." 
 
 2 Wisdom, vi. 12, 13, 14. 
 
 3 Multo difficilius est facere ista quae facitis. Quid enim 
 
20 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 neral design of Christianity, it propounds to us in 
 this world nothing that is of difficult purchase, no- 
 thing beyond that God allots us by the ordinary and 
 common providence ; such things which we are to 
 receive without care and solicitous vexation: so 
 that the ends are not big, and the way is easy ; 
 and this walked over with much simplicity and 
 sweetness, and those obtained without difficulty. 
 He that propounds to himself to live low, pious, 
 humble, and retired, his main employment is no- 
 thing but sitting quiet and undisturbed with variety 
 of impertinent affairs : but he that loves the world 
 and its acquisitions, entertains a thousand busi- 
 nesses, and every business hath a world of em- 
 ployment, and every employment is multiplied 
 and made intricate by circumstances, and every 
 circumstance is to be disputed, and he that dis- 
 putes ever hath two sides in enmity and opposi- 
 tion ; and by this time there is a genealogy, a long 
 descent and cognation of troubles, branched into 
 so many particulars that it is troublesome to un- 
 derstand them, and much more to run through 
 
 quiete otiosius est animi ? Quid ira laboriosius ? Quid de- 
 mentia remissius ? Quid crudelitate negotiosius ? Vacat pu- 
 dicitia, libido occupatissima est. Omnium denique virtu turn 
 tutela facilior est; vitia magno coluntur. Seneca. — "The 
 things which you do are much more difficult. For what is 
 more easy than tranquillity of mind ? What more laborious 
 than anger ? What is more free than clemency, or more fully 
 occupied than cruelty ? Modesty enjoys leisure ; lust is always 
 occupied. The preservation, in short, of all the virtues is com- 
 paratively easy ; the vices are cherished with danger and diffi- 
 culty." 
 
 In vitiis abit voluptas, manet turpitudo ; cum in recte factis 
 abeat labor, maneat honestas. Muson. — " The pleasure con- 
 ferred by vice soon vanishes : the turpitude remains. On the 
 other hand, when the labour of good actions is over, the virtue 
 and its recompense still exist." 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 27 
 
 them. The ways of virtue are very much upon 
 the defensive, and the work one, uniform, and 
 little : they are like watch within a strong castle ; if 
 they stand upon their guard, they seldom need to 
 strike a stroke : but vice is like storming of a fort, 
 full of noise, trouble, labour, danger, and disease, 
 How easy a thing is it to restore the pledge ? but 
 if a man means to defeat him that trusted him, 
 what a world of arts must he use to make pre- 
 tences ! to delay first, then to excuse, then to ob- 
 ject, then to intricate the business; next to quar- 
 rel, then to forswear it, and all the way to palliate 
 his crime, and represent himself honest ! And if 
 an oppressing and greedy person have a design to 
 cozen a young heir, or to get his neighbour's 
 land, the cares of every day, and the interruptions 
 of every night's sleep are more than the purchase 
 is worth : whereas, he might buy virtue at half 
 that watching, and the less painful care of a fewer 
 number of days. A plain story is soonest told, and 
 best confutes an intricate lie. And when a per- 
 son is examined in judgment, one false answer asks 
 more wit for its support and maintenance than a 
 history of truth. And such persons are put to so 
 many shameful retreats, false colours, fucuses, and 
 daubings with un tempered mortar, to avoid con- 
 tradiction or discovery, that the labour of a false 
 story seems in the order of things to be designed 
 the beginning of its punishment : and if we consi- 
 der how great a part of our religion consists in 
 prayer, and how easy a thing God requires of us 
 when he commands us to pray for blessings, the 
 duty of a Christian cannot seem very trouble- 
 some. 
 
28 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 5. And indeed I can hardly instance in any 
 vice, but there is visibly more pain in the order of 
 acting and observing it, than in the acquist or pro- 
 motion of virtue. I have seen drunken persons, in 
 their seas of drink and talk, dread every cup as a 
 blow ; and they have used devices and private arts 
 to escape the punishment of a full draught; and 
 the poor wretch, being condemned by the laws of 
 drinking to his measure, was forced and haled to 
 execution ; and he suffered it, and thought himself 
 engaged to that person, who with much kindness 
 and importunity invited him to a fever : but cer- 
 tainly there was more pain in it than the strictness 
 of holy and severe temperance : and he that shall 
 compare the troubles and dangers of an ambitious 
 war, with the gentleness and easiness of peace, will 
 soon perceive that every tyrant and usurping 
 prince that snatches at his neighbour's rights 
 hath two armies, one of men and the other of 
 cares. Peace sheds no blood, but of the pruned 
 vine; and hath no business, but modest and 
 quiet entertainments of the time, opportune for 
 piety, and circled with reward. But God often 
 punishes ambition and pride with lust ; and he 
 sent a thorn in the flesh as a corrective to the 
 elevations and grandezza of St. Paul, growing up 
 from the multitude of his revelations: and it is 
 likely the punishment should have less trouble than 
 the crime, whose pleasures and obliquity this was 
 designed to punish* And indeed every experi- 
 ence can verify, that an adulterer hath in him the 
 impatience of desires, the burnings of lust, the fear 
 of shame, the apprehensions of a jealous, abused, 
 and an enraged husband. He endures affronts, 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 29 
 
 mistimings, tedious waitings, the dullness of de- 
 lay, the regret of interruption, the confusion and 
 amazements of discovery, the scorn of a reproached 
 vice, the debasings of contempt upon it ; unless the 
 man grows impudent, and then he is more miser- 
 able upon another stock. But David was so put 
 to it to attempt, to obtain, to enjoy Bathsheba, and 
 to prevent the shame of it, that the difficulty was 
 greater than all his wit and power ; and it drove 
 him into base and unworthy arts, which discovered 
 him the more, and multiplied his crime. But 
 while he enjoyed the innocent pleasures of his 
 lawful bed, he had no more trouble in it than there 
 was in inclining his head upon his pillow. The 
 ways of sin are crooked, desert, rocky, and un- 
 even. They are 'broad' 1 indeed, and there is va- 
 riety of ruins, and allurements to entice fools, and 
 a large theatre to act the bloody tragedies of souls 
 upon ; but they are nothing smooth, or safe, or de- 
 licate. The ways of virtue are strait, but not 
 crooked ; narrow, but not unpleasant. There are 
 two vices for one virtue ; and therefore the way to 
 hell must needs be of greater extent, latitude, and 
 dissemination : but because virtue is but one way, 
 therefore it is easy, regular, and apt to walk in 
 without error or diversions. ' Narrow is the gate, 
 and strait is the way ;' it is true, considering our 
 evil customs and depraved natures, by which we 
 have made it so to us. But God hath made it more 
 passable by his grace and present aids: and St. 
 John Baptist receiving his commission to preach 
 repentance, it was expressed in these words, ' Make 
 plain the paths of the Lord/ Indeed repentance 
 
 1 Wisdom, v. 7» 
 
30 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 is a rough and a sharp virtue, and like a mattock 
 and spade breaks away all the roughnesses of the 
 passage, and hinderances of sin : but when we 
 enter into the dispositions which Christ hath de- 
 signed to us, the way is more plain and easy than 
 the ways of death and hell. Labour it hath in it, 
 just as all things that are excellent; but no con- 
 fusions, no distractions of thoughts, no amaze- 
 ments, no labyrinths and intricacy of counsels : 
 but it is like the labours of agriculture, full of 
 health and simplicity, plain and profitable, requir- 
 ing diligence, but such in which crafts and painful 
 stratagems are useless and impertinent. But vice 
 hath oftentimes so troublesome a retinue, and so 
 many objections in the event of things, is so entan- 
 gled in difficult and contradictory circumstances, 
 hath in it parts so opposite to each other, and so 
 inconsistent with the present condition of the man, 
 or some secret design of his, that those little plea- 
 sures which are its fucus and pretence are less 
 perceived and least enjoyed, while they begin in 
 fantastic semblances, and rise up in smoke, vain 
 and hurtful, and end in dissatisfaction. 
 
 6. But it is considerable that God, and the sin- 
 ner, and the devil, all join in increasing the diffi- 
 culty and trouble of sin ; upon contrary designs 
 indeed, but all co-operate to the verification of this 
 discourse. For God, by his restraining grace, and 
 the checks of a tender conscience, and the bands 
 of public honesty, and the sense of honour and re- 
 putation ; and the customs of nations, and the se- 
 verities of laws, makes that in most men the 
 choice of vice is imperfect, dubious, and trouble- 
 some, and the pleasures abated, and the apprehen- 
 sions various and in differing degrees; and men 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 31 
 
 act their crimes while they are disputing against 
 them, and the balance is cast by a few grains, and 
 scruples vex and disquiet the possession : and the 
 difference is perceived to be so little, that inconsi- 
 deration and inadvertency is the greatest means to 
 determine many men to the entertainment of a sin. 
 And this God does with a design to lessen our 
 choice, and to disabuse our persuasions from ar- 
 guments and weak pretences of vice, and to invite 
 us to the trials of virtue, when we see its enemy 
 giving us so ill conditions. And yet the sinner 
 himself makes the business of sin greater: for its 
 nature is so loathsome, and its pleasure so little, 
 and its promises so unperformed, that when it lies 
 open, easy, and apt to be discerned, there is no ar- 
 gument in it ready to invite us : and men hate a 
 vice which is every day offered and prostitute ; 
 and when they seek for pleasure, unless difficulty 
 presents it, as there is nothing in it really to per- 
 suade a choice, so there is nothing strong or witty 
 enough to abuse a man. And to this purpose 
 (amongst some others, which are malicious and 
 crafty) the devil gives assistance, knowing that 
 men despise what is cheap and common, and sus- 
 pect a latent excellency to be in difficult and for- 
 bidden objects : and therefore the devil sometimes 
 crosses an opportunity of sin, knowing that the de- 
 sire is the iniquity and does his work sufficiently ; 
 and yet the crossing the desire by impeding the act 
 heightens the appetite, and makes it more violent 
 and impatient. But by all these means sin is 
 made more troublesome than the pleasures of the 
 temptation can account for : and it will be a strange 
 imprudence to leave virtue upon pretence of its 
 difficulty, when for that very reason we the rather 
 
32 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 entertain the instances of sin, despising a cheap 
 sin and a costly virtue ; choosing to walk through 
 the brambles of a desert, rather than to climb the 
 fruit-trees of paradise. 
 
 7. Thirdly, Virtue conduces infinitely to the con- 
 tent of our lives, to secular felicities and political 
 satisfactions; and vice does the quite contrary. 
 For the blessings of this life are these that make it 
 happy, peace and quietness, content and satisfac- 
 tion of desires, riches, love of friends and neigh- 
 bours, honour and reputation abroad, a healthful 
 body, and a long life. This last is a distinct con- 
 sideration, but the other are proper to this title. 
 For the first it is certain, peace was so designed by 
 the holy Jesus, that he framed all his laws in com- 
 pliance to that design. He that returns good for 
 evil, a soft answer to the asperity of his enemy, 
 kindnesses to injuries, lessens the contention al- 
 ways, and sometimes gets a friend, and when he 
 does not, he shames his enemy. Every little acci- 
 dent in a family to peevish and angry persons is 
 the matter of a quarrel, and every quarrel discom- 
 poses the peace of the house, and sets it on fire; 
 and no man can tell how far that may burn, it may 
 be to a dissolution of the whole fabric. But who- 
 soever obeys the laws of Jesus, bears with the in- 
 firmities of his relatives and society, seeks with 
 sweetness to remedy what is ill, and to prevent 
 what it may produce, and throws water upon a 
 spark, and lives sweetly with his wife, affectionately 
 with his children, providently and discreetly with 
 his servants ; and they all love the major-domo, and 
 look upon him as their parent, their guardian, their 
 friend, their patron, their proveditore. But look 
 upon a person angry, peaceless, and disturbed, 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 33 
 
 when he enters upon his threshold, it gives an 
 alarm to his house, and puts them to flight, or 
 upon their defence; and the wife reckons the joy 
 of her day is done when he returns ; and the chil- 
 dren enquire into their father's age, and think his 
 life tedious ; and the servants curse privately, and 
 do their service as slaves do, only when they dare 
 not do otherwise; and they serve him as they 
 serve a lion — they obey his strength, and fear his 
 cruelty, and despise his manners, and hate his per- 
 son. No man enjoys content in his family but he 
 that is peaceful and charitable, just and loving, 
 forbearing and forgiving, careful and provident. 
 He that is not so, his house may be his castle, but 
 it is manned by enemies : his house is built, not 
 upon the sand, but upon the waves, and upon a 
 tempest : the foundation is uncertain, but his ruin 
 is not so. 
 
 8. And if we extend the relations of the man 
 beyond his own walls, he that does his duty to his 
 neighbour, that is, all offices of kindness, gentle- 
 ness, and humanity, nothing of injury and affront, 
 is certain never to meet with a wrong so great as is 
 the inconvenience of a lawsuit, or the contention 
 of neighbours, and all the consequent dangers and 
 inconvenience. Kindness will create and invite 
 kindness; and injury provokes an injury. And 
 since the love of neighbours is one of those beau- 
 ties which Solomon did admire, and that this beau- 
 ty is within the combination of precious things 
 which adorn and reward a peaceable, charitable 
 disposition ; he that is in love with spiritual excel- 
 lencies, with intellectual rectitudes, with peace and 
 with blessings of society, kntfws they grow amongst 
 the rose-bushes of virtue and holy obedience to the 
 
 VOL. III. d 
 
34 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 laws of Jesus. And ' for a good man some will 
 even dare to die and a sweet and charitable dis- 
 position is received with fondness, and all the en- 
 dearments of the neighbourhood. He that ob- 
 serves how many families are ruined by conten- 
 tion, and how many spirits are broken by the care, 
 and contumely, and fear, and spite, which are 
 entertained as advocates to promote a suit of law, 
 will soon confess that a great loss and peaceable 
 quitting of a considerable interest is a purchase 
 and a gain, in respect of a long suit and a vexatious 
 quarrel. 1 And still if the proportion rises higher, 
 the reason swells, and grows more necessary and 
 determinate : for if we would live according to 
 the discipline of Christian religion, one of the 
 great plagues which vex the world would be no 
 more. That there should be no wars, was one of 
 the designs of Christianity : and the living accord- 
 ing to that institution which is able to prevent all 
 wars, and to establish an universal and eternal 
 peace, when it is obeyed, is the using an infallible 
 instrument towards that part of our political hap- 
 piness which consists in peace. This world would 
 be an image of heaven, if all men were charitable, 
 peaceable, just, and loving. To this excellency all 
 those precepts of Christ which consist in forbear- 
 ance and forgiveness do co-operate. 
 
 9. But the next instance of the reward of holy 
 obedience and conformity to Christ's laws is itself 
 a duty, and needs no more but a mere repetition of 
 it. We must be content in every state ; 2 and be- 
 
 1 James, iii. 16. 
 
 4 AvrdpKua rS €lh (pikoGoty'ia avrodidaicrog. — Poli. Dixit 
 M. Cato apud Aul. Gel. lib. xiii. c. 22. " True content is a 
 self-taught philosophy." 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 35 
 
 cause Christianity teaches us this lesson, it teaches 
 us to be happy : for nothing from without can make 
 us miserable, unless we join our consents to it, and 
 apprehend it such, and entertain it in our sad and 
 melancholic retirements. A prison is but a retire- 
 ment, and opportunity of serious thoughts, to a 
 person whose spirit is confined, and apt to sit still, 
 and desires no enlargement beyond the cancels of 
 the body, till the state of separation calls it forth 
 into a fair liberty ; but every retirement is a pri- 
 son to a loose and wandering fancy, for whose 
 wildness no precepts are restraint, no band of duty 
 is confinement ; who, when he hath broken the 
 first hedge of duty, can never after endure any en- 
 closure so much as in a symbol. But this precept is 
 so necessary, that it is not more a duty than a rule 
 of prudence, and in many accidents of our lives it 
 is the only cure of sadness. For it is certain that 
 no providence less than divine can prevent evil and 
 cross accidents : but that is an excellent remedy to 
 the evil, that receives the accident within its power, 
 and takes out the sting, paring the nails, and 
 drawing the teeth" of the wild beast, that it may be 
 tame, or harmless, and medicinal. For all content 
 consists in the proportion of the object to the ap- 
 petite : and because external accidents are not in 
 our power, and it were nothing excellent that 
 things happened to us according to our first desires, 
 God hath by his grace put it into our power to 
 make the happiness, by making our desires descend 
 to the event, and comply with the chance, and 
 combine with all the issues of divine providence 
 And then we are noble persons, when we borrow 
 not our content from things below us, but make 
 our satisfactions from within. And it may be con- 
 
 d 2 
 
36 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 sidered, that every little care may disquiet us, and 
 may increase itself by reflection upon its own acts, 
 and every discontent may discompose our spirits, 
 and put an edge, and make afflictions poignant, 
 but cannot take off one from us, but makes every 
 one to be two. But content removes not the acci- 
 dent, but complies with it, takes away the sharp- 
 ness and displeasure of it, and, by stooping 
 down makes the lowest equal, proportionable, and 
 commensurate. Impatience makes an ague to be 
 a fever, and every fever to be a calenture, and that 
 calenture may expire in madness; but a quiet 
 spirit is a great disposition to health, and for the 
 present does alleviate the sickness. And this also 
 is notorious in the instance of covetousness. ' The 
 love of money is the root of all evil, which while 
 some have coveted after, they have pierced them- 
 selves with many sorrows.' 1 Vice makes poor, and 
 does ill endure it. 
 
 10. For he that in the school of Christ hath 
 learned to determine his desires when his needs are 
 served, and to judge of his needs by the propor- 
 tions of nature, hath nothing wanting towards 
 riches. Virtue makes poverty become rich, and no 
 riches can satisfy a covetous mind, or rescue him 
 from the affliction of the worst kind of poverty. 
 He only wants that is not satisfied. And there is 
 a great infelicity in a family where poverty dwells 
 with discontent : there the husband and wife quar- 
 rel for want of a full table and a rich wardrobe ; 
 and their love, that was built upon false arches, 
 sinks when such temporary supporters are removed : 
 they are like two millstones, which set the mill on 
 
 1 1 Tim. vi. 10 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 3? 
 
 fire when they want corn : and then their combi- 
 nations and society were unions of lust, or not 
 supported with religious love. But we may easily 
 suppose St. Joseph and the holy virgin-mother in 
 Egypt, poor as hunger, forsaken as banishment, 
 disconsolate as strangers ; and yet their present lot 
 gave them no affliction, because the angel fed them 
 with a necessary hospitality, and their desires were 
 no larger than their tables, and their eyes looked 
 only upwards, and they were careless of the future 
 and careful of their duty, and so made their life 
 pleasant by the measures and discourses of divine 
 philosophy. When Elisha stretched upon the 
 body of the child, and laid hands to hands, and 
 applied mouth to mouth, and so shrunk himself 
 into the posture of commensuration with the child, 
 he brought life into the dead trunk ; and so may 
 we, by applying our spirits to the proportions of a 
 narrow fortune, bring life and vivacity into our 
 dead and lost condition, and make it live till it 
 grows bigger, or else returns to health and salutary 
 uses. 
 
 11. And besides this philosophical extraction of 
 gold from stones, and riches from the dungeon of 
 poverty, a holy life does most probably procure 
 such a proportion of riches which can be useful to 
 us, or consistent with our felicity. For besides 
 that the holy Jesus hath promised all things which 
 our heavenly Father knows we need, (provided we 
 do our duty,) and that we find great securities and 
 rest from care when we have once cast our cares 
 upon God, and placed our hopes in his bosom ; 
 besides all this, the temperance, sobriety, and pru- 
 dence of a Christian is a great income, and by not 
 despising it, a small revenue combines its Darts till 
 
38 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 it grows to a heap big enough for the emissions of 
 charity, and all the offices of justice, and the sup- 
 plies of all necessities ; whilst vice is unwary, pro- 
 digal, and indiscreet, throwing away great revenues 
 as tributes to intemperance and vanity, and suf- 
 fering dissolution and forfeiture of estates, as a 
 punishment and curse. Some sins are direct im- 
 providence and ill husbandry. I reckon in this 
 number intemperance, lust, litigiousness, ambition, 
 bribery, prodigality, gaming, pride, sacrilege ; 
 which is the greatest spender of them all, and 
 makes a fair estate evaporate like camphor, turning 
 it into nothing, no man knows which way. But 
 what the Roman gave as an estimate of a rich man, 
 saying, " He that can maintain an army is rich," 
 was but a short account ; for he that can maintain 
 an army may be beggared by one vice, and it is a 
 vast revenue that will pay the debt-books of intem- 
 perance or lust, 
 
 12. To these, if we add that virtue is honourable, 
 and a great advantage to a fair reputation ; that it 
 is praised by them that love it not ; 1 that it is ho- 
 noured by the followers and family of vice; that it 
 forces glory out of shame, honour from contempt ; 
 that it reconciles men to the fountain of honour — 
 the almighty God, who will honour them that ho- 
 nour him : there are but a few more excellencies in 
 the world to make up the rosary of temporal feli- 
 city. And it is so certain that religion serves even 
 our temporal ends, that no great end of state can 
 well be served without it; 2 not ambition, not de- 
 
 1 Virtus laudatur et alget. Juven. — "Virtue is praised 
 
 and mourns." 
 
 2 Praecipuam imperatoriae majestatis curam esse prospicimus, 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 39 
 
 sires of wealth, not any great design, but religion 
 must be made its usher or support. If a new opi- 
 nion be commenced, and the author w r ould make a 
 sect, and draw disciples after him, at least he must 
 be thought to be religious ; which is a demonstra- 
 tion how great an instrument of reputation piety 
 and religion is. And if the pretence will do us 
 good offices amongst men, the reality will do the 
 same, besides the advantages which we shall receive 
 from the divine benediction. The power of godli- 
 ness will certainly do more than the form alone. 
 And it is most notorious in the affairs of the clergy, 
 whose lot it hath been to fall from great riches to 
 poverty, when their wealth made them less curious 
 of their duty : but when humility and chastity and 
 exemplary sanctity have been the enamel of their 
 holy order, the people, like the Galatians, would 
 pull out their own eyes to do them benefit. And 
 indeed God hath singularly blessed such in- 
 struments to the being the only remedies to 
 repair the breaches made by sacrilege and irre- 
 ligion. But certain it is, no man was ever ho- 
 noured for that which was esteemed vicious. 1 Vice 
 hath got money and a curse many times ; and 
 vice hath adhered to the instruments and purchases 
 of honour: but among all nations whatsoever, 
 those called honourable put on the face and pre- 
 
 religionis indaginem ; cujus si cultum retinere potuerimus, iter 
 prosperitatis humanis aperitur inceptis. Theod. et Valent. in 
 Cod. Theod. — " We consider that the promotion of religion 
 should be the principal care of imperial authority : for if we 
 can secure this, the way is opened for success in all things 
 beside." 
 
 1 Dedit enim providentia hominibus munus, ut honesta 
 magis juvarent. Quint, lib. i. c 12 — " The providence of God 
 ordained that virtue should best avail us." 
 
40 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 tence of virtue. But I choose to instance in the 
 proper cognizance of a Christian, humility, which 
 seems contradictory to the purposes and reception 
 of honour ; and yet in the world nothing is a more 
 certain means to purchase it. Do not all the world 
 hate a proud man ? And therefore what is contrary 
 to humility is also contradictory to honour and re- 
 putation. And when the apostle had given com- 
 mand, that in giving honour we should one go be- 
 fore another, he laid the foundation of praises, and 
 panegyrics, and triumphs. And as humility is se- 
 cure against affronts and tempests of despite, be- 
 cause it is below them ; so when by employment, 
 or any other issue of divine Providence, it is drawn 
 from its sheath and secrecy, it shines clear and 
 bright as the purest and most polished metals. Hu- 
 mility is like a tree, whose root, when it sets deep- 
 est in the earth, rises higher, and spreads fairer, 
 and stands surer, and lasts longer : every step of its 
 descent is like a rib of iron, combining its parts in 
 unions indissoluble, and placing it in the chambers 
 of security. No wise man ever lost any thing by 
 cession, but he receives the hostility of violent per- 
 sons into his embraces, like a stone into alap of wool ; 
 it rests and sits down soft and innocently; but a 
 stone falling upon a stone makes a collision, and 
 extracts fire, and finds no rest. And just so are two 
 proud persons, despised by each other, contemned 
 by all, living in perpetual dissonances, always 
 fighting against affronts, jealous of every person, 
 disturbed by every accident, a perpetual storm 
 within, and daily hissings from without. 
 
 13. Fourthly, Holiness and obedience is an ex- 
 cellent preservative of life, and makes it long and 
 healthful. In order to which discourse, because it 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 41 
 
 is new, material, and argumentative, apt to per- 
 suade men who prefer life before all their other in- 
 terests, I consider many things. First, in the Old 
 Testament, a long and prosperous life were the great 
 promises of the covenant ; their hopes were built 
 upon it, and that was made the support of all their 
 duty. ' If thou wilt diligently hearken unto the 
 voice of the Lord thy God, I will put none of the 
 diseases upon thee which I brought upon the 
 Egyptians : for I am the Lord that healeth thee.' 1 
 And more particularly yet, that we may not think 
 piety to be security only against the plagues of 
 Egypt, God makes his promise more indefinite and 
 unconfined : 1 Ye shall serve the Lord your God, 
 and I will take sickness away from the midst of 
 thee, and will fulfil the number of thy days:' 2 that 
 is, the period of nature shall be the period of thy 
 person ; thou shalt live long, and die in a seasonable 
 ripe age. And this promise was so verified by a 
 long experience, that by David's time it grew up to 
 a rule : ' What man is he that desireth life, and 
 loveth many days, that he may see good ? Keep 
 thy tongue from evil, and thy lips that they speak 
 no guile' 3 And the same argument was pressed 
 by Solomon, who was an excellent philosopher, 
 and well skilled in the natural and accidental 
 means of preservation of our lives : ' Fear the 
 Lord, and depart from evil ; and it shall be health 
 to thy navel, and marrow to thy bones. Length of 
 days is in the right hand of wisdom ;' for ' she is a 
 tree of life to them that lay hold upon her/ 4 Mean- 
 ing, that the tree of life and immortality which God 
 
 1 Exod. xv. 26. 
 
 3 Psalm xxxiv. 12, 13. 
 
 * Exod. xxiii. 25, 26. 
 4 Prov. iii. 7, 8, 16, 18. 
 
42 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 had planted in paradise, and which, if man had 
 stood, he should have tasted, and have lived for 
 ever, the fruit of that tree is offered upon the same 
 conditions ; if we will keep the commandments of 
 God, our obedience, like the tree of life, shall con- 
 sign us to immortality hereafter, by a long and 
 a healthful life here. And therefore, although in 
 Moses's time the clays of man had been shortened, 
 till they came to ' threescore years and ten, or 
 fourscore years, and then their strength is but la- 
 bour and sorrow 1 (for Moses was the author of 
 that Psalm;) yet to show the great privilege of 
 those persons whose piety was great, Moses himself 
 attained to one hundred and twenty years, which 
 was almost double to the ordinary and determined 
 period. But Enoch and Elias never died, and be- 
 came great examples to us, that a spotless and holy 
 life might possibly have been immortal. 
 
 14. I shall add no more examples, but one 
 great conjugation of precedent observed by the 
 Jewish writers, who tell us, that in the second tem- 
 ple there were three hundred high-priests, (I sup- 
 pose they set down a certain number for an uncer- 
 tain, and by three hundred they mean very many,) 
 and yet that temple lasted but four hundred and 
 twenty years : the reason of this so rapid and vio- 
 lent abscision of their priests being their great 
 and scandalous impieties. And yet in the first 
 temple, whose abode was within ten years as long 
 as the second, there was a succession of but eighteen 
 high-priests : for they being generally very pious, 
 and the preservers of their rites and religion against 
 the schism of Jeroboam, and the defection of Israel, 
 
 i Psalm xc. 10. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 43 
 
 and the idolatry and irreligion of many of the 
 kings of Judah, God took delight to reward it with 
 a long and honourable old age. And Balaam 
 knew well enough what he said, when in his ecstasy 
 and prophetic rapture he made his prayer to God, 
 ' Let my soul die the death of the righteous.' 1 It 
 was not a prayer that his soul might be saved, or 
 that he might repent at last ; for repentance and im- 
 mortality were revelations of a later date : but he, in 
 his prophetic ecstacy, seeing what God had pro- 
 posed to the Moabites, and what blessings he had 
 reserved for Israel, prays that he might not die, as 
 the Moabites were like to die, with an untimely 
 death, by the sword of their enemies, dispossessed 
 of their country, spoiled of their goods, in the pe- 
 riod and last hour of their nation : — But let my soul 
 die the death of the just, the death designed for 
 the faithful Israelites; such a death which God 
 promised to Abraham, that he should return to 
 his fathers in peaee, and in a good old age. For 
 the death of the righteous is like the descending 
 of ripe and wholesome fruits from a pleasant and 
 florid tree ; our senses entire, our limbs unbroken, 
 without horrid tortures, after provision made for 
 our children, with a blessing entailed upon poste- 
 rity, in the presence of our friends, our dearest re- 
 lative closing up our eyes, and binding our feet, 
 leaving a good name behind us. O let my soul die 
 such a death ! for this, in whole or in part, accord- 
 ing as God sees it good, is the manner that the 
 righteous die. And this was Balaams prayer: 
 and this was the state and condition in the Old 
 Testatament. 
 
 1 Numb, xxiii. 10. 
 
44 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 15. In the gospel the case is nothing altered; for 
 besides that those austerities, rigours, and mortifi- 
 cations which are in the gospel advised or com- 
 manded respectively, are more salutary or of less 
 corporeal inconvenience than a vicious life of in- 
 temperance, or lust, or carefulness, or tyrant co- 
 vetousnes; there is no accident or change to the 
 sufferance of which the gospel hath engaged us, 
 but in the very thing our life is carefully provided 
 for, either in kind, or by a gainful exchange. ' He 
 that loseth his life for my sake, shall find it ; and 
 he that will save his life, shall lose it.' 1 And al- 
 though God, who promised long life to them that 
 obey, did not promise that himself would never 
 call for our life, borrowing it of us, and repaying it 
 in a glorious and advantageous exchange; yet this 
 very promise of giving us a better life in exchange 
 for this, when we exposed it in martyrdom, does 
 confirm our title to this, this being the instrument 
 of permutation with the other : for God obliging 
 himself to give us another in exchange for this, 
 when in cases extraordinary he calls for this, says 
 plainly, that this is our present right by grace, and 
 the title of the Divine promises. But the promises 
 are clear; for St. Paul calls children to the observa- 
 tion of the fifth commandment, by the same argu- 
 ment which God used in the first promulgation of 
 it : ' Honour thy father and thy mother, (which is 
 the first commandment with promise,) that it may 
 be well with thee, and that thou mayest live long 
 upon the earth.' 2 For although the gospel be 
 built upon better promises than the law, yet it hath 
 the same too, not as its foundation, but as appen- 
 
 Matt. x. 39. 
 
 2 Ephes. vi. 2, 3. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 45 
 
 dages and adjuncts of grace, and supplies of need. 
 f Godliness bath the promise of this life, as well as 
 of the life that is to come.' 1 That is plain. And 
 although Christ revealed his Father's mercies to us 
 in new expresses and great abundance ; yet he took 
 nothing from the world which ever did in any sense 
 invite piety, or endear obedience, or co-operate to- 
 wards felicity. And therefore the promises which 
 were made of old, are also presupposed in the new, 
 and mentioned by intimation and implication 
 within the greater. When our blessed Saviour, in 
 seven of the eight beatitudes, had instanced in new 
 promises and rewards, as ' heaven, seeing of God, 
 life eternal in one of them, to which heaven is as 
 certainly consequent as to any of the rest, he dfd 
 choose to instance in a temporal blessing, and in 
 the very words of the Old Testament ; to show 
 that that part of the old covenant which concerns 
 morality, and the rewards of obedience, remains 
 firm and included within the conditions of the 
 gospel. 3 
 
 16. To this purpose is that saying of our blessed 
 Saviour, ' Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every 
 word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God:' 4 
 meaning, that besides natural means ordained for the 
 preservation of our lives, there are means supernatu- 
 ral and divine. God's blessings does as much as 
 bread. Nay, it is every word proceeding out of the 
 mouth of God ; that is, every precept and command- 
 ment of God is so for our good, that it is intended as 
 food and physic to us, a means to make us live 
 long. And therefore God hath done in this as in 
 
 i 1 Tim. iv. 8. 
 
 3 Psalm xxxvii. 11. 
 
 « Matt. v. 3, 5. 
 
 4 Matt. iv. 4 ; Deut. viii. & 
 
46 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 other graces and issues evangelical, which he 
 proposed to continue in his church for ever. He 
 first gave it in miraculous and extraordinary man- 
 ner, and then gave it by way of perpetual ministry. 
 The Holy Ghost appeared at first like a prodigy, 
 and with miracle ; he descended in visible repre- 
 sentments, expressing himself in revelations and 
 powers extraordinary : but it being a promise in- 
 tended to descend upon all ages of the church, 
 there was appointed a perpetual ministry for its 
 conveyance; and still, though without a sign or 
 miraculous rep resentment, it is ministered in con- 
 firmation by imposition of the bishop's hands. 
 And thus also health and long life, which by way 
 of ordinary benediction is consequent to piety, 
 faith, and obedience, evangelical, was at first given 
 in a miraculous manner ; that so the ordinary 
 effects, being at first confirmed by miraculous and 
 extraordinary instances and manners of operation, 
 might for ever after be confidently expected without 
 any dubitation, since it was in the same manner 
 consigned by which all the whole religion was; by 
 a voice from heaven, and a verification of miracles, 
 and extraordinary supernatural effects. That the 
 gift of healing, and preservation and restitution of 
 life was at first miraculous, needs no particular 
 probation. All the story of the gospel is one 
 entire argument to prove it: and amongst the 
 fruits of the Spirit, St. Paul reckons gifts of healing, 
 and government, and helps, or exterior assistances 
 and advantages, to represent that it was intended 
 the life of Christian people should be happy and 
 healthful for ever. Now that this grace also de- 
 scended afterwards in an ordinary ministry is 
 recorded by St. James. i Is any man sick amongst 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 47 
 
 you ? let him call for the elders of the church, and 
 let them pray over him, anointing him with oil, in 
 the name of the Lord:' 1 that was then the cere- 
 mony, and the blessing and effect is still : for ' the 
 prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord 
 shall raise him up/ 2 For it is observable, that the 
 blessing of healing and recovery is not appendant 
 to the anealing, but to the prayer of the church ; 
 to manifest that the ceremony went with the first 
 miraculous and extraordinary manner, yet that 
 there was an ordinary ministry appointed for the 
 daily conveyance of the blessing : the faithful 
 prayers and offices of holy priests shall obtain life 
 and health to such persons who are receptive of it, 
 and in spiritual and apt dispositions. And when 
 we see, by a continual flux of extraordinary bene- 
 diction, that even some Christian princes are in- 
 struments of the Spirit, not only in the govern- 
 ment, but in the gifts of healing too, as a reward 
 for their promoting the just interests of Chris- 
 tianity, we may acknowledge ourselves convinced 
 that a holy life in the faith and obedience of Jesus 
 Christ, may be of great advantage for our health 
 and life, by that instance to entertain our present 
 desires, and to establish our hopes of life eternal. 
 
 17. Fori consider that the fear of God is there- 
 fore the best antidote in the world against sickness 
 and death : 1. Because it is the direct enemy to sin, 
 which brought in sickness and death ; and besides 
 this, that God by spiritual means should produce 
 alterations natural, is not hard to be understood by 
 a Christian philosopher, take him in either of the 
 two capacities. 2. For there is a rule of propor- 
 
 1 James, v. 14. 
 
 2 Ibid, verse 15. 
 
48 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 tion and analogy of effects, that if sin destroys not 
 only the soul but the body also, then may piety 
 preserve both, and that* much rather. For if sin, 
 that is, the effects and consequents of sin, 'hath 
 abounded, then shall grace superabound ; M that is, 
 Christ hath done us more benefit than the fall of 
 Adam hath done us injury ; and therefore the 
 effects of sin are not greater upon the body, than 
 either are to be restored or prevented by a pious 
 life. 3. There is so near a conjunction between 
 soul and body, that it is no wonder if God, mean- 
 ing to glorify both by the means of a spiritual life, 
 suffers spirit and matter to communicate in effects 
 and mutual impresses. Thus the waters of bap- 
 tism purify the soul ; and the holy eucharist, not 
 the symbolical, but the mysterious and spiritual 
 part of it, makes the body also partaker of the 
 death of Christ and a holy union. The flames of 
 hell, whatsoever they are, torment accursed souls ; 
 and the stings of conscience vex and disquiet the 
 body. 4. And if we consider that in the glories of 
 heaven, when we shall live a life purely spiritual, 
 our bodies also are so clarified and made spiritual, 
 that they are also become immortal ; that state of 
 glory being nothing else but a perfection of the 
 state of grace, it is not unimaginable but that the 
 soul may have some proportion of the same opera- 
 tion upon the body as to conduce to its prolonga- 
 tion, as to an antepast of immortality. 5. For 
 since the body hath all its life from its conjunction 
 with the soul, why not also the perfection of life 
 according to its present capacity, that is, health 
 and duration from the perfection of the soul.. I 
 
 1 Rom. v. 20. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 mean from the ornaments of grace ? And as the 
 blessedness of the soul (saith the philosopher) con- 
 sists in the speculation of honest and just things; 
 so the perfection of the body and of the whole man 
 consists in the practice, the exercise, and operations 
 of virtue. 
 
 18. But this problem in Christian philosophy is 
 yet more intelligible, and will be reduced to cer- 
 tain experience, if we consider good life in union 
 and concretion with particular, material, and cir- 
 cumstantiate actions of piety : for these have 
 great powers and influences even in nature to re- 
 store health and preserve our lives. Witness the 
 sweet sleeps of temperate persons, and their con- 
 stant appetite ; which Timotheus, the son of Conon, 
 observed, when he dieted in Plato's academy with 
 severe and moderated diet : " They that sup with 
 Plato are well the next day." Witness the sym- 
 metry of passions in meek men, their freedom from 
 the violence of enraged and passionate indisposi- 
 tions ; the admirable harmony and sweetness of 
 content which dwells in the retirements of a 
 holy conscience : to which if we add those joys 
 which they only understand truly who feel them 
 inwardly, the joys of the Holy Ghost, the content 
 and joys which are attending upon the lives of 
 holy persons are most likely to make them long 
 and healthful. ' For now we live/ saith St. Paul, 
 * if ye stand fast in the Lord.' 1 It would prolong 
 St. Paul's life to see his ghostly children persevere 
 in holiness : and if we understood the joys of it, it 
 would do much greater advantage to ourselves. 
 But if we consider a spiritual life abstractedly and 
 in itself, piety produces our life, not by a natural 
 
 * 1 Thes. Hi. 8. 
 VOL III. E 
 
50 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 efficiency, but by divine benediction. God gives a 
 healthy and a long life as a reward and blessing to 
 crown our piety even before the sons of men : ' For 
 such as be blessed of him shall inherit the earth ; 
 but they that be cursed of him shall be cut off.' 1 
 So that this whole matter is principally to be re- 
 ferred to the act of God, either by ways of nature, 
 or by instruments of special providence, rewarding 
 piety with a long life. And we shall more fully 
 apprehend this, if, upon the grounds of Scripture, 
 reason, and experience we weigh the contrary. 
 Wickedness is the w r ay to shorten our days. 2 
 
 19. Sin brought death in first; and yet man 
 lived almost a thousand years. But he sinned 
 more, and then death came nearer to him ; for 
 when all the world was first drowned in wicked- 
 ness, and then in water, God cut him shorter by 
 one half, and five hundred years was his ordinary 
 period. And man sinned still, and had strange 
 imaginations, and built towers in the air; and then 
 about Peleg's time God cut him shorter by one 
 half yet, two hundred and odd years was his deter- 
 mination. And yet the generations of the world 
 returned not unanimously to God ; and God cut 
 him off another half yet, and reduced him to one 
 hundred and twenty years ; and, by Moses's 
 time, one half of the final remanent portion was 
 pared away, reducing him to threescore years 
 and ten : so that, unless it be by special dispensa- 
 tion, men live not beyond that term, or thereabout. 
 But if God had gone on still in the same method, 
 and shortened our days as we multiplied our sins, 
 we should have been but as an ephemeron ; man 
 should have lived the life of a fly or a gourd ; the 
 « Psalm xxxvii. 22. 2 Prov. x. 26. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 51 
 
 morning should have seen his birth, his life have 
 been the term of a day, and the evening must 
 have provided him with a shroud. But God 
 seeing man's thoughts were only evil continually, 
 he was resolved no longer so to strive with him, nor 
 destroy the kind, but punish individuals only and 
 single persons ; and if they sinned, or if they did 
 not obey regularly, their life should be propor- 
 tionable. This God set down for his rule : f Evil 
 shall slay the wicked person :' 1 and, ' He that 
 keepeth the commandments keepeth his own soul ; 
 but he that despiseth his own ways shall die.' 3 
 
 20. But that we may speak more exactly in this 
 problem, we must observe, that in Scripture three 
 general causes of natural death are assigned — na- 
 ture, providence, and chance. By these three I 
 only mean the several manners of divine influence 
 and operation. For God only predetermines; and 
 what is changed in the following events by divine 
 permission, to this God and man in their several 
 manners do co-operate. The saying of David 
 concerning Saul, with admirable philosophy de- 
 scribes the three ways of ending mans life : ' David 
 said furthermore, as the Lord liveth, the Lord shall 
 smite him, or his day shall come to die, or he shall 
 descend into battle and perish.' 3 The first is 
 special providence : the second means the term 
 of nature : the third is that which in our want 
 of words we call chance or accident, but is 
 in effect nothing else but another manner of the 
 divine providence. That in all these sin does in- 
 terrupt and retrench our lives, is the undertaking 
 of the following periods : 
 
 1 Psalm xxxiv. 21. 2 Prov. xix. 16. 
 
 3 1 Sam. xxvi, 10. 
 
 E 2 
 
52 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 21. First, In nature sin is a cause of dyscrasies 
 and distempers, making our bodies healthless and 
 our days few : for although God hath prefixed a 
 period to nature by an universal and antecedent 
 determination, and that naturally every man that 
 lives temperately, and by no supervening accident 
 is interrupted, shall arrive thither ; yet because the 
 greatest part of our lives is governed by will and 
 understanding, and there are temptations to in- 
 temperance, and to violations of our health, the 
 period of nature is so distinct a thing from the 
 period of our person, that few men attain to that 
 which God had fixed by his first law and preceding 
 purpose; but end their days with folly, and in a 
 period which God appointed them with anger, and 
 a determination secondary, consequent, and acci- 
 dental. And therefore, says David, 'health is 
 far from the ungodly, for they regard not thy 
 statutes.' And to this purpose is that saying of 
 Eben-Ezra: " He that is united to God, the foun- 
 tain of life, his soul being improved by grace, com- 
 municates to the body an establishment of its radical 
 moisture and natural heat, to make it more health- 
 ful, that so it may be more instrumental to the spi- 
 ritual operations and productions of the soul, and 
 itself be preserved in perfect constitution." Now, 
 how this blessing is contradicted by the impious life 
 of a wicked person is easy to be understood, if we 
 consider, that from drunken surfeits come dissolu- 
 tion of members, head-aches, apoplexies, dangerous 
 falls, fracture of bones, drenchings and dilution of 
 the brain, inflammation of the liver, crudities of 
 the stomach, and thousands more, which Solomon 
 sums up in general terms: 'Who hath woe? 
 Who hath sorrow ? Who hath redness of eyes ? 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 53 
 
 They that tarry long at the wine.' 1 I shall not 
 need to instance in the sad and uncleanly con- 
 sequents of lusts ; the wounds and accidental deaths 
 which are occasioned by jealousies, by vanity, by 
 peevishness, vain reputation, and animosities, by 
 melancholy, and the despair of evil consciences : 
 and yet these are abundant argument, that when 
 God so permits a man to run his course of nature, 
 that himself does not intervene by an extraordinary 
 influence, or any special acts of providence, but 
 only gives his ordinary assistance to natural causes, 
 a very great part of men make their natural period 
 shorter, and by sin make their days miserable and 
 few. 
 
 22. Secondly, Oftentimes providence intervenes, 
 and makes the way shorter ; God, for the iniquity 
 of man, not suffering nature to take her course, but 
 stopping her in the midst of her journey. Against 
 this David prayed, ' O my God, cut me not off in 
 the midst of my days.' 2 But in this there is some 
 variety ; for God does it sometimes in mercy, 
 sometimes in judgment. i The righteous die, and 
 no man regardeth ; not considering that they are 
 taken away from the evil to come.' 3 God takes the 
 righteous hastily to his crown, lest temptation 
 snatch it from him by interrupting his hopes and 
 sanctity : and this was the case of the old world. 
 For from Adam to the flood by the patriarchs were 
 eleven generations ; but by Cains line there were 
 but eight, so that Cain's posterity were longer- 
 lived ; because God, intending to bring the flood 
 upon the world, took delight to rescue his elect 
 from the dangers of the present impurity and the 
 
 1 Prov. xxiii. 29, 30. 2 Psalm cii. 24. 
 
 3 Isaiah, Ivii. I. 
 
64 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 future deluge. Abraham lived five years less than 
 his son Isaac, it being (say the doctors of the 
 Jews) intended for mercy to him, that he might 
 not see the iniquity of his grand-child, Esau. And 
 this the church for many ages hath believed in the 
 case of baptized infants dying before the use of 
 reason : for besides other causes in the order of di- 
 vine providence, one kind of mercy is done to them 
 too ; for although their condition be of a lower 
 form, yet it is secured by that timely (shall I call 
 it ?) or untimely death. But these are cases ex- 
 tra-regular ; ordinarily and by rule God hath re- 
 vealed his purposes of interruption of the lives of 
 sinners to be in anger and judgment; for when 
 men commit any signal and grand impiety, God 
 suffers not nature to take her course, but strikes a 
 stroke with his own hand. To which purpose I 
 think it a remarkable instance which is reported by 
 Epiphanius, 1 that for three thousand three hundred 
 and thirty-two years, even to the twentieth age, there 
 was not one example of a son that died before his 
 father ; but the course of nature was kept, that he 
 who was first born in the descending line did die 
 first ; (I speak of natural death ; and therefore 
 Abel cannot be opposed to this observation ;) till 
 that Terah, the father of Abraham, taught the peo- 
 ple to make images of clay, and worship them : 
 and concerning him it was first remarked, that 
 ' Haran died before his father Terah in the land of 
 his nativity:' 2 God by an unheard-of judgment, 
 and a rare accident, punished his newly-invented 
 crime. And whenever such intercision of a life 
 happens to a vicious person, let all the world ac- 
 
 1 Lib. i. torn. i. Panar. sect. 6. 2 Gen. xi. 28. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION, 
 
 55 
 
 knowledge it for a judgment : and when any man 
 is guilty of evil habits or unrepented sins, he may 
 therefore expect it, because it is threatened and de- 
 signed for the lot and curse of such persons. This is 
 threatened to covetousness, injustice, and oppres- 
 sion. ' As a partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth 
 them not, so he that getteth riches, and not by 
 right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, 
 and at his end shall be a fool.' 1 The same is 
 threatened to voluptuous persons in the highest 
 caresses of delight ; and Christ told a parable with 
 the same design. The rich man said, ' Soul, take 
 thy ease :' but God answered, ' O fool, this night 
 shall thy soul be required of thee.' Zimri and 
 Cozbi were slain in the trophies of their lust. And 
 it was a sad story that was told by Thomas Canti- 
 pratanus : two religious persons, tempted by each 
 other in the vigour of their youth, in their very 
 first pleasures and opportunities of sin, were both 
 struck dead in their embraces and posture of enter- 
 tainment. God smote Jeroboam for his usurpation 
 and tyranny, and he died. 2 Saul died for dis- 
 obedience against God, and asking counsel of a 
 Pythoness. 3 God smote Uzziah with a leprosy 
 for his profaneness ; 4 and distressed Ahaz sorely 
 for his sacrilege; 5 and sent a horrid disease upon 
 Jehoram for his idolatry. 6 These instances repre- 
 sent voluptuousness and covetousness, rapine and 
 injustice, idolatry and lust, profaneness and sacri- 
 lege, as remarked by the signature of exemplary 
 judgments to be the means of shortening the days 
 of man ; God himself proving the executioner of 
 his own fierce wrath. I instance no more, but in 
 
 1 Jer. xvii. 11. « 2 Chron. xiii. 20. 3 1 Chron. x. 13. 
 4 2 Chron. xxvi. 19. 5 2 Kings, xvi. 6 2 Chi on. xxi. 18. 
 
EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 the singular case of Hananiah the false prophet : 
 ' Thus saith the Lord, Behold I will cut thee from 
 off the face of the earth ; this year thou shalt die, be- 
 cause thou hast taught rebellion against the Lord.' 1 
 That is the curse and portion of a false prophet — a 
 short life, and a sudden death of God's own parti- 
 cular and more immediate infliction. 
 
 23. And thus also the sentence of the divine 
 anger went forth upon criminal persons in the 
 New Testament. Witness the disease of Herod, 
 Judas's hanging himself, the blindness of Elymas, 
 the sudden death of Ananias and Sapphira, the 
 buffettings with which Satan afflicted the bodies of 
 persons excommunicate. Yea, the blessed sacra- 
 ment of Christ's body and blood, which is intended 
 for our spiritual life, if it be unworthily received, 
 proves the cause of a natural death. c For this 
 cause many are weak and sickly among you, and 
 many are fallen asleep/ 2 saith St. Paul to the 
 Corinthian church. 
 
 24. Thirdly, But there is yet another manner of 
 ending man's life, by way of chance or contingency ; 
 meaning thereby the manner of God's providence 
 and event of things which is not produced by the 
 disposition of natural causes, nor yet by any parti- 
 cular and special act of God ; but the event which 
 depends upon accidental causes, not so certain and 
 regular as nature, not so conclusive and determined 
 as the acts of decretory providence, but comes by 
 disposition of causes irregular to events rare and 
 accidental. This David expresses by entering into 
 battle. And in this, as in the other, we must sepa- 
 rate cases extraordinary and rare from the ordinary 
 
 1 Jer. xxviii. 16. 
 
 2 1 Cor. xi. 30. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 57 
 
 and common. Extra-regular! y and upon extraor- 
 dinary reasons and permissions, we find that holy 
 persons have miscarried in battle. So the Israelites 
 fell before Benjamin ; and Jonathan and Uriah, 
 and many of the Lord's champions, fighting against 
 the Philistines. But in these deaths, as God served 
 other ends of providence, so he kept to the good men 
 that fell all the mercies of the promise,' by giving 
 them a greater blessing of event and compensation. 
 In the more ordinary course of divine dispensation, 
 they that prevaricate the laws of God are put out 
 of protection ; God withdraws his special provi- 
 dence, or their tutelar angel, and leaves them ex- 
 posed to the influences of heaven, to the power 
 of a constellation, to the accidents of humanity, 
 to the chances of a battle, which are so many 
 and various, that it is ten thousand to one a 
 man in that case never escapes : and in such va- 
 riety of contingencies there is no probable way 
 to assure our safety, but by a holy life to en- 
 dear the providence of God to be our guardian, 
 [t was a remarkable saying of Deborah, ' the 
 stars fought in their courses,' or in their orbs, 
 1 against Sisera.' 1 Sisera fought when there was an 
 evil aspect, or malignant influence of heaven upon 
 him. For even the smallest thing that is in oppo- 
 sition to us is enough to turn the chance of a bat- 
 tle ; that although it be necessary for defence 
 of the godly that a special providence should in- 
 tervene, yet to confound the impious no special act 
 is requisite. If God exposes them to the*ill aspect 
 of a planet, or any other casualty, their days are in- 
 terrupted, and they die. And that is the meaning 
 
 1 Judg. v. 20. 
 
58 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 of the prophet Jeremiah : ' Be not ye dismayed at 
 the signs of heaven, for the heathen are dismayed at 
 them :' 1 meaning, that God will overrule all infe- 
 rior causes for the safety of his servants, but the 
 wicked shall be exposed to chance and human ac- 
 cidents ; and the signs of heaven, which of them- 
 selves do but signify, or at most but dispose 
 and incline towards events, shall be enough to ac- 
 tuate and consummate their ruin. And this is 
 ,he meaning of that proverb of the Jews, " Israel 
 hath no planet;" which they expounded to mean, 
 if they observe the law, the planets shall not hurt 
 them; God will overrule all their influences; but 
 if they prevaricate and rebel, the least star in 
 the firmament of heaven shall bid them battle, and 
 overthrow them. A stone shall lie in a wicked 
 man's way, and God shall so expose him to it, 
 leaving him so unguarded and defenceless, that he 
 shall stumble at it and fall, and break a bone, and 
 that shall produce a fever, and the fever shall end 
 his days. For not only every creature, when it is 
 set on by God, can prove a ruin ; but if we be not 
 by the providence of God defended against it, we 
 cannot behold the least atom in the sun without 
 danger of losing an eye, nor eat a grape without 
 fear of choking, nor sneeze without breaking of a 
 vein. And Arius, going to the ground, purged his 
 entrails forth, and fell down upon the earth, and 
 died. Such and so miserable is the great inse- 
 
 1 Jer. x^2. Gentes signa dierum et rmmerum mensis aut 
 hebdomadag cum metu superstitioso observarunt. Quarta luna in- 
 fausta reputabatur, unde proverbium, 'Ev rsTpadi yiytvvi)<jQai. 
 Hujusmodi dies Graeci cnrotypaSag vocant; Latini, nefastos. 
 Hesiodus quintas omnino suspectas habet. UkfiTrrac, ds 
 IZaXiaaOai, end %a\£7rat re $ aivcii. 'Ev 7T£jU7rr^ yap (pdrriv 
 'Epivvvag a/uUpmoXeveiv. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 59 
 
 curity of a sinner : and of this Job had an excel- 
 lent meditation. ' How oft is the candle of the 
 wicked put oat ? and how oft cometh their de- 
 struction upon them ? God distributed sorrows in 
 his anger.' 1 c For what pleasure hath he in his 
 house after him, when the number of his months is 
 cut off in the midst P' 2 1 This is he that dieth in his 
 full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet.' 3 
 
 25. I sum up this discourse with an observation 
 that is made concerning the family of Eli, upon 
 which, for remissness of discipline on the father's 
 part, and for the impiety and profaneness of his 
 sons, God sent this curse, ' All the increase of their 
 house shall die in the flower of their age.' 4 Ac- 
 cording to that sad malediction it happened for 
 many generations; the heir of the family died as 
 soon as he begat a son to succeed him ; till the 
 family being wearied by so long a curse, by the 
 counsel of Rabbi Johanan Ben Zachary, betook 
 themselves universally to a sedulous and most de- 
 vout meditation of the law ; that is, to an exem- 
 plary devotion and strict religion : but then the 
 curse was turned into a blessing, and the line mas- 
 culine lived to an honourable old age. For the 
 doctors of the Jews said, that God often changes 
 his purposes concerning the death of man, when 
 the sick person is liberal in alms, or fervent in 
 prayer, or changes his name ; that is, gives up his 
 name to God by the serious purposes and religious 
 vows of holy obedience. ' He that followeth after 
 righteousness (alms it is in the vulgar Latin) and 
 mercy, findeth life;' 5 that verifies the first; and 
 the fervent prayer of Hezekiah is a great instance 
 
 1 Job, xxi. 17. 2 lb. verse 21. 3 lb. verse 23. 
 
 4 1 Sam. ii. 33. 5 Prov. xxi. 21. 
 
60 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 of the second : and all the precedent discourse was 
 intended for probation of the third, and proves 
 that no disease is so deadly as a deadly sin; and 
 the ways of righteousness are therefore advantages 
 of health, and preservatives of life, (when health 
 and life are good for us,) because they are a certain 
 title to all God's promises and blessings. 
 
 26. Upon supposition of these premises, I con- 
 sider there is no cause to wonder, that tender per- 
 sons and the softest women endure the violences of 
 art and physic, sharp pains of caustics and cup- 
 ping-glasses, the abscission of the most sensible 
 part, for preservation of a mutilous and imperfect 
 body : but it is a wonder that, when God hath ap- 
 pointed a remedy in grace apt to preserve nature, 
 and that a dying unto sin should prolong our 
 natural life, yet few men are willing to try the ex- 
 periment. They will buy their life upon any condi- 
 tions in the world but those which are the best and 
 easiest; any thing but religion and sanctity al- 
 though for so doing they are promised that immor- 
 tality shall be added to the end of a long life, to 
 make the life of a mortal partake of the eternal du- 
 ration of an angel or of God himself. 
 
 27. Fifthly, The last testimony of the excellency 
 and gentleness of Christ's yoke, the fair load of 
 Christianity, is the reasonableness of it, and the 
 unreasonableness of its contrary. 1 For whatsoever 
 the wisest men in the world, in all nations and re- 
 ligions, did agree upon as most excellent in itself, 
 and of greatest power to make political, or future 
 and immaterial felicities, all that and much more 
 the holy Jesus adopted into his law. For they re- 
 
 1 Religio sapientiam adauget, et sapientia religionem. Lac* 
 tant. — " Religion augments wisdom, and wisdom religion." 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 61 
 
 ceiving sparks or single irradiations from the re- 
 gions of light, or else having fair tapers shining in- 
 deed excellently in representations and expresses 
 of morality, were all involved and swallowed up 
 into the body of light, the Sun of Righteousness. 
 Christ's discipline was the breviary of all the wis- 
 dom of the best men, and a fair copy and transcript 
 of his Father's wisdom : and there is nothing in the 
 laws of our religion but what is perfective of our 
 spirits, excellent rules of religion, and rare expe- 
 dients of obeying God by the nearest ways of 
 imitation, and such duties which are the proper 
 ways of doing benefits to all capacities and orders 
 of men. But I remember, my design now is not to 
 represent Christianity to be a better religion than 
 any other-; for I speak to Christians, amongst whom 
 we presuppose that ; but I design to invite all 
 Christians in name to be such as they are called, 
 upon the interest of such arguments which repre- 
 sent the advantages of obedience to our religion as 
 it is commanded us by God. And this I shall 
 do yet further, by considering, as touching those 
 Christian names, who apprehend religion as the 
 fashion of their country, and know no other use of 
 a church but customary, or secular and profane, 
 that supposing Christian religion to have come 
 from God, as we all profess to believe, there are no 
 greater fools in the world, than such whose life con- 
 forms not to the pretence of their baptism and 
 institution. They have all the signs and characters 
 of fools, and indiscreet, unwary persons. 
 
 28. First, Wicked persons, like children and 
 fools, choose the present, whatsoever it is, and 
 neglect the infinite treasures of the future. They 
 that have no faith nor foresight have an excuse for 
 
62 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 snatching at what is now represented, because it 
 is that all which can move them. But then such 
 persons are infinitely distant from wisdom, whose 
 understanding neither reason nor revelation hath 
 carried further than the present adherences: not 
 only because they are narrow souls who cannot 
 look forward, and have nothing to distinguish them 
 from beasts, who enjoy the present, being careless 
 of what is to come ; but also because whatsoever is 
 present is not fit satisfaction to the spirit, nothing 
 but gluttings of the sense and sottish appetites. 1 
 Moses was a wise person, and so esteemed and re- 
 ported by the Spirit of God, because ' he despised 
 the pleasures of Pharaoh's court, having an eye to 
 the recompence of reward that is, because he de- 
 spised all the present arguments of delight, and 
 preferred those excellences which he knew should 
 be infinitely greater, as well as he knew they should 
 be at all. He that would have rather chosen to stay 
 in the theatre and see the sports out, than quit the 
 present spectacle, upon assurance to be adopted 
 into Caesars family, had an offer made him too 
 great for a fool ; and yet his misfortune was not 
 big enough for pity, because he understood nothing 
 of his felicity, and rejected what he understood 
 not. But he that prefers moments before eter- 
 nity, and despises the infinite successions of eter- 
 nal ages, that he may enjoy the present, not dar- 
 ing to trust God for what he sees not, and having 
 no objects of his affections, but those which are the 
 objects of his eyes, hath the impatience of a child, 
 and the indiscretion of a fool, and the faithlessness 
 
 1 Ei fxkv yap irpcLTTtiq n fieO* r)dovr)g atc^poi/, 7) /jlev rjdovij 
 7rapri\Se, to kclkov [levei. Hierocl. — " If thou doest a base 
 thing for pleasure ? the pleasure passes away, the evil remains." 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 63 
 
 of an unbeliever. The faith and hope of a Chris- 
 tian are the graces and portions of spiritual wis- 
 dom, which Christ designed as an antidote against 
 this folly. 
 
 29. Secondly, Children and fools choose to please 
 their senses rather than their reason, because they 
 still dwell within the regions of sense, and have 
 but little residence amongst intellectual essences. 
 And because the needs of nature first employ our 
 sensual appetites, these being first in possession 
 would also fain retain it, and therefore for ever 
 continue their title, and perpetually fight for it. 
 But because the inferior faculty fighting against 
 the superior is no better than a rebel, and that it 
 takes reason for its enemy, it shows such actions 
 which please the sense, and do not please the rea- 
 son, to be unnatural, monstrous, and unreason- 
 able. And it is a greater disreputation to the 
 understanding of a man to be so cozened and 
 deceived, as to choose money before a moral vir- 
 tue ; to please that which is common to him and 
 beasts, rather than that part which is a com- 
 munication of the Divine nature ; to see him run 
 after a bubble which himself hath made and the 
 sun hath particoloured, and to despise a treasure 
 which is offered to him, to call him off from pursu- 
 ing that emptiness and nothing. But so does 
 every vicious person; he feeds upon husks, and 
 loathes manna ; worships cats and onions, the beg- 
 garly and basest Egyptian deities, and neglects to 
 adore and honour the eternal God : he prefers the 
 society of drunkards before the communion of 
 saints ; or the fellowship of harlots, before a choir 
 of pure, chaste, and immaterial angels; the sick- 
 ness and filth of luxury, before the health and pu- 
 
64 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 rities of charity and temperance ; a dish of red 
 lentil pottage before a benison ; drink before im- 
 mortality ; money before mercy ; wantonness before 
 the severe precepts of Christian philosophy ; earth 
 before heaven ; and folly before the crowns, and 
 sceptres, and glories of a kingdom. Against this 
 folly Christian religion opposes contempt of things 
 below, and setting our affections on things above. 
 
 30. Thirdly, Children and fools propound to 
 themselves ends silly, low, and cheap, the getting 
 of a nut-shell, or a bag of cherry-stones, a gaud to 
 entertain the fancy of a few minutes ; and in order 
 to such ends, direct their counsels and designs. 
 And indeed in this they are innocent. But persons 
 not living according to the discipline of Christianity 
 are as foolish in the designation of their ends, 
 choosing things as unprofitable and vain to them- 
 selves, and yet with many mixtures of malice and 
 injuriousness both to themselves and others. His 
 end is to cozen his brother of a piece of land, or to 
 disgrace him by telling a lie, to supplant his for- 
 tune, to make him miserable : ends which wise 
 men and good men look upon as miseries and per- 
 secutions, instruments of affliction and regret ; be- 
 cause every man is a member of a society, and hath 
 some common terms of union and conjuncture, 
 which make all the body susceptive of all accidents 
 to any part. And it is a great folly, for pleasing 
 of the eye, to snatch a knife which cuts our fingers; 
 to bring affliction upon my brother or relative 
 which either must affect me, or else I am useless, a 
 base or dead person. The ends of vice are ignoble 
 and dishonourable. To discompose the quiet of a 
 family, or to create jealousies, or to raise wars, or 
 to make a man less happy, or apparently miserable, 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 65 
 
 or to fish for the devil, and gain souls to our enemy, 
 or to please a passion that undoes us, or to get 
 something that cannot satisfy us ; this is the chain 
 of counsels, and the great aims of unchristian livers: 
 they are all of them extreme great miseries. And 
 it is a great undecency for a man to propound an 
 endless and more imperfect than our present con- 
 dition ; as if we went about to unravel our present 
 composure, and to unite every degree of essence 
 and capacity, and to retire back to our first matter 
 and unshapen state, hoping to get to our journey's 
 end by going backwards. Against this folly the 
 holy Jesus opposed the fourth beatitude, or precept, 
 of' hungering and thirsting after righteousness/ 
 
 31. Fourthly, But children and fools, whatever 
 their ends be, they pursue them with as much 
 weakness and folly as they first choose them with 
 indiscretion ; running to broken cisterns, or to pud- 
 dles to quench their thirst. When they are hun- 
 gry they make fantastic banquets, or put colo- 
 quintida into their pottage, that they may be fur- 
 nished with pot-herbs : or are like the ass that de- 
 sired to flatter his master, and therefore fawned 
 upon him like a spaniel, and bruised his shoulders. 
 Such undecencies of means and prosecutions of in- 
 terests we find in unchristian courses. It may be 
 they propound to themselves riches for their end, 
 and they use covetousness for their means, and that 
 brings nought home ; or else they steal to get it, 
 and they are apprehended, and made to restore 
 fourfold. Like moths gnawing a garment, they 
 devour their own house, and by greediness of de- 
 sire they destroy their content, making impatience 
 the parent and instrument of all their felicity. Or 
 they are so greedy and imaginative, and have raised 
 
 vol. ni. F 
 
66 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 their expectation by an over-valuing* esteem of tem- 
 poral felicities, that when they come they fall short 
 of their promises, and are indeed less than they 
 would have been, by being beforehand appre- 
 hended greater than they could be. If their design 
 be to present themselves innocent and guiltless of 
 a suspicion or a fault, they deny the fact, and 
 double it. When they would repair their losses, 
 they fall to gaming: and besides that, they are in- 
 finitely full of fears, passions, wrath, and violent 
 disturbances in the various changes of their game ; 
 that which they use to restore their fortunes, ruins 
 even the little remnant, and condemns them to 
 beggary, or what is worse. Thus evil men seek for 
 content out of things that cannot satisfy, and take 
 care to get that content; that is, they raise war to 
 enjoy present peace, and renounce all content to 
 get it. They strive to depress their neighbours, 
 that they may be their equals ; to disgrace them, 
 to get reputation to themselves; (which arts being 
 ignoble, do them the most disparagement;) and re- 
 solve never to enter into the felicities of God by 
 content taken in the prosperities of man ; which is 
 making ourselves wretched by being wicked. Ma- 
 lice and envy is indeed a mighty curse ; and the 
 devil can show us nothing more foolish and unrea- 
 sonable than envy, which is in its very formality a 
 curse ; an eating of coals and vipers, because my 
 neighbour's table is full, and his cup is crowned 
 with health and plenty. The Christian religion, 
 as it chooseth excellent ends, so it useth proportion- 
 ate and apt means. The most contradictory acci- 
 dent in the world, when it becomes hallowed by a 
 pious and Christian design, becomes a certain means 
 of felicity and content. To quit our lands for 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 67 
 
 Christ's sake will certainly make us rich ; to depart 
 from our friends will increase our relations and be- 
 neficiaries: but the striving to secure our temporal 
 interests by any other means than obedient actions 
 or obedient sufferings, is declared by the holy Jesus 
 to be the greatest improvidence and ill husbandry 
 in the world. Even in this world Christ will repay 
 us an hundred-fold for all our losses which we suffer 
 for the interests of Christianity. In the same pro- 
 portion we find, that all graces do the work of hu- 
 man felicities with a more certain power and infal- 
 lible effect than their contraries. Gratitude endears 
 benefits, and procures more friendships: confession 
 gets pardon ; impudence and tying doubles the 
 fault, and exasperates the offended person : inno- 
 cence is bold, and rocks a man asleep ; but an evil 
 conscience is a continual alarm. Against this 
 folly of using disproportionate means in order to 
 obtain their ends, the holy Jesus hath opposed the 
 eight beatitudes, which by contradictions of nature 
 and improbable causes, according to human and 
 erring estimate, bring our best and wisest ends to 
 pass infallibly and divinely. 
 
 32. But this is too large a field to walk in ; for it 
 represents all the flatteries of sin to be a mere co- 
 zenage and deception of the understanding ; and 
 we find by this scrutiny, that evil and unchristian 
 persons are infinitely unwise, because they neglect 
 the counsel of their superiors and their guides. 
 They dote passionately upon trifles ; they rely 
 upon false foundations and deceiving principles; 
 they are most confident when they are most abused; 
 they are like shelled fish, singing loudest when their 
 house is on fire about their ears ; and being mer- 
 riest when they are most miserable and perishing ; 
 
 f 2 
 
68 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 when they have the option of two things, they ever 
 choose the worst ; they are not masters of their own 
 actions, but break all purposes at the first tempta- 
 tion ; they take more pains to do themselves a mis- 
 chief than would secure heaven ; that is, they are 
 rude, ignorant, foolish, unwary, and undiscerning 
 people in all senses, and to all purposes; and are 
 incurable but by their obedience and conformity to 
 the holy Jesus, the eternal wisdom of the Father. 
 
 33. Upon the strength of these premises, the 
 yoke of Christianity must needs be apprehended 
 light, though it had in it more pressure than it 
 hath ; because lightness or heaviness being relative 
 terms, are to be esteemed by comparison to others. 
 Christianity is far easier than the yoke of Moses's 
 law, not only because it consists of fewer rites, but 
 also because those perfecting and excellent graces 
 which integrate the body of our religion, are made 
 easy by God's assisting, and the gifts of the Holy 
 Ghost : and we may yet make it easier by love and 
 by fear, which are the proper products of the evan- 
 gelical promises and threatenings ; for I have seen 
 persons in afFrightment have carried burdens, 
 and leaped ditches, and climbed walls, which their 
 natural power could never have done. And if we 
 understood the sadnesses of a cursed eternity, from 
 which we are commanded to fly, and yet knew how 
 near we are to it, and how likely to fall into it, it 
 would create fears greater than a sudden fire, or a 
 midnight alarm. And those unhappy souls who 
 come to feel this truth, when their condition is 
 without remedy, are made the more miserable by 
 the apprehension of their stupid folly : for certainly 
 the accursed spirits feel the smart of hell once 
 doubled upon them, by considering by what vain and 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION, 
 
 (39 
 
 unsatisfying trifles they lost their happiness, with 
 what pains they perished, and with how great ease 
 they might have been beatified. And certain it is, 
 Christian religion hath so furnished us with assist- 
 ances, both exterior and interior, both of persua- 
 sion and advantages, that whatsoever Christ hath 
 doubled upon us in perfection, he hath alleviated 
 in aids. 
 
 34. And then, if we compare the state of Chris- 
 tianity with sin, all the preceding discourses were 
 intended to represent how much easier it is to be a 
 Christian than a vile and wicked person. And 
 he that remembers, that whatever fair allurements 
 may be pretended as invitations to a sin, are 
 such false and unsatisfying pretences, that they 
 drive a man to repent him of his folly, and, 
 like a great laughter, end in a sigh, and expire 
 in weariness and indignation, must needs con- 
 fess himself a fool for doing that which he knows 
 will make him repent that ever he did it. A sin 
 makes a man afraid whenever it thunders; and in 
 all dangers the sin detracts the visor, and affrights 
 him, and visits him when he comes to die, upbraid- 
 ing him with guilt, and threatening misery. So 
 that Christianity is the easiest law, and the easiest 
 state ; it is more perfect, and less troublesome ; it 
 brings us to felicity by ways proportionable, land- 
 ing us in rest by easy and unperplexed journeys. 
 This discourse I therefore thought necessary, be- 
 cause it reconciles our religion with those passions 
 and desires which are commonly made the instru- 
 ments and arguments of sin : for we rarely meet 
 with such spirits which love virtue so metaphysi- 
 cally as to abstract her from all sensible and deli- 
 cious compositions, and love the purity of the idea. 
 
70 
 
 EXCELLENCY OF THE 
 
 St. Lewis the king sent Ivo, bishop of Chartres, on 
 an embassy ; and he told, That he met a grave 
 matron on the way, with fire in one hand and 
 water in the other ; and, observing her to have a 
 melancholic, religious, and fantastic deportment 
 and look, asked her what those symbols meant, 
 and what she meant to do with her fire and water ? 
 She answered, " My purpose is with the fire to burn 
 Paradise, and with my water to quench the flames 
 of hell ; that men may serve God without the in- 
 centives of hope and fear, and purely for the love 
 of God." Whether the w oman were only imagina- 
 tive and sad, or also zealous, I know not. But 
 God knows he would have few disciples, if the argu- 
 ments of invitation were not of greater promise 
 than the labours of virtue are of trouble. And 
 therefore the Spirit of God, knowing to what we 
 are inflexible, and by what we are made most 
 ductile and malleable, hath propounded virtue 
 clothed and dressed with such advantages as may 
 entertain even our sensitive part and first desires; 
 that those also may be invited to virtue who under- 
 stand not what is just and reasonable, but what is 
 profitable ; who are more moved with advantage 
 than justice. 1 And because emolument is more felt 
 than innocence, and a man may be poor for all his 
 
 1 Quis enim virtutem amplectitur ipsam, praemia si 
 
 toll as ? 
 
 Sublatis studiorum pretiis, etiam studia peritura, at minus 
 decora. — Tacit. 
 
 " For who will embrace virtue herself if you take away 
 
 her rewards ?" 
 
 " The rewards of study being denied, the studies will perish 
 as becoming less honourable." 
 
 Vide Ciceron. Tuscul. 2 ; Lact. lib. iii. c. 27« Instit. ; et Idem, 
 c. 12. Aug. ep. 12. 
 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 71 
 
 gift of chastity, the holy Jesus, to endear the 
 practices of religion, hath represented godliness to 
 us under the notion of gain, and sin as unfruitful : 
 and yet, besides all the natural and reasonable ad- 
 vantages, every virtue hath a supernatural reward, 
 a gracious promise attending; and every vice is 
 not only naturally deformed, but is made more 
 ugly by a threatening, and horrid by an appendant 
 curse. Henceforth, therefore, let no man complain 
 that the commandments of God are impossible; 
 for they are not only possible but easy : and they 
 that say otherwise, and do accordingly, take more 
 pains to carry the instruments of their own death 
 than would serve to ascertain them of life : and if 
 we would do as much for Christ as we have done 
 for sin, we should find the pains less and the plea- 
 sure more : and therefore such complainers are 
 without excuse. For certain it is, they that can go 
 in foul ways must not say they cannot walk in 
 fair : they that march over rocks, in despite of so 
 many impediments, can travel the even ways of re- 
 ligion and peace, when the holy Jesus is their guide, 
 and the Spirit is their guardian, and infinite felici- 
 ties are at their journey's end, and all the reason of 
 the world, political, oecumenical, and personal, do 
 entertain and support them in the travel of the 
 passage. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O eternal Jesus ! who gavest laws unto the world, that man- 
 kind being united to thee by the bands of obedience, might 
 partake of all thy glories and felicities, open our understanding, 
 give us the spirit of discerning, and just apprehension of all the 
 beauties with which thou hast enamelled virtu e, to represent it 
 
72 
 
 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 beauteous and amiable in our eyes ; that by the allurements of 
 exterior decencies and appendant blessings our present desires may 
 be entertained, our hopes promoted, our affections satisfied, and 
 love, entering in by these doors, may dwell in the interior regions 
 of the will. O make us to love thee for thyself, and religion for 
 thee, and all the instruments of religion in order to thy glory and 
 our own felicities. Pull off the visors of sin, and discover its de- 
 formities by the lantern of thy word, and the light of the Spirit, 
 that I may never be bewitched with sottish appetites. Be 
 pleased to build up all the contents I expect in this world upon 
 the interests of a virtuous life, and the support of religion ; that 
 I may be rich in good works, content in the issues of thy provi- 
 dence, my health may be the result of temperance and severity, 
 my mirth in spiritual emanations, my rest in hope, my peace in 
 a good conscience, my satisfaction and acquiescence in thee : that 
 from content I may pass to an eternal fulness, from health to im- 
 mortality, from grace to glory, walking in the paths of righteous- 
 ness, by the waters of comfort, to the land of everlasting rest, to 
 feast in the glorious communications of eternity ; eternally ador- 
 ing, loving, and enjoying the infinity of the ever-blessed and mys- 
 terious Trinity ; to whom be glory, and honour, and dominion, 
 now and for ever. Amen. 
 
 DISCOURSE XVI. 
 
 Of Certainty of Salvation. 
 
 1. When the holy Jesus took an account of the 
 first legation and voyage of his apostles, he found 
 them rejoicing in privileges and exterior powers, 
 in their authority over unclean spirits ; but weigh- 
 ing it in his balance, he found the cause too light, 
 and therefore diverted it upon the right object : 
 ' Rejoice that your names are written in heaven.' 
 The revelation was confirmed, and more personally 
 applied in answer to St. Peter's question : ' We 
 have forsaken all and followed thee: what shall we 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 73 
 
 have therefore ?' Their Lord answered, ' Ye shall 
 sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of 
 Israel.' Amongst these persons to whom Christ 
 spake Judas was ; he was one of the twelve, and 
 he had a throne allotted for him ; his name was de- 
 scribed in the book of life, and a sceptre and a 
 crown was deposited for him too : for we must not 
 judge of Christ's meaning by the event, since he 
 spake these words to produce in them faith, comfort, 
 and joy in the best objects. It was a sermon of duty 
 as well as a homily of comfort, and therefore was 
 equally intended to all the college. And since the 
 number of thrones is proportioned to the number of 
 men, it is certain there was no exception of any 
 man there included ; and yet it is as certain Judas 
 never came to sit upon the throne, and his name 
 was blotted out of the book of life. Now if we put 
 these ends together, that in Scripture it was not 
 revealed to any man concerning his final condition, 
 but to the dying penitent thief, and to the twelve 
 apostles, that twelve thrones were designed for 
 them, and a promise made of their enthronization ; 
 and yet that no man's final estate is so clearly de- 
 clared miserable and lost as that of Judas, one of 
 the twelve, to whom a throne was promised; the 
 result will be, that the election of holy persons is a 
 condition allied to duty, absolute and infallible in 
 the general, and supposing all the dispositions and 
 requisities concurring ; but fallible in the particu- 
 lar, if we fall off from the mercies of the covenant, 
 and prevaricate the conditions. But the thing 
 which is most observable is, that if in persons so 
 eminent and privileged, and to whom a revelation 
 of their election was made as a particular grace, 
 
74 
 
 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 their condition had one weak leg, upon which, be- 
 cause it did rely for one half of the interest, it 
 could be no stronger than its supporters ; the con- 
 dition of lower persons, to whom no revelation is 
 made, no privileges are indulged, no greatness of 
 spiritual eminency is appendant, as they have no 
 greater certainty in the thing, so they have less in 
 person, and are therefore to work out their salvation 
 with great fears and tremblings of spirit. 
 
 2. The purpose of this consideration is, that we 
 do not judge of our final condition by any dis- 
 courses of our ow n, relying upon God's secret coun- 
 sels, and predestination of eternity. This is a 
 mountain, upon which whosoever climbs, like 
 Moses, to behold the land of Canaan at great dis- 
 tances, may please his eyes, or satisfy his curiosity, 
 but is certain never to enter that way. It is like 
 inquiring into fortunes, concerning which Phavori- 
 nus the philosopher spake not unhandsomely : 
 " They that foretel events of destiny and secret pro- 
 vidence, either foretel sad things or prosperous. If 
 they promise prosperous, and deceive you, you 
 are made miserable by a vain speculation, if they 
 threaten ill fortune, and say false, thou art made 
 wretched by a false fear. But if they foretel ad- 
 versity, and say true, thou art made miserable by 
 thy own apprehension before thou art so by des- 
 tiny; and many times the fear is worse than the 
 evil feared. But if they promise felicities, and 
 promise truly what shall come to pass, then thou 
 shalt be wearied by an impatience and a suspended 
 hope, and thy hope shall ravish and deflower the 
 joys of thy possession." Much of it is hugely ap- 
 plicable to the present question. And our blessed 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 75 
 
 Lord, when he was petitioned that he would grant 
 to the two sons of Zebedee, that they might sit 
 one on the right hand and the other on the left, in 
 his kingdom, rejected their desire, and only pro- 
 mised them what concerned their duty and their 
 suffering ; referring them to that, and leaving the 
 final event of men to the disposition of his Father. 
 This is the great secret of the kingdom, which 
 God hath locked up and sealed with the counsels of 
 eternity. ' The sure foundation of God standeth ; 
 having this seal, the Lord knoweth who are his/ 1 
 This seal shall never be broken up till the great day 
 of Christ : in the meantime, the divine knowledge is 
 the only repository of the final sentences, and this 
 ' way of God is unsearchable and past finding out.' 
 And therefore, if we be solicitous and curious to 
 know what God in the counsels of eternity hath 
 decreed concerning us, he hath, in two fair tables, 
 described all those sentences from whence we must 
 take accounts — the revelations of Scripture, and the 
 book of conscience. The first recites the law and 
 the conditions ; the other gives in evidence. The 
 first is clear, evident, and conspicuous ; the other, 
 when it is written with large characters, may also 
 be discerned ; but there are many little accents, 
 periods, distinctions, and little significations of ac- 
 tions, which either are there written in water, 
 or sullied over with carelessness, or blotted with 
 forgetfulness, or not legible by ignorance, or mis- 
 construed by interest and partiality, that it will be 
 extremely difficult to read the hand upon the wall, 
 or to copy out one line of the eternal sentence. 
 And therefore excellent was the counsel of the son 
 
 1 2 Tim. ii. 19. 
 
76 
 
 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 of Sirach : ' Seek not out the things that are too 
 hard for thee, neither search the things that are 
 above thy strength. But what is commanded thee 
 think thereupon with reverence ; for it is not 
 needful for thee to see with thine eyes the things 
 that are in secret.' 1 For whatsoever God hath re- 
 vealed in general concerning election, it concerns 
 all persons within the pale of Christianity. He 
 hath conveyed notice to all Christian people, that 
 they are sons of God, that they are the heirs of 
 eternity, coheirs with Christ, partakers of the 
 divine nature ; meaning that such they are by the 
 design of God, and the purposes of the manifesta- 
 tion of his Son. The election of God is disputed 
 in Scripture to be an act of God, separating whole 
 nations and rejecting others ; in each of which, 
 many particular instances there were contrary to 
 the general and universal purpose ; and of the 
 elect nations many particulars perished, and many 
 of the rejected people ' sat clown with Abraham, 
 Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.' 
 And to those persons to whom God was more par- 
 ticular, and was pleased to show the scrolls of his 
 eternal counsels, and to reveal their particular elec- 
 tions, as he did to the twelve apostles, he showed 
 them wrapped up and sealed : and, to take off 
 their confidences or presumptions, he gave proba- 
 tion in one instance, that those scrolls may be can- 
 celled, that his purpose concerning particulars 
 may be altered by us ; and therefore that he did 
 not discover the bottom of the abyss, but some 
 purposes of special grace and indefinite design. 
 But his peremptory, final, unalterable decree, he 
 
 » Ecclus. iii. 21,22. 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 77 
 
 keeps in the cabinets of the eternal ages, never to 
 be unlocked till the angel of the covenant shall 
 declare the unalterable universal sentence. 
 
 3. But as we take the measure of the course of 
 the sun by the dimensions of the shadows made by 
 our own bodies or our own instruments ; so must 
 we take the measures of eternity by the span of a 
 man's hand, and guess at what God decrees of us, 
 by considering how our relations and endearments 
 are to him. And it is observable, that all the con- 
 fidences which the Spirit of God hath created in 
 the elect, are built upon duty, and stand or fall 
 according to the strength or weakness of such sup- 
 porters. ' We know we are translated from death 
 to life by our love unto the brethren : M meaning, 
 that the performance of our duty is the best con- 
 signation to eternity, and the only testimony God 
 gives us of our election. And therefore we are to 
 make our judgments accordingly. And here I 
 consider, that there is no state of a Christian, in 
 which by virtue of the covenant of the gospel it is 
 effectively and fully declared that his sins are ac- 
 tually pardoned, but only in baptism, at our first 
 coming to Christ, when he redeems us from our 
 vain conversation, when he makes us become sons 
 of God, when he justifies us freely by his grace, 
 when we are purified by faith, when we make a 
 covenant with Christ to live for ever according to 
 his laws. And this I shall suppose I have already 
 proved and explicated in the discourse of repent- 
 ance. So that whoever is certain he hath not 
 offended God since that time, and in nothing 
 transgresseth the laws of Christianity, he is certain 
 
 1 1 John, iii. 14. 
 
78 
 
 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 that he actually remains in the state of baptismal 
 purity ; but it is too certain that this certainty re- 
 mains not long, but we commonly throw some dirt 
 into our waters of baptism, and stain our white 
 robe which we then put on. 
 
 4. But then because our restitution to this state 
 is a thing that consists of so many parts, is so di- 
 visible, various, and uncertain whether it be arrived 
 to the degree of innocence, (and our innocence 
 consists in a mathematical point, and is not capa- 
 ble of degrees any more than unity, because one 
 stain destroys our being innocent,) it is therefore a 
 very difficult matter to say that we have done all 
 our duty towards our restitution to baptismal 
 grace ; and if we have not done all that we can 
 do, it is harder to say that God hath accepted that 
 which is less than the conditions we entered into, 
 when we received the great justification and pardon 
 of sins. We all know we do less than our duty, 
 and we hope that God makes abatements for human 
 infirmities; but we have but a few rules to judge 
 by, and they not infallible in themselves, and we 
 yet more fallible in the application ; whether we 
 have not mingled some little minutes of malice in 
 the body of infirmities, and how much will bear 
 excuse, and in what time, and to what persons, 
 and to what degrees, and upon what endeavours 
 we shall be pardoned. So that all the interval 
 between our losing baptismal grace, and the day 
 of our death, we walk in a cloud, having lost the 
 certain knowledge of our present condition by our 
 prevarications. And indeed it is a very hard 
 thing for a man to know his own heart. And he 
 that shall observe how often himself hath been 
 abused by confidences and secret imperfections, 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 79 
 
 and how the greatest part of Christians in name 
 only do think themselves in a very good condition, 
 when God knows they are infinitely removed from 
 it ; (and yet if they did not think themselves well 
 and sure, it is unimaginable they should sleep so 
 quietly, and walk securely, and consider negli- 
 gently, and yet proceed confidently ;) he that con- 
 siders this, and upon what weak and false princi- 
 ples of divinity men have raised their strengths 
 and persuasions, will easily consent to this, that it 
 is very easy for men to be deceived in taking esti- 
 mate of their present condition, of their being in 
 the state of grace. 
 
 5. But there is great variety of men, and dif- 
 ference of degrees; and every step of returning to 
 God may reasonably add one degree of hope, till 
 at last it comes to the certainty and top of hope. 
 Many men believe themselves to be in the state of 
 grace, and are not ; many are in the state of grace, 
 and are infinitely fearful they are out of it : and 
 many that are in God s favour do think they are 
 so, and they are not deceived. And all this is cer- 
 tain. For some sin that sin of presumption and 
 flattery of themselves ; and some good persons are 
 vexed with violent fears and temptations to despair, 
 and all are not : and when their hopes are right, 
 yet some are strong, and some are weak. For they 
 that are well persuaded of their present condition, 
 have persuasions as different as are the degrees of 
 their approach to innocence ; and he that is at the 
 highest, hath also such abatements which are apt 
 and proper for the conservation of humility and 
 godly fear. 'I am guilty of nothing,' saith St. Paul ; 
 ' but I am not hereby justified : ' 1 meaning thus, 
 1 i Cor. iv 4. 
 
so 
 
 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 though I be innocent, for ought I know ; yet God, 
 who judges otherwise than we judge, may find 
 something to reprove in me : ' It is God that 
 judges/ that is, concerning my degrees of accept- 
 ance and hopes of glory. If the person be newly 
 recovering from a state of sin, because his state is 
 imperfect, and his sin not dead, and his lust active, 
 and his habit not quite extinct, it is easy for a man 
 to be too hasty in pronouncing well. He is wrapt 
 up in a cloak of clouds, hidden and encumbered ; 
 and his brightest day is but twilight, and his dis- 
 cernings dark, conjectural, and imperfect; 1 and his 
 heart is like a cold hand newly applied to the fire, 
 full of pain, and whether the heat or the cold be 
 strongest it is not easy to determine : or like 
 middle colours, which no man can tell to which 
 of the extremes they are to be accounted. 1 But 
 according as persons grow in grace, so they may 
 grow in confidence of their present condition. It 
 is not certain they will do so ; for sometimes the 
 beauty of their tabernacle is covered with goats'- 
 hair and skins of beasts ; and holy people do infi- 
 nitely deplore the want of such graces which God 
 observes in them with great complacency and ac- 
 ceptance. Both these cases say, that to be cer- 
 tainly persuaded of our present condition is 
 not a duty : sometimes it is not possible, and 
 sometimes it is better to be otherwise. But, if we 
 consider of this certainty as a blessing and a re- 
 ward, there is no question but in a great and emi- 
 nent sanctity of life there may also be a great con- 
 fidence and fulness of persuasion, that our present 
 being is well and gracious ; and then it is certain 
 
 1 Eccles. ix. 1, 2. 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 81 
 
 that such persons are not deceived. For the thing 
 itself being- sure, if the persuasion answers to it, it 
 is needless to dispute of the degree of certainty 
 and the manner of it. Some persons are heartily 
 persuaded of their being reconciled ; and of these 
 some are deceived, and some are not deceived ; 
 and there is no sign to distinguish them, but by 
 that which is the thing signified ; — a holy life, ac- 
 cording to the strict rules of Christian discipline, 
 tells what persons are confident, and who are pre- 
 sumptuous. But the certainty is reasonable in 
 none but in old Christians, habitually holy persons ; 
 not in new converts, or in lately lapsed people ; 
 for concerning them we find the Spirit of God 
 speaking with clauses of restraint and ambiguity ; 
 a 'perhaps/ 1 and, ' who knoweth?' and ' perad- 
 venture the thoughts of thy heart may be forgiven 
 thee;' 2 God may have mercy on thee. And that 
 God hath done so, they only have reason to be 
 confident, whom God hath blessed with a lasting, 
 continuing piety, and who have wrought out the 
 habits of their precontracted vices. 
 
 6. But we find in Scripture many precepts 
 given to holy persons, being in the state of grace, 
 to secure their standing, and perpetuate their pre- 
 sent condition. For, f He that endureth unto the 
 end he [only] shall be saved/ 3 said our blessed 
 Saviour : and ' He that standeth, let him take heed 
 
 1 Beatus Daniel praescius futurorum, de sententia Dei dubitat. 
 Rem temerariam faciunt qui audacter veniam pollicentur pec- 
 can tibus.—S. Hieron. Dan. iv. 27. " The blessed Daniel, 
 though revealing future things, doubts concerning the sentence 
 of God. They act with temerity who boldly promise pardon to 
 sinners." 
 
 2 Joel, ii. 14 ; Acts, viii. 22. 3 Matt. xxiv. 13. 
 VOL. III. G 
 
^2 
 
 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 lest he fall : ' 1 and, ' Thou standest by faith ; be 
 not high-minded, but fear :' 2 and, ' Work out your 
 salvation with fear and trembling.' 3 c Hold fast 
 that thou hast, and let no man take thy crown 
 from thee :' 4 and it was excellent advice; for one 
 church had 'lost their first love,' 5 and was likely 
 also to lose their crown. And St. Paul himself, 
 who had once entered within the veil, and seen 
 unutterable glories, yet was forced to endure hard- 
 ship, and to fight against his own disobedient ap- 
 petite, and to do violence to his inclinations, for 
 fear that, ' whilst he preached to others, himself 
 should become a cast-away.' And since we ob- 
 serve in holy story, that Adam and Eve fell in 
 paradise, and the angels fell in heaven itself, stum- 
 bling at the very jewels which pave the streets of 
 the celestial Jerusalem ; and in Christ's family, 
 one man, for whom his Lord had prepared a throne, 
 turned devil ; and that in the number of the dea- 
 cons, it is said that one turned apostate, who yet 
 had been a man full of the Holy Ghost; it will 
 lessen our train, and discompose the gaieties of our 
 present confidence, to think that our securities 
 cannot be really distinguished from danger and 
 uncertainties For every man walks upon two 
 legs ; one is firm, invariable, constant, and eternal ; 
 but the other is his own. God's promises are the 
 objects of our faith ; but the events and final con- 
 ditions of our souls, which are consequent to our 
 duty, can at the best be but the objects of our 
 hope. And either there must in this be a less cer- 
 tainty, or else faith and hope are not two distinct 
 
 * 1 Cor. x. 12. 2 Rom. xi. 20. 3 Phil. ii. 12 
 
 4 Rev. iii. 11. 5 Ibid. xxiv. 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 S3 
 
 graces. * God's gifts and vocation are without 
 repentance ; ' 1 meaning, on God's part: but the 
 very people concerning whom St. Paul used the 
 expression, were reprobate and cut off, and in good 
 time shall be called again ; in the meantime many- 
 single persons perish. ' There is no condemna- 
 tion to them that are in Christ Jesus.' 2 God will 
 look to that, and it will never fail : but then they 
 must secure the following period, and 'not walk 
 after the flesh, but after the Spirit.' 3 ' Behold the 
 goodness of God towards thee/ saith St. Paul, 'if 
 thou continue in his goodness ; otherwise thou 
 also shalt be cut off.' And if this be true con- 
 cerning the whole church of the Gentiles, to whom 
 the apostles then made the address, and concerning 
 whose election the decree was public and manifest, 
 that they might be cut off, and their abode in 
 God's favour was upon condition of their perseve- 
 rance in the faith ; much more is it true in single 
 persons, whose election in particular is shut up in 
 the abyss, and permitted to the condition of our 
 faith and obedience, and the revelations of dooms- 
 day. 
 
 7. Certain it is, that God hath given to holy 
 persons the spirit of adoption, enabling them to 
 cry, 'Abba, Father,' and to account themselves for 
 sons; and by this 'spirit we know we dwell in 
 him/ and therefore it is called in Scripture, ' the 
 earnest of the Spirit:' 4 though at its first mission, 
 and when the apostle wrote and used this appella- 
 tive, the Holy Ghost was of greater signification, 
 and a more visihle earnest and endearment of their 
 
 1 Horn. xi. 29. 2 R m. viii. 1. 3 Rom. xi. 22. 
 
 4 Horn. viii. 15 ; 1 John, iv. 13 ; 2 Cor. i. 22, and 
 v. 5. 
 
 G 2 
 
84 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 hopes, than it is to most of us since. For the visi- 
 ble sending of the Holy Ghost upon many believers, 
 in gifts, signs, and prodigies, was an infinite argu- 
 ment to make them expect events as great beyond that 
 as that was beyond the common gift of men : just as 
 miracles and prophecy, which are gifts of the Holy 
 Ghost, were arguments of probation for the whole 
 doctrine of Christianity. And this being a mighty 
 verification of the great promise, the promise of 
 the Father, was an apt instrument to raise their 
 hopes and confidences concerning those other pro- 
 mises which Jesus made, the promises of immor- 
 tality and eternal life, of which the present mira- 
 culous graces of the Holy Spirit were an earnest, 
 and in the nature of a contracting-penny. And 
 still also the Holy Ghost, though in another man- 
 ner, is ' an earnest of the great price of the hea- 
 venly calling,' the rewards of heaven ; though not 
 so visible and apparent as at first, yet as certain 
 and demonstrative, where it is discerned, or where 
 it is believed, as it is and ought to be in every per- 
 son who does any part of his duty, because by the 
 Spirit we do it, and without him we cannot. And 
 since we either feel or believe the presence and 
 gifts of the Holy Ghost to holy purposes, (for 
 whom we receive voluntarily, we cannot easily 
 receive without a knowledge of his reception,) we 
 cannot but entertain him as an argument of greater 
 good hereafter, and an earnest-penny of the per- 
 fection of the present grace, that is, of the rewards 
 of glory ; glory and grace differing no otherwise, 
 than as an earnest in part of payment does from 
 the whole price, ( the price of our high calling.' 
 So that the Spirit is an earnest, not because he 
 always signifies to us that we are actually in the 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 85 
 
 state of grace, but by way of argument or reflec- 
 tion. We know we do belong to God, when we 
 receive his Spirit ; (and all Christian people have 
 received him, if they were rightly baptized and 
 confirmed ;) I say, we know by that testimony that 
 we belong to God ; that is, we are the people with 
 whom God hath made a covenant, to whom he 
 hath promised and intends greater blessings, to 
 which the present gifts of the Spirit are in order. 
 But all this is conditional, and is not an immediate 
 testimony of the certainty and future event ; but 
 of the event as it is possibly future, and may 
 (without our fault) be reduced to act as certainly 
 as it is promised, or as the earnest is given in hand. 
 And this the Spirit of God oftentimes tells us in 
 secret visitations and public testimonies ; and this 
 is that which St. Paul calls, ' tasting of the hea- 
 venly gift, and partaking of the Holy Ghost, and 
 tasting of the good word of God, and the powers of 
 the world to come.' 1 But yet some that have done 
 so, have fallen away, and have quenched the 
 Spirit, and have given back the earnest of the 
 Spirit, and contracted new relations ; and God hath 
 been their Father no longer, for they have done the 
 works of the devil. So that if new converts be 
 uncertain of their present state, old Christians are 
 not absolutely certain they shall persevere. They 
 are as sure of it as they can be of future acts of 
 theirs which God hath permitted to their own 
 power : but this certainty cannot exclude all fear, 
 till their charity be perfect ; only according to the 
 strength of their habits, so is the confidence of their 
 abodes in grace. 
 
 » Heb. vi. 4, 5. 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 8. Beyond this, some holy persons have degrees 
 of persuasion superadded as largesses and acts of 
 grace; God loving to bless one degree of grace 
 with another, till it comes to a confirmation in 
 grace, which is a state of salvation directly oppo- 
 site to obduration : and as this is irremediable and 
 irrecoverable, so is the other inamissible. As 
 God never saves a person obdurate and obstinately 
 impenitent, so he never loses a man whom he hath 
 confirmed in grace; -'whom he [so] loves, he loves 
 unto the end : ' and to others, indeed, he offers his 
 persevering love ; but they will not entertain it with 
 a persevering duty, they will not be beloved unto 
 the end. But I insert this caution, that every man 
 that is in this condition of a confirmed grace, does 
 not always know it : but sometimes God draws 
 aside the curtains of peace, and shows him his 
 throne, and visits him with irradiations of glory, 
 and sends him a little star to stand over his dwell- 
 ing, and then again covers it with a cloud. It is 
 certain concerning some persons, that they shall 
 never fall, and that God will not permit them to 
 the danger or probability of it ; to such it is mo- 
 rally impossible : but these are but few, and them- 
 selves know it not as they know a demonstrative 
 proposition, but as they see the sun, sometimes 
 breaking from a cloud very brightly, but all day 
 long giving necessary and sufficient light. 
 
 9. Concerning the multitude of believers this 
 discourse is not pertinent, for they only take their 
 own accounts by the imperfections of their own 
 duty blended with the mercies of God : the cloud 
 gives light on one side, and is dark upon the other ; 
 and sometimes a bright ray peeps through the 
 fringes of a shower, and immediately hides itself ; 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 87 
 
 that we might be humble and diligent, striving for- 
 wards, and looking upwards, endeavouring our 
 duty, and longing after heaven, ' working out our 
 salvation with fear and trembling;' and in good 
 time our calling and election may be assured, 
 when we first, according to the precept of the 
 apostle, use all diligence. St. Paul, when he wrote 
 his first epistle to the Corinthians, was more fear- 
 ful of being reprobate, and therefore he used exte- 
 rior arts of mortification. 1 But when he wrote to 
 the Romans, which was a good while after, we find 
 him more confident of his final condition, ' per- 
 suaded that neither height, nor depth, angel, nor 
 principality, nor power, could separate him from 
 the love of God in Jesus Christ.' 2 And when he 
 grew to his latter end, when he wrote to St. Timo- 
 thy, he was more confident yet, and declared that 
 now ' a crown of righteousness was certainly laid 
 up for him ; for now he had fought the fight, and 
 finished his course ; the time of his departure was at 
 hand.' 3 Henceforth he knew no more fear ; his love 
 was as perfect as this state would permit, and that 
 cast out all fear. According to this precedent, if 
 we reckon our securities, we are not likely to be re- 
 proved by any words of Scripture, or by the con- 
 ditions of human infirmity : but when the confi- 
 dence outruns our growth in grace, it is itself a 
 sin; though when the confidence is equal with 
 the grace, it is of itself no regular and universal 
 duty, but a blessing and a reward indulged by spe- 
 cial dispensation, and in order to personal neces- 
 sities or accidental purposes. For only so much 
 hope is simply necessary as excludes despair, and 
 
 1 1 Cor. ix. 27. 2 Rom. viii. 38, 39. 
 
 3 2 Tim. iv. 6, 7, 8. 
 
88 OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 encourages our duty, and glorifies God, and enter- 
 tains his mercy : but that the hope should be with- 
 out fear, is not given but to the highest faith, and 
 the most excellent charity, and to habitual, ratified, 
 and confirmed Christians; and to them also with 
 some variety. The sum is this : all that are in the 
 state of beginners and imperfection have a condi- 
 tional certainty, changeable and fallible in respect 
 of us ; (for we meddle not with what it is in God's 
 secret purposes;) changeable, I say, as their wills 
 and resolutions. They that are grown towards 
 perfection have more reason to be confident, 
 and many times are so : but still, although the 
 strength of the habits of grace adds degrees of mo- 
 ral certainty to their expectation, yet it is but as 
 their condition is, hopeful and promising, and of a 
 moral determination. But to those few to whom 
 God hath given confirmation in grace, he hath also 
 given a certainty of condition ; and therefore if that 
 be revealed to them, their persuasions are certain 
 and infallible. If it be not revealed to them, their 
 condition is in itself certain, but their persuasion is 
 not so ; but in the highest kind of hope, ' an an- 
 chor of the soul, sure and steadfast.' 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O eternal God, whose counsels are in the great deep, and thy 
 ways past finding out ; thou hast built our faith upon thy pro- 
 mises, our hopes upon thy goodness, and hast described our paths 
 between the waters of comfort and the dry, barren land of our own 
 duties and affections. We acknowledge that all our comforts derive 
 from thee, and to ourselves we owe all our shame and confusions 
 and degrees of desperation. Give us the assistances of the Holy 
 Ghost to help us in performing our duty ; and give us those com- 
 
OF CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. 
 
 89 
 
 forts and visitation of the Holy Ghost, which thou in thy infinite 
 and eternal wisdom knowest most apt and expedient to encourage 
 our duties, to entertain our hopes, to alleviate our sadnesses, to 
 refresh our spirits, and to endure our abode and constant endea- 
 vours in the strictnesses of religion and sanctity. Lead us, 
 dearest God, from grace to grace, from imperfection to strength, 
 from acts to habits, from habits to confirmation in grace ; that 
 we may also pass into the region of comfort, receiving the earn- 
 est of the Spirit, and the adoption of sons ; till by such a signa- 
 ture we be consigned to glory, and enter into the possession of 
 the inheritance which we expect in the kingdom of thy Son, and 
 in the fruition of the felicities of thee, O gracious Father, God 
 eternal. Amen. 
 
90 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 SECTION XIV. 
 
 O f the Third Year of the Preaching of Jesus. 
 
 1 . But Jesus knowing* of the death of the Baptist, 
 Herod's jealousy, and the envy of the Pharisees, re- 
 tired into a desert place beyond the lake, together 
 with his apostles ; for the people pressed so upon 
 them, they had not leisure to eat. But neither 
 there could he be hid, but great multitudes flocked 
 thither also ; to whom he preached many things. 
 And afterwards, because there were no villages in 
 the neighbourhood, lest they should faint in their 
 return to their houses, he caused them to sit 
 down upon the grass ; and with five loaves of bar- 
 ley, and two small fishes he satisfied five thousand 
 men, besides women and children ; and caused the 
 disciples to gather up the fragments, which being 
 amassed together filled twelve baskets. Which 
 miracles had so much proportion to the understand- 
 ing, and met so happily with the affections of the 
 people, that they were convinced that this was the 
 ' Messias who was to come into the world,' and 
 had a purpose to have taken him by force, and 
 made him a king. 
 
 2. But he that left his Father's kingdom, to take 
 upon him the miseries and infelicities of the world, 
 fled from the offers of a kingdom, and their tu- 
 multuary election, as from an enemy : and there- 
 fore, sending his disciples to the ship to go before 
 towards Bethsaida, he ran into the mountains to 
 hide himself, till the multitude should scatter to their 
 several habitations; he, in the meantime, taking 
 the opportunity of that retirement for the ad- 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 91 
 
 vantage of his prayers. But when the apostles 
 were far engaged in the deep, a great tempest 
 arose, with which they were pressed to the extremi- 
 ty of danger, and the last refuges, labouring in 
 sadness and hopelessness, till the fourth watch of 
 the night ; when, in the midst of their fears and 
 labour, Jesus comes walking on the sea, and ap- 
 peared to them, which turned their fears into af- 
 frightments ; for they supposed it had been a spi- 
 rit. But he appeased their fears with his pre- 
 sence and manifestation who he was ; which yet 
 they desired to have proved to them by a sign. 
 For ' Simon Peter said unto him, ' Master, if it be 
 thou, command me to come to thee on the waters/ 
 The Lord did so : and Peter, throwing himself 
 upon the confidence of his Master's power and pro- 
 vidence, came out of the ship ; and his fear began 
 to weigh him down, and he cried, saying, ' Lord, 
 save me.' Jesus took him by the hand, reproved 
 the timorousness of his faith, and went with him 
 into the ship ; where, when they had worshipped 
 him, and admired the divinity of his power and 
 person, they presently came into the land of Gen- 
 nesaret, the ship arriving at the port immediately. 
 And all that were sick, or possessed of unclean 
 spirits, ' were brought to him : and as many as 
 touched the border of his garment were made 
 whole/ 
 
 3. By this time they whom Jesus had left on 
 the other side of the lake, had come as far as Ca- 
 pernaum to seek him, wondering that he was 
 there before them. But upon the occasion of their 
 so diligent inquisition, Jesus observes to them, 
 " That it was not the divinity of the miracle that 
 provoked their zeal, but the satisfaction they had 
 
92 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 in the loaves, a carnal complacency in their meal : 
 and upon that intimation speaks of celestial bread, 
 the divine nutriment of souls ; and then discourses 
 of the mysterious and symbolical manducation of 
 Christ himself ; affirming that he himself was ' the 
 bread of life that came down from heaven that he 
 would give his disciples ' his flesh to eat, and his 
 blood to drink ;' " and all this shall be ' for the life 
 of the world,' to nourish unto life eternal ; so that 
 without it a happy eternity could not be obtain- 
 ed. Upon this discourse ' divers of his disciples 
 (amongst whom St. Mark the evangelist is said to 
 be one, though he was afterwards recalled by Si- 
 mon Peter) forsook him,' 1 being scandalized by their 
 literal and carnal understanding of those words of 
 Jesus, which he intended in a spiritual sense. For 
 the words that he spake were not profitable in the 
 sense of flesh and blood ; but ' they are spirit, and 
 they are life/ himself being the expounder, who 
 best knew his own meaning. 
 
 4. When Jesus saw this great defection of his dis- 
 ciples from him, he turned him to the twelve apostles, 
 and asked if they f also would go away. Simon Pe- 
 ter answered, Lord, whither shall we go ? thou hast 
 the words of eternal life : and we believe and are 
 sure thou art that Christ the Son of the living God/ 
 Although this confession was made by Peter, in the 
 name and confidence of the other apostles, yet 
 Jesus told them, that even amongst the twelve 
 there was one devil ; meaning Judas Iscariot, who 
 afterwards betrayed him. This he told them pro- 
 phetically, that they might perceive the sad acci- 
 dents which afterwards happened, did not invade 
 
 1 Epiphan. Hasres. 15. 
 
JESUS's PREACHING. 
 
 93 
 
 and surprise him in the disadvantages of ignorance 
 or improvision, but came by his own knowledge and 
 providence. 
 
 5. Then came to him the Pharisees, and some 
 Scribes, which came from Jerusalem and Galilee, 
 (fo - 'Jesus would not go to Judaea, because the 
 Jews laid wait to kill him,) and quarrelled with 
 him about certain impertinent, unnecessary rites, 
 derived to them not by Divine sanction, but ordi- 
 nances of man; such as were, 'washing their hands 
 oft when they eat, baptizing cups and platters/ 
 and 6 washing tables and beds which ceremonies 
 the apostles of Jesus did not observe, but attended 
 diligently to the simplicity and spiritual holiness of 
 their Master's doctrine. But in return to their vain 
 demands, Jesus gave them a sharp reproof, for pro- 
 secuting these and many other traditions, to the 
 discountenance of divine precepts ; and in particu- 
 lar, they taught men to give to the Corban, and re- 
 fused to supply the necessity of their parents, think- 
 ing it to be religion, though they neglected piety 
 and charity. And again he thunders out woes and 
 sadnesses against their impieties; for being curious 
 of minutes, and punctual in rites and ceremonials, 
 but most negligent and incurious of judgment and 
 the love of God ; for their pride, for their hypocrisy, 
 for their imposing burdens upon others which 
 themselves helped not to support ; for taking away 
 the key of knowledge from the people, obstructing 
 the passages to heaven ; for approving the acts of 
 their fathers in persecuting the prophets. But for 
 the question itself, concerning washings, Jesus 
 taught the people, that no outward impurity did 
 stain the soul in the sight of God ; but all pol- 
 lution is from within, from the corruption of the 
 
04 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 heart and impure thoughts, unchaste desires and 
 unholy purposes ; and that charity is the best pu- 
 rifier in the world. 
 
 6. And thence 'Jesus departed into the coasts of 
 Tyre and Sidon, and entered into a house/ that he 
 might not be known. The diligence of a mother's 
 love and sorrow, and necessity, found him out in 
 his retirement : for ' a Syrophoenician woman came 
 and besought him lie would cast the devil out of 
 her daughter.' But Jesus discoursed to her by way 
 of discomfort and rejection of her, for her nation's 
 sake. But the seeming denial did but enkindle 
 her desires, and made her importunity more bold 
 and undeniable: she begged but 'some crumbs 
 that fell from the children's table,' but one instance 
 of favour to her daughter, which he poured forth 
 without measure upon the sons and daughters of 
 Israel. Jesus was pleased with her zeal and dis- 
 cretion, and pitied her daughter's infelicity, and 
 dismissed her with saying, ' the devil was gone out 
 of her daughter/ 
 
 7. But Jesus stayed not long here, but returning 
 * to the sea of Galilee, through the midst of Deca- 
 polis, they brought unto him a man deaf and 
 dumb ;' whom Jesus cured by ' touching his tongue, 
 and putting his fingers in his ears ;' which caused 
 the people to give a large testimony in appro- 
 bation of all his actions. And they followed 
 him unto a mountain, bringing to him multitudes 
 of diseased people ; and he healed them all. But 
 because the people had followed him ' three days, 
 and had nothing to eat/ Jesus, in pity to their 
 need, resolved to feast them once more at the charge 
 of a miracle : therefore taking ' seven loaves and a 
 few small fishes, he blessed them/ and ' satisfied 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING 
 
 95 
 
 four thousand men, besides women and children.' 
 And there remained ' seven baskets full of broken 
 bread arid fish.' From whence Jesus departed by 
 ship to the coasts of Mageddon and Dalmanutha, 
 whither ' the Pharisees and Sadducees came seek- 
 ing of him a sign.' But Jesus rejected their im- 
 pertinent and captious demand, knowing they did 
 it to ill purposes and with disaffection ; reprov- 
 ing them, that they ' discerned the face of the sky,' 
 and the prognostics of fair or foul weather, but 1 not 
 the signs of the times' of the Son of man. How- 
 ever, since they had neglected so great demonstra- 
 tions of miracles, gracious discourses, holy laws 
 and prophecies, they must expect ' no other sign 
 but the sign of the prophet Jonas meaning, the 
 resurrection of his body after three days' burial. 
 And so he dismissed the impertinent inquisitors. 
 
 8. And passing again over the lake, as his dis- 
 ciples were solicitous, because ' they had forgot to 
 take bread/ he gave them caution to beware ' of 
 the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the 
 leaven of Herod :' meaning the hypocrisy and va- 
 nities of the one, and the heresy of the other : for 
 Herod's leaven was the pretence that he was the 
 Messias ; which the sect of the Herodians did ear- 
 nestly and spitefully promote. And after this en- 
 tertainment of themselves by the way, they came 
 together to Bethsaida, where Jesus cured a blind 
 man with a collyrium of spittle, salutary as balsam, 
 or the purest eye-bright, when his divine benedic- 
 tion once had hallowed it. But Jesus staid not 
 there, but departing thence, into the coasts of 
 Caesarea Philippi, out of Herod's power, (for it was 
 in Philip's jurisdiction,) after he had f prayed with 
 his disciples,' he enquired what opinion the world 
 
96 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 had of him, and ' whom they reported him to be. 
 They answered, Some say thou art John the Bap- 
 tist, some that thou art Elias, or Jeremias, or one of 
 the prophets for in Galilee especially the sect of 
 the Pharisees was mightily disseminated, whose 
 opinion it was, that the souls of dead men, accord- 
 ing to their several merits, did transmigrate into 
 other bodies of very perfect and excellent persons. 
 And therefore in all this variety, none hit upon the 
 right, or fancied him to be a distinct person from 
 the ancients : but although they differed in the as- 
 signation of his name, yet generally they agreed it 
 was the soul of a departed prophet which had pas- 
 sed into another body. But Jesus asked the apos- 
 tles their opinion ; and Peter, in the name of all 
 the rest, made an open and confident confession, 
 ( Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God.' 
 
 9. This confession Jesus not only confirmed as 
 true, but as ' revealed by God,' and of fundamental 
 necessity : for after the blessing of Peter's person, 
 upon allusion of Peter's name, Jesus said, that * upon 
 this rock [the article of Peter's confession,] he 
 would build his church promising to it assistances 
 even to perpetuity, insomuch that ' the gates of 
 hell/ that is, persecution, and death, and the grave, 
 ' should never prevail against it.' Adding withal 
 a promise to Peter, in behalf of all the rest, as he 
 made a confession for them all, that he would 
 ' give unto him the keys of the kingdom of heaven ; 
 so that whatsoever he should bind on earth should 
 be bound in heaven, and whatsoever he should 
 loose on earth should be loosed in heaven ; a power 
 which he never communicated before or since, but 
 to their successors ; greater than the large charter 
 of nature and the donative of creation, in which all 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 97 
 
 the creatures under heaven were made subject to 
 man's empire, but till now heaven itself was never 
 subordinate to human ministration. 
 
 10. And now the days from henceforward to the 
 death of Jesus we must reckon to be like the vigils 
 or eves of his passion ; for now he began, and often 
 did ingeminate those sad predictions of his un- 
 handsome usage he should shortly find ; that he 
 should be ' rejected of the elders, and chief-priests, 
 and Scribes, and suffer many things at Jerusalem, 
 and be killed, and be raised up the third day,' But 
 Peter, hearing that sad discourse, so contrary to his 
 hopes, which he had blended with temporal ex- 
 pectances, (for he had learnt the doctrine of Christ's 
 advent, but not the mystery of the cross,) in 
 great and mistaken civility, took Jesus aside, 
 ' and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from 
 thee, Lord; this shall not be unto thee.' But Jesus, 
 full of zeal against so soft and human admonition, 
 that savoured nothing of God, or of abstracted im- 
 material considerations, chid Peter bitterly : ' Get 
 thee behind me, Satan ; thou art an offence unto 
 me. And calling his disciples to him, he told them 
 a second part of the sad doctrine, that not only him- 
 self, but all they also must surTer : for when the 
 head was to be crowned with thorns, if the mem- 
 bers were wrapped in softnesses, it was an unhand- 
 some indecency, and a disunion too near an anti- 
 pathy ; and therefore whoever will be the disciple 
 of Jesus, must ' take up his cross, deny himself,' and 
 his own fonder appetites, and trace his Master's 
 footsteps, marked out with blood that he shed for 
 our redemption and restitution. And that there 
 be no escape from the participation of Christ's suf- 
 
 VOL. III. H 
 
98 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 fering, Jesus added this dilemma: ' He that will 
 save his life shall lose it ; and he that will lose it 
 shall save it' to eternity. Which part soever we 
 choose, there is a life to be lost. But as the first 
 are foolish to the extremest misery, that will lose 
 their souls to gain the world ; so they are most 
 wise and fortunate that will give their lives for 
 him, because when ' the Son of man shall c me in 
 his own glory, and his Fathers, and of his angels', 
 he shall reward every man according to his works.' 
 This discourse Jesus concluded with a prophecy, 
 that some, standing in that presence ' should not 
 die till they saw the Son of man coming in his 
 kingdom.' 
 
 11. Of the greater glories of which, in due time 
 to be revealed, ' Jesus after eight days' gave a bright 
 and excellent probation : for ' taking with him 
 Peter, and James, and John, he went up into the 
 mountain Tabor to pray : and while he prayed he 
 was transfigured before them ; and his face did 
 shine like the sun, and his garments were white and 
 glistering. And there appeared talking with him 
 Moses and Elias gloriously, speaking of the de- 
 cease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem ;' 
 which glory, these apostles, after they had 
 awaked from sleep, did behold. And the interlo- 
 cutors with Jesus, having finished their embassy 
 of death, (which they delivered in forms of glory, 
 representing the excellencies of the reward, to- 
 gether with the sharpness of the passage and 
 interval,) departed, leaving the apostles full of 
 fear, and wonder, and ecstacy ; insomuch that 
 ' Peter talked he knew not what,' but nothing 
 amiss, something prophetical ; saying, f Master, it 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 99 
 
 is good to be here : let us build three tabernacles/ 1 
 And some devout persons, in memory of the mys- 
 tery, did erect three churches in the same place in 
 after-ages. But after the departure of those atten- 
 dant saints, a cloud encircled Jesus and the dis- 
 ciples, and a voice came from the excellent glory, 
 * This is my beloved Son, hear him.' The cloud 
 quickly disappeared, and freed the disciples from 
 the fear it had put them in. So they attended 
 Jesus and descended from the mountain, being 
 commanded silence ; which they observed till the 
 resurrection. 
 
 12. The next day came to Jesus a man praying 
 in behalf of his son, lunatic and sore troubled with 
 a devil, who sought oft to destroy him in fire and 
 water, that Jesus would be pleased to deliver him. 
 For his apostles tried, and could not, by reason of 
 the want of faith : for this grace, if it be true, 
 though in a less degree, is of power to remove 
 mountains, to pluck up trees by the roots, and to 
 give them solid foundation in the waters. And 
 Jesus rebuked the devil, and he departed out of 
 him from that very hour. Then Jesus departed 
 privately into Galilee, and in his journey repeated 
 those sadnesses of his approaching passion ; which 
 so afflicted the spirits of the disciples, that they 
 durst no more provoke him to discourse, lest he 
 should take occasion to interweave something of 
 that unpleasant argument with it. For sad and 
 disconsolate persons use to create comforts to them- 
 selves by fiction of fancy, and use arts of avocation 
 to remove displeasure from them, and stratagems 
 to remove it from their presence, by removing it 
 
 1 Bede de Locis Sanctis, c. 17. 
 
ICO 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 from their apprehensions; thinking the incommo- 
 dity of it is then taken away when they have lost 
 the sense. 
 
 13. When Jesus was now come to Capernaum, 
 the exactors of rates came to Simon Peter, asking 
 him if his Master paid the accustomed imposition, 
 viz. a sicle or a didrachm, the fourth part of an 
 ounce of silver, which was the tribute which the 
 Lord imposed upon all the sons of Israel from 
 twenty years old and above, to pay for redemption 
 and propitiation, and for the use of the tabernacle. 1 
 When Peter came into the house, Jesus knowing 
 the message that he was big with, prevented him, 
 by asking him, ' Of whom do the kings of the na- 
 tions take tribute ; of their own children, or of 
 strangers?' Peter answered, ' Of strangers.' Then 
 said Jesus, ' then are the children free meaning, 
 that since the Gentile kings do not exact tribute of 
 their sons, neither will God of his. And therefore 
 this pension to be paid for the use of the tabernacle, 
 for the service of God, for the redemption of their 
 souls, was not to be paid by him, who was the Son 
 of God, but by strangers. Yet, to avoid offence, 
 he sent Peter a fishing, and provided a fish with 
 two didrachms of silver in it, which he commanded 
 Peter to pay for them two. 
 
 14. But when the disciples were together with 
 Jesus in the house, he asked them what they dis- 
 coursed of upon the way. For they had fallen 
 upon an ambitious and mistaken quarrel, which of 
 them should be greatest in their Master's kingdom ; 
 which they still did dream should be an external 
 and secular royalty, full of fancy and honour. But 
 
 1 Exod. xax. 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 101 
 
 the Master was diligent to check their forwardness, 
 establishing a rule for clerical deportment : ' He 
 that will be greatest among you, let him be your 
 minister:' so supposing a greater and a lesser, a 
 minister and a person to be ministered unto ; but 
 dividing the grandeur of the person from the great- 
 ness of office, that the higher the employment is, 
 the more humble should be the man. Because in 
 spiritual prelation it is not as in secular pomps, 
 where the dominion is despotic, the coercion bloody, 
 the dictates imperious, the laws externally com- 
 pulsory, and the titles arrogant and vain ; and all 
 the advantages are so passed upon the person, that 
 making that first to be splendid, it passes from the 
 person to the subjects, who in abstracted essences 
 do not easily apprehend regalities in veneration, 
 but as they are subjected in persons made excellent 
 by such superstructures of majesty. But in digni- 
 ties ecclesiastical the dominion is paternal, the regi- 
 ment persuasive and argumentative, the coercion 
 by censures immaterial, by cession and consent, 
 by denial of benefits, by the interest of virtues, and 
 the efficacy of hopes, and impresses upon the 
 spirit; the laws are full of admonition and sermon ; 
 the titles of honour monitors of duty, and memo- 
 rials of labour and offices ; and all the advantages, 
 which from the office usually pass upon the per- 
 son, are to be divested by the humility of the 
 man ; and when they are of greatest veneration, 
 they are abstracted excellencies and immaterial, 
 not passing through the person to the people, and 
 reflected to his lustre, but transmitted by his labour 
 and ministry, and give him honour for his labour's 
 sake, (which is his personal excellency,) not for 
 his honour and title, which is either a derivative 
 
102 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 from Christ, or from the constitution of pious per- 
 sons, estimating and valuing the relatives of reli- 
 gion. 
 
 15. Then Jesus taketh a little child, and setteth 
 him in the midst, propounding him, by way of em- 
 blem, a pattern of humility and simplicity, without 
 the mixtures of ambition or caitive distempers : 
 such infant candour and lowliness of spirit being 
 the necessary port through which we must pass, if 
 we will enter into the courts of heaven. But as a 
 current of wholesome waters breaking from its re- 
 straint runs out in a succession of waters, and every 
 preceding draught draws out the next ; so were the 
 discourses of Jesus excellent and opportune, creat- 
 ing occasions for others, that the whole doctrine of 
 the gospel and the entire will of the Father might 
 be communicated upon design ; even the chances of 
 words and actions being made regular and orderly 
 by divine providence : for from the instance of hu- 
 mility in the symbol and hieroglyphic of the child, 
 Jesus discourses of " the care God takes of little 
 children, whether naturally or spiritually such ; 
 the danger of doing them scandal and offences ; 
 the care and power of their angels-guardian ; of 
 the necessity in the event that scandals should 
 arise, and of the great woe and infelicity of those 
 persons who were the active ministers of such 
 offences." 
 
 16. But if in the traverses of our life discontents 
 and injuries be done, Jesus teaches how the in- 
 jured person should demean himself : first, reprove 
 the offending party privately ; if he repent, forgive 
 him for ever, with a mercy as unwearied and as 
 multiplied as his repentance. 1 For the servant to 
 
 1 Injuriam qui tulit, oblivisci potest; qui fecit, nunquam. 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 103 
 
 whom his Lord had forgiven ten thousand talents, 
 because he refused to forgive his fellow-servant 
 one hundred pence, was delivered to the tormen- 
 tors, till he should pay that debt which his lord 
 once forgave, till the servant's impiety forced him 
 to repent his donative and remission. 1 But if he 
 refuses the charity of private correction, let him be 
 reproved before a few witnesses : and in case he be 
 still incorrigible, let him be brought to the tribunal 
 of the church ; against whose advices if he shall 
 kick, let him feel her power, and be cut off from 
 the communion of saints, becoming a pagan or a 
 publican. And to make that the church shall not 
 have a dead and ineffectual hand in her animad- 
 versions, Jesus promises to all the apostles, what 
 before he promised to Peter, a power of binding 
 and loosing on earth, and that it should be ratified 
 in heaven what they shall so dispose on earth, with 
 an unerring key. 
 
 17. But John interrupted him, telling him of a 
 stranger that cast out devils in the name of Jesus ; 
 but because he was not of the family, he had for- 
 bidden him. To this Jesus replied, that he should 
 ' in no wise have forbidden him for in all reason 
 he would do veneration to that person whose name 
 he saw to be energetical and triumphant over devils, 
 and in whose name it is almost necessary that man 
 should believe, who used it as an instrument of 
 
 Tacit. — " He who has suffered an injury may forget it : he who 
 has inflicted it can never." 
 
 1 Be pcenis debitorum qui solvendo non sunt, vide Livium. 
 Decad. I. lib. i. & vi. et Dionys. Halicarn. Hist. Rom. lib. vi. 
 et A. Gellium, lib. xx. c. 1. Cod. Theod. lib. iv. & 7. de 
 exact. 
 
104 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 ejection of impure spirits. Then Jesus proceeded in 
 liis excellent sermon and union of discourses, add- 
 ing holy precepts u concerning offences which a 
 man might do to himself ; in which case he is to 
 be severe, though most gentle to others : for in his 
 own case he must show no mercy, but abscission : 
 for it is better to cut off the offending hand or foot, 
 or extinguish the offending eye, rather than, upon 
 the support of a troublesome foot, and by the light 
 of an offending eye, walk into ruin and a sad eter- 
 nity, where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not 
 quenched. " And so Jesus ended this chain of ex- 
 cellent discourses. 
 
 18. About this time was the Jews' feast of taber- 
 nacles, whither Jesus went up as it were in secret ; 
 and passing through Samaria, he found the inha- 
 bitants of a little village so inhospitable as to re- 
 fuse to give him entertainment ; which so provoked 
 the intemperate zeal of James and John, that they 
 would fain have called for fire to consume them, 
 even as Elias did. But Jesus rebuked the furies of 
 their anger, teaching them to distinguish the spirit 
 of Christianity from the ungentleness of the decre- 
 tory zeal of Elias : for since the Son of man came 
 with a purpose to seek and to save what was lost, 
 it was but an indiscreet temerity suddenly, upon the 
 lightest umbrages of displeasure, to destroy a man, 
 whose redemption cost the effusion of the dearest 
 blood from the heart of Jesus. But contrariwise 
 Jesus does a miracle upon the ten leprous persons 
 who came to him from the neighbourhood, crying 
 out with sad exclamations for help. But Jesus sent 
 them to the priest to offer for their cleansing. Thither 
 they went; and but one only returned to give thanks, 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 105 
 
 and he ' a stranger/ who e with a loud voice glorified 
 God/ and with humble adoration worshipped, and 
 gave thanks to Jesus. 
 
 19. When Jesus had finished his journey, and 
 was now come to Jerusalem, for the first days he 
 was undiscerned in public conventions, but heard 
 of the various opinions of men concerning him ; 
 some saying he was a good man ; others, that he 
 deceived the people : and the Pharisees sought for 
 him to do him a mischief. But when they despaired 
 of finding him in the midst of the feast and the 
 people, he made sermons openly in the midst of 
 the temple : whom when he had convinced by the 
 variety and divinity of his miracles and discourses, 
 they gave the greatest testimony in the world of 
 human weakness, and how prevalent a prejudice is 
 above the confidence and conviction of a demon- 
 stration : for a proverb, a mistake, an error, in mat- 
 ter of circumstance, did in their understandings 
 outweigh multitudes of miracles and arguments: 
 and because ' Christ was of Galilee/ because ' they 
 knew whence he was/ because of the proverb, 
 that ' out of Galilee comes no prophet/ because 
 * the rulers did not believe in him/ these outweighed 
 the demonstrations of his mercy, and his power, 
 and divinity. But yet ' very many believed on 
 him ; and no man durst lay hands to take him : for 
 as yet his time was not come/ in which he meant to 
 give himself up to the power of the Jews. And 
 therefore, when the Pharisees sent officers to seize 
 him, they also became his disciples, being them- 
 selves surprised by the excellency of his doctrine. 
 
 20. After this ' Jesus went to the Mount of Oli- 
 vet/ on the east of Jerusalem, and ' the next day 
 returned again into the temple / where the Scribes 
 
100 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 and Pharisees brought him a woman taken in the 
 act of adultery/ tempting him to give sentence, that 
 they might accuse him of severity or intermed- 
 dling, if he condemned, or of remissness and popu- 
 larity, if he did acquit her. But Jesus found out 
 an expedient for their difficulty, and changed the 
 scene, by bidding 'the innocent person among 
 them cast the first stone at the adulteress :' and 
 then stooping down, to give them fair occasion to 
 withdraw, ' he wrote upon the ground with his 
 finger,' whilst they left the woman and her crime to 
 a more private censure. ' Jesus was left alone, and 
 the woman in the midst whom Jesus dismissed, 
 charging her to ' sin no more.' And a while after, 
 Jesus begins again to discourse to them, " of his 
 mission from the Father, of his crucifixion and 
 exaltation from the earth, of the reward of be- 
 lievers, of the excellency of truth, of spiritual li- 
 berty and relations, who are the sons of Abraham, 
 and who the children of the devil, of his own 
 eternal generation, of the desire of Abraham to see 
 his day. In which sermon he continued, adding 
 still new excellencies, and confuting their malicious 
 and vainer calumnies, till they, that they might 
 also confute him, ' took up stones to cast at him/ 
 But he ' went out of the temple, going through the 
 midst of them, and so passed by. 
 
 21. But in his passage he met a man who had 
 been born blind ; and after he had discoursed cur- 
 sorily of the cause of that blindness, it being a mi- 
 sery not sent as a punishment to ' his own or his 
 parents' sin/ but as an occasion to make public 
 * the glory of God / he, to manifest that himself 
 was ' the light of the world' in all senses, said it 
 now, and proved it by a miracle; for, sitting down, 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 107 
 
 ' he made clay of spittle/ and ' anointing the eyes 
 of the blind man,' bid him ' go wash in Siloam : J 
 which was a pool of limpid water which God sent 
 at the prayer of Isaiah the prophet, a little before 
 his death, to satisfy the necessity of his people, 
 oppressed with thirst and a strict siege; and it 
 stood at the foot of the Mount Sion, and gave its 
 water at first by returns and periods, always to the 
 Jews, but not to the enemies : l and those inter- 
 mitted springings were still continued, but only a 
 pool was made from the frequent effluxes. The 
 blind man ' went and washed, and returned see- 
 ing ;' and was incessantly vexed by the Pharisees, 
 to tell them the manner and circumstances of the 
 cure. And when the man had averred the truth, 
 and named his physician, giving him a pious and 
 charitable testimony, the Pharisees, because they 
 could not force him to disavow his good opinion of 
 Jesus, ' cast him out of the synagogue.' But Jesus 
 meeting him received him into the church, told 
 him he was Christ ; and the man became again 
 enlightened, and he believed, and worshipped. But 
 the Pharisees blasphemed : for such was the dis- 
 pensation of the divine mysteries, that the blind 
 should see, and they which think they see clearly 
 should become blind, because they had not the excuse 
 of ignorance to lessen or take off the sin, but in the 
 midst of light they shut their eyes, and doted upon 
 darkness ; and ' therefore did their sin remain.' 
 
 22. But Jesus continued his sermon among the 
 Pharisees, insinuating reprehensions in his dog- 
 matical discourses, which like light shined and 
 discovered error : for by discoursing, " the proper- 
 
 1 Ephiphan. de Vita et Interitu Prophet, c 7. 
 
108 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 ties of a good shepherd, and the lawful way of 
 intromission, he proved them to be ' thieves and 
 robbers,' because they refused to ' enter in by Jesus/ 
 who is ' the door of the sheep:' and upon the same 
 ground reproved all those false Christs which be- 
 fore him usurped the title of Messias ; and proved 
 his own vocation and office by an argument which 
 no other shepherd would use, because he ' laid 
 down his life for his sheep.' Others would take 
 the fleece, and eat the flesh ; but none but himself 
 would die for his sheep: but he would first die, 
 and then gather his sheep together into one fold, 
 (intimating the calling of the Gentiles.) To which 
 purpose he was ' enabled by his Father to lay 
 down his life, and to take it up :' and had also en- 
 deared them to his Father, that they should be 
 ' preserved unto eternal life ; and no power should 
 be able to take them out of his hand, or the hand 
 of his Father:' for, because Jesus was ( united to 
 the Father/ the Father's care preserved the Son's 
 flocks." 
 
 23. But the Jews, to requite him for his so divine 
 sermons, betook themselves to their old argument; 
 ' they took up stones again to cast at him,' pre- 
 tending he had blasphemed. But Jesus proved it 
 to be no blasphemy to call himself the ( Son of 
 God/ because they to whom the word of God came, 
 are in Scripture called gods. But nothing could 
 satisfy them, whose temporal interest was con- 
 cerned, not to consent to such doctrine which 
 would save their souls by ruining their temporal 
 concernments. But when ' they sought again to 
 take him, Jesus escaped out of their hands, and 
 went away beyond Jordan, where John at first bap- 
 tized ; which gave the people occasion to remem- 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 109 
 
 ber that 1 John did no miracle, but this man does 
 many and John, whom all men did revere and 
 highly account for his office and sanctity, gave tes- 
 timony to Jesus : ' and many believed on him 
 there.' 
 
 24. After this, Jesus knowing that f the harvest 
 w r as great, and as yet the labourers had been few, 
 sent out seventy-two of his disciples, with the like 
 commission as formerly the twelve apostles, that 
 they might ' go before to those places whither him- 
 self meant to come. Of which number were the 
 seven, whom afterwards the apostles set over the 
 widows, and Matthias, Mark, and some say Luke, 
 Justus, Barnabas, Appelles, Rufus, Niger, Cephas, 
 (not Peter,) Thaddaeus, Aristion, and John. The 
 rest of the names could not be recovered by the 
 best diligence of Eusebius and Epiphanius. 1 But 
 when they returned from their journey they rejoiced 
 greatly in the legation and power : and Jesus also 
 rejoiced in spirit, giving glory to God, that he had 
 made his revelations to babes and the more imper- 
 fect persons ; like the lowest valleys, which receive 
 from heaven the greatest floods of rain and bless- 
 ings, and stand thick with corn and flowers, when 
 the mountains are unfruitful in their height and 
 greatness. 
 
 25. And now a doctor of the law came to 
 Jesus, asking him a question of the greatest 
 consideration that a wise man could ask, or a 
 prophet answer : ' Master, what shall I do to 
 inherit eternal life ?' Jesus referred him to the 
 Scriptures, and declared the way to heaven to be 
 this only, ' To love the Lord with all our powers 
 
 1 Ephiphan. Pan. lib. i. torn. ] ; Euseb. lib. i. c. 12 ; Papias 
 apud Euseb. lib. iii. c. 33. 
 
110 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 and faculties, and our neighbour as ourself.' But 
 when the lawyer, being captious, made a scruple in 
 a smooth rush, asking what is meant by ' neighbour; 
 Jesus told him by a parable of a traveller fallen 
 into the hands of robbers, and neglected by a priest 
 and by a levite, but relieved by a Samaritan, that 
 no distance of country or religion destroys the rela- 
 tion of neighbourhood ; but every person with 
 whom we converse in peace and charity, is that 
 neighbour whom we are to love as ourselves. 
 
 26. Jesus having departed from Jerusalem upon 
 the fore-mentioned danger, came to a village called 
 Bethany ; where Martha, making great and busy 
 preparation for his entertainment, to express her 
 joy and her affections to his person, desired Jesus 
 to dismiss her sister Mary from his feet, who sat 
 there, feasting herself with the viands and sweet- 
 nesses of his doctrine, incurious of the provisions 
 for entertainment. But Jesus commended her 
 choice ; and though he did not expressly disrepute 
 Martha's civility, yet he preferred Mary's religion 
 and sanctity of affections. In this time (because 
 ' the night drew on in which no man could 
 work,') Jesus hastened to do his Father's busi- 
 ness, and to pour out the whole cataracts of 
 holy lessons ; like the fruitful Nilus, swelling 
 over the banks, and filling all the trenches, to 
 make a plenty of corn and fruits, great as the in- 
 undation. Jesus therefore teaches his disciples 
 " that form of prayer the second time, which we 
 call the Lord's Prayer : teaches them assiduity 
 and indefatigable importunity in prayer, by a pa- 
 rable of an importunate neighbour borrowing loaves 
 at midnight, and a troublesome widow, who forced 
 an unjust judge to do her right by her clamorous 
 
JESUs's PREACHING. 
 
 Ill 
 
 and hourly addresses; encourages them to pray, 
 by consideration of the divine goodness and fa- 
 therly affection, far more indulgent to his sons 
 than natural fathers are to their dearest issue ; and 
 adds a gracious promise of success to them that 
 pray. He reproves pharisaical ostentation ; arms 
 his disciples against the fear of men and the terrors 
 of persecution, which can arrive but to the incom- 
 modities of the body; teaches the fear of God, 
 who is Lord of the whole man, and can accurse the 
 soul as well as punish the body. He refuses to 
 divide the inheritance between two brethren, as not 
 having competent power to become lord in tem- 
 poral jurisdictions. He preaches against covetous- 
 ness, and the placing felicities in worldly posses- 
 sions, by a parable of a rich man, whose riches 
 were two big for his barns, and big enough for his 
 soul, and he ran over into voluptuousness, and stu- 
 pid complacencies in his perishing goods; he was 
 snatched from their possession, and his soul taken 
 from him in the violence of a rapid and hasty sick- 
 ness, in the space of one night. Discourses of di- 
 vine Providence and care over us all, and descend- 
 ing even as low as grass. He exhorts to alms- 
 deeds, to watchfulness, and preparation against the 
 sudden and unexpected coming of our Lord to 
 judgment, or the arrest of death; tells the offices 
 and sedulity of the clergy, under the apologue of 
 stewards and governors of their lords' houses; 
 teaches them gentleness and sobriety, and not to 
 do evil upon confidence of their Lord's absence 
 and delay ; and teaches the people even of them- 
 selves to judge what is right concerning the signs 
 of the coming of the Son of man. And the end 
 
112 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR. OF 
 
 of all these discourses was, that all men should re- 
 pent, and live good lives, and be saved." 
 
 27. At this sermon ' there were present some that 
 told him of the Galileans, whose blood Pilate min- 
 gled with their sacrifices.' For the Galileans were 
 a sort of people that taught it to be unlawful to 
 pay tribute to strangers, or to pray for the Romans ; 
 and because the Jews did both, they refused to 
 communicate in their sacred rites, and would sacri- 
 fice apart; at which solemnity, when Pilate the 
 Roman deputy had apprehended many of them, 
 he caused them all to be slain, making them to 
 die upon the same altars. These were of the pro- 
 vince of Judaea, but of the same opinion with those 
 who taught in Galilee, from whence the sect had 
 its appellative. But to the story : Jesus made re- 
 ply, that these external accidents, though they be 
 sad and calamitous, yet they are no arguments of 
 condemnation against the persons of the men, to 
 convince them of a greater guilt than others, upon 
 whom no such visible signatures have been im- 
 printed. The purpose of such chances is, that we 
 should ' repent, lest we perish' in the like judg- 
 ment. 
 
 28. About this time a certain ruler of the syna- 
 gogue renewed the old question about the observa- 
 tion of the sabbath; repining at Jesus that he cured 
 ' a woman that was crooked, loosing her from her 
 infirmity, with which she had been afflicted eigh- 
 teen years/ But Jesus made the man ashamed by 
 an argument from their own practice, who them- 
 selves ' loose an ox from the stall on the sabbath, 
 and lead him to watering/ And by the same ar- 
 gument he also stopped the mouths of the Scribes 
 
JESUSS PREACHING. 
 
 113 
 
 and Pharisees, which were open upon him for 
 curing an hydropic person upon the sabbath. 
 For Jesus, that he might draw off and separate 
 Christianity from the yoke of ceremonies, by abo- 
 lishing and taking off the strictest Mosaical rites, 
 chose to do very many of his miracles upon the 
 sabbath, that he might do the work of abrogation 
 and institution both at once : not much unlike the 
 sabbatical pool in Judaea, which was dry six clays, 
 but gushed out in a full stream upon the sab- 
 bath. 1 For though upon all days Christ was ope- 
 rative and miraculous, yet many reasons did concur 
 and determine him to a more frequent working 
 upon those days of public ceremony and convention 
 But going forth from thence he went up and down 
 the cities of Galilee, re-enforcing the same doctrine 
 he had formerly taught them, and daily adding 
 new precepts and cautions and prudent insinua- 
 tions : " advertising of the multitudes of them 
 that perish, and the paucity of them that shall be 
 saved, and that we should strive c to enter in at 
 the strait gate;' that the way to destruction is 
 broad and plausible, the way to heaven nice and 
 austere, ' and few there be that find it :' teaches 
 them modesty at feasts and entertainments of the 
 poor; discourses of the many excuses and unwil- 
 lingnesses of persons who were invited to the feast 
 of the kingdom, the refreshments of the gospel ; and 
 tacitly insinuates the rejection of the Jews, who 
 were the first invited, and the calling of the Gen- 
 tiles, who were the persons called in from the high- 
 ways and hedges. He reprehends Herod for his 
 subtlety and design to kill him ; prophesies that he 
 
 1 Joseph, de Bello Jud. lib. vii. c. 24. 
 VOL. III. i 
 
114 
 
 THE THIRD YEAR OF 
 
 should die at Jerusalem ; and intimates great sad- 
 nesses future to them for neglecting this their day 
 of visitation, and for s killing the prophets and the 
 messengers sent from God.* " 
 
 29. It now grew towards winter, and the Jews' 
 feast of dedication was at hand ; therefore Jesus 
 went up to Jerusalem to the feast, where he preach- 
 ed in Solomon's porch, which part of the temple 
 stood entire from the first ruins; and the end of 
 his sermon was, that the Jews had like to have 
 stoned him. But retiring from thence he went 
 beyond Jordan, where he taught the people in a 
 most elegant and persuasive parable, concerning 
 " the mercy of God in accepting penitents, in the 
 parable of the Prodigal Son returning : discourses 
 of the design of the Messias coming into the world, 
 to recover erring persons from their sin and dan- 
 ger, in the apologues of the lost sheep, and groat ; 
 and under the representment of an unjust, but 
 prudent steward, he taught us so to employ our pre- 
 sent opportunities and estates, by laying them out 
 in acts of mercy and religion, that when our souls 
 shall be dismissed from the stewardship and cus- 
 tody of our body, we ' may be entertained in ever- 
 lasting habitations.' He instructed the Pharisees 
 in the question of divorces, limiting the permis- 
 sions of separations to the only cause of fornica- 
 tion : preferreth holy celibate before the estate of 
 marriage, in them to whom the gift of continency 
 is given, in order to the kingdom of heaven. He 
 telleth a story or a parable, (for which is uncer- 
 tain,) of a rich man (whom Euthymius, out of the 
 tradition of the Hebrews, nameth Nymensis) and 
 Lazarus : the first a voluptuous person, and uncha- 
 ritable ; the other pious, afflicted, sick, and a beg- 
 
JESUS'S PREACHING. 
 
 115 
 
 gar : the first died, and went to hell ; the second 
 to Abraham's bosom. God so ordering the dis- 
 pensation of good things, that we cannot easily 
 enjoy two heavens ; nor shall the infelicities of our 
 lives, if we be pious, end otherwise than in a be- 
 atified condition. The epilogue of which story dis- 
 covered this truth also, that the ordinary means 
 of salvation are the express revelations of Scrip- 
 ture, and the ministries of God's appointment : 
 and whosoever neglects these, shall not be sup- 
 plied with means extraordinary ; or if he were, 
 they would be totally ineffectual. 
 
 30. And still the people drew water from the 
 fountains of our Saviour, which streamed out in 
 a full and continual emanation. For adding wave 
 to wave, ' line to line, precept upon precept/ he 
 " reproved the fastidiousness of the Pharisee, that 
 came with eucharist to God, and contempt to his 
 brother; and commended the humility of the 
 publican's address, who came deploring his sins, 
 and with modesty and penance and importunity 
 begged and obtained a mercy. Then he laid 
 hands upon certain young children, and gave them 
 benediction, charging his apostles to admit in- 
 fants to him, because to them in person, and to 
 such in emblem and signification, the kingdom of 
 heaven does appertain. He instructs a young man 
 in the ways and counsels of perfection, besides the 
 observation of precepts, by heroical renunciations 
 and acts of munificent charity." Which discourse 
 because it alighted upon an indisposed and an un- 
 fortunate subject, ( f for the young man was very 
 rich,') Jesus discourses " how hard it is for a rich 
 man to be saved ; but he expounds himself to mean, 
 ' they that trust in riches :' and however it is a 
 
 T 2 
 
116 THE THIRD YEAR OF JESUS's PREACHING 
 
 matter of so great temptation, that it is almost im- 
 possible to escape ; yet ' with God nothing is im- 
 possible.' But when the apostles heard the Mas- 
 ter bidding the young man ' sell all, and give to 
 the poor, and follow him,' and for his reward pro- 
 mised him ' a heavenly treasure Peter, in the 
 name of the rest, began to think that this was their 
 case, and the promise also might concern them ; 
 and asking him this question, What shall we have, 
 who have forsaken all, and followed thee ? Jesus 
 answered, that they should ' sit upon twelve 
 thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.' 
 
 31. And Jesus extended this mercy to every dis- 
 ciple that should ' forsake either house, or wife, or 
 children, or any thing, for his sake and the gospel's 
 and that they ' should receive a hundred fold in 
 this life,' by way of comfort and equivalency, 
 ' and in the world to come' thousands of glories 
 and possessions, in fruition and redundancy. For 
 ' they that are last shall be first, and the first 
 shall be last:' and the despised people of this 
 world shall reign like kings, and contempt it- 
 self shall swell up into glory, and poverty into 
 an eternal satisfaction. And these rewards shall 
 not be accounted according to the privileges of na- 
 tions, or priority of vocation, but readiness of mind 
 and obedience and sedulity of operation after 
 calling. Which Jesus taught his disciples in the 
 parable of the labourers in the vineyard, to whom 
 the master gave the same reward, though the times 
 of their working were different; as their calling 
 and employment had determined the opportunity 
 of their labours. 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 117 
 
 DISCOURSE XVII. 
 
 Of Scandal ; or, giving and taking Offence. 
 
 1. A sad curse being threatened in the gospel to 
 them who offend any of Christ's little ones ; that 
 is, such as are novices and babes in Christianity, it 
 concerns us to learn our duty and perform it, that 
 we may avoid the curse : for, ' Woe to all them by 
 whom offences come.' 1 And although the duty is 
 so plainly explicated and represented in gloss and 
 case by the several commentaries of St. Paul upon 
 this menace of our blessed Saviour; yet because 
 our English word, offence, 8 which is commonly used 
 in this question of scandal, is so large and equivo- 
 cal that it hath made many pretences, and in- 
 dicated this article to some inconvenience, it is 
 not without good purpose to draw into one body 
 those propositions which the masters of spiritual life 
 have described in the managing of this question. 
 
 2. First, By whatsoever we do our duty to God, 
 we cannot directly do offence, or give scandal to 
 our brother ; because in such cases where God hath 
 obliged us, he hath also obliged himself to recon- 
 cile our duty to the designs of God, to the utility 
 of souls, and the ends of charity. And this propo- 
 sition is to be extended to our obedience to the 
 lawful constitutions of our competent superiors : 
 in which cases we are to look upon the command- 
 ment, and leave the accidental events to the dispo- 
 sition of that Providence who reconciles dissonances 
 in nature,, and concentres all the variety of acci- 
 dents in his own glory. And whosoever is offended 
 
 1 Matth. xviii. 7* 
 
 * Rom. xiv. ; 1 Cor. viii. ; Gal. ii. 
 
118 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 at me for obeying God or God's vicegerent, is 
 offended at me for doing my duty: and in this 
 there is no more dispute, but whether I shall dis- 
 please God, or my peevish neighbour. These are 
 such whom the Spirit of God complains of under 
 other representments : they think it strange we 
 run not into the same excess of riot ; their eye is 
 evil, because their Master's eye is good ; and the 
 abounding of Gods grace also may become to 
 them an occasion of falling, and the long-suffering 
 of God the encouragement to sin. In this there is 
 no difficulty ; for in what case soever we are bound 
 to obey God or man, in that case and in that con- 
 junction of circumstances we have nothing per- 
 mitted to our choice, and have no authority to re- 
 mit of the right of God or our superior : and to 
 comply with our neighbour in such questions, be- 
 sides that it cannot serve any purposes of piety, if 
 it declines from duty in any instance, it is like 
 giving alms out of the portion of orphans, or build- 
 ing hospitals with the money and spoils of sacri- 
 lege. It is pusillanimity, or hypocrisy, or a deny- 
 ing to confess Christ before men, to comply with 
 any man, and to offend God, or omit a duty. What- 
 soever is necessary to be done, and is ade so by 
 God, no weakness or peevishness of mai* an make 
 necessary not to be done : for the matter of scandal 
 is a duty beneath the prime obligations of re- 
 ligion. 
 
 3. Secondly, But every thing which is used in 
 religion is not matter of precise duty ; but there 
 are some things which indeed are pious and religi- 
 ous, but dispensable, voluntary, and commutable : 
 such as are voluntary fasts, exterior acts of disci- 
 pline and mortification not enjoined, great degrees 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 119 
 
 of exterior worship, prostration, long prayers, vigils. 
 And in these things, although there is not directly 
 a matter of scandal, yet there may be some pruden- 
 tial considerations in order to charity and edifica- 
 tion. By pious actions I mean, either particular 
 pursuances of a general duty, which are uncom- 
 manded in the instance, such as are the minutes 
 and expresses of alms ; or else they are com- 
 mended, but in the whole kind of them unenjoined, 
 such as divines call the counsels of perfection. Ii\ 
 both these cases a man cannot be scandalous : for 
 the man doing in charity and the love of God such 
 actions which are aptly expressive of love, the 
 man, I say, is not uncharitable in his purposes ; 
 and the actions themselves being either attempts 
 or proceedings toward perfection, or else actions of 
 direct duty, are as innocent in their productions as 
 in themselves, and therefore, without the malice of 
 the recipient, cannot induce him into sin ; and no- 
 thing else is scandal : to do any pious act proceeds 
 from the Spirit of God ; and to give scandal, from 
 the spirit of malice or indiscretion ; and therefore 
 a pious action, whose fountain is love and wisdom, 
 cannot end in uncharitableness or imprudence. 
 But because when any man is offended at what I 
 esteem piety, there is a question whether the action 
 be pious or no ; therefore it concerns him that 
 works, to take care that his action be either an act 
 of duty, though not determined to a certain parti- 
 cular; or else be something counselled in Scrip- 
 ture, or practised by a holy person there recorded, 
 and nowhere reproved ; or a practice warranted 
 by such precedents which modest, prudent, and 
 religious persons account a sufficient inducement of 
 such particulars : for he that proceeds upon such 
 
120 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 principles derives the warrant of his actions from 
 beginnings which secure the particular, and quits 
 the scandal. 
 
 4. This, I say, is a security against the un charit- 
 ableness and the sin of scandal ; because a zeal of 
 doing pious actions is a zeal according to God ; 
 but it is not always a security against the indiscre- 
 tion of the scandal. He that reproves a foolish 
 person in such circumstances that provoke him, or 
 make him imprudent or blasphemous, does not 
 give scandal, and brings no sin upon himself, 
 though he occasioned it in the other. But if it 
 was probable such effects should be consequent to 
 the reprehension, his zeal was imprudent and rash : 
 but so long as it was zeal for God, and in its own 
 matter lawful, it could not be an active or guilty 
 scandal. But if it be no zeal, and be a design to 
 entrap a man's unwariness or passion or shame, and 
 to disgrace the man, by that means or any ether to 
 make him sin, then it is directly the offending of 
 our brother. They that preached Christ out of 
 envy intended to do offence to the apostles : but 
 because they were impregnable, the sin rested in 
 their own bosom, and God wrought his own ends 
 by it. And in this sense they are scandalous per- 
 sons who fast for strife, who pray for rebellion, who 
 entice simple persons into the snare by colours of 
 religion. Those very exterior acts of piety become 
 an offence, because they are done to evil purposes, to 
 abuse proselytes, and to draw away disciples after 
 them, and make them love the sin, and march 
 under so splendid and fair colours. They who out 
 of strictness and severity of persuasion represent the 
 conditions of the gospel alike to every person ; that 
 is, nicer than Christ described them in all circum- 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 121 
 
 stances, and deny such liberties of exterior desires 
 and complacency which may be reasonably permitted 
 to some men, do very indiscreetly, and may occa- 
 sion the alienation of some men's minds from the 
 entertainments of religion. But this being acci- 
 dental to the thing itself, and to the purpose of the 
 man, is not the sin of scandal; but it is the indis- 
 cretion of scandal, if by such means he divorces 
 any man's mind from the cohabitation and unions 
 of religion. And yet if the purpose of the man be 
 to affright weaker and unwise persons, it is a direct 
 scandal, and one of those ways which the devil 
 uses towards the peopling of his kingdom : it is a 
 plain laying of a snare to entrap feeble and unin- 
 structed souls. 
 
 5. But if the pious action have formerly joined 
 with any thing that is truly criminal, with idolatry, 
 with superstition, with impious customs or impure 
 rites, and by retaining the piety I give cause to 
 my weak brother to think I approve of the old ap- 
 pendage, and by my reputation invite him to 
 swallow the whole action without discerning ; the 
 case is altered ; I am to omit that pious action, if 
 it be not under command, until I have acquitted it 
 from the suspicion of evil company. But when I 
 have done what in prudence I guess sufficient to 
 thaw the frost of jealousy, and to separate those 
 dissonances which formerly seemed united, I have 
 done my duty of charity, by endeavouring to free 
 my brother from the snare ; and I have done what 
 in Christian prudence I was obliged, when I have 
 protested against the appendant crime. If after- 
 wards the same person shall entertain the crime 
 upon pretence of my example, who have plainly 
 disavowed it ; he lays the snare for himself, and is 
 
122 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 glad of the pretence, or will in spite enter into the 
 net, that he might think it reasonable to rail at me. 
 I may not, with Christian charity or prudence, wear 
 the picture of our blessed Lord in rings or medals, 
 though with great affection and designs of doing 
 him all the honour that I can, if by such pictures 
 I invite persons, apt more to follow me than to un- 
 derstand me, to give divine honour to a picture : 
 but when I have declared my hatred of supersti- 
 tious worshippings, and given my brother warn- 
 ing of the snare which his own mistake or the 
 devils malice was preparing for him, I may then 
 without danger signify my piety and affections in 
 any civil representments which are not against 
 God's law, or the customs of the church, or the 
 analogy of faith. And there needs no other reason 
 to be given for this rule, than that there is no rea- 
 son to be given against it. If the nature of the 
 thing be innocent, and the purpose of the man be 
 pious, and he hath used his moral industry to 
 secure his brother against accidental mischances 
 and abuses, his duty in this particular can have 
 no more parts and instances. 
 
 6. But it is too crude an assertion, to affirm in- 
 definitely, that whatsoever hath been abused to evil 
 or superstious purposes, must presently be abjured, 
 and never entertained for fear of scandal ; for it is 
 certain that the best things have been most abused. 
 Have not some persons used certain verses of the 
 Psalter as an antitode against the tooth-ache ; and 
 carried the blessed sacrament in pendents about their 
 necks as a charm to countermand witches ; and St. 
 John's gospel as a spell against wild beasts and wilder 
 untamed spirits ? Confession of sins to the minis- 
 ters of religion hath been made an instrument to 
 
OF SCANDAL 
 
 123 
 
 serve base ends ; and so indeed hath all religion 
 been abused : and some persons have been so 
 receptive of scandal, that they suspected all reli- 
 gion to be a mere stratagem, because they have 
 observed very many men have used it so. For 
 some natures are like sponges or sugar, whose ut- 
 most verge if you dip in wine, it drowns itself by 
 the moisture it sucks up, and is drenched all over, 
 receiving its alteration from within : its own nature 
 did the mischief, and plucks on its own dissolution. 
 And these men are greedy to receive a scandal, 
 and when it is presented but in small instances, 
 they suck it up to the dissolution of their whole 
 religion ; being glad of a quarrel, that their impie- 
 ties may not want all excuse. But yet it is cer- 
 tainly very unreasonable to reject excellent things 
 because they have been abused ; as if separable 
 accidents had altered natures and essences ; or that 
 they resolve never to forgive the duties, for having 
 once fallen into the hands of unskilful or malicious 
 persons. Hezekiah took away the brazen serpent* 
 because the people abused it to idolatry ; but the 
 serpent had long before lost its use : and yet, if the 
 people had not been a peevish and refractory and 
 superstitious people, in whose nature it was to take 
 all occasions of superstition ; and further yet, if 
 the taking away such occasions and opportunities of 
 that sin in special had not been most agreeable with 
 the designs of God, in forbidding to the people the 
 common use of all images in the second command- 
 ment, which was given them after the erection of 
 that brazen statue, Hezekiah possibly would not, 
 or at least had not been bound to have destroyed 
 that monument of an old story and a great bless- 
 ing, but have sought to separate the abuse from 
 
124 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 the minds of men, and retained the image. But 
 in Christianity, when none of these circumstances 
 occur, where, by the greatness and plenty of reve- 
 lations, we are more fully instructed in the ways of 
 duty, and when the thing itself is pious, and the 
 abuse very separable, it is infinite disparagement 
 to us, or to our religion, either that our religion is 
 not sufficient to cure an abuse, or that we will 
 never part with it, but we must un pardonably re- 
 ject a good, because it had once upon it a crust or 
 spot of leprosy, though since it hath been washed 
 in the waters of reformation. The primitive Chris- 
 tians abstained from actions of themselves indiffer- 
 ent, which the unconverted people used, if those 
 actions were symbolical, or adopted into false reli- 
 gions, or not well understood by those they were 
 bound to satisfy : but when they had washed off 
 the accrescences of Gentile superstition, they chose 
 such rites which their neighbours used, and had 
 designs not imprudent or unhandsome ; and they 
 were glad of heathen temples, to celebrate the 
 Christian rites in them ; and they made no other 
 change, but that they ejected the devil, and invited 
 their Lord into the possession. 
 
 7. Thirdly, In things merely indifferent, whose 
 practice is not limited by command, nor their na- 
 ture heightened by an appendant piety, we must 
 use our liberty, so as may not offend our brother, 
 or lead him into a sin directly or indirectly. For 
 scandal being directly against charity, it is to be 
 avoided in the same measure and by the same pro- 
 portions in which charity is to be pursued. Now 
 we must so use ourselves, that we must cut off a 
 foot, or pluck out an eye, rather than the one should 
 bear us, and the other lead us to sin and death : 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 125 
 
 we must rather rescind all the natural and sen- 
 sual, or clearest invitations to vice, and deny our- 
 selves lawful things, than that lawful things 
 should betray us to unlawful actions. And this 
 rule is the measure of charity ; our neighbours 
 soul ought to be dearer unto us than any tem- 
 poral privilege. It is lawful for me to eat herbs, 
 or fish, and to observe an ascetic diet ; but if by 
 such austerities I lead others to a good opinion 
 of Montanism, or the practices of Pythagoras, 
 or to believe flesh to be impure, I must rather 
 alter my diet, than teach him to sin by mistaking 
 me. St. Paul gave an instance of eating flesh 
 sold in the shambles from the idol-temples. To 
 eat it in the relation of an idol-sacrifice is a 
 great sin ; but when it is sold in the shambles, the 
 property is altered to them that understand it so. 
 But yet even this Paul would not do, if by so 
 doing he should encourage undiscerning people to 
 eat all meat conveyed from the temple, and offered 
 to devils. It is not in every man's head to distinguish 
 formalities, and to make abstractions of purpose 
 from exterior acts, and to alter their devotions by 
 new relations and respects depending upon intel- 
 lectual and metaphysical notions. And therefore it 
 is not safe to do an action which is not lawful, but 
 after the making distinctions, before ignorant and 
 weaker persons, who swallow down the bole and 
 the box that carries it, and never pare their apple, 
 or take the core out. If I, by the law of charity, 
 must rather quit my own goods than suffer my 
 brother to perish, much rather must I quit my 
 privilege, and those superstructures of favour and 
 grace which Christ hath given me beyond my ne- 
 cessities, than wound the spirit and destroy the 
 
126 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 soul of a weak man, for whom Christ died. It is 
 an inordinate affection, to love my own ease and 
 circumstances of pleasure, before the soul of a bro- 
 ther; and such a thing are the privileges of Chris- 
 tian liberty ; for Christ hath taken off from us the 
 restraints which God had laid upon the Jews in 
 meat and holidays. But these are but circum- 
 stances of grace given us for opportunities, and 
 cheap instances of charity : we should ill die for 
 our brother, who will not lose a meal to prevent 
 his sin, or change a dish to save his soul. And if 
 the thing be indifferent to us, yet it ought not to 
 be indifferent to us whether our brother live or 
 die. 
 
 8. Fourthly, And yet we must not, to please 
 peevish or froward people, betray our liberty 
 which Christ hath given us. If any man opposes 
 the lawfulness and license of indifferent actions, 
 or be disturbed at my using my privileges inno- 
 cently ; in the first case I am bound to use them 
 still, in the second I am not bound to quit them 
 to please him. For in the first instance, he that 
 shall cease to use his liberty, to please him that 
 says his liberty is unlawful, encourages him that 
 says so in his false opinion, and by complying 
 with him gives the scandal ; and he who is angry 
 with me for making use of it, is a person that, it 
 may be, is crept in to spy out and invade my liberty 
 but not apt to be reduced into sin by that act of 
 mine which he detests, for which he despises me, 
 and so makes my person unapt to be exemplar to 
 him. To be angry with me for doing what Christ 
 hath allowed me, and which is part of the liberty 
 he purchased for me when he took upon himself 
 the form of a servant, is to judge me, and to be 
 
OF SCANDAI,. 
 
 127 
 
 uncharitable to me ; and he that does so is before- 
 hand with me, and upon the active part ; he does 
 the scandal to me, and by offering to deprive me 
 of my liberty, he makes my way to heaven nar- 
 rower and more encumbered than Christ left it, 
 and so places a stumbling-stone in my way ; I put 
 none in his. And if such peevishness and discon- 
 tent of a brother engages me to a new and unim- 
 posed yoke, then it were in the power of my enemy, 
 or any malevolent person, to make me never to 
 keep festival, or never to observe any private fast, 
 never to be prostrate at my prayers, nor to do any 
 thing but according to his leave, and his humour 
 shall become the rule of my actions ; and then my 
 charity to him shall be the greatest uncharitable- 
 ness in the world to myself, and his liberty shall 
 be my bondage. Add to this, that such complying 
 and obeying the peevishness of discontented per- 
 sons is to no end of charity. For besides that 
 such concessions never satisfy persons who are un- 
 reasonably angry, because by the same reason they 
 may demand more, as they ask this for which they 
 had no reason at all ; it also encourages them to 
 be peevish, and gives fuel to the passion, and 
 feeds the wolf, and so encourages the sin, and pre- 
 vents none. 
 
 9. Fifthly, For he only gives scandal, who in- 
 duces his brother directly or collaterally into sin ; 
 as appears by all the discourses in Scripture guid- 
 ing us in this duty ; and it is called ' laying a 
 stumbling-block in our brother's way, wounding 
 the conscience of our weak brother.' 1 Thus Balaam 
 
 1 1 Cor. viii. 10, 12 ; Rom. xiv. 21 ; Matt. v. 20, and xiii. 
 57 ; Mark, xiv. 27, and vi.3,and iv. 17; Luke, vii. 23; John, 
 xvi. 1. 
 
128 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 was said to lay a scandal before the sons of Israel, 
 by tempting them to fornication with the daugh- 
 ters of Moab. Every evil example, or imprudent, 
 sinful, and unwary deportment is a scandal, be- 
 cause it invites others to do the like, leading them 
 by the hand, taking off the strangeness and inso- 
 lency of the act, which deters many men from 
 entertaining it ; and it gives some offers of security 
 to others, that they shall escape as we have 
 done : besides that it is in the nature of all 
 agents, natural and moral, to assimilate, either 
 by proper efficiency, or by counsel and moral in- 
 vitements, others to themselves. But this is a di- 
 rect scandal. And such it is to give money to an 
 idle person, who you know will be drunk with it ; 
 or to invite an intemperate person to an opportu- 
 nity of excess, who desires it always, but without 
 thee wants it. Indirectly and accidentally, but 
 very criminally they give scandal, who introduce 
 persons into a state of life from whence probably 
 they pass into a state of sin. So did the Israelites, 
 who married their daughters to the idolatrous Mo- 
 abites ; and so do they who intrust a pupil to a 
 vicious guardian : for although God can preserve 
 children in the midst of flames without scorching; 
 yet if they singe their hair, or scorch their flesh, 
 they that put them in are guilty of the burning. 
 And yet further, if persons so exposed to danger 
 should escape by miracle, yet they escape not who 
 expose them to the danger. They who threw the 
 children of the captivity into the furnace, were 
 burnt to death, though the children were not hurt. 
 And the very offering a person in our trust to a 
 certain or probable danger, foreseen and under- 
 stood, is a likely way to pass sin upon the person 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 129 
 
 so exposed, but a certain way to contract it in our- 
 selves : it is directly against charity ; for no man 
 loves a soul, unless he loves its safety ; and he cares 
 not to have his child safe that throws him into the 
 fire. Hither are to be reduced all false doctrines 
 aptly productive of evil life ; the doctrines are 
 scandalous, and the men guilty, if they understand 
 the consequents oftheirown propositions : or if they 
 think it probable that persons will be led by such 
 doctrines into evil persuasions, though themselves 
 believe them not to be necessary products of their 
 opinions, yet the very publishing such opinions, 
 which (of themselves not being necessary, or other- 
 wise very profitable) are apt to be understood, 
 by weak persons at least, to ill ends, is against 
 charity, and the duty we owe to our brother's soul. 
 
 10. Sixthly, It is not necessary for ever to ab- 
 stain from things indifferent, to prevent the offend- 
 ing of a brother, but only till I have taken away 
 that rock against which some did stumble, or have 
 done my endeavour to remove it. In questions of 
 religion it is lawful to use primitive and ancient 
 words, at which men have been weakened and 
 seemed to stumble, when the objection is cleared, 
 and the ill consequents and suspicion disavowed ; 
 and it may be of good use x charity, and edification 
 to speak the language of the purest ages, although 
 that some words were used also in the impurest 
 ages, and descended along upon changing and de- 
 clining articles, when it is rightly explicated in 
 what sense the best men did innocently use them, 
 and the same sense is now protested. But in 
 this case it concerns prudence to see that the 
 benefit be greater than the danger. And the 
 same also is to be said concerning the actions and 
 
 VOL. Ill K 
 
130 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 parts of Christian liberty : for if after I have re- 
 moved the unevenness and objection of the acci- 
 dent, that is, if, when I have explained my disre- 
 lish to the crime which might possibly be gathered 
 up and taken into practice by my misunderstood 
 example, still any man will stumble and fall, it is 
 a resolution to fall, a love of danger, a peevishness 
 of spirit, a voluntary misunderstanding ; it is not a 
 misery in the man more than that it is his own fault. 
 And whenever the cause of any sin becomes crimi- 
 nal to the man that sins, it is certain, that if the 
 other, who was made the occasion, did disavow 
 and protest against the crime, the man that sins is 
 the only guilty person, both in the effect and cause 
 too ; for the other could do no more but use a mo- 
 ral and prudent industry to prevent a being misin- 
 terpreted ; and if he were tied to more, he must 
 quit his interest for ever in a perpetual scruple : 
 and it is like taking away all laws, to prevent dis- 
 obedience ; and making all even, to secure the 
 world against the effects of pride or stubbornness. 
 I add to this, that since actions indifferent in their 
 own natures are not productive of effects and ac- 
 tions criminal, it is merely by accident that men 
 are abused into a sin ; that is, by weakness, by 
 misconceit, by something that either discovers 
 malice or indiscretion : w hich because the act it- 
 self does not of itself, if the man does not volun- 
 tarily, or by intention, the sin dwells nowhere but 
 with the man that entertains it. The man is no 
 longer weak than he is mistaken ; and he is not 
 mistaken or abused into the sin by example of 
 any man, who hath rightly stated his own question, 
 and divorced the suspicion of the sin from his ac- 
 tion : whatsoever comes after this is not weakness 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 131 
 
 of understanding-, but strength of passion. And 
 he that is always learning, and never comes to the 
 knowledge of the truth, is something besides a silly 
 man. Men cannot be always ' babes in Christ' 1 
 without their own fault : they are no longer ' Christ's 
 little ones' than they are inculpably ignorant : for it 
 is but a mantle cast over pride and frowardness, to 
 think ourselves able to teach others, and yet pre- 
 tend offence and scandal ; to scorn to be instructed, 
 and yet complain that we are offended, and led into 
 sin for want of knowledge of our duty. He that 
 understands his duty is not a person capable of 
 scandal by things indifferent. And it is certain, 
 that no man can say concerning himself, that he is 
 scandalized at another; that is, that he is led into 
 sin by mistake and weakness; for if himself 
 knows it the mistake is gone. Well may the guides 
 of their souls complain, concerning such persons, 
 that their sin is procured by offending persons 
 or actions : but he that complains concerning him- 
 self to the same purpose, pretends ignorance for 
 other ends, and contradicts himself by his com- 
 plaint and knowledge of his error. The boy was 
 prettily peevish, who, when his father bid pronounce 
 Thalassius, told him he could not pronounce Tha- 
 lassius, at the same time speaking the word. J ust 
 so impotent, weak, and undiscerning a person is 
 that, who would forbid me to do an indifferent ac- 
 tion, upon pretence that it makes him ignorantly 
 sin ; for his saying so confutes his ignorance, and 
 argues him of a worse folly : it is like asking my 
 neighbour, whether such an action be done against 
 my own will. 
 
 1 'AcrSrevaig ry Trlarei. Rom. xiv. ; 1 Cor. viii. 10, 12. 
 
 K 2 
 
132 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 1 1. Seventhly, When an action is apt to be mis- 
 taken to contrary purposes it concerns the prudence 
 and charity of aChristian, to use such compliance as 
 best co-operates to God's glory, and hath in it the 
 less danger. The apostles gave an instance in the 
 matter of circumcision, in which they walked wa- 
 rily, and with variety of design, that they might 
 invite the Gentiles to the easy yoke of Christianity, 
 and yet not deter the Jews by a disrespect to the 
 law of Moses. And therefore St. Paul circumcised 
 Timothy, because he was among the Jews and de- 
 scended from a Jewish parent, and in the instance 
 gave sentence in compliance with the Jewish per- 
 suasion, because Timothy might well be accounted 
 for a Jew by birth : unto them the rites of Moses 
 were for a while permitted. But when Titus was 
 brought upon the scene of a mixed assembly, and 
 was no Jew, but a Greek, to whom Paul had taught 
 6 they ought not to be circumcised 1 although some 
 Jews watched what he would do, yet he plainly re- 
 fused to circumcise him ; choosing rather to leave 
 the Jews angry, than the Gentiles scandalized, or 
 led into an opinion that circumcision was neces- 
 sary, or that he had taught them otherwise out of 
 collateral ends, or that now he did so. But when 
 a case of Christian liberty happened to St. Peter, 
 he was not so prudent in his choice, but at the 
 coming of certain Jews from Jerusalem, withdrew 
 himself from the society of the Gentiles ; not con- 
 sidering, that it was worse if the Gentiles, who 
 were invited to Christianity by the sweetness of 
 its liberty and compliance, should fall back, when 
 they that taught them the excellency of Christian 
 
 ■Gal. ii. 3. 4, &c. 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 133 
 
 liberty durst not stand to it, than if those Jews 
 were displeased at Christianity for admitting Gen- 
 tiles into its communion, after they had been in- 
 structed that God had broken down the partition- 
 wall, and made them one sheepfold. It was of 
 greater concernment to God's glory to gain the 
 Gentiles than to retain the Jews : and yet if he 
 had not, the apostles were bound to bend to the 
 inclinations of the weaker, rather than be mastered 
 by the wilfulness of the stronger, ' who had been 
 sufficiently instructed in the articles of Christian 
 liberty, and in the adopting the Gentiles into the 
 family of God. Thus if it be a question whether I 
 should abate any thing of my external religion or 
 ceremonies to satisfy an heretic or a contentious 
 person, who pretends scandal to himself, and is 
 indeed of another persuasion ; and at the same 
 time I know that good persons will be weakened 
 at such forbearance, and estranged from the good 
 persuasion and charity of communion, which is 
 part of their duty ; it more concerns charity and 
 the glory of God, that I secure the right than 
 twine about the wrong, wilful, and malicious per- 
 sons. A prelate must rather fortify and encourage 
 obedience, and strengthen discipline, than by re- 
 missness toward refractory spirits, and a desire not 
 to seem severe, weaken the hands of conscientious 
 persons, by taking away the marks of difference 
 between them that obey and them that obey not. 
 And in all cases when the question is between a 
 friend to be secured from apostacy, or an enemy 
 to be gained from indifferency, St. Paul's rule is to 
 be observed: ' Do good to all, but especially to the 
 household of faith.' When the church, in a parti- 
 
134 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 cular instance, cannot be kind to both, she must first 
 love her own children, 
 
 12. Eighthly, But when the question is between 
 pleasing and contenting the fancies of a friend, 
 and the gaining of an enemy, the greater good of the 
 enemy is infinitely to be preferred before the satis- 
 fying the unnecessary humour of the friend. And 
 therefore that we may gain persons of a different re- 
 ligion, it is lawful to entertain them in their innocent 
 customs, that we may represent ourselves charitable 
 and just, apt to comply in what we can, and yet 
 for no end complying further than we are per- 
 mitted. It was a policy of the devil to abuse 
 Christians to the rites of Mithra, by imitating the 
 Christian ceremonies. And the Christians them- 
 selves were beforehand with him in that policy ; 
 for they facilitated the reconcilement of Judaism 
 with Christianity by common rites; and invited 
 the Gentiles to the Christian churches, because 
 they never violated the heathen temples, but loved 
 the men, and imitated their innocent rites, and 
 only offered to reform their errors, and hallow their 
 abused purposes : and this, if it had no other con- 
 tradictory or unhandsome circumstance, gave no 
 offence to other Christians, when they had learned 
 to trust them with the government of ecclesiastical 
 affairs to whom God had committed them, and 
 they all had the same purposes of religion and 
 charity. And when there is no objection against 
 this but the furies or greater heats of a mistaken 
 zeal, the compliance with evil or unbelieving per- 
 sons, to gain them from their errors to the ways of 
 truth and sincerity, is great prudence and great 
 charity ; because it chooses and acts a greater good 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 135 
 
 at no other charge or expense but the discomposing 
 of an intemperate zeal. 
 
 13. Ninthly, We are not bound to intermit a 
 good or a lawful action as soon as any man tells 
 us it is scandalous : (for that may be an easy 
 stratagem to give me laws, and destroy my liberty :) 
 but either when the action is of itself, or by reason 
 of a public known indisposition of some persons, 
 probably introductive of a sin ; or when we know it 
 is so in fact. The other is but affrighting a man : 
 this only is prudent, that my charity be guided by 
 such rules which determine wise men to actions or 
 omissions respectively ; and therefore a light fame 
 is not strong enough to wrest my liberty from me ; 
 but a reasonable belief, or a certain knowledge ; 
 in the taking of which estimate we must neither be 
 too credulous and easy, nor yet ungentle and stub- 
 born, but do according to the actions of wise men 
 and the charities of a Christian. Hither we may 
 refer the rules of abstaining from things which are 
 of evil report : for not every thing which is of 
 good report is to be followed ; for then a false opi- 
 nion, when it is become popular, must be professed 
 for conscience' sake : nor yet every thing that is of 
 bad report is to be avoided ; for nothing endured 
 more shame and obloquy than Christianity at its 
 first commencement. But by good report we are 
 to understand such things which are well reported 
 of by good men and wise men, or Scripture, or the 
 consent of nations. And thus for a woman to marry 
 within the year of mourning is scandalous, because 
 it is of evil report, gives suspicion of lightness, or 
 some worse confederacy, before the death of her 
 husband ; the thing itself is apt to minister the 
 suspicion, and this we are bound to prevent : and 
 
136 
 
 OF SCANDAL. 
 
 unless the suspicion be malicious, or imprudent 
 and unreasonable, we must conceal our actions 
 from the surprises and deprehensions of suspicion. 
 It was scandalous amongst the old Romans not to 
 marry ; among the Christians, for a clergyman to 
 marry twice, because it was against an apostolical 
 canon : but when it became of ill report for any 
 Christian to marry the second time, because this 
 evil report was begun by the errors of Montanus, 
 and is against a permission of holy Scripture, no 
 lay-christian was bound to abstain from a second 
 bed for fear of giving scandal. 
 
 14. Tenthly, The precept of avoiding scandal 
 concerns the governors of the church or state in 
 the making and execution of laws; for no law in 
 things indifferent ought to be made to the provoca- 
 tion of the subject, or against that public disposi- 
 tion which is in the spirits of men, and will cer- 
 tainly cause perpetual irregularities and schisms. 
 Before the law be made, the superior must comply 
 with the subject; after it is made, the subject must 
 comply with the law : but in this the church hath 
 made fair provision, accounting no laws obligatory 
 till the people have accepted them, and given tacit 
 approbation. For ecclesiastical canons have their 
 time of probation : and if they become a burden 
 to the people, or occasion schism, tumults, public 
 disunion of affections, and jealousies against au- 
 thority, the laws give place, and either fix not 
 when they are not first approved, or disappear by 
 desuetude. And in the execution of laws no less 
 care is to be taken : for many cases occur in which 
 the laws can be rescued from being a snare to 
 men's consciences by no other way but by dispen- 
 sation, and slacking of the discipline as to certain 
 
OF SCANDAL. 
 
 137 
 
 particulars. Mercy and sacrifice, the letter and 
 the spirit, the words and the intention, the general 
 case and the particular exception, the present dis- 
 position and the former state of things, are often- 
 times so repugnant, and of such contradictory in- 
 terests, that there is no stumbling-block more 
 troublesome or dangerous than a severe, literal, 
 and rigorous exacting of laws in all cases. But 
 when stubbornness or a contentious spirit, when 
 rebellion and pride, when secular interest, or ease 
 and licentiousness, set men up against the laws, 
 the laws then are upon the defensive, and ought 
 not to give place. It is ill to cure particular dis- 
 obedience by removing a constitution decreed by 
 public wisdom for a general good. When the evil 
 occasioned by the law is greater than the good 
 designed, or than the good which will come by it 
 in the present constitution of things, and the evil 
 can by no other remedy be healed, it concerns 
 the lawgiver's charity to takeoff such positive con- 
 stitutions, which in the authority are merely human, 
 and in the matter indifferent, and evil in the event. 
 The sum of this whole duty I shall choose to re- 
 present in the words of an excellent person, St. 
 Jerome : " We must, for the avoiding of scandal, 
 quit every thing which may be omitted without pre- 
 judice to the threefold truth, of life, of justice, and 
 doctrine." Meaning, that what is not expressly 
 commanded by God or our superiors, or what is 
 not expressly commanded as an act of piety and 
 perfection, or what is not an obligation of justice; 
 that is, in which the interest of a third person, or 
 else our own Christian liberty, is not totally con- 
 cerned; all that is to be given in sacrifice to mercy, 
 
138 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 and to be made matter of edification and charity ; 
 but not of scandal ; that is, of danger, and sin, and 
 falling, to our neighbour. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O eternal Jesus, who art made unto us wisdom, righteousness, 
 sanctification, and redemption, give us of thy abundant charity, 
 that we may love the eternal benefit of our brother's soul with 
 a true, diligent, and affectionate care and tenderness. Give us a 
 fellow-feeling .of one another's calamities, a readiness to bear each 
 other's burdens, aptness to forbear, wisdom to advise, counsel to 
 direct, and a spirit of meekness and modesty trembling at our in- 
 firmities, fearful in our brother's dangers, and joyful in his resti- 
 tution and securities. Lord, let all our actions be pious and 
 prudent, ourselves wise as serpents, and innocent as doves, and 
 our whole life exemplary, and just, and charitable : that wc may, 
 like lamps shining in thy temple, serve thee and enlighten others, 
 and guide them to thy sanctuary ; and that, shining clearly, and 
 burning zealously, when the bridegroom shall come to bind up his 
 jewels, and beautify his spouse, and gather his saints together, 
 we, and all thy Christian people knit in holy fellowship, may 
 enter into the joy of our Lord, and partake of the eternal re- 
 freshments of the kingdom of light and glory, where thou, O 
 holy and eternal Jesu, livest and reignest in the excellencies of a 
 kingdom, and the infinite durations of eternity. Amen. 
 
 DISCOURSE XVIII. 
 
 Of the Causes and Manner of the Divine Judgments. 
 
 1. God's judgments are like the writing upon 
 the wall, 1 which was a missive of anger from God 
 
 1 Udvrrj d' aSavariov d^avrjg voog av9pu)7roun. Solon. — 
 " The designs of the immortals are inscrutable to man." 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 139 
 
 upon Belshazzar. It came upon an errand of re- 
 venge, and yet was writ in so dark characters that 
 none could read it but a prophet. Whenever God 
 speaks from heaven, he would have us to under- 
 stand his meaning : and if he declares not his 
 sense in particular signification, yet we understand 
 his meaning well enough, if every voice of God 
 leads us to repentance. Every sad accident is di- 
 rected against sin, either to prevent it or to cure it; 
 to glorify God or to humble us; to make us go 
 forth of ourselves, and to rest upon the centre of 
 all felicities, that we may derive help from the 
 same hand that smote us. Sin and punishment 
 are so near relatives, that when God hath marked 
 any person with a sadness or unhandsome acci- 
 dent, men think it warrant enough for their uncha- 
 ritable censures, and condemn the man whom God 
 hath smitten, making God the executioner of our 
 uncertain or ungentle sentences. ' Whether sinned 
 this man or his parents, that he was born blind ? 
 said the Pharisees to our blessed Lord. ' Neither 
 this man, nor his parents/ was the answer ; mean- 
 ing, that God had other ends in that accident to 
 serve ; and it was not an effect of wrath, but a 
 design of mercy both directly and collaterally. 
 God's glory must be seen clearly by occasion of the 
 curing the blind man. But in the present case the 
 answer was something different. Pilate slew the 
 Galileans when they were sacrificing in their con- 
 venticles apart from the Jews : for they first had 
 separated from obedience and paying tribute to 
 Caesar ; and then from the church, who disavowed 
 their mutinous and discontented doctrines. The 
 cause of the one and other are linked in mu- 
 tual complications and endearment; and he who 
 
CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 despises the one will quickly disobey the other. 
 Presently, upon report of this sad accident, the 
 people ran to the judgment-seat; and every man 
 was ready to be accuser and witness and judge 
 upon these poor destroyed people. But Jesus al- 
 lays their heat; and though he would by no means 
 acquit these persons from deserving death for their 
 denying tribute to Caesar, yet he alters the face of 
 the tribunal, and makes those persons who were 
 so apt to be accusers and judges, to act another 
 part, even of guilty persons too; that since they will 
 needs be judging, they might judge themselves: 
 for, ' Think not these were greater sinners than all 
 the other Galileans, because they suffered such 
 things. I tell you, nay ; but, except ye repent, ye 
 shall all likewise perish.' 1 Meaning, that although 
 there was great probability to believe such persons 
 (schismatics, I mean, and rebels) to be the greatest 
 sinners of the world ; yet themselves, who had de- 
 signs to destroy the Son of God, had deserved as 
 great damnation. And yet it is observable, that 
 the holy Jesus only compared the sins of them 
 that suffered with the estate of the other Galileans 
 who suffered not, (and that also applies it to the 
 persons present who told the news,) to consign this 
 truth unto us — that when persons confederate in 
 the same crimes, are spared from a present judg- 
 ment falling upon others of their own society, it is 
 indeed a strong alarm to all to secure themselves 
 by repentance against the hostilities and eruptions 
 of sin ; but yet it is no exemption or security to 
 them that escape, to believe themselves persons less 
 sinful. For God sometimes decimates or tithes 
 
 1 Luke, xiii. 3. 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 141 
 
 delinquent persons, that they die for a common 
 crime, according as God hath cast their lot in the 
 decrees of predestination; and either they that 
 remain are sealed up to a worse calamity, or left 
 within the reserves and mercies of repentance ; for 
 in this there is some variety of determination and 
 undiscerned providence. 
 
 2. The purpose of our blessed Saviour is of 
 great use to us in all the traverses and changes, 
 and especially the sad and calamitous accidents of 
 the world. But in the misfortune of others we 
 are to make other discourses concerning divine 
 judgments, than when the case is of nearer con- 
 cernment to ourselves. For, first, when we see a 
 person come to an unfortunate and untimely death, 
 we must not conclude such a man perishing and mi- 
 serable to all eternity. 1 It was a sad calamity that 
 fell upon the man of Judah, that returned to eat 
 bread into the prophet's house, contrary to the word 
 of the Lord. He was abused into the act by a 
 prophet, and a pretence of a command from God : 
 and whether he did violence to his own under- 
 standing, and believed the man because he was 
 willing, or did it in sincerity, or in what degree of 
 sin or excuse the action might consist, no man 
 there knew ; and yet a lion slew him, and the ly- 
 ing prophet that abused him escaped, and went to 
 his grave in peace. Some persons, joined in society 
 
 1 De Anania et Sapphira dixit Grigenes, Digni enim erant 
 in sseculo recipere peccatum suum, ut mundiores exeant ab hac 
 vita, mundati castigatione sibi illata per mortem communem, 
 quoniam credentes erant in Christum. Idem ait S. Aug. lib. iv. 
 c. 1. cont. Parmen. et Cassian. — " Origen has said, concerning 
 Ananias and Sapphira, that they were punished in this world 
 that they might leave it chastened, purified by the death which 
 they both suffered, because they were believers in Christ." 
 
142 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 and interest with criminals, have perished in the 
 same judgments; and yet it would be hard to call 
 them equally guilty, who in the accident were 
 equally miserable and involved. And they who 
 are not strangers in the affairs of the world, cannot 
 but have heard or seen some persons who have lived 
 well and moderately, though not like the flames of 
 the holocaust, yet like the ashes of incense, send- 
 ing up good perfumes, and keeping a constant and 
 slow fire of piety and justice, yet have been sur- 
 prised in the midst of some unusual, unaccustomed 
 irregularity, and died in that sin. A sudden gaiety 
 of fortune, a great joy, a violent change, a friend 
 is come, or a marriage-day hath transported some 
 persons to indiscretions and too bold a licence; and 
 the indiscretion hath betrayed them to idle com- 
 pany, and the company to drink, and drink to a 
 fall, and that hath hurried them to their grave. 
 And it were a sad sentence to think God would 
 not repute the untimely death for a punishment 
 great enough to that deflexion from duty, and 
 judge the man according to the constant tenour of 
 his former life. Unless such an act was of malice 
 great enough to outweigh the former habits, and 
 interrupt the whole state of acception and grace. 
 Something like this was the case of Uzzah, who 
 espying the tottering ark, went to support it with 
 an unhallowed hand : God smote him, and he 
 died immediately. It were too severe to say his 
 zeal and indiscretion carried him beyond a tempo 
 ral death to the ruins of eternity. Origen and 
 many others have made themselves ' eunuchs for 
 the kingdom of heaven,' and did well after it ; but 
 those that did so, and died of the wound, were 
 smitten of God, and died in their folly ; and yet it 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 143 
 
 is rather to be called a sad consequence of their in- 
 discretion, than the express of a final anger from 
 God Almighty. For as God takes off our sins and 
 punishments by parts, remitting to some persons the 
 sentence of death, and inflicting the fine of a tem- 
 poral loss, or the gentle scourge of a lesser sick- 
 ness ; so also he lays it on by parts, and according 
 to the proper proportions of the man and of the 
 crime ; and every transgression and lesser deviation 
 from our duty does not drag the soul to death eter- 
 nal ; but God suffers our repentance, though im- 
 perfect, to have an imperfect effect, knocking off the 
 fetters by degrees, and leading us in some cases to 
 a council, in some to judgment, and in some to 
 hell-fire. But it is not always certain that he who 
 is lead to the prison doors shall there lie entomb- 
 ed ; and a man may by a judgment be brought to 
 the gates of hell, and yet those gates shall not 
 prevail against him. This discourse concerns per- 
 sons whose life is habitually fair and just, but are 
 surprised in some unhandsome, but less criminal 
 action, and die or suffer some great calamity as the 
 instrument of its expiation or amendment. 
 
 3. Secondly, But if the person upon whom the 
 judgment falls be habitually vicious, or the crime 
 of a clamorous nature or deeper tincture ; if the 
 man ' sin a sin unto death,' and either meets it, or 
 some other remarkable calamity not so feared as 
 death, provided we pass no further than the sen- 
 tence we see then executed, it is not against cha- 
 rity or prudence to say, this calamity, in its own 
 formality, and by the intention of God, is a pu- 
 nishment and judgment. In the favourable cases 
 of honest and just persons our sentence and opi- 
 nions ought also to be favourable, and in such 
 
144 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 questions to incline ever to the side of charitable 
 construction, and read other ends of God in the 
 accidents of our neighbour than revenge or express 
 wrath. But when the impiety of a person is scan- 
 dalous and notorious, when it is clamorous and 
 violent, when it is habitual and yet corrigible, if 
 we find a sadness and calamity dwelling with such 
 a sinner, especially if the punishment be spiritual, 
 we read the sentence of God written with his own 
 hand ; and it is not sauciness of opinion, or a 
 pressing into the secrets of Providence, to say the 
 same thing which God hath published to all the 
 world in the expresses of his Spirit. In such cases 
 we are to observe the ' severity of God ; on them 
 that fall severity and to use those judgments as 
 instruments of the fear of God, and arguments to 
 hate sin ; which we could not well do, but that we 
 must look on them as verifications of God's threat- 
 ening against great and impenitent sinners. But 
 then, if we descend to particulars, we may easily be 
 deceived. 
 
 4. For some men are diligent to observe the ac- 
 cidents and chances of providence upon those es- 
 pecially who differ from them in opinion ; and 
 whatever ends God can have, or whatever sins man 
 can have, yet we lay that in fault which we there- 
 fore hate because it is most against our interest; 
 the contrary opinion is our enemy, and we also 
 think God hates it. But such fancies do seldom 
 serve either the ends of truth or charity. Pierre 
 Calceon died under the barber's hand : there 
 wanted not some who had said it was a judgment 
 upon him for condemning to the fire the famous 
 Pucelle of France, who prophesied the expulsion of 
 the English out of the kingdom. They that thought 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 145 
 
 this, believed her to be a prophetess ; but others, 
 that thought her a witch, were willing to find out 
 another conjecture for the sudden death of that 
 gentleman. Gamier, earl of Gretz, kept the pa- 
 triarch of Jerusalem from his right in David's 
 tower and the city, and died within three days ; 
 and by Dabart, the patriarch, it was called a judg- 
 ment upon him for his sacrilege. But the uncer- 
 tainty of that censure appeared to them who con- 
 sidered that Baldwin (who gave commission to 
 Gamier to withstand the patriarch) did not die; 
 but Godfrey of Bouillon did die immediately after 
 he had passed the right of the patriarch. And yet 
 when Baldwin was beaten at Rhamula, some bold 
 people pronounced that then God punished him 
 upon the patriarch's score, and thought his sacri- 
 lege to be the secret cause of his overthrow : and 
 yet his own pride and rashness was the more visi- 
 ble, and the judgment was but a cloud, and pas- 
 sed away quickly into succeeding victory. 1 But I 
 instance in a trifle. Certain it is, that God 
 removed the candlestick from the Levantine 
 churches because he had a quarrel unto them : for 
 that punishment is never sent upon pure designs 
 of emendation, or for direct and immediate pur- 
 poses of the divine glory, but ever makes reflection 
 upon the past sin ; but when we descend to a judg- 
 ment of the particulars, God walks so in the dark 
 to us, that it is not discerned upon what ground he 
 smote them. Some say it was because they dis- 
 honoured the eternal Jesus, in denying the proces- 
 sion of the Holy Ghost from the Son. And in 
 this some thought themselves sufficiently assured 
 
 1 Baron. A.D. 1100, and 2024. 
 VOL. ITT. L 
 
146 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 by a sign from heaven, because the Greeks lost 
 Constantinople upon Whitsunday, the day of the 
 festival of the Holy Spirit. 1 The church of Rome 
 calls the churches of the Greek communion schis- 
 matical, and thinks God righted the Roman quarrel 
 when he revenged his own. Some think they were 
 cut off for being breakers of images : others think 
 that their zeal against images was a means they 
 were cut off no sooner. And yet he that shall 
 observe what innumerable sects, heresies, and 
 factions were commenced amongst them, and how 
 they were wanton with religion, making it serve 
 ambitious and unworthy ends, will see that, besides 
 the ordinary conjectures of interested persons, they 
 had such causes of their ruin which we also now feel 
 heavily incumbent upon ourselves. To see God 
 adding fifteen years to the life of Hezekiah upon 
 his prayer, and yet cutting off the young son of 
 David, begotten in adulterous embraces ; to see him 
 rejecting Adonijah, and receiving Solomon to the 
 kingdom, begotten of the same mother whose son 
 God in anger formerly slew ; to observe his mer- 
 cies to Manasses, in accepting him to favour, and 
 continuing the kingdom to him, and his severity to 
 Zedekiah, in causing his eyes to be put out; to 
 see him rewarding Nebuchadnezzar with the spoils 
 of Egypt for destroying Tyre, and executing God's 
 severe anger against it, and yet punishing others for 
 being executioners of his wrath upon Jerusalem, 
 even then when he purposed to chastise it ; to see 
 Wenceslaus raised from a peasant to a throne, 
 and Pompey from a great prince reduced to that 
 condition, that a pupil and an eunuch passed sen- 
 
 1 Estius. 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 147 
 
 tence of death upon him ; to see great fortunes fall 
 into the hand of a fool, and honourable old persons 
 and learned men descend to unequal beggary; to 
 see him strike a stroke with his own hand in the 
 conversion of Saul, and another quite contrary in 
 the cutting off of Judas ; must needs be some re- 
 straint to our judgments concerning the general 
 state of those men who lie under the rod : but it 
 proclaims an infinite uncertainty in the particulars, 
 since we see contrary accidents happening to per- 
 sons guilty of the same crime, or put in the same 
 indispositions. God hath marked all great sins 
 with some signal and express judgments, and hath 
 transmitted the records of them, or represented 
 them before our eyes ; that is, hath done so in our 
 age, or it hath been noted to have been done be- 
 fore : and that being sufficient to affright us from 
 those crimes, God hath not thought it expedient to 
 do the same things to all persons in the same 
 cases, having to all persons produced instances 
 and examples of fear by fewer accidents, sufficient 
 to restrain us, but not enough to pass sentence 
 upon the changes of divine Providence. 
 
 5. But sometimes God speaks plainer, and gives 
 us notice what crimes he punishes in others, that 
 we may the rather decline such rocks of offence. 
 If the crime and the punishment be symbolical, 
 and have proportion and correspondence of parts, 
 the hand of God strikes the man, but holds up one 
 finger to point at the sin. The death of the child 
 of Bathsheba was a plain declaration that the 
 anger of God was upon David for the adulterous 
 mixture. That blasphemer, whose tongue was 
 presently struck with an ulcerous tumour, with his 
 tongue declared the glories of God and his own 
 
 l 2 
 
148 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 shame. And it was not doubted but God, when he 
 smote the lady of Dominicus Silvius, the duke of 
 Venice, with a loathsome and unsavoury disease, 
 did intend to chastise a remarkable vanity of hers, 
 in various and costly perfumes, which she affected 
 in an unreasonable manner, and to very evil pur- 
 poses. And that famous person, and of excellent 
 learning, Giacchettus of Geneva, being by his wife 
 found dead in the unlawful embraces of a stranger 
 woman, who also died at the same instant, left an 
 excellent example of God's anger upon the crime, 
 and an evidence that he was then judged for his 
 intemperate lust. 1 Such are all those punishments 
 which are natural consequents to a crime : as drop- 
 sies, redness of eyes, dissolution of nerves, apo- 
 plexies, to continual drunkenness ; to intemperate 
 eating, short lives and sudden deaths; to lust, a 
 caitive, slavish disposition, and a foul, diseased 
 body ; fire and sword, and depopulations of towns 
 and villages, the consequents of ambition and un- 
 just wars; poverty to prodigality; and all those 
 judgments which happen upon cursings and hor- 
 rid imprecations, when God is, under a curse, called 
 to attest a lie, and to connive at impudence ; or 
 when the oppressed persons, in the bitterness of 
 their souls, wish evil and pray for vengeance on 
 their oppressors; or that the church upon just 
 cause inflicts spiritual censures, and delivers 
 unto Satan, or curses and declares the divine 
 sentence against sinners; as St. Peter against 
 Ananias and Sapphira; and St. Paul against 
 Elymas ; and, of old, Moses against Pharaoh and 
 his Egypt. (Of this nature also was the plague 
 
 1 Fulgos, lib ix. c. 12 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 149 
 
 of a withered hand, inflicted upon Jeroboam for 
 stretching forth his hand to strike the prophet.) 
 In these and all such instances the offspring is so 
 like the parent that it cannot easily be concealed. 
 Sometimes the crime is of that nature that it cries 
 aloud for vengeance, or is threatened with a special 
 kind of punishment ; which, by the observation and 
 experience of the world, hath regularly happened to 
 a certain sort of persons. Such are dissolutions 
 of estates, the punishment of sacrilege ; a descend- 
 ing curse upon posterity for four generations, spe- 
 cially threatened to the crime of idolatry ; any 
 plague whatsoever to oppression ; untimely death 
 to murder; an unthriving estate to the detention of 
 tithes, or whatsoever is God's portion allotted for 
 the services of religion ; untimely and strange 
 deaths to the persecutors of Christian religion : 
 Nero killed himself ; Domitian was killed by his 
 servants; Maximinus and Decius were murdered, 
 together with their children ; Valerianus impri- 
 soned, flayed, and slain with tortures, by Sapor, king 
 of Persia ; Diocletian perished by his own hand, 
 and his house was burned with the fate of Sodom 
 and Gomorrah, with fire from above ; Antiochus, the 
 president under Aurelian, while Agapetus was in 
 his agony and sufferance of martyrdom, cried out 
 of a flame within him, and died ; Flaccus vomited 
 out his entrails presently after he had caused Gre- 
 gory, bishop of Spoleto, to be slain ; and Dioscorus, 
 the father of St. Barbara, accused and betrayed his 
 daughter to the hangman's cruelty, for being a 
 Christian, and he died by the hand of God, by fire 
 from heaven. These are God's tokens, marks upon 
 the body of infected persons, and declare the ma- 
 
150 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 lignity of the disease, and bid us all beware of 
 those determined crimes. 
 
 6. Thirdly, But then in these and all other ac- 
 cidents we must first observe from the cause to the 
 effect, and then judge from the effect concerning 
 the nature and the degree of the cause. We cannot 
 conclude — this family is lessened, beggared, or ex- 
 tinct, therefore they are guilty of sacrilege : but 
 thus — they are sacrilegious, and God hath blotted 
 out their name from among the posterities, there- 
 fore this judgment was an express of God's anger 
 against sacrilege : the judgment will not conclude 
 a sin ; but when a sin infers the judgment with 
 a legible character and a prompt signification, 
 not to understand God's choice is next to stupidity 
 or carelessness. Arius was known to be a seditious, 
 heretical, and dissembling person, and his entrails 
 descended on the earth when he went to cover his 
 feet : l it was very suspicious that this was the pu- 
 nishment of those sins which were the worst in him. 
 But he that shall conclude Arius to be an heretic 
 or seditious, upon no other ground but because his 
 bowels gushed out, begins imprudently, and pro- 
 ceeds uncharitably. But it is considerable that 
 men do not arise to great crimes on the sudden, but 
 by degrees of carelessness to lesser impieties, and 
 then to clamorous sins. And God is therefore 
 
 i Ruit Arius alvo 
 
 Infelix, plus mente cadens, lethumque peremptus 
 Cum Juda commune tulit, qui gutture pendens 
 Visceribus curvatus obit : nec poena sequestrat 
 Quos par culpa ligat, qui majestatis honori 
 Vulnus ab ore parant. Hie prodidit, ille diremit 
 
 Sacrilega de voce. 
 
 Poet. Christ, apud Baron, torn. 3. ad ann. 
 Christ. 336 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 151 
 
 said to punish great crimes or actions of highest 
 malignity, because they are commonly productions 
 from the spirit of reprobation; they are the highest 
 ascents, and suppose a body of sin. And therefore, 
 although the judgment may be intended to punish 
 all our sins, yet it is like the Syrian army, it kills 
 all that are its enemies, but it hath a special com- 
 mission to ' fight against none but the king of Is- 
 rael,' because his death would be the dissolution 
 of the body. And if God humbles a man for his 
 great sin, that is, for those acts which combine and 
 consummate all the rest, possibly the body of sin 
 may separate, and be apt to be scattered and sub- 
 dued by single acts and instruments of mortifica- 
 tion. And therefore it is but reasonable, in our 
 making use of God's judgments upon others, to think 
 that God will rather strike at the greatest crimes; 
 not only because they are in themselves of greatest 
 malice and iniquity, but because they are the sum 
 total of the rest, and by being great progressions in 
 the state of sin suppose all the rest included : and 
 we, by proportioning and observing the judgment 
 to the highest, acknowledge the whole body of sin 
 to lie under the curse, though the greatest only 
 was named, and called upon with the voice of 
 thunder. And yet because it sometimes happens, 
 that upon the violence of a great and new occasion 
 some persons leap into such a sin, which in the 
 ordinary course of sinners uses to be the effect 01 
 an habitual and growing state ; then if a judgment 
 happens, it is clearly appropriate to that one great 
 crime, which as of itself it is equivalent to a vicious 
 habit, and interrupts the acceptation of all its for- 
 mer contraries, so it meets with a curse, such as 
 
152 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 usually God chooses for the punishment of a whole 
 hody and state of sin. However, in making obser- 
 vation upon the expresses of God's anger, we must 
 be careful that we reflect not with any bitterness 
 or scorn upon the person of our calamitous bro- 
 ther, lest we make that to be an evil to him which 
 God intends for his benefit, if the judgment was 
 medicinal ; or that we increase not the load, al- 
 ready great enough to sink him beneath his grave, 
 if the judgment was intended for a final abscission. 
 
 7. Fourthly, But if the judgments descend upon 
 ourselves, we are to take another course : not to 
 enquire into particulars to find out the proportions, 
 (for that can only be a design to part with just so 
 much as we must needs,) but to mend all that is 
 amiss ; for then only we can be secure to remove 
 the Achan, when we keep nothing within us or 
 about us that may provoke God to jealousy or 
 wrath. And that is the proper product of holy 
 fear, which God intended should be the first effect 
 of all his judgments. And of this God is so 
 careful, and yet so kind and provident, that fear 
 might not be produced always at the expense of a 
 great suffering, that God hath provided for us cer- 
 tain prologues of judgment, and keeps us waking 
 with alarms, that so he might reconcile his mercies 
 with our duties. Of this nature are epidemical 
 diseases, not yet arrived at us, prodigious tempests, 
 thunder, and loud noises from heaven : and he that 
 will not fear when God speaks so loud, is not yet 
 made soft with the impresses and perpetual drop- 
 pings of religion. Venerable Bede reports of St. 
 Chad, that if a great gust of wind suddenly arose, 
 he presently made some holy ejaculation, to beg 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 153 
 
 favour of God for all mankind, who might possibly 
 be concerned in the effects of that wind : but if a 
 storm succeeded, he fell prostrate to the earth, and 
 grew as violent in prayer as the storm was either 
 at land or sea : but if God added thunder and 
 lightning, he went to the church, and there spent 
 all his time during the tempest in reciting Litanies, 
 Psalms, and other holy prayers, till it pleased God 
 to restore his favour, and to seem to forget his an- 
 ger. 1 And the good bishop added this reason ; 
 because these are the extensions and stretchings 
 forth of God's hand, and yet he did not strike ; 
 but he that trembles not when he sees God's arm 
 held forth to strike us, understande neither God's 
 mercies nor his own danger ; he neither knows 
 what those horrors were which the people saw from 
 Mount Sinai, nor what, the glories and amazements 
 shall be at the great day of judgment. And if 
 this religious man had seen Tullus Hostilius, the 
 Roman king, and Anastasius, a Christian em- 
 peror, but a reputed heretic, struck dead with 
 thunderbolts, and their own houses made their 
 urns to keep their ashes in, there could have been 
 no posture humble enough, no prayers devout 
 enough, no place holy enough, nothing sufficiently 
 expressive of his fear, and his humility, and his 
 adoration and religion to the almighty and infinite 
 power and glorious mercy of God, sending out his 
 emissaries to denounce war with designs of peace. 
 A great Italian general, seeing the sudden death 
 of Alfonsus, duke of Ferrara, kneeled down in- 
 stantly, saying, " And shall not this sight make 
 me religious ?" Three and twenty thousand fell 
 
 1 Hist. Gent. Anglor. lib. iii. c. 18 
 
154 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 in one night in the Israelitish camp, who were all 
 slain for fornication. 1 And this so prodigious a 
 judgment was recorded in Scripture for our ex- 
 ample and affrightment, that we should not with 
 such freedom entertain a crime which destroyed so 
 numerous a body of men in the darkness of one 
 evening. Fear and modesty, and universal refor- 
 mation, are the purposes of Gods judgments upon 
 us, or in our neighbourhood. 
 
 8. Fifthly, Concerning judgments happening to 
 a nation or a church, the consideration is particu- 
 lar, because there are fewer capacities of making 
 sins to become national than personal ; and there- 
 fore if we understand when a sin is national, we may 
 the rather understand the meaning of God's hand 
 when he strikes a people. For national sins grow 
 higher and higher, not merely according to the degree 
 of the sin, or the intention alone, but according to 
 the extension ; according to its being national, so 
 it is productive of more or less mischief to a king- 
 dom. Customary iniquities amongst the people 
 do then amount to the account of national sins, 
 when they are of so universal practice as to take 
 in well near every particular ; such as was that of 
 Sodom, not to leave ten righteous in all the coun- 
 try ; 2 and such were the sins of the old world, who 
 left but eight persons to escape the angry baptism 
 of the flood. And such was the murmur of the 
 children of Israel, refusing to march up to Canaan 
 at the commandment of God; they all murmured 
 but Caleb and Joshua. And this God, in the case 
 of the Amalekites, calls the fulfilling of their sins, 
 and a filling up the measure of their iniquities. 
 
 1 1 Cor. x. 8. 
 
 ' Hor. lib. iii. Od. 6. 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 155 
 
 And hither also I reckon the defection of the ten 
 tribes from the house of Juclah, and the Samaritan 
 schism ; these caused the total extirpation of the 
 offending people. For although these sins were 
 personal and private at first, yet when they come 
 to be universal by diffusion and dissemination, 
 and the good people remaining among them are 
 but like drops of wine in a tun of water, of no con- 
 sideration with God, save only to the preservation 
 of their own persons ; 1 then although the persons 
 be private, yet all private or singular persons make 
 the nation. But this hath happened but seldom 
 in Christianity : I think indeed never, except in 
 the case of mutinies and rebellion against their 
 lawful prince, or the attesting violence done in 
 unjust wars. But God only knows, and no man 
 can say, when any sin is national by diffusion : 
 and therefore in this case we cannot make any 
 certain judgment or advantage to ourselves, or very 
 rarely, by observing the changes of providence 
 upon a people. 
 
 9. But the next above this, in order to the pro- 
 curing popular judgments, is public impunities; 
 the not doing justice upon criminals publicly 
 complained of and demanded, especially when the 
 persons interested call for justice and execution of 
 good laws, and the prince's arm is at liberty and 
 in full strength, and there is no contrary reason in 
 the particular instance to make compensation to 
 the public for the omission, or no care taken to 
 satisfy the particular. Abimelech thought he had 
 reason to be angry with Isaac for saying Rebecca 
 was his sister : for ' one of the people might have 
 
 1 Ezek, xiv. 20. 
 
156 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 lain with thy wife, and thou shouldst have brought 
 evil upon us:' meaning, that the man should have 
 escaped unpunished, by reason of the mistake ; 
 which very impunity he feared might be ex- 
 pounded to be a countenance and encouragement 
 to the sin. But this was no more than his fear. 
 The case of the Benjamites comes home to this pre- 
 sent article; for they refused to do justice upon 
 the men that had ravished and killed the Levite's 
 concubine ; they lost twenty-five thousand in battle, 
 their cities were destroyed, and the whole tribe 
 almost extinguished. For punishing public and 
 great acts of injustice is called in Scripture 6 put- 
 ting away the evil from the land ; ' 1 because to 
 this purpose the sword is put into the prince's 
 hand, and he ( bears the sword in vain' who 
 ceases to protect his people : and not to punish 
 the evil is a voluntary retention of it; unless a 
 special case intervene in which the prince thinks 
 it convenient to give a particular pardon ; provided 
 this be not encouragement to others, nor without 
 great reason big enough to make compensation for 
 the particular omission, and with care to render 
 some other satisfaction to the person injured. In 
 all other cases of impunity, that sin becomes national 
 by forbearing, which in the acting was personal : 
 and it is certain the impunity is a spring of uni- 
 versal evils; it is no thank to the public if the best 
 man be not as bad as the worst. 
 
 10. But there is a step beyond this, and of a 
 more public concernment : such are the laws of 
 Omri, when a nation consents to and makes un - 
 godly statues. When mischief is established as a 
 
 » Deut.xvii. 12 ; xix. 13, 19; xxi. <J, 21, et alibi. 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 157 
 
 law, then the nation is engaged to some purpose. 
 When I see the people despise their governors, scorn 
 and rob and disadvantage the ministers of religion, 
 make rude addresses to God, to his temple, to his 
 sacraments, I look upon it as the insolency of an 
 untaught people, who would as readily do the 
 contrary, if the fear of God and the king were 
 upon them by good examples, and precepts, and 
 laws, and severe executions. And further yet, 
 when the more public and exemplary persons are 
 without sense of religion, without a dread of ma- 
 jesty, without reverence to the church, without im- 
 presses of conscience, and the tendernesses of a 
 religious fear towards God ; as the persons are 
 greater in estimation of law, and in their influences 
 upon the people, so the score of the nation ad- 
 vances, and there is more to be paid for in popu- 
 lar judgments. But when iniquity or irreligion is 
 made a sanction, and either God must be dishon- 
 oured, or the church exauctorated, or her rites in- 
 vaded by a law, then the fortune of the kingdom is 
 at stake. No sin engages a nation so much, or is 
 so public, so solemn iniquity as is a wicked law. 
 Therefore it concerns princes and states to secure 
 the piety and innocency of their laws ; and if there 
 be any evil laws, which upon just grounds may be 
 thought productive of God's anger, because a pub- 
 lic misdemeanour cannot be expiated but by a 
 public act of repentance, or a public calamity, the 
 laws must either have their edge abated by a 
 desuetude, or be laid asleep by a non-execution, 
 or dismembered by contrary privisos, or have the 
 sting drawn forth by interpretation, or else by ab- 
 rogation be quite rescinded. But these are national 
 sins within itself, or within its own body, by the 
 
158 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 act of the body (I mean) diffusive or representa- 
 tive; and they are like the personal sins of men in 
 or against their own bodies in the matter of sobriety. 
 There are others in the matter of justice, as the 
 nation relates to other people communicating in 
 public intercourse. 
 
 11. For as the intercourse between man and 
 man in the actions of commutative and distribu- 
 tive justice is the proper matter of virtues and 
 vices personal ; so are the transactions between 
 nation and nation against the public rules of jus- 
 tice ; sins national directly, and in their first origi- 
 nal, and answer to injustice between man and 
 man. Such are commencing war upon unjust 
 titles, invasion of neighbours' territories, confede- 
 racies and aids upon tyrannical interest, wars 
 against true religion or sovereignty, violation of 
 the laws of nations, which they have consented to 
 as the public instrument of accord and negociation, 
 breach of public faith, defending pirates, and the 
 like. When a public judgment comes upon a na- 
 tion, these things are to be thought upon ; that we 
 may not think ourselves acquitted by crying out 
 against swearing, and drunkenness, and cheating 
 in manufactures, which, unless they be of univer- 
 sal dissemination, and made national by diffusion, 
 are paid for upon a personal score ; and the private 
 infelicities of our lives will either expiate or punish 
 them severely. But while the people mourn for 
 those sins of which their low condition is capable, 
 sins that may produce a popular fever, or perhaps 
 the plague, where the misery dwells in cottages, 
 and the princes often have indemnity, as it was 
 in the case of David ; yet we may not hope 
 to appease a war, to master a rebellion, to cure 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 159 
 
 the public distemperatures of a kingdom, which 
 threaten not the people only, or the governors 
 also, but even the government itself, unless the 
 sins of a more public capacity be cut off by 
 public declarations, or other acts of natural jus- 
 tice and religion. But the duty which concerns 
 us all in such cases is, that every man in every ca- 
 pacity should enquire into himself, and for his own 
 portion of the calamity put in his own symbol 
 of emendation for his particular, and his prayers 
 for the public interest. In which it is not safe 
 that any private persons should descend to par- 
 ticular censures of the crimes of princes and states ; 
 no, not towards God, unless the matter be notorious 
 and past a question ; but it is a sufficient assoil- 
 ment of this part of his duty, if, when he hath set 
 his own house in order, he would pray, with inde- 
 finite significations of his charity and care of the 
 public, that God would put it into the hearts of all 
 whom it concerns, to endeavour the removal of 
 the sin that hath brought the exterminating angel 
 upon the nation. But yet there are sometimes 
 great lines drawn by God in the expresses of an- 
 ger in some judgments upon a nation : and when 
 the judgment is of that danger as to invade the 
 very constitution of a kingdom, the proportions 
 that judgments many times keep to their sins in- 
 timate, that there is some national sin in which, 
 either by diffusion, or representation, or in the di- 
 rect matter of sins, (as false oaths, unjust wars, 
 wicked confederacies, or ungodly laws,) the nation 
 in the public capacity is delinquent. 
 
 12. For as the nation hath in sins a capacity dis- 
 tinct from the sins of all the people, inasmuch as 
 the nation is united in one head, guarded by a dis- 
 
160 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 tinct and a higher angel, (as Persia by St. Michael,) 
 transacts affairs in a public right, transmits influ- 
 ence to all particulars from a common fountain, 
 and hath intercourse with other collective bodies, 
 who also distinguish from their own particulars ; 
 so likewise it hath punishments distinct from those 
 infelicities which vex particulars; punishments 
 proporiionable to itself and its own sins: such as 
 are change of governments, of better into worse, of 
 monarchy into aristocracy, and so to the lowest 
 ebb of democracy; death of princes, infant kings, 
 foreign invasions, civil wars, a disputable title to 
 the crown, making a nation tributary, conquest by 
 a foreigner, and, which is worst of all, removing 
 the candlestick from a people, by extinction of the 
 church, or that which is necessary to its conserva- 
 tion, the several orders and ministries of religion. 
 And the last hath also proper sins of its own an- 
 alogy ; such as are false articles in the public con- 
 fessions of a church, schism from the catholic, pub- 
 lic scandals, a general viciousness of the clergy, an 
 indifferency in religion, without warmth and holy 
 fires of zeal, and diligent pursuance of all its just 
 and holy interests. Now in these and all parallel 
 cases, when God by punishments hath probably 
 marked and distinguished the crime, it concerns 
 public persons to be the more forward and impor- 
 tunate in consideration of public irregularities; 
 and for the private also, not to neglect their own 
 particulars ; for by that means, although not cer- 
 tainly, yet probably, they may secure themselves 
 from falling in the public calamity. It is not in- 
 fallibly sure that holy persons shall not be smitten 
 by the destroying angel ; for God in such deaths 
 hath many ends of mercy, and some of providence, 
 
OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 161 
 
 to serve ; but such private and personal emenda- 
 tions and devotions are the greatest securities of the 
 men against the judgment, or the evil of it, pre- 
 serving them in this life, or wafting them over to 
 a better. Thus many of the Lord's champions 
 did fall in battle, and the armies of the Benjamites 
 did twice prevail upon the juster people of all 
 Israel ; and the Greek empire hath declined and 
 shrunk under the fortune and power of the Otto- 
 man family ; and the holy land, which was twice 
 possessed by Christian princes, is now in the do- 
 minion of unchristened Saracens ; and in the pro- 
 duction of these alterations many a gallant and 
 pious person suffered the evils of war, and the 
 change of an untimely death. 
 
 13. But the way for the whole nation to pro- 
 ceed in cases of epidemical diseases, wars, great 
 judgments, and popular calamities, is to do in the 
 public proportion the same that every man is to 
 do for his private; by public acts of justice, re- 
 pentance, fastings, pious laws, and execution of 
 just and religious edicts, making peace, quitting of 
 unjust interests, declaring publicly against a crime, 
 protesting in behalf of" the contrary virtue or re- 
 ligion. And to this also every man, as he is a 
 member of the body politic, must co-operate ; that 
 by a repentance in diffusion help may come, as 
 well as by a sin of universal dissemination the 
 plague was hastened and invited the rather. But 
 in these cases all the work of discerning and pro- 
 nouncing concerning the cause of the judgment, as 
 it must be without asperity, and only for designs of 
 correction and emendation, so it must be done by 
 kings and prophets, and the assistance of other 
 public persons, to whom the public is committed. 
 
 VOL. III. m 
 
162 
 
 CAUSES AND MANNER 
 
 Joshua cast lots upon Achan, and discovered the 
 public trouble in a private instance; and of old 
 the prophets had it in commission to reprove the 
 popular iniquity of nations, and the confederate 
 sins of kingdoms ; and in this Christianity altered 
 nothing. And when this is done modestly, pru- 
 dently, humbly, and penitently, oftentimes the 
 tables turn immediately, but always in due time ; 
 and a great alteration in a kingdom becomes the 
 greatest blessing in the world, and fastens the 
 church, or the crown, or the public peace, in bands 
 of great continuance and security ; and it may be 
 the next age shall feel the benefits of our sufferance 
 and repentance. And therefore, as we must endea- 
 vour to secure it, so we must not be too decretory 
 in the case of others, or disconsolate or diffident in 
 our own, when it may so happen, that all succeed- 
 ing generations shall see that God pardoned us 
 and loved us even when he smote us. Let us all 
 learn to fear and walk humbly. The churches of 
 Laodicea and the Colossians suffered a great ca- 
 lamity within a little while after the Spirit of God 
 had sent them two epistles by the ministry of St. 
 Paul : their cities were buried in an earthquake ; 
 and yet we have reason to think they were churches 
 beloved of God, and congregations of holy people. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O eternal and powerful God, thou just and righteous Governor 
 of the world, who callest all orders of men by precepts, pro- 
 mises, and threatenings, by mercies, and by judgments, teach us 
 to admire and adore all the wisdom, the effects and infinite va- 
 rieties of thy providence ; and make us to dispose ourselves so, by 
 
Ob DIVINE JUDGMENTS. 
 
 163 
 
 obedience, by repentance, by all the manners of holy living, that 
 we may never provoke thee to jealousy, much less to wrath and 
 indignation against us. Keep far from us the sword of the de- 
 stroying angel, and let us never perish in the public expresses of 
 thy wrath, in diseases epidemical, with the furies of war, with 
 calamitous, sudden, and horrid accidents, with unusual diseases ; 
 unless that our so strange fall be more for thy glory and our 
 eternal benefit, and then thy will be done : we beg thy grace, 
 that we may cheerfully conform to thy holy will and pleasure. 
 Lord, open our understandings, that we may know the meaning 
 of thy voice, and the signification of thy language, when thou 
 speakest from heaven in signs and judgments : and let a holy fear 
 so soften our spirits, and an intense love so inflame and sanctify our 
 desires, that we may apprehend every intimation of thy pleasure 
 at its first and remotest and most obscure representment; that 
 so we may with repentance go out to meet thee, and prevent the 
 expresses of thine anger. Let thy restraining grace, and the ob- 
 servation of the issues of thy justice, so allay our spirits-, that 
 we be not severe and forward in condemning others, nor back- 
 ward in passing sentence upon ourselves. Make us to obey thy 
 voice described in holy Scripture, to tremble at thy voice ex- 
 pressed in wonders and great effects of providence, to condemn 
 none but ourselves, nor to enter into the recesses of thy sanctuary, 
 and search the forbidden records of predestination ; but that we 
 may read our duty in the pages of revelation, not in the labels of 
 accidental effects: that thy judgments may confirm thy word, 
 and thy word teach us our duty; and we, by such excellent instru- 
 ments, may enter in and grow up in the ways of godliness, through 
 Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 SECTION XV. 
 
 Of the Accidents happening from the Death of Laza- 
 rus, until the Death and Burial of Jesus. 
 
 1. While Jesus was in Galilee, messengers came 
 to him from Martha and her sister Mary, that he 
 would hasten into Judaea, to Bethany, to relieve the 
 sickness and imminent dangers of their brother 
 Lazarus. But he deferred his going till Lazarus 
 w r as dead ; purposing to give a great probation of 
 his divinity, power, and mission, by a glorious mi- 
 racle, and to give God glory, and to receive reflec- 
 tions of the glory upon himself : for after he had 
 stayed two days, he called his disciples to go with 
 him into Judaea, telling them that Lazarus was 
 dead, but he would raise him out of that sleep of 
 death. But by that time Jesus was arrived at 
 Bethany, he found that Lazarus had been dead 
 four days, and now near to putrefaction. But 
 when Martha and Mary met him, weeping their 
 pious tears for their dead brother, Jesus suffered 
 the passions of pity and humanity, and wept; dis- 
 tilling that precious liquor into the grave of Laza- 
 rus, watering the dead plant, that it might spring 
 into a new life, and raise his head above the 
 ground. 
 
 2. When Jesus had, by his words of comfort and 
 institution, strengthened the faith of the two mourn- 
 ing sisters, and commanded the stone to be removed 
 from the grave, he made an address of adoration 
 and eucharist to his Father, confessing his perpe- 
 tual propensity to hear him ; and then cried out, 
 ' Lazarus, come forth !' And he that was dead 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 165 
 
 came forth from his bed of darkness, with his night- 
 clothes on him, whom when the apostles had un- 
 loosed at the command of Jesus, he went to Bethany. 
 And many that were present believed on him ; but 
 others, wondering and malicious, went and told the 
 Pharisees the story of the miracle ; who, upon that 
 advice, called their great council, whose great and 
 solemn cognizance was of the greater causes of 
 prophets, of kings, and of the holy law. At this 
 great assembly it was that Caiaphas, the high- 
 priest, prophesied that it was expedient one should 
 die for the people : and thence they determined 
 the death of Jesus: but he, knowing they had 
 passed a decretory sentence against him, retired to 
 the city Ephraim, in the tribe of Judah, near the 
 desert, where he stayed a few days, till the ap- 
 proximation of the feast of Easter. 
 
 3. Against which feast, when Jesus with his dis- 
 ciples was going to Jerusalem, he told them the 
 event of the journey would be, that the Jews should 
 deliver him to the Gentiles ; that they should 
 scourge him, and mock him, and crucify him, and 
 the third day he should rise again. After which 
 discourse, the mother of Zebedee's children begged 
 of Jesus for her two sons, that one of them might 
 sit at his right hand, the other at the left, in his 
 kingdom. For no discourses of his passion, or in- 
 timations of the mysteriousness of his kingdom, 
 could yet put them into right understandings of 
 their condition : but Jesus, whose heart and 
 thoughts were full of fancy and apprehensions of 
 the neighbour passion, gave them answer in pro- 
 portion to his present conceptions and their future 
 condition : for if they desired the honours of his 
 kingdom, such as they were, they should have 
 
166 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 them, unless themselves did decline them ; they 
 should drink of his cup, and dip in his lavatory, 
 and be washed with his baptism, and sit in his 
 kingdom, if the heavenly Father had prepared it 
 for them : but the donation of that immediately 
 was an issue of divine election and predestination, 
 and was only competent to them who, by holy 
 living and patient suffering, put themselves into a 
 disposition of becoming vessels of election. 
 
 4. But as Jesus in this journey came near 
 Jericho, he cures a blind man, who sat begging by 
 the way-side : and espying Zacchaeus, the chief of 
 the publicans, upon a tree, (that he, being low in 
 stature, might upon that advantage of station see 
 Jesus passing by,) he invited himself to his house ; 
 who received him with gladness and repentance of 
 his crimes, purging his conscience, and filling his 
 heart and house with joy and sanctity ; for, imme- 
 diately upon the arrival of the Master at his house, 
 he offered restitution to all persons whom he had 
 injured, and satisfaction, and half of his remanent 
 estate he gave to the poor ; and so gave the fairest 
 entertainment to Jesus, who brought along with 
 him salvation to his house. There it was that he 
 spake the parable of the king who concredited 
 divers talents to his servants ; and having at his 
 return exacted an account, rewarded them who 
 had improved their bank, and been faithful in their 
 trust, with rewards proportionable to their capacity 
 and improvement; but the negligent servant, who 
 had not meliorated his stock, was punished with ab- 
 legation and confinement to outer darkness : and 
 from hence sprang up that dogmatical proposition, 
 which is mysterious and determined in Christianity : 
 ' To him that hath shall be given ; and from him 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 167 
 
 that hath not shall be taken away even what he 
 hath.' After this, going forth of Jericho, he cured 
 two blind men upon the way. 
 
 5. Six days before Easter Jesus came to Bethany, 
 where he was feasted by Martha and Mary ; and 
 accompanied by Lazarus, who sat at the table with 
 Jesus. But Mary brought a pound of nard pistic, 1 
 and, as formerly she had done, again anoints the 
 feet of Jesus, and fills the house with the odour, 
 till God himself smelt thence a savour of a sweet- 
 smelling sacrifice: but Judas Iscariot, the thief 
 and the traitor, repined at the vanity of the expense, 
 as he pretended, because it might have been sold 
 for three hundred pence, and have been given to 
 the poor. But Jesus, in his reply, taught us, that 
 there is an opportunity for actions of religion as 
 well as of charity. Mary did this against the 
 burial of Jesus ; and her religion was accepted by 
 him, to whose honours the holocaust of love and 
 the oblations of alms-deeds are in their proper sea- 
 sons direct actions of worship and duty. But at 
 this meeting there came many Jews to see Lazarus, 
 who was raised from death, as well as to see Jesus : 
 and because by occasion of his resurrection many 
 of them believed on Jesus, therefore the Pharisees 
 deliberated about putting him to death. 2 But God, 
 in his glorious providence, was pleased to preserve 
 him as a trumpet of his glories, and a testimony of 
 the miracles, thirty years after the death of Jesus. 
 
 6. The next day, being the fifth day before the 
 passover, Jesus came to the foot of the Mount of 
 Olives ; and sent his disciples to Bethphage, a vil- 
 
 1 Pisticam, id est spicatam, corrupte, uti ex Latinis fere solent 
 Graeci. Vide Erasm. in 14 Marci. 
 
 2 Epiphan conk Manich. 
 
168 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 lage in the neighbourhood, commanding them to 
 unloose an ass and a colt, and bring them to him, 
 and to tell the owners it was done for the Master's 
 use: and they did so. And when they brought 
 the ass to Jesus, he rides on him to Jerusalem: 
 and the people, having notice of his approach, 
 took branches of palm-trees, and went out to meet 
 him, strewing branches and garments in the way, 
 crying out, ' Hosannah to the Son of David !' 1 
 Which was a form of exclamation used to the ho- 
 nour of God, and in great solemnities ; and signifies 
 adoration to the Son of David, by the rite of car- 
 rying branches ; which when they used in proces- 
 sion about their altars they used to pray, " Lord, 
 save us ; Lord, prosper us :" 2 which hath occasioned 
 the reddition of Hoschiannah to be, amongst some, 
 that prayer which they repeated at the carrying of 
 the Hoschiannah, as if itself did signify, " Lord, 
 save us." But this honour was so great and unusual 
 to be done even unto kings, that the Pharisees, 
 knowing this to be an appropriate manner of ad- 
 dress to God, said one to another by way of won- 
 der, ' Hear ye what these men say ?' for they were 
 troubled to hear the people revere him as a God. 
 
 7. When Jesus from the Mount of Olives ' be- 
 held Jerusalem, he wept over it/ and foretold great 
 sadnesses and infelicities futurely contingent to it : 
 which not only happened in the sequel of the 
 story, according to the main issues and significa- 
 tions of this prophecy, but even to minutes and cir- 
 
 1 ^YxpqXav apsrav § ^e<pav(t)v clojtov ywizvv. Pindar. 
 Vocat palmarum ramos, Olymp. Altissimarum virtutum et coro- 
 narum florem suavem. 
 
 2 Drusius de vocib. Heb. N. T. c. 19. Canin. de locis, 
 N. T. 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 169 
 
 cumstances it was verified ; for in the Mount of 
 Olives, where Jesus shed tears over perishing Jeru- 
 salem, the Romans first pitched their tents when 
 they came to its final overthrow. 1 From thence 
 descending to the city, he went into the temple, 
 and still the acclamations followed him ; till the 
 Pharisees were ready to burst with the noises 
 abroad, and the tumults of envy and scorn within; 
 and by observing that all their endeavours to sup- 
 press his glories were but like clasping their hands 
 to veil the sun, and that, in despite of all their stra- 
 tagems, the whole nation was become disciple to 
 the glorious Nazarene. And there he cured certain 
 persons that were blind and lame. 
 
 8. But while he abode at Jerusalem, f certain 
 Greeks, who came to the feast to worship/ made 
 their address to Philip, that they might be brought 
 to Jesus. ' Philip tells Andrew, and they both tell 
 Jesus y who, having admitted them, discoursed 
 many things concerning his passion ; and then 
 prayed a petition, which is the end of his own suf- 
 ferings, and of all human actions, and the purpose 
 of the whole creation : ' Father, glorify thy name :' 
 to which he was answered by a voice from heaven, 
 * I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.' 
 But this, nor the whole series of miracles that he 
 did, the mercies, the cures, nor the divine discourses, 
 could gain the faith of all the Jews, who were de- 
 termined by their human interest ; for ' many of 
 the rulers who believed on him durst not confess 
 him, because they loved the praise of men more 
 than the praise of God.' Then Jesus again ex- 
 horted all men " to believe on him, that so they 
 
 1 Joseph, de Bello Jud. lib. vi. c. 3. 
 
170 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 might in the same act believe on God ; that they 
 might approach unto the light, and not abide in 
 darkness ; that they might obey the commandments 
 of the Father, whose express charge it was that Jesus 
 should preach this gospel ; and that they might not 
 be judged at the last day by the word which they 
 have rejected, which word to all its observers is ever- 
 lasting life." After which sermon retiring to Bethany, 
 he abode there all night." 
 
 9. On the morning, returning to Jerusalem, on 
 the way being hungry he passed by a fig-tree, where, 
 expecting fruit he found none, and cursed the fig-tree, 
 which by the next day was dried up and withered. 
 Upon occasion of which preternatural event Jesus 
 discoursed of the power of faith, and its power to 
 produce miracles. But upon this occasion others, 
 the disciples of Jesus in after-ages, have pleased 
 themselves with fancies and imperfect descants; 
 as that he cursed this tree in mystery and secret 
 intendment, it having been the tree in the eat- 
 ing whose fruit Adam, prevaricating the divine 
 law, made an inlet to sin, which brought in death 
 and the sadnesses of Jesus's passion. 1 But Jesus 
 having entered the city came into the temple, and 
 preached the gospel : and the chief-priests and 
 Scribes questioned his commission, and by what 
 authority he did those things. But Jesus promis- 
 ing to answer them if they would declare their 
 opinions concerning John's baptism, which they 
 durst not, for fear of displeasing the people, or 
 throwing dirt in their own faces, was acquitted of 
 his obligation, by their declining the proposition. 
 
 10. But there he reproved the Pharisees and ru- 
 
 1 Isidor. ad Theo. pom. lib. i. ep. 51. 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 171 
 
 lers by the parable of " two sons ; the first whereof 
 said to his father, he would not obey, but repented, 
 and did his command ; the second gave good words, 
 but did nothing: meaning, that persons of the great- 
 est improbability were more heartily converted than 
 they whose outside seemed to have appropriated 
 religion to the labels of their frontlets. He added 
 a parable of the vineyard let to husbandmen, who 
 killed the servants sent to demand the fruits, and at 
 last the son himself, that they might invade the in- 
 heritance : but made a sad commination to all such 
 who should either stumble at this stone, or on 
 whom this stone should fall." After which, and 
 some other reprehensions, (which he so veiled in 
 parable that it might not be expounded to be ca- 
 lumny or declamation, although such sharp ser- 
 mons had been spoken in the people's hearing ; 
 but yet so transparently that themselves might 
 see their own iniquity fn those modest and just re- 
 presentments,) the Pharisees would fain have seized 
 him; but they durst not for the people, but re- 
 solved, if they could, ' to entangle him in his talk;' 
 and therefore ' sent out spies,' who should pretend 
 sanctity and veneration of his person ; who with 
 a goodly insinuating preface, that ' Jesus re- 
 garded no man's person, but spake the word of 
 God;' with much simplicity and justice, desired to 
 know if it were ' lawful to pay tribute to Caesar or 
 not.' A question which was of great dispute, be- 
 cause of the numerous sect of the Galileans, who 
 denied it, and of the affections of the people, who 
 loved their money, and their liberty, and the pri- 
 vileges of their nation. And now, in all probability, 
 he shall fall under the displeasure of the people or 
 of Caesar. But Jesus called to see a penny; and 
 
172 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 finding it to be superscribed with Caesar's image, 
 with incomparable wisdom be brake their snare, 
 and established an evangelical proposition for ever ; 
 saying, ' Give to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, 
 and to God the things that are God's.' 
 
 11. Having so excellently and so much to their 
 wonder answered the Pharisees, the Sadducees 
 bring their great objection to him against the resur- 
 rection, by putting the case of a woman married to 
 seven husbands, and ' whose wife should she be in 
 the resurrection ?' thinking that to be an impos- 
 sible state, which engages upon such seeming in- 
 congruities, that a woman should at once be wife 
 to seven men. But Jesus first answered their objec- 
 tion, telling them, that all those relations whose 
 foundation is in the imperfections and pas- 
 sions of flesh and blood, and duties here below, 
 shall cease in that state; which is so spiritual that 
 it is like to the condition of angels, amongst whom 
 there is no difference of sex, no cognations, no ge- 
 nealogies or derivation from one another : and then, 
 by a new argument, proves the resurrection, by one 
 of God's appellatives, who did then delight to be 
 called f the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob for 
 since God f is not the God of the dead, but of the 
 living/ unto him even these men are alive ; and if 
 so, then either they now exercise acts of life, and 
 therefore shall be restored to their bodies, that 
 their actions may be complete, and they not remain 
 in a state of imperfection to all eternity ; or if they 
 be alive, and yet cease from operation, they shall be 
 much rather raised up to a condition which shall 
 actuate and make perfect their present capacities 
 and indispositions, lest power and inclination 
 should for ever be in the root, and never rise up to 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 173 
 
 fruit or herbage; and so be an eternal vanity, like 
 an old bud, or an eternal child. 
 
 12. After this, the Pharisees being well pleased, 
 not that Jesus spake so excellently, but that the 
 Sadducees were confuted, came to him, asking, 
 ' which was the great commandment,' and some 
 other things, more out of curiosity than pious desires 
 of satisfaction. But at last Jesus was pleased to 
 ask them concerning Christ, ' whose son he was :' 
 they answered, 1 The son of David.' But he re 
 plying, ' How then doth David call him Lord?' 
 ['The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou on my 
 right hand,' &c] they had nothing to answer. But 
 Jesus then gave his disciples caution against the 
 pride, the hypocrisy, and the oppression of the 
 Scribes and Pharisees ; and commended the poor 
 widow's oblation of her ' two mites into the trea- 
 sury,' it being a great love in a little print, for it 
 was ' all her living.' All this was spoken in the 
 temple; the goodly stones of which, when the 
 apostles beheld with wonder, they being white 
 and firm, twenty cubits in length, twelve in breadth, 
 eight in depth, as Josephus reports, 1 Jesus prophe- 
 cies the destruction of the place. Concerning 
 which prediction when the apostles, being with 
 him at the Mount of Olives, asked hirn privately 
 concerning the time and the signs of so sad event, 
 he discoursed largely of " his coming to judgment 
 against that city, and interweaved predictions of 
 the universal judgment of all the world ; of which 
 this, though very sad, was but a small adumbra- 
 tion : adding precepts of watchfulness, and stand- 
 ing in preparation, with hearts filled with grace, 
 
 1 Lib. xiv. Antiq. c. 14. 
 
174 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 our lamps always shining-, that when the bride- 
 groom shall come, we may be ready to enter in ; M 
 which was intended in the parable of the five wise 
 virgins ; and concluded his sermon with a narra- 
 tive of his passion, foretelling that within two days 
 he should be crucified. 
 
 13. Jesus descended from the mount, and came 
 to Bethany ; and turning" into the house of Simon 
 the leper, Mary Magdalene, having been reproved 
 by Judas for spending ointment upon Jesus's feet, 
 it being so unaccustomed and large a profusion, 
 thought now to speak her love once more, and 
 trouble nobody ; and therefore she ( poured oint- 
 ment on his sacred head believing that, being a 
 pompousness of a more accustomed festivity, would 
 be indulged to the expressions of her affection. 
 But now all the disciples murmured, wondering at 
 the prodigiousness of the woman's religion, great 
 enough to consume a province in the overflowings 
 of her thankfulness and duty. But Jesus now 
 also entertained the sincerity of her miraculous 
 love; adding this prophecy, that where the gospel 
 should be preached, there also a record of this act 
 shall be kept, as a perpetual monument of her 
 piety, and an attestation of his divinity, who could 
 foretel future contingencies ; Christianity receiving 
 the greatest argument from that which St, Peter 
 calls c the surer word of prophecy ;' meaning it to 
 be greater than the testimony of miracles, not easy 
 to be dissembled by impure spirits, and whose 
 efficacy should descend to all ages : for this pro- 
 phecy shall for ever be fulfilling, and, being every 
 day verified, does every day preach the divinity of 
 Christ's person, and of his institution. 
 
 14. Two days before the passover, the Scribes 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 175 
 
 and Pharisees called a council, to contrive crafty 
 ways of destroying Jesus, they not daring to do it 
 by open violence. Of which meeting when Judas 
 Iscariot had notice, (for those assemblies were pub- 
 lic and notorious,) he ran from Bethany, and offered 
 himself to betray his Master to them, if they would 
 give him a considerable reward. They agreed for 
 thirty pieces of silver. Of what value each piece 
 was is uncertain ; but their own nation hath given 
 a rule, that when a piece of silver is named in the 
 Pentateuch, it signifies a side ; if it be named in 
 the prophets, it signifies a pound ; if in the other 
 writings of the Old Testament, it signifies a talent. 1 
 This therefore being alleged out of the prophet 
 Jeremy by one of the evangelists, it is probable 
 the price at which Judas sold his Lord was thirty 
 pounds weight of silver : a goodly price for the Sa- 
 viour of the world to be prized at by his undiscern- 
 ing and unworthy countrymen. 2 
 
 15. The next day was the first day of unleavened 
 bread, on which it was necessary they should kill the 
 passover : therefore Jesus sent Peter and John to the 
 city, to a certain man, whom they should find carry- 
 ing a pitcher of water to his house ; him they should 
 follow, and there prepare the passover. They went 
 and found the man in the same circumstances; 
 and prepared for Jesus and his family, who at the 
 
 1 Elias Levita Jud. in Tisbi. Arius Montanus in diction. 
 Syro-Chaldaic. 
 
 2 Matt, xxvii. 9, ubi citatur Jeremias pro Zecharia, per erro- 
 rem illapsum in Codices. Nam tempore S. Augustini in non- 
 nullis Codicibus (Zecharias) legebatur ; atque hodie in Syriac. 
 T. Sed fortassis ex traditione, hoc descendit a Jeremia dictum, 
 sicut multa alia in vet. testam. non descripta, et in N. T. repetita : 
 quod eo magis est credibile, quia proverbialiter dictum apud 
 Judaeos, Spiritum Jeremiae resedisse in Zech. 
 
176 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 even came to celebrate the passover. It was at the 
 house of John, surnamed Mark, which had always 
 been open to this blessed family, where he was 
 pleased to finish his last supper, and the mysteri- 
 ousness of the vespers of his passion. 1 
 
 16. When evening was come, Jesus stood with 
 his disciples, and ate the paschal lamb : after 
 whicb he girt himself with a towel, and taking a 
 basin washed the feet of his disciples ; not only by 
 the ceremony, but in his discourses, instructing 
 them in the doctrine of humility, which the Master, 
 by his so great condescension to his disciples, had 
 made sacred, and imprinted the lesson in lasting 
 characters by making it symbolical. But Peter 
 was unwilling to be washed by his Lord, until he 
 was told, he must renounce his part in him unless 
 he were washed : which option being given to 
 Peter, he cried out, ' Not my feet only, but my 
 hands and my head.' But Jesus said, the ablution 
 of the feet was sufficient for the purification of the 
 whole man ; relating to the custom of those coun- 
 tries who used to go to supper immediately from 
 the baths, who therefore were sufficiently clean save 
 only on their feet, by reason of the dust contracted 
 in their passage from the baths to the dining- 
 room ; from which, when by the hospitable master 
 of the house, they were caused to be cleansed, they 
 needed no more ablution : and by it Jesus, passing 
 from the letter to the spirit, meant, that the body 
 of sin was washed in the baths of baptism ; and 
 afterwards, if we remained in the same state of 
 purity, it was only necessary to purge away the 
 
 1 Alexand. Mon. apud Metaphrasten die 11 Junii. Vide 
 Adrichom. in descript. Jerus. n. 6. 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 177 
 
 filth contracted in our passage from the font to the 
 altar ; and then we are clean all over, when the 
 baptismal state is unaltered, and the little ad- 
 herences of imperfection are passions also washed 
 off. 
 
 17. But after the manducation of the paschal 
 lamb, it was the custom of the nation to sit down 
 to a second supper, in which they ate herbs and 
 unleavened bread; the major-domo first dipping 
 his morsel, and then the family ; after which the 
 father brake bread into pieces, and distributed a 
 part to every of the guests; and, first drinking him- 
 self, gave to the rest the chalice filled with wine, 
 according to the age and dignity of the person, add- 
 ing to each distribution a form of benediction 
 proper to the mystery, which was eucharistical and 
 commemorative of their deliverance from Egypt. 
 This supper Jesus being to celebrate, changed the 
 forms of benediction, turned the ceremony into 
 mystery, and gave his body and blood in sacrament 
 and religious configuration ; so instituting the ve- 
 nerable sacrament, which, from the time of its in- 
 stitution, is called the Lord's supper : which rite 
 Jesus commanded the apostles to perpetuate in 
 commemoration of him, their Lord, until his second 
 coming. And this was the first delegation of a 
 perpetual ministry which Jesus made to his apos- 
 tles, in which they were to be succeeded to in all 
 the generations of the church. 
 
 18. But Jesus being troubled in spirit, told his 
 apostles, that one of them should betray him. 
 Which prediction he made, that they might not be 
 scandalized at the sadness of objection of the pas- 
 sion, but be confirmed in their belief, seeing so 
 great demonstration of his wisdom and spirit of 
 
 VOX. TIT. N 
 
178 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZAKU& 
 
 prophecy. The disciples were all troubled at this 
 sad arrest, looking one on another, and doubting of 
 whom he spake; but they beckoned to the beloved 
 disciple, leaning on Jesus's breast, that he might 
 ask: for they who knew their own innocency and 
 infirmity, were desirous to satisfy their curiosity, 
 and to be rid of their indetermination and their 
 fear. But Jesus being asked, gave them a sign, 
 and a sop to Judas ; commanding him to do what 
 he list speedily: for Jesus was extremely strait- 
 ened till he had drunk the chalice off, and accom- 
 plished his mysterious and afflictive baptism. After 
 Judas received the sop, the devil entered into him, 
 and Judas went forth immediately, it being now 
 night. 
 
 19. When he was gone out, Jesus began his 
 farewell-sermon, rarely mixed of sadness and joys, 
 and studded with mysteries as with emeralds; dis- 
 coursing of " the glorification of God in his Son, 
 and of those glories which the Father had prepared 
 for him; of his sudden departure, and his migra- 
 tion to a place whither they could not come yet, 
 but afterwards they should : meaning, first to death, 
 and then to glory : commanding them to love one 
 another ; and foretelling to Peter, (who made con- 
 fident protests that he would die with his Master,) 
 that 6 before the cock should crow twice, he should 
 deny him thrice." But lest he should afflict them 
 with too sad representments of his present condi- 
 tion, he comforts them with the comforts of faith, 
 with the intendments of his departure to prepare 
 places in heaven for them, whither they might come 
 by him, who is the way, the truth, and the life ; 
 adding a promise, in order to their present support 
 and future felicities, that if they should ask of God 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 179 
 
 any thing in his name, they should receive it; and 
 upon condition they would love him, and keep his 
 commandments, he would pray for the Holy Ghost 
 to come upon them, to supply his room, to furnish 
 them with proportionable comforts, to enable them 
 with great gifts, to lead them into all truth, and to 
 abide with them for ever. Then arming them 
 against future persecutions, giving them divers holy 
 precepts, discoursing of his emanation from the 
 Father, and of the necessity of his departure, he 
 gave them his blessing, and prayed for them : and 
 then, having sung an hymn, which was part of the 
 great Allelujah, beginning at the 114th Psalm, 
 (' When Israel came out of Egypt,') and ending 
 at the 118th, inclusively, he went forth with his 
 disciples over the brook Cedron, unto the Mount of 
 Olives, to a village called Gethsemane, where there 
 was a garden, into which he entered to pray toge- 
 ther with his disciples." 
 
 20. But taking Peter, James, and John apart 
 with him, about a stone's cast from the rest, he 
 began to be exceeding sorrowful, and sad even 
 unto death ; for now he saw the ingredients of his 
 bitter draught pouring into the chalice, and the 
 sight was full of horror and amazement : he there- 
 fore fell on his face, and prayed, ' O, my Father, if 
 it be possible, let this cup pass from me.' In this 
 prayer he fell into so sad an agony, that the pains 
 inflicted by his Father's wrath, and made active by 
 his own apprehension, were so great, that a sweat 
 distilled from his sacred body as great and conglo- 
 bated as drops of blood : l and God, who heard his 
 prayer, but would not answer him in kind, sent an 
 
 1 Quidam ex Hegesippo notant, ex irroratione sanguinis Christi 
 natam arborem. Sic Philippus Bosquius et alii. Sed has sunt 
 Tierse nugae. 
 
 N 2 
 
180 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 angel to comfort him in the sadness, which he was 
 pleased not to take away. But knowing that the 
 drinking this cup was the great end of his coming 
 into the world, he laid aside all his own interests, 
 and divested himself of the affections of flesh and 
 blood, willing his Father's will ; and because his 
 Father commanded, he, in defiance of sense and 
 passion, was desirous to suffer all our pains. But 
 as when two seas meet, the billows contest in un- 
 gentle embraces, and make violent noises, till, 
 having wearied themselves into smaller waves and 
 disunited drops, they run quietly into one stream : 
 so did the Spirit and nature of Jesus assault each 
 other with disagreeing interests and distinguishing 
 disputations, till the earnestness of the contention 
 was diminished by the demonstrations of the Spirit, 
 and the prevailings of grace ; which the sooner 
 got the victory, because they were not to contest 
 with an unsanctified or rebellious nature, but a 
 body of affections which had no strong desires, 
 but of its own preservation. And therefore Jesus 
 went thrice, and prayed the same prayer, that, 
 ' if it were possible, the cup might pass from 
 him;' and thrice made an act of resignation; and 
 in the intervals 6 came and found his apostles 
 asleep,' gently chiding their incuriousness, and 
 warning them to ' watch and pray, that they enter 
 not into temptation ;' till the time that the traitor 
 c came with a multitude armed with swords and 
 staves, from the priests and elders of the people/ to 
 apprehend him. 
 
 21. Judas gave them the opportunity of the 
 night, that was all the advantage they had by him ; 
 because they durst not seize him by day, for fear of 
 the people : and he signified the person of his 
 master to the soldiers by a kiss, and an address of 
 
TO THE BTJRTAL OF JESUS. 
 
 181 
 
 seeming civility. But when they came towards 
 him, 'Jesus said, Whom seek ye? They said, 
 Jesus of Nazareth. He said, I am he.' But there 
 was a divinity upon him, that they could not seize 
 him at first. But as a wave climbing of a rock is 
 beaten back and scattered into members, till falling 
 down it creeps with gentle waftings, and kisses 
 the feet of the stony mountain, and so encircles it : 
 so the soldiers, coming at first with a rude attempt, 
 were twice repelled by the glory of his person, till 
 they, falling at his feet, were at last admitted to the 
 seizure of his body ; having by those involuntary 
 prostrations confessed his power greater than 
 theirs, and that the lustre and influence of a God 
 are greater than the violences and rudenesses of 
 soldiers. And still they, like weak eyes, durst not 
 behold the glory of this sun, till a cloud, like a 
 dark veil, did interrupt the emissions of his glories, 
 they could not seize upon him, till they had thrown 
 a veil upon his holy face. Which although it was 
 a custom of the Easterlings, and of the Roman 
 empire generally, yet in this case was violence 
 and necessity, because a certain impetuosity and 
 vigorousness of spirit and divinity issuing from his 
 holy face, made them to take sanctuary in dark- 
 ness, and to throw a veil over him, in that dead 
 time of a sad and dismal night. 1 But Peter, a stout 
 Galilean, bold and zealous, attempted a rescue, 
 and ' smote a servant of the high-priest, and cut 
 off his ear/ But Jesus rebuked the intemperance 
 of his passion, and commanded him to f put up 
 his sword/ saying, ' all they that strike with the 
 sword shall perish with the sword ; ' so putting a 
 
 1 Hieron. in c. ix. Matt. 
 
182 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 bridle upon the illegal inflictions and expresses of 
 anger or revenge from an incompetent authority. 
 But 4 Jesus touched Malchus's ear, and cured it.' 
 
 22. When Jesus had yielded himself into their 
 power, and was now ' led away by the chief- 
 priests, captains of the temple, elders of the people, 
 and soldiers/ who all came in combination and 
 covenant to surprise him, his disciples fled ; and 
 John the Evangelist, who with grief and an over- 
 running fancy had forgot to lay aside his upper 
 garment, which in festivals they were used to put 
 on, began to make escape ; but being arrested by 
 his linen upon his bare body, he was forced to leave 
 that behind him, that himself might escape his 
 master's danger; for now was verified the pro- 
 phetical saying, ' I will smite the shepherd, and 
 the sheep shall be scattered ; but Peter followed 
 affar off and the greatness of John's love, when 
 he had mastered the first inconsiderations of his 
 fear, made him to return awhile after into the 
 high-priest's hall. 
 
 23. Jesus was first led to Annas, who was the 
 prince of the Sanhedrim, and had cognizance of 
 prophets and public doctrines ; who therefore 
 ' enquired of Jesus concerning his disciples and 
 his discipline.' But he answered, that his doctrine 
 had been public or popular ; that he never taught 
 in conventicles ; and therefore referred him to the 
 testimony of all the people. For which free answer, 
 ' a servant standing by smote him on the face ;' 
 and Jesus meekly asked him what evil he had 
 done. But Annas without the seventy assessors 
 could judge nothing; and therefore ' sent him 
 bound to Caiaphas, who was high-priest that year,' 
 president of the rites of the temple ; as the other 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 183 
 
 high-priest was of the great council. Thither 
 Peter came, and had admission by the means of 
 another disciple, supposed to be John, who having 
 sold his possession in Galilee to Caiaphas, came 
 and dwelt near Mount Sion ; but was, by interven- 
 tion of that bargain, made known to the high-priest, 
 and brought Peter into the house. Where when Pe- 
 ter was challenged three times by the servants to 
 be a Galilean, and of Jesus's family, he denied and 
 forswore it; till Jesus, looking back, reminded him 
 of his prediction, and the foulness of the crime ; 
 ' and the cock crew/ for it was now the second 
 cock-crowing after ten of the clock in the fourth 
 watch. ' And Peter went out and wept bitterly,' 
 that he might cleanse his soul, washing off the 
 foul stains he had contracted in his shameful per- 
 jury and denying of his Lord. And it is reported of 
 the same holy person, that ever after, when he 
 heard the cock crow, he wept ; remembering the 
 old instrument of his conversion, and his own un- 
 worthiness, for which he never ceased to do actions 
 of sorrow and sharp repentance. 1 
 
 24. On the morning the council was to assem- 
 ble; and whilst Jesus was detained in expecta- 
 tion of it, the servants mocked him, and did all 
 actions of affront and ignoble despite to his sacred 
 head ; and because the question was whether he 
 were a prophet, 6 they covered his eyes, and smote 
 him,' in derision calling on him to ' prophecy 
 who smote him/ But in the morning, when the 
 high-priests and rulers of the people were assem- 
 bled, they sought false witness against Jesus ; but 
 
 1 Arsenius in vitis Pp. 
 
184 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 found none to purpose : they railed boldly, and 
 could prove nothing ; they accused vehemently, 
 and the allegations were of such things as were no 
 crimes ; and the greatest article which the united 
 diligence of all their malice could pretend, was, 
 that ' he said he would destroy the temple, and 
 in three days build it up again.' But Jesus nei- 
 ther answered this nor any other of their vainer 
 allegations ; for the witnesses destroyed each others 
 testimony by their disagreeing ; till at last Caia- 
 phas, who, to verify his prophecy, and to satisfy 
 his ambition, and to bait his envy, was furiously 
 determined Jesus should die, 'adjures him by the 
 living God to say whether he were the Christ, the 
 Son of the living God/ Jesus knew his design to be 
 an inquisition of death, not of piety or curiosity ; 
 yet, because his htiur was now come, he openly 
 affirmed it, without any expedient to elude the 
 high-priest's malice, or to decline the question. 
 
 25. When Caiaphas heard the saying, he accused 
 Jesus of blasphemy, and pretended an apprehen- 
 sion so tragical, that he overacted his wonder and 
 feigned detestation ; for he rent his garments, 
 (which was the interjection of the country, and 
 custom of the nation, but forbidden to the high- 
 priest,) and called presently to sentence. And, as 
 it was agreed beforehand, ' they all condemned 
 him as guilty of death/ and as far as they had 
 power inflicted it; for they f beat him with their 
 fists, smote him with the palms of their hands, 
 spit upon him,' and abused him beyond the license 
 of enraged tyrants. When Judas heard that they 
 had passed the final and decretory sentence of 
 death upon his Lord, he, who thought not it would 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 185 
 
 have gone so far, repented him to have been an 
 instrument of so damnable a machination, and came 
 and brought the silver which they gave him for 
 hire, 1 threw it in amongst them, and said, T have 
 sinned in betraying the innocent blood.' But they, 
 incurious of those hell-torments Judas felt within 
 him, because their own fires burned not yet, dis- 
 missed him ; and upon consultation bought with 
 the money ' a field to bury strangers in.' And 
 ' Judas went and hanged himself :' and the judg- 
 ment was made more notorious and eminent, by 
 an unusual accident at such deaths; for he so 
 swelled, that 'he burst, and his bowels gushed 
 out.* But the Greek scholiast and some others 
 report out of Papias, St. John's scholar, that 
 Judas fell from the fig-tree on which he hanged, 
 before he was quite dead, and survived his attempt 
 some while, being so sad a spectacle of deformity 
 and pain, and a prodigious tumour, that his plague 
 was deplorable, and highly miserable; till at last 
 he burst in the very substance of his trunk, as 
 being extended beyond the possibilities and capa- 
 cities of nature. 1 
 
 26. But the high-priest had given Jesus over to 
 the secular power, and carried him to Pilate, to be 
 put to death by his sentence and military power. 
 But coming thither, they ' would not enter into 
 the judgment-hall,' because of the feast; but 
 Pilate met them, and willing to decline the busi- 
 ness, bid them 'judge him according to their own 
 law.' They replied, ' it was not lawful for them 
 
 1 Euthem. in xxvi. Matt. Cedren. in compend. Oecumen. 
 in c. i. Act. Juvencus Hist. Evangel, lib. iv. Beda de locis 
 sanct c. 4. 
 
186 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 to put any man to death meaning, during the 
 seven days of unleavened bread : l (as apears in the 
 instance of Herod, who detained Peter in prison, in- 
 tending after Easter to bring him out to the people:) 
 and their malice was restless, till the sentence they 
 had passed were put in execution. Others think that 
 all the right of inflicting capital punishments was 
 taken from the nation by the Romans. And Jo- 
 sephus writes, that when Ananias, their high-priest, 
 had by a council of the Jews condemned St. James, 
 the brother of our Lord, and put him to death, 
 without the consent of the Roman president, he 
 was deprived of his priesthood.* But because 
 PUate (who either by common right, or at that 
 time was the judge of capital inflictions) was 
 averse from intermeddling in the condemnation 
 of an innocent person, they attempted him with 
 excellent craft ; for knowing that Pilate was a 
 great servant of the Roman greatness, and a 
 hater of the sect of the Galileans, the high-priest 
 accused Jesus, that he was of that sect, that he 
 ' denied paying tribute to Caesar, that he called 
 himself king/ Concerning which, when Pilate in- 
 terrogated Jesus, he answered, that ( his kingdom 
 was not of this world.' And Pilate, thinking he 
 had nothing to do with the other, came forth 
 again, and gave testimony, that ' he found nothing 
 worthy of death in Jesus.' But hearing that he 
 was a Galilean, and of Herod's jurisdiction, Pi- 
 late sent him to Herod, who was at Jerusalem, at 
 the feast. * And Herod was glad, because he had 
 
 1 S. Aug. tract 114. in Joan. Cyril, in Joan. Ambros. serm. 
 de calend. Januar. Chrys. in Joan. horn. lib. xx. 
 ? Antiq. c. viii. 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 187 
 
 heard much of him;' and since his return from 
 Rome had desired to see him, but could not, by 
 reason of his own avocations, and the ambulatory 
 life of Christ; ' and now he hoped to see a miracle 
 done by him/ of whom he had heard so many. 
 But the event of this was, that Jesus did there no 
 miracle ; ' Herod's soldiers set him at nought, and 
 mocked him. And that day Herod was reconciled 
 to Pilate.' 1 And Jesus was sent back, arrayed 
 in a white and splendid garment : which though 
 possibly it might be intended for derision, yet was 
 a symbol of innocence, condemned persons usually 
 being arrayed in blacks. And when Pilate had 
 again examined him, f Jesus, meek as a lamb, and 
 as a sheep before the shearers, opened not his 
 mouth: insomuch that Pilate wondered,' perceiving 
 the greatest innocence of the man, by not offering 
 to excuse or lessen any thing : for though ' Pilate 
 had power to release him or crucify him ;' yet his 
 contempt of death was in just proportion to his in- 
 nocence : which also Pilate concealed not, but pub- 
 lished Jesus's innocence by Herod's and his own 
 sentence; to the great regret of the rulers, who, like 
 ravening wolves, thirsted for a draught of blood, 
 and to devour the morning prey. 
 
 27. But Pilate hoped to prevail upon the rulers, 
 by making it a favour from them to Jesus, and an 
 indulgence from him to the nation, to set him free: 
 for oftentimes even malice itself is driven out by 
 the devil of self-love ; and so we may be acknow- 
 ledged the authors of a safety, we are content to 
 rescue a man even from our ownselves. Pilate 
 therefore offered that, according to the custom of 
 the nation, Jesus should be released for the honour 
 1 Joseph, lib. xvi. c. 14. Idem in vita sua. 
 
188 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 of the present festival, and as a donative to the 
 people. But the spirit of malice was here the more 
 prevalent, and they desired that Barabbas, ( a mur- 
 derer, a thief, and a seditious person,' should be 
 exchanged for him. Then Pilate, casting about all 
 ways to acquit Jesus of punishment, and himself 
 of guilt, offered to ' scourge him and let him go ;' 
 hoping that a lesser draught of blood might stop 
 the furies and rabidness of their passion, without 
 their bursting with a river of his best and vital 
 liquor. But these leeches would not so let go ; 
 f they cry out, Crucify him :' and to engage him 
 finally, they told him, ' if he did let this man go, 
 he was no friend to Caesar.' 
 
 '28. But Pilate called for ' water, and washed his 
 hands,' to demonstrate his own unwillingness, and 
 to reject and transmit the guilt upon them ; who 
 took it on them as greedily as they sucked the 
 blood : ' they cried out, His blood be on us and on 
 our children.' As Pilate was going to give sen- 
 tence, his wife, being troubled in her dreams, 
 sent, with the earnestness and passion of a woman, 
 that he should ' have nothing to do with that just 
 person/ But he was engaged : Caesar and Jesus, 
 God and the king, did seem to have different inter- 
 ests ; or at least he was threatened into that opinion; 
 and Pilate, though he was satisfied it was but ca- 
 lumny and malice, yet he was loath to venture 
 upon his answer at Rome, in case the high-priest 
 should have accused him : for no man knows whe- 
 ther the interest or the mistake of his judge may 
 cast the sentence ; and whoever is accused strongly, 
 i*s never thought entirely innocent. And therefore, 
 not only against the divine laws, but against the 
 Roman too, he condemned an innocent person upon 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 189 
 
 objections notoriously malicious : he adjudged him 
 to a death which was only due to public thieves 
 and homicides, (crimes with which he was not 
 charged,) upon a pretence of blasphemy, of which 
 he stood accused, but not convicted ; and for which, 
 by the Jewish law, he should have been stoned, if 
 found guilty. And this he did put into present 
 execution, against the Tiberian law, which about 
 twelve years before decreed in favour of condemned 
 persons, that after sentence execution should be 
 deferred ten days. 1 
 
 29. And now was the Holy Lamb to bleed. 
 First, therefore, Pilate's soldiers array him in a 
 kingly robe, put a reed in his hand for a sceptre, 
 plait a crown of thorns and put it on his head ; 
 they bow the knee, and mock him ; they smite him 
 with his fantastic sceptre, and instead of tribute, pay 
 h m wnh blows and spitting upon his holy head. 
 And when they had emptied the whole stock of poi- 
 sonous contempt, they divest him of the robes of 
 mockery, and put him on his own : they lead him to a 
 pillar, and bind him fast, and scourge him with 
 whips; a punishment that slaves only did use to suf- 
 fer, (free persons being, in certain cases, beaten with 
 rods and clubs,) that they might add anew scorn to 
 his afflictions, and make his sorrows like their own 
 guilt, vast and mountainous. 2 After which, Ba- 
 rabbas being set free, f Pilate delivered Jesus to be 
 crucified/ 
 
 1 Sueton. in Tiberio, c. 75. Dio Rom. Hist, lib lvii. Sub 
 Tiberio et Druso Coss. Corruptos autem est codex Epist. Sido- 
 nii, qui ait, Nunc, ex vetere S. C. Tiberiano, Triginta dierum 
 vitam post sententiarn trahit. — " According to the original law, 
 thirty days were to intervene between the passing of the sentence 
 and the execution." 
 
 2 Lib. In servorum D. de pcanis. Lib. Levia, D. de accus. 
 
190 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 30. Tti3 soldiers therefore having framed a cross, 
 sad and heavy, laid it upon Jesus's shoulders, (who, 
 like Isaac, bore the wood with which he was to be 
 sacrificed himself ) nd they drove him out to cru- 
 cifixion, who was scarce able to stand under that 
 load. It is generally supposed that Jesus bore 
 the whole tree ; ! that is, both the parts of his cross ; 
 but to him that considers it, it will seem impossible : 
 and therefore it is more likely, and agreeable to the 
 old manner of crucifying malefactors, that Jesus 
 only carried the cross- part ; the body of it being 
 upon the place either already fixed, or prepared 
 for its station. Even that lesser part was grievous 
 and intolerable to his tender, virginal, and weakened 
 body ; and when he fainted, they compel Simon, 
 a Cyrenian, to help him. A great and a mixed 
 multitude followed Jesus to Golgotha, the charnel- 
 house of the city, and the place of execution. But 
 the women wept with bitter exclamations ; and 
 their sadness was increased by the sad predictions 
 Jesus then made of their future misery, saying, 'Ye 
 daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep 
 for yourselves and for your children. For the time 
 shall come that men shall say, Blessed are the 
 barren that never bare, and the paps that never 
 gave suck : for they shall call on the hills to cover 
 them, and on the mountains to fall upon them ;' 
 
 1 Lignum transversum solum portavit J esus, soil. Patibulum, 
 ad locum ubi crux, scil. lignum oblongum, terra defixum stetit. 
 Sic Plautus, Patibulum ferant per urbem, et cruci affigantur. 
 Male ergo pictores hodierni pingunt Jesum, bajulantem utrum- 
 que lignum scil. Lipsius Tract, de supplicio crucis. — " Jesus, 
 says Lipsius, carried the transverse beam of the cross to the place 
 where the tree itself was already fixed in the ground. Plautus 
 alludes to this custom. Modern painters, therefore, err in re- 
 presenting Jesus bearing the whole of the cross." 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 191 
 
 that by a sudden ruin they may escape the linger- 
 ing calamities of famine and fear, and the horror of 
 a thousand deaths. 
 
 31. ' When Jesus was come to Golgotha/a place 
 in the Mount of Calvary, (where, according to the 
 tradition of the ancients, Adam was buried, 1 and 
 where Abraham made an altar for the sacrifice of 
 his son, 2 ) by the piety of his disciples, and, it is 
 probable, of those good women which did use to 
 minister to him, there was provided f wine mingled 
 with myrrh which among the Levantines is an 
 excellent and pleasant mixture, and such as the 
 piety and indulgence of the nations used to admi- 
 nister to condemned persons. 3 But Jesus, who by 
 voluntary susception did choose to suffer our pains, 
 refused that refreshment which the piety of the wo- 
 men presented to him. The soldiers having strip- 
 ped him, nailed him to the cross with four nails, and 
 divided his mantle into four parts, giving to each 
 soldier a part ; but for his coat, because it would 
 be spoiled if parted, it being weaved without seam, 
 they cast lots for it. 
 
 32. Now Pilate had caused a title, containing 
 the cause of his death, to be superscribed on a table 
 in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew ; the Hebrew being 
 first, the Greek next, and the Latin nearest to the 
 holy body; but all written after the Jewish manner, 
 from the right hand to the left ; for so the title is 
 shown in the church of Santa Croce, in Rome, the 
 
 1 Tertul. lib. ii. contra Marcion. Origen. Tract, xxxv. in 
 Matt. Basil, in Levit. c. 5. Athan. de Pass, et cruce, et fere 
 omnes Pp. unico excepto Hieronymo, in Epist. ad Ephes. c. 5, 
 et in c. 27, Matth. 
 
 3 S. Aug. Serm. vii. de Tempore. 
 
 3 Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xiv. c. 13. Athenseus, lib. xi. c 30. 
 
192 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 Latin letters being to be read as if it were Hebrew : 
 the reason of which I could never find sufficiently 
 discovered, unless it were to make it more legible 
 to the Jews, who by conversing with the Romans, 
 began to understand a little Latin. The title was, 
 ' Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews.' But the 
 Pharisees would have it altered, and, f that he said 
 he was king of the Jews.' But Pilate, out of wilful- 
 ness, or to do despite to the nation, or in ho- 
 nour to Jesus, whom he knew to be a just per- 
 son, or being overruled by divine Providence, 
 refused to alter it. ( And there were crucified with 
 Jesus two thieves, Jesus being in the midst, ac- 
 cording to the prophecy, ' he was reckoned with 
 the transgressors/ Then Jesus prayed for his per- 
 secutors: ' Father, forgive them, for they know not 
 what they do.' But while Jesus was full of pain 
 and charity, and was praying and dying for his 
 enemies, ' the rulers of the Jews mocked him,' up- 
 braiding him with the good works he did, and the ex- 
 presses of his power, saying, ' He saved others; him- 
 self he cannot save;* others saying, ' Let him come 
 down from the cross, if he be the king of the Jews, 
 and we will believe in him and others, according 
 as their malice was determined by fancy and occa- 
 sion, added weight and scorn to his pains: and of 
 the two malefactors that were crucified with him, 
 f one reviled him, saying, If thou be the Christ, 
 save thyself and us.' And thus far the devil pre- 
 vailed, undoing himself in riddle, provoking men 
 to do despite to Christ, and to heighten his passion 
 out of hatred to him ; and yet doing and promot- 
 ing that which was the ruin of all his own kingdom 
 and potent mischiefs : like the Jew, who in indig- 
 nation against Mercury, threw stones at his image, 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 193 
 
 and yet was by his superior judged idolatrous, that 
 being the manner of doing honour to the idol 
 among the Gentiles. 1 But then Christ, who had 
 upon the cross prayed for his enemies, and was 
 heard of God in all that he desired, felt now the 
 beginnings of success. For the other thief, whom 
 the present pains and circumstances of Jesus's pas- 
 sion had softened and made believing, reproved his 
 fellow for not fearing God ; confessed that this 
 death happened to them deservedly, but to Jesus 
 causelessly; and then prayed to Jesus, ' Lord, re- 
 member me when thou comest into thy kingdom.' 
 Which combination of pious acts and miraculous 
 conversion Jesus entertained with a speedy pro- 
 mise of a very great felicity, promising ' that upon 
 that very day he should be with him in paradise.' 
 
 33. ' Now there were standing by the cross the 
 mother of Jesus and her sister, and Mary Magda- 
 len, and John.' And Jesus, being upon his death- 
 bed, although he had no temporal estate to be- 
 stow, yet he would make provision for his mother, 
 who, being a widow, and now childless, was likely 
 to be exposed to necessity and want ; and there- 
 fore he did arrogate John, the beloved disciple, into 
 Mary's kindred, making him to be her adopted 
 son, and her to be his mother, by fiction of law : 
 f Woman, behold thy son ; and man, behold thy 
 mother. And from that time forward John took 
 her home to his own house,' which he had near 
 Mount Sion, after he had sold his inheritance in 
 Galilee to the high-priest. 
 
 34. While these things were doing, the whole 
 frame of nature seemed to be dissolved and out ot 
 
 1 R. Manasses. Vid. Dionys. Vossium in annot. ad Rab. 
 R. Maimon. 
 
 VOL. III. O 
 
FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 order, while their Lord and Creator suffered. For 
 the sun was so darkened, that the stars appeared ; 
 and the eclipse was prodigious in the manner as 
 well as in degree, because the moon was not then 
 in conjunction, but full: 1 and it was noted by 
 Phlegon, the freed man of the emperor Hadrian, 
 by Lucian out of the Acts of the Gauls, and Dio- 
 nysius, while he was yet a heathen, excellent scho- 
 lars all, great historians and philosophers ; who 
 also noted the day of the week and the hour of the 
 day, agreeing with the circumstances of the cross. 
 For the sun hid his head from beholding such a 
 prodigy of sin and sadness, and provided a veil 
 for the nakedness of Jesus, that the women might 
 be present, and himself die with modesty. 
 
 35. The eclipse and the passion began at the 
 sixth hour, and endured till the ninth; about 
 which time Jesus, being tormented with the un- 
 sufferable load of his Father's wrath due for our 
 sins, and wearied with pains and heaviness, ' cried 
 out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken 
 me ?' And, as it is thought, repeated the whole 
 two-and -twentieth Psalm, which is an admirable 
 narrative of the passion, full of prayer and sadness, 
 and description of his pains at first, and of eucha- 
 rist and joy and prophecy at the last. But these 
 first words, which it is certain and recorded that 
 he spake, were in a language of itself, or else by 
 
 1 Origen. cont. Cels. lib- ii. Tertul. Apolog. Lucian. in actis 
 sui mart. August, ep. 80, ad Hesychium. Suidas in vita 
 Dionys. ait eum dixisse, Aut Deus patitur, aut patienti com- 
 patitur : et hac de causa Athenienses erexisse aram ayvtJGry 
 Oeqi, aiunt quidam. — " Suidas, in the life of Dionysius, says, 
 that he observed, Either God is suffering, or compassionating the 
 sufferer ; and that from this the Athenians erected, as is reported, 
 an altar to the unknown God." 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 195 
 
 reason of distance, not understood ; for they 
 thought he had called for Elias to take him down 
 from the cross. Then Jesus, being in the agonies 
 of a high fever, said, ' I thirst. And one ran, and 
 filled a sponge with vinegar, wrapping it with 
 hyssop, and put it on a reed, that he might drink.' 
 The vinegar and the sponge were, in executions of 
 condemned persons, set to stop the too violent 
 issues of blood, and to prolong the death ; but 
 were exhibited to him in scorn ; ' mingled with 
 gall,' to make the mixture more horrid and ungen- 
 tle. 1 But Jesus tasted it only, and refused the 
 draught. And now, knowing that the prophecies 
 were fulfilled, his Father's wrath appeased, and 
 his torments satisfactory, he said, c It is finished : 
 and crying with a loud voice, Father, into thy 
 hands I commend my spirit, he bowed his head, 
 and yielded up his spirit' into the hands of God, 
 and died, hastening to his Father's glories. Thus 
 did this glorious Sun set in a sad and clouded 
 west, running speedily to shine in the other world. 
 
 36. Then was the veil of the temple, which se- 
 parated the secret Mosaic rites from the eyes of the 
 people, rent in the midst, from the top to the bottom ; 
 and the angels, presidents of the temple, called to 
 each other to depart from their seats ; and so 
 great " an earthquake happened, that the rocks did 
 rend, the mountains trembled, the graves opened, 
 and the bodies of dead persons arose, walking 
 from their cemeteries to the holy city, and appeared 
 unto many." 2 And so great apprehensions and 
 amazements happened to them all that stood by, 
 
 1 Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xxxi. c. 11. Tertul. de Spect. c. 25. 
 * S. Hieron. ep. 150. q. 8. 
 
 O 2 
 
196 
 
 FROM THE DEATH OF LAZARUS 
 
 that they departed, smiting their breasts, with sor- 
 row and fear. And the centurion that ministered 
 at the execution said, ' Certainly this was the Son 
 of God and he became a disciple, renouncing 
 his military employment, and died a martyr. 1 
 
 37. But because the next day was the Jews' sab- 
 bath, and a paschal festival besides, 5 the Jews has- 
 tened, that the bodies should be taken from the 
 cross ; and therefore sent to Pilate to hasten their 
 death by breaking their legs, that before sun-set 
 they might be taken away, according to the com- 
 mandment, and be buried. 3 The soldiers there- 
 fore came, and brake the legs of the two thieves ; 
 but espying and wondering that Jesus was already 
 dead, they brake not his legs ; for the Scripture 
 foretold, that a bone of him should not be broken. 
 But a soldier with his lance pierced his side, and 
 immediately there streamed out two rivulets of 
 water and blood. But the holy virgin-mother, 
 (whose soul, during this whole passion, was pierced 
 with a sword and sharper sorrows, though she was 
 supported by the comforts of faith, and those holy 
 predictions of his resurrection and future glories, 
 which Mary had laid up in store against this great 
 day of expense,) now that she saw her holy Son 
 had suffered all that our necessities and their ma- 
 lice could require or inflict, caused certain minis- 
 ters, with whom she joined, to take her dead Son 
 from the cross ; whose body, when once she got 
 free from the nails, she kissed and embraced with 
 
 1 Apud Metaph. die 16 Octob. 
 
 s Plin. lib. xi. c. 45. Vide Lactant. lib. i. c. 26. Cic pro 
 
 Rose 
 
 3 Philo de leg. special. Deut. xxi. 
 
TO THE BURIAL OF JESUS. 
 
 197 
 
 entertainments of the nearest vicinity that could 
 be expressed by a person that was holy and sad, 
 and a mother weeping for her dead son. 
 
 38. But she was highly satisfied with her own 
 meditations, that now that great mystery, deter- 
 mined by divine predestination before the begin- 
 ning of all ages, was fulfilled in her Son ; and the 
 passion that must needs be, was accomplished. 
 She therefore first bathes his cold body with her 
 warm tears, and makes clean the surface of the 
 wounds, and delivering a winding-napkin to Jo- 
 seph of Arimathea, gave to him in charge to en- 
 wrap the body and embalm it, to compose it to the 
 grave, and to do it all the rites of funeral ; having 
 first exhorted him to a public confession of what 
 he was privately till now. 1 And he obeyed the 
 counsel of so excellent a person, and ventured 
 upon the displeasure of the Jewish rulers, and 
 1 went confidently to Pilate, and begged the body 
 of Jesus.' And Pilate gave him the power of it. 
 
 39. Joseph therefore takes the body, binds his 
 face with a napkin, washes the body, anoints it 
 with ointment, enwraps it in a composition of 
 myrrh and aloes, and puts it into a new tomb, 
 which he for himself had hewn out of a rock : (it 
 not being lawful among the Jews to inter a con- 
 demned person in the common cemeteries:) for all 
 these circumstances were in the Jews' manner of 
 burying. But when the sun was set, the chief 
 priests and Pharisees went to Pilate, telling him 
 that Jesus, whilst he was living, foretold his own 
 resurrection upon the third day ; and lest his disci- 
 ples should come and steal the body, and say he 
 
 1 Bletaphr. August. 15. 
 
198 CONSIDERATIONS ON ACCIDENTS 
 
 was risen from the dead, desired that the sepulchre 
 might be secured against the danger of any such 
 imposture. Pilate gave them leave to do their 
 pleasure, even to the satisfaction of their smallest 
 scruples. They therefore ' sealed the grave, rolled 
 a great stone to the mouth of it.' and, as an ancient 
 tradition says, bound it about with labels of iron, 
 and set a watch of soldiers, as if they had intended 
 to have made it surer than the decrees of fate, or 
 the never-failing laws of nature. 1 
 
 Ad. SECTION XV. 
 
 Considerations of some preparatory Accidents before 
 the Entrance of Jesus into his Passion. 
 
 1. He that hath observed the story of the life of 
 Jesus, cannot but see it all the way to be strewed 
 with thorns and sharp-pointed stones; and, al- 
 though by the kisses of his feet they became preci- 
 ous and salutary, yet they procured to him sorrow 
 and disease. It was meat and drink to him to do 
 his Father's will ; but it was bread of affliction, and 
 rivers of tears to drink : and for these he thirsted 
 like the earth after the cool stream ; for so great 
 was his perfection, so exact the conformity of his 
 will, so absolute the subordination of his inferior 
 faculties to the infinite love of God, which sat re- 
 gent in the court of his will and understanding, 
 that in this election of accidents he never con- 
 sidered the taste, but the goodness ; never distin- 
 guished sweet from bitter, but duty and piety 
 
 1 Beda de locis Sanctis, c. 2. Niceph. lib. i. c. 32. 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 199 
 
 always prepared his table. And therefore, now 
 knowing that his time determined by the Father 
 was nigh, he hastened up to Jerusalem. ' He went 
 before his disciples,' saith St. Mark, c and they 
 followed him, trembling and amazed :' and yet be- 
 fore that, even then, when his brethren observed he 
 had a design of publication of himself, he suffered 
 them to go before him, and went up as it were in 
 secret : for so we are invited to martyrdom, and 
 suffering in a Christian cause, by so great an ex- 
 ample : the holy Jesus is gone before us, and it 
 were a holy contention to strive whose zeal were 
 forwardest in the designs of humiliation and self- 
 denial. But it were also well, if in doing ourselves 
 secular advantage, and promoting our worldly in- 
 terest, we should follow him, who was ever more 
 distant from receiving honours than from receiving 
 a painful death. Those affections which dwell in 
 sadness, and are married to grief, and lie at the 
 foot of the cross, and trace the sad steps of Jesus, 
 have the wisdom of recollection, the tempers of so- 
 briety ; and are the best imitations of Jesus, and 
 securities against the levity of a dispersed and a 
 vain spirit. This was intimated by many of the 
 disciples of Jesus in the days of the Spirit, and 
 when they had tasted of the good word of God, 
 and the powers of the world to come : for then we 
 find many ambitious of martyrdom, and that have 
 laid stratagems and designs by unusual deaths to 
 get a crown. The soul of St. Laurence was so 
 scorched with ardent desires of dying for his Lord, 
 that he accounted the coals of his gridiron but as 
 a julep or the aspersion of cold water to refresh his 
 soul; they were chill as the Alpine snows in re- 
 spect of the heats of his diviner flames. And if 
 
200 CONSIDERATIONS ON ACCIDENTS 
 
 these lesser stars shine so brightly and burn so 
 warmly, what heat of love may we suppose to have 
 been in the Sun of righteousness ! If they went 
 fast toward the crown of martyrdom, yet we know 
 that the holy Jesus went before them all. No wonder 
 that ( he cometh forth as a bridegroom from his 
 chamber, and rejoiceth as a giant to run his course.' 
 
 2. When the disciples had overtaken Jesus, he 
 begins to them a sad homily upon the old text of 
 suffering, which he had well-nigh for a year toge- 
 ther preached upon : but because it was an un- 
 pleasing lesson, so contradictory to those interests 
 upon the hopes of which they had entertained 
 themselves, and spent all their desires, they could 
 by no means understand it : for an understanding 
 prepossessed with a fancy, or an unhandsome prin- 
 ciple, construes all other notions to the sense of the 
 first ; and whatsoever contradicts it, we think it 
 an objection, and that we are bound to answer it : 
 but now that it concerned Christ to speak so plainly, 
 that his disciples, by what was to happen within 
 five or six days, might not be scandalized, or believe 
 it happened to Jesus without his knowledge and 
 voluntary entertainment, he tells them of his suf- 
 ferings to be accomplished in this journey to Jeru- 
 salem. And here the disciples showed themselves 
 to be but men, full of passion and indiscreet affec- 
 tion; and the bold Galilean, St. Peter, took the 
 boldness to dehort his Master from so great an in- 
 felicity ; and met with a reprehension so great, that 
 neither the Scribes, nor the Pharisees, nor Herod 
 himself ever met with its parallel : Jesus called 
 him Satan ; meaning, that no greater contradic- 
 tions can be offered to the designs of God and his 
 holy Son, than to dissuade us from suffering : and 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 201 
 
 if we understood how great are the advantages of a 
 suffering condition, we should think all our daggers 
 gilt, and our pavements strewed with roses, and 
 our halters silken, and the rack an instrument of 
 pleasure, and be most impatient of those tempta- 
 tions which seduce us into ease, and divorce us 
 from the cross, as being opposite to our greatest 
 hopes and most perfect desires : but still this 
 humour of St. Peter's imperfection abides amongst 
 us. He that breaks off the yoke of obedience, and 
 unties the bands of discipline, and preaches a cheap 
 religion, and presents heaven in the midst of 
 flowers, and strews carpets softer than the Asian 
 luxury in the way, and sets the songs of Sion to 
 the tunes of Persian and lighter airs, and offers 
 great liberty of living, and bondage under affection 
 and sins, and reconciles eternity with the present 
 enjoyment, he shall have his schools filled with 
 disciples : but he that preaches the cross, and the 
 severities of Christianity, and the strictnesses of a 
 holy life, shall have the lot of his blessed Lord ; 
 he shall be thought ill of, and deserted. 
 
 3. Our blessed Lord, five days before his passion, 
 sent his disciples to a village to borrow an ass, that 
 he might ride in triumph to Jerusalem : he had 
 none of his own, but yet he who was so dear to 
 God could not want what was to supply his needs. 
 It may be, God hath laid up our portion in the re- 
 positories of other men, and means to furnish us 
 from their tables, to feed us from their granaries, 
 and that their wardrobe shall clothe us : for it is all 
 one to him to make a fish bring us money, or a crow 
 to bring us meat, or the stable of our neighbour to 
 furnish our needs of beasts. If he brings it to thy 
 need as thou wantest it, thou hast all the good in 
 
202 CONSIDERATIONS ON ACCIDENTS 
 
 the use of the creature which the owners can re- 
 ceive : and the horse which is lent me in charity, 
 does me as much ease ; and the bread which is 
 given me in alms, feeds me as well as the other 
 part of it, which the good man that gave me a por- 
 tion reserved for his own eating, could do to him. 
 And if we would give God leave to make provi- 
 sions for us in the ways of his own choosing, and 
 not estimate our wants by our manner of receiving, 
 being contented, that God by any of his own ways 
 will minister it to us, we shall find our cares eased, 
 and our content increased, and our thankfulness 
 engaged, and all our moderate desires contented 
 by the satisfaction of our needs : for, if God is 
 pleased to feed me by my neighbour's charity, 
 there is no other difference, but that God makes 
 me an occasion of his ghostly good, as he is made 
 the occasion of my temporal. And if we think it 
 disparagement, we may remember that God con- 
 veys more good to him by me, than to me by him : 
 and it is a proud impatience, to refuse or to be 
 angry with God's provisions, because he hath not 
 observed my circumstances and ceremonies of elec- 
 tion. 
 
 4. And now begins that great triumph in which the 
 holy Jesus was pleased to exalt his office, and to abase 
 his person. He rode, like a poor man, upon an ass, 
 a beast of burden, and the lowest value; and yet it 
 was not his own; and in that equipage he received 
 the acclamations due to a mighty Prince, to the 
 Son of the eternal King: telling us, that the 
 smallness of fortune, and the rudeness of exterior 
 habiliments, and a rough wall, are sometimes the 
 outsides of a great glory; and that, when God 
 means to glorify or do honour to a person, he needs 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 203 
 
 no help from secular advantages. He bides great 
 riches in renunciation of the world, and makes 
 great honour breathe forth from the clouds of humi- 
 lity, and victory to arise from yielding and the 
 modesty of departing from our interest, and peace 
 to be the reward of him that suffers all the hostili- 
 ties of men and devils : for Jesus, in this great hu- 
 mility of his, gives a great probation that he was 
 the Messias, and the King of Sion ; because no 
 other king entered into those gates riding upon an 
 ass ; and received the honour of Hosannah in that 
 unlikelihood and contradiction of unequal circum- 
 stances. 
 
 5. The blessed Jesus had never but two days of 
 triumph in his life : the one was on his transfigura- 
 tion upon Mount Tabor; the other, this, his riding 
 into the holy city. But that it may appear how 
 little were his joys and present exterior compla- 
 cencies ; in the day of his transfiguration Moses 
 and Elias appeared to him, telling him what great 
 things he was to suffer ; and in this day of his 
 riding to Jerusalem, he wet the palms with a dew 
 sweeter than the moistures upon Mount Hermon, 
 or the drops of manna : for, to allay the little 
 warmth of a springing joy, he let down a shower of 
 tears, weeping over undone Jerusalem in the day 
 of his triumph, leaving it disputable whether he 
 felt more joy or sorrow in the acts of love : for he 
 triumphed to consider that the redemption of the 
 world was so near; and wept bitterly that men 
 would not be redeemed : his joy was great, to con- 
 sider that himself was to suffer so great sadness 
 for our good ; and his sorrow was very great, to 
 consider that we would not entertain that good that 
 he brought and laid before us by his passion. He 
 
204 CONSIDERATIONS ON ACCIDENTS 
 
 was in figure, as his servant S. Paphnutius was 
 afterwards in letter and true story, "crucified upon 
 palms :" 1 which indeed was the emblem of a vic- 
 tory; but yet such as had leaves, sharp, poignant, 
 and vexatious. However, he entered into Jeru- 
 salem dressed in gaieties, which yet he placed under 
 his feet; but with such pomps and solemnities 
 each family, according to its proportion, was ac- 
 customed to bring the paschal lamb to be slain for 
 the passover. And it was not an undecent cere- 
 mony, that ' the Lamb slain from the beginning 
 of the world ' should be brought to his slaughter, 
 with the acknowledgments of a religious solemnity, 
 because now that real good was to be exhibited to 
 the world, which those little paschal lambs did 
 but signify and represent in shadow, and that was 
 the true cause of all the little joy he had. 
 
 6. And if we consider what followed, it might 
 seem also to be a design to heighten the dolorous- 
 ness of his passion. For to descend from the greatest 
 of worldly honours, from the adoration of a God, 
 and the acclamations to a king, to the death of a 
 slave and the torments of a cross, and the disho- 
 nours of a condemned criminal, were so great 
 stoopings and vast changes, that they gave height 
 and sense, and excellency to each other. This 
 then seemed an excellent glory, but indeed was 
 but an art and instrument of grief. For such 
 is the nature of all our felicities, they end in sad- 
 
 1 Palma est victorum, palmae tu affixus es ; ergo laetus obi, 
 quoniam non nisi victor obis. 
 
 " The palm the victor's is, and to tne palm 
 Triumphant thou wert bound : 
 Go forth ! be joyous and be calm ; 
 Thou goest a victor crowned !" 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 205 
 
 ness, and increase the sting of sorrows, and add 
 moment to them, and cause impatience and un- 
 comfortable remembrances. But the griefs of a 
 Christian, whether they be instances of repentance, 
 or parts of persecution, or exercises of patience, 
 end in joy and endless comfort. Thus Jesus, like 
 a rainbow, half made of the glories of light, and 
 half of the moisture of a cloud, half triumph and 
 half sorrow, entered into that town where he had 
 done much good to others, and to himself received 
 nothing but affronts. Yet his tenderness increased 
 upon him : and that very journey, which was 
 Christ's last solemn visit for their recovery, he 
 doubled all the instruments of his mercy and their 
 conversion. He rode in triumph ; the children 
 sang Hosannah to him ; he cured many diseased 
 persons ; he wept for them, and pitied them, and 
 sighed out the intimations of a prayer, and did 
 penance for their ingratitude; and stayed all day 
 there, looking about him towards evening, and no 
 man would invite him home ; but he was forced 
 to go to Bethany, where he was sure of an hospi- 
 table entertainment. I think no Christian that 
 reads this but will be full of indignation at the 
 whole city, who for malice or for fear would not or 
 durst not receive their Saviour into their houses : 
 and yet we do worse ; for now that he is become 
 our Lord, with mightier demonstrations of his 
 eternal power, we suffer him to look round about 
 upon us for months and years together, and pos- 
 sibly never entertain him, till our house is ready 
 to rush upon our heads, and we are going to unu- 
 sual and stranger habitations. And yet in the 
 midst of a populous and mutinous city this great 
 King had some good subjects, persons that threw 
 
206 CONSIDERATIONS ON ACCIDENTS 
 
 away their own garments, and laid them at the 
 feet of our Lord ; that being divested of their own, 
 they might be reinvested with a robe of his righte- 
 ousness, wearing that till it were changed into a 
 stole of glory. The very ceremony of their recep- 
 tion of the Lord became symbolical to them, and 
 expressive of all our duties. 
 
 7. But I consider that the blessed Jesus had 
 affections no less than infinite towards all man- 
 kind : and he who wept upon Jerusalem, who had 
 done so great despite to him, and within five days 
 were to fill up the measure of their iniquities, and 
 do an act which all ages of the world could never 
 repeat in the same instance, did also in the number 
 of his tears reckon our sins as sad considerations 
 and incentives of his sorrow. And it would well 
 become us to consider what great evil we do, when 
 our actions are such as for which our blessed Lord 
 did weep. He who was seated in the bosom of feli- 
 city, yet he moistened his fresh laurels upon the day 
 of his triumph with tears of love and bitter allay. 
 His day of triumph was a day of sorrow : and if 
 we would weep for our sins, that instance of sorrow 
 would be a day of triumph and jubilee. 
 
 8. From hence the holy Jesus went to Bethany, 
 where he had another manner of reception than at 
 the holy city. There he supped : for his goodly 
 day of triumph had been with him a fasting-day. 
 And Mary Magdalen, who had spent one box of 
 nard pistic upon our Lord's feet as a sacrifice of 
 eucharist for her conversion, now bestowed ano- 
 ther in thankfulness for the restitution of her bro- 
 ther Lazarus to life, and consigned her Lord unto 
 his burial. And here she met with an evil inter- 
 preter : Judas, an apostle, one of the Lord's own 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 207 
 
 family, pretended it had been a better religion to 
 have given it to the poor. But it was malice, and 
 the spirit either of envy or avarice, in him that 
 passed that sentence. For he that sees a pious 
 action well done, and seeks to undervalue it by 
 telling how it might have been better, reproves 
 nothing but his own spirit. For a man may do 
 very well, and God would accept it; though to 
 say he might have done better, is to say only that 
 action was not the most perfect and absolute in its 
 kind. But to be angry at a religious person, and 
 without any other pretence but that he might have 
 done better, is spiritual envy ; for a pious person 
 would have nourished up that infant action by love 
 and praise, till it had grown to the most perfect 
 and intelligent piety. But the event of that man 
 gave the interpretation of his present purpose : and 
 at the best it could be no other than a rash judg- 
 ment of the action and intention of a religious, 
 thankful, and holy person. But she found her 
 Lord, who was her beneficiary in this, become her 
 patron and her advocate. And hereafter, when 
 we shall find the devil, the great accuser of God's 
 saints, object against the piety and religion of holy 
 persons, a cup of cold water shall be accepted 
 unto reward, and a good intention heightened to 
 the value of an exterior expression, and a piece of 
 gum to the equality of an holocaust, and an action 
 done with great zeal and an intense love be ac- 
 quitted from all its adherent imperfections: Christ 
 receiving them into himself, and being like the 
 altar of incense, hallowing the very smoke, and 
 raising it into a flame, and entertaining it into em- 
 braces of the firmament and the bosom of heaven. 
 Christ himself, who is the judge of our actions, is 
 
208 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON ACCIDENTS 
 
 also the entertainer and object of our charity and 
 duty, and the advocate of our persons. 
 
 9. Judas, who declaimed against the woman, 
 made tacit reflections upon his Lord for suffering 
 it. And, indeed, every obloquy against any 01 
 Christ's servants is looked on as an arrow shot into 
 the heart of Christ himself. And now a persecu- 
 tion being begun against the Lord within his own 
 family, another was raised against him from with- 
 out. For the chief-priests ' took crafty counsel 
 against Jesus,' and called a consistory to contrive 
 ' how they might destroy him.' And here was the 
 greatest representment of the goodness of God, 
 and the ingratitude of man, that could be practised 
 or understood. How often had Jesus poured 
 forth tears for them ! how many sleepless nights 
 had he awaked to do them advantage ! how many 
 days had he spent in homilies and admirable visi- 
 tations of mercy and charity, in casting out devils, 
 in curing their sick, in correcting their delinquen- 
 cies, in reducing them to the ways of security and 
 peace, and, that we may use the greatest expres- 
 sion in the world, that is, his own, ' in gathering 
 them as an hen gathereth her chickens under her 
 wings/ to give them strength, and warmth, and 
 life, and ghostly nourishment ! And the chief- 
 priests, together with their faction, use all arts and 
 watch all. opportunities to get Christ, not that they 
 might possess him, but to destroy him : little con- 
 sidering that they extinguish their own eyes, and 
 destroy that spring of life which was intended to 
 them for a blissful immortality. 
 
 10. And here it was that the devil showed his 
 promptness to furn ish every evil-intended person with 
 apt instruments to act the very worst of his inten- 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 209 
 
 tions. The devil knew their purposes, and the 
 aptness and proclivity of Judas ; and by bringing 
 these together he served their present design, and 
 his own great intendment. The devil never fails 
 to promote every evil purpose ; and, except where 
 God's restraining grace does intervene and inter- 
 rupt the opportunity, by interposition of different 
 and cress accidents to serve other ends of provi- 
 dence, no man easily is fond of wickedness, but he 
 shall receive enough to ruin him. Indeed Nero 
 and Julian, both witty men and powerful, desired 
 to have been magicians, and could not: and al- 
 though possibly the devil would have corresponded 
 with them, who yet were already his own in all 
 degrees of security ; yet God permitted not that, 
 lest they might have understood new ways of doing 
 despite to martyrs and afflicted Christians. And 
 it concerns us not to tempt God, or invite a for- 
 ward enemy. For as we are sure the devil is ready 
 to promote all vicious desires, and brin^ them out 
 to execution ; so we are not sure that God will not 
 permit him : and he that desires to be undone, 
 and cares not to be prevented by God's restraining 
 grace, shall find his ruin in the folly of his own 
 desires, and become wretched by his own election. 
 Judas, hearing of this congregation of the priests, 
 went and offered to betray his Lord, and made a 
 covenant, the price of which was thirty pieces of 
 silver ; and he returned. 
 
 11. It is not intimated in the history of the life 
 of Jesus, that Judas had any malice against the 
 person of Christ ; for when afterwards he saw the 
 matter was to end in the death of his Lord, he re- 
 pented ; but a base and unworthy spirit to covet- 
 ousness possessed him; and the relics of indig- 
 
 vol. III. p 
 
210 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS OF ACCIDENTS 
 
 nation, for missing the price of the ointment which 
 the holy Magdalen had poured upon his feet, burnt 
 in his bowels with a secret, dark, melancholic fire, 
 and made an eruption into an act which all ages of 
 the world could never parallel. They appointed him 
 for hire thirty pieces; and some say that every piece 
 did in value equal ten ordinary current deniers : 
 and so Judas was satisfied by receiving the worth 
 of three hundred pence, at which he valued the 
 nard pistic. But hereafter let no Christian be 
 ashamed to be despised and undervalued ; for 
 he will hardly meet so great reproach, as to have so 
 disproportioned a price set upon his life as was upon 
 the holy Jesus. St. Mary Magdalen thought it not 
 good enough to aneal his sacred feet ; Judas thought 
 it a sufficient price for his head : for covetousness 
 aims at base and low purchases ; whilst holy love 
 is great and comprehensive as the bosom of heaven, 
 and aims at nothing that is less than infinite. The 
 love of God is a holy fountain, limpid and pure, 
 sweet and salutary, lasting and eternal ; the love 
 of money is a vertiginous pool, sucking all into it 
 to destroy it; it is troubled and uneven, giddy and 
 unsafe, serving no end but its own, and that also 
 in a restless and uneasy motion. The love of God 
 spends itself upon him, to receive again the reflec- 
 tions of grace and benediction ; the love of money 
 spends all its desires upon itself, to purchase 
 nothing but unsatisfying instruments of exchange, 
 or supernumerary provisions ; and ends in dissatis- 
 faction, and emptiness of spirit, and a bitter curse. 
 St. Mary Magdalen was defended by her Lord 
 against calumny, and rewarded with an honourable 
 mention to all ages of the church ; besides unction 
 from above, which she shortly after received to con- 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 
 
 211 
 
 sign her to crowns and scepters : but Judas was 
 described in the Scripture, the book of life, with the 
 black character of death ; he was disgraced to eter- 
 nal ages, and presently after acted his own tragedy 
 with a sad and ignoble death. 
 
 12. Now, all things being fitted, our blessed 
 Lord sends two disciples to prepare the passover, 
 that he might fulfil the law of Moses, and pass from 
 thence to institutions evangelical, and then fulfil 
 his sufferings. Christ gave them a sign to guide 
 them to the house — a man bearing a pitcher of 
 water : by which some, that delight in mystical 
 significations, say was typified the sacrament of 
 baptism : meaning, that, although by the occasion 
 of the paschal solemnity the holy eucharist was 
 first instituted, yet it was afterwards to be applied 
 to practice, according to the sense of this accident ; 
 only baptized persons were apt suscipients of the 
 other more perfective rite, as the taking nutriment 
 supposes persons born into the world, and within 
 the common conditions of human nature ; but in 
 the letter it was an instance of the divine Omnis- 
 cience, who could pronounce concerning accidents 
 at distance as if they were present; and yet also, 
 like the provision of the colt to ride on, it was an 
 instance of providence, and security of all God's 
 sons for their portion of temporals. Jesus had not 
 a lamb of his own, and possibly no money in the 
 bags to buy one ; and yet Providence was his 
 guide, and the charity of a good man was his pro- 
 veditore ; and he found excellent conveniences in 
 the entertainments of an hospitable good man, as 
 if he had dwelt in Abab's ivory-house, and had had 
 the riches of Solomon, and the meat of his house- 
 hold. 
 
 p 2 
 
212 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS OF ACCIDENTS 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 L 
 
 O holy King of Sion, eternal Jesus, who with great humility 
 and infinite love didst enter into the holy city, riding upon an 
 ass, that thou mightest verify the predictions of the prophets, 
 and give example of meekness, and of the gentle and paternal 
 government which the eternal Father laid upon thy shoulders ; 
 be pleased, dearest Lord, to enter into my soul with triumph, 
 trampling over all thine enemies ; and give me grace to enter- 
 tain thee with joy and adoration, with abjection of my own de- 
 sires, with lopping off all my superfluous branches of a temporal 
 condition, and spending them in the offices of charity and reli- 
 gion, and divesting myself of all my desires, laying them at thy 
 holy feet ; that I may bear the yoke and burden of the Lord 
 with alacrity, with love, and the wonders of a satisfied and tri- 
 umphant spirit. Lord, enter in and take possession ; and thou, 
 to whose honour the very stones would give testimony, make my 
 stony heart an instrument of thy praises ; let me strew thy way 
 with flowers of virtue, and the holy rosary of Christian graces. 
 And by thy aid and example let us also triumph over all our in- 
 firmities and hostilities, and then lay our victories at thy feet, 
 and at last follow thee into thy heavenly Jerusalem, with palms 
 in our hands, and joy in our hearts, and eternal acclamations on 
 our lips, rejoicing in thee ; and singing hallelujahs in a happy 
 eternity to thee, O holy King of Sion, eternal Jesus. Amen. 
 
 II. 
 
 O blessed and dear Lord, who wert pleased to permit thyself 
 to be sold to the assemblies of evil persons for a vile price, by 
 one of thy own servants, for whom thou hadst done so great fa- 
 vours, and hadst designed a crown and a throne to him ; and he 
 turned himself into a sooty coal, and entered into the portion of 
 evil angels ; teach us to value thee above all the joys of men, to 
 prize thee at an estimate beyond all the wealth of nature, to buy 
 wisdom, and not to sell it, to part with all that we may enjoy 
 thee. And let no temptation abuse our understandings, no loss 
 vex us into impatience, no frustration of hope fill us with indig- 
 nation, no pressure of calamitous accidents make us angry at thee, 
 the fountain of love and blessing, no covetousness transport us 
 
PREPARATORY TO THE PASSION. 
 
 213 
 
 into the suburbs of hell and the regions of sin ; but make us to 
 love thee as well as ever any creature loved thee ; that we may 
 never burn in any fires but of a holy love, nor sink in any inun- 
 dation but what proceeds from penitential showers, and suffer no 
 violence but of implacable desires to live with thee ; and when 
 thou callest us, to suffer with thee, and for thee. Amen. 
 
 III. 
 
 Lord, let me never be betrayed by myself, or any violent ac- 
 cident and importunate temptation ; let me never be sold for the 
 vile price of temporal gain, or transient pleasure ; or a pleasant 
 dream ; but, since thou hast bought me with a price, even then 
 when thou wert sold thyself, let me never be separated from thy 
 possession. I am thine, bought with a price : Lord, save me ; 
 and in the day when thou bindest up thy jewels, remember, 
 Lord, that I cost thee as dear as any, and therefore cast me not 
 into the portion of Judas ; but let me walk and dwell, and bathe 
 in the field of thy blood, and pass from hence pure and sanctified 
 into the society of the elect apostles, receiving my part with them, 
 and my lot in the communications of thy inheritance, O gracious 
 Lord, and dearest Saviour, Jesus. Amen. 
 
 Considerations upon the Washing of the Disciples 
 Feet by Jesus, and his Sermon of Humility. 
 
 ]. The holy Jesus went now to eat his last 
 paschal sapper, and to finish the work of his lega- 
 tion, and to fulfil that part of the law of Moses in 
 every of its smallest and most minute particulari- 
 ties; in which also the actions were significant of 
 spiritual duties : which we may transfer from the 
 letter to the spirit in our own instances ; that as 
 Jesus ate the paschal lamb with a staff in his 
 hand, with his loins girt, with sandals on his feet, 
 in great haste, with unleavened bread, and with 
 bitter herbs ; so we also should do all our services 
 
214 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 according to the signification of these symbols, 
 leaning upon the cross of Jesus for a staff, and 
 bearing the rod of his government, with loins girt 
 with angelical chastity, with shoes on our feet, that 
 so we may guard and have custody over our affec- 
 tions, and be shod with the preparation of the gospel 
 of peace, eating in haste, as becomes persons hun- 
 gering and thirsting after righteousness, doing the 
 work of the Lord zealously and fervently, without 
 the leven of malice and secular interest, with bitter 
 herbs of self-denial, and mortification of our sensual 
 and inordinate desires. The sense and mystery of 
 the whole act with all its circumstances is, that we 
 obey all the sanctions of the divine law ; and that 
 every part of our religion be pure and peaceable, 
 chaste and obedient, confident in God, and diffident 
 in ourselves, frequent and zealous, humble and re- 
 signed, just and charitable ; and there will not 
 easily be wanting any just circumstance to hallow 
 and consecrate the action. 
 
 2. When the holy Jesus had finished his last 
 Mosaic rite, he descends to give example of the 
 first-fruit of evangelical graces: he rises from sup- 
 per, lays aside his garment, like a servant, and 
 with all the circumstances of an humble ministry, 
 washes the feet of his disciples, beginning at first 
 with St Peter, until he came to Judas, the traitor ; 
 that we might in one scheme see a rare con- 
 junction of charity and humility, of self-denial 
 and indifTerency, represented by a person glo- 
 rious and great, their Lord and Master sad and 
 troubled. And he chose to wash their feet rather 
 than their head, that he might have the op- 
 portunity of a more humble posture, and a more 
 apt signification of his charity. Thus God lays 
 
Christ's sermon of humility. 
 
 215 
 
 every thing aside that he may serve his servants ; 
 heaven stoops to earth, and one abyss calls upon 
 another, and the miseries of man, which were next 
 to infinite, are excelled by a mercy equal to the 
 immensity of God. And this washing of their 
 feet, which was an accustomed civility and enter- 
 tainment of honoured strangers at the beginning of 
 their meal, Christ deferred to the end of the pas- 
 chal supper, that it might be the preparatory to 
 the second, which he intended should be festi- 
 val to all the world. St. Peter was troubled that 
 the hands of his Lord should wash his servants' 
 feet; those hands which had opened the eyes of 
 the blind, and cured lepers, and healed all diseases, 
 and when lift up to heaven were omnipotent, and 
 could restore life to dead and buried persons : he 
 counted it a great indecency for him to suffer it. 
 But it was no more than was necessary : for they 
 had but lately been earnest in dispute for prece- 
 dency ; and it was of itself so apt to swell into 
 tumour and inconvenience, that it was not to be 
 cured but by some prodigy of example and mira- 
 cle of humility; which the holy Jesus offered to 
 them in this express, calling them to learn some 
 great lesson ; a lesson which God descended from 
 heaven to earth, from riches to poverty, from essen- 
 tial innocence to the disreputation of a sinner, 
 from a master to a servant, to learn us ; that is, 
 that we should esteem ourselves but just as we 
 are, low, sinful, miserable, needy, and unworthy. 
 It seems it is a great thing, that man should come 
 to have just and equal thoughts of himself, that 
 God used such powerful arts to transmit this les- 
 son, and engrave it in the spirits of men ; and if 
 
216 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 the receipt fails, we are eternally lost in the mists 
 of vanity, and enter into the condition of those 
 angels whom pride transformed and spoiled into 
 the condition of devils. And upon consideration 
 of this great example, Guericus, a good man, cried 
 out, "Thou hast overcome, O Lord, thou hast 
 overcome my pride ; this example hath mastered 
 me : I deliver myself up into thy hands, never to 
 receive liberty or exaltation but in the condition of 
 thy humblest servant." 
 
 3. And to this purpose St. Bernard hath an af- 
 fectionate and devout consideration, 1 saying, " That 
 some of the angels, as soon as they were created, 
 had an ambition to become Jike God, and to as- 
 pire into the throne which God had appointed to 
 the holy Jesus in eternal ages. When God created 
 man, presently the devil rubbed his leprosy upon 
 him, and he would needs be like God too ; and 
 Satan promised him that he should. As the evil 
 angels would have been like to God in power and 
 majesty, so man would have been like him in 
 knowledge, and have imitated the wisdom of the 
 eternal Father. But man had the fate of Gehazi ; 
 he would needs have the talent and garments of 
 Lucifer, and he had also his plague ; he lost para- 
 dise for his pride. And now what might befit the 
 Son of God to do, seeing man so lost, and God so 
 zealous of his honour P I see (saith he) that by 
 occasion of me the Father loses his creatures ; for 
 they have all aspired to be like me, and are fallen 
 into the greatest infelicities. Behold, I will go to- 
 
 1 Quomodo non humiliabitur homo sub tarn hurnili Deo ? 
 S. Bernard. — " How can man refuse to humble himself under 
 so humble a God ?" 
 
CHRIST'S SEIIMON OF HUMILITY. 217 
 
 ward man in such a form, that whosoever from 
 henceforth would become like me shall be so, and 
 be a gainer by it. And for this cause the Son of 
 God came from heaven, and made himself a poor 
 humble person, and by all the actions of his life, 
 commented upon the present discourse:" f Learn 
 of me, for I am meek and humble of heart.' 1 
 Blessed be that mercy and bounty which moved 
 Almighty God to condescend to that so great ap- 
 petite we had of being like him : for now we may 
 be like unto God, but it must be by humility, of 
 which he hath given us an example powerful as 
 miracles, and as great as our own pride and mi- 
 sery. 
 
 4. And indeed our blessed Lord, knowing that 
 examples are like maps and perfect schemes, in 
 which the whole continent may at once be repre- 
 sented to the eye to all the purposes of art and 
 benefit, did, in the latter end of his life, draw up 
 the dispersions and larger harvest of his precepts, 
 binding them in the bundle of great examples, 
 and casting them into actions as into sums total. 
 For so this act of washing the feet of his own mi- 
 nisters, and then dying for them, and for all his 
 enemies, did preach the three great sums of evan- 
 gelical perfection with an admirable energy and 
 abbreviature ; humility and charity and suffer- 
 ings, being to Christianity as the body and the 
 soul and the spirit are to the whole man. For no 
 man brings a sad funeral into the theatre to make 
 his spectators merry, nor can well preach chastity in 
 the impurity of the Bordelli, or persuade tempe- 
 rance, when himself is full of wine and luxury, 
 
 1 Matt. xi. 29. 
 
218 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 and enters into the baths to boil his undigested 
 meat, that he may return to his second supper, 
 and breathes forth impure belchings together with 
 his homily. A poor eremite, or a severely-living 
 philosopher, into whose life his own precepts have 
 descended, and his doctrine is mingled with his 
 soul, mingles also effect and virtue with homilies, 
 and incorporates his doctrine in the hearts of his 
 disciples. And this the holy Jesus did in his own 
 person, bearing the burden first upon his own 
 shoulders, that we may with better alacrity un- 
 dergo what our blessed Lord bears with us and for 
 us. But that we may the better understand what 
 our blessed Lord designed to us in this lecture, let 
 us consider the proper acts of humility which in- 
 tegrate the virtue. 
 
 5. The first is, Christ's humble man thinks 
 meanly of himself. A.nd there is great reason 
 every man should. For his body is but rottenness 
 and infirmity covered with a fair mantle; a dung- 
 hill overcast with snow. And if we consider sad- 
 ly, that from trees and plants come oil, balsam, 
 wine, spices, and aromatic odours, and that from 
 the sinks of our body no such sweet or salutary 
 emanations are observed ; we may at least think 
 it unreasonable to boast our beauty, which is no- 
 thing but a clear and well-coloured skin, which 
 every thing in the world can spoil; or our strength, 
 which an ague tames into the infirmities of a child, 
 and in which we are excelled by a bull ; or any 
 thing of our body, which is nothing but an unruly 
 servant of the soul, marked with characters of want 
 and dependence, and begging help from all the 
 elements; and upon a little disturbance growing 
 troublesome to itself by its own impurities. And 
 
Christ's sermon of humility. 
 
 219 
 
 yet there is no reason in respect of the soul for 
 any man to exalt himself above his brother; be- 
 cause all reasonable souls are equal, and that one 
 is wise, and another is foolish or less learned, is by 
 accident and extrinsic causes. God at first makes 
 all alike ; but an indisposed body, or an inoppor- 
 tune education, or evil customs, superinduce varie- 
 ty and difference. And if God discerns a man 
 from his brother by distinction of gifts, it alters not 
 the case; still the man hath nothing of himself 
 that can call him excellent. It is as if a wall upon 
 which the sun reflects should boast itself against 
 another that stands in the shadow. Greater glory 
 is to be paid to God for the discerning gifts ; but 
 to take any of it to ourselves, or rise higher than 
 our brother, or advance our own opinion, is as if a 
 man should be proud of being in debt, and think 
 it the greater excellency that he is charged with 
 heavier and more severe accounts. 
 
 (]. This act consists not in declamations and 
 forms of satire against ourselves ; saying, I am a mi- 
 serable, sinful creature ; I am proud, or covetous, or 
 ignorant : for many men say so that are not willing 
 to be thought so. 1 Neither is humility a virtue 
 made up of wearing old clothes, or doing servile 
 and mean employments by voluntary undertaking, 
 or of sullen gestures, or demiss behaviour, and ar- 
 tifice of lowly expressions ; for these may become 
 snares to invite and catch at honour; and then 
 they are collateral designs of pride, and direct ac- 
 
 1 Auterantur omnia figmenta verborum, cessent mulati gestus, 
 verum humilem patientia ostendit. S. Hier — " Let all the af- 
 fectations of words and gestures be despised : patience is the best 
 proof of a man's humility.'" 
 
220 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 tions of hypocrisy. But it consists in a true un- 
 derstanding of our own condition, and separating 
 our own nothing from the good we have received, 
 and giving to God all the glory, taking to ourselves 
 all the shame and dishonour due to our sinful con- 
 dition. He that thinks himself truly miserable 
 and vilified by sin, hates it perfectly ; and he that 
 knows himself to be nothing, cannot be exalted in 
 himself ; and whatsoever is besides these two ex- 
 tremes, of a natural nothing, and a superadded sin, 
 must be those good things we have received, which, 
 because they derive from God, must make all their 
 returns thither. But this act is of greater difficulty 
 in persons pious, full of gifts and eminent in 
 graces, who, being fellow-workers together with 
 God, sometimes grow tacitly and without notice 
 given, to confide in themselves, and with some 
 freer fancy ascribe too much of the good action to 
 their own choice and diligence, and take up their 
 crowns, which lie at the foot of the throne, and set 
 them upon their own heads. For a sinner to de- 
 sire to be esteemed a sinner, is no more humility 
 than it is for the son of a ploughman to confess his 
 father : but indeed it is hard for a man to be cried 
 up for a saint, to walk upon the spire of glory, 
 and to have no adherence or impure mixtures of 
 vanity grow upon the outside of his heart. All 
 men have not such heads as to walk in great 
 heights without giddiness and unsettled eyes. Lu- 
 cifer and many angels, walking upon the battle- 
 ments of heaven, grew top-heavy, and fell into the 
 state of devils. And the father of the Christian 
 eremites, St. Anthony, was frequently attempted 
 by the devil, and solicited to vanity; the devil usu- 
 
CHRIST'S SERMON OF HUMILITY. 221 
 
 ally making fantastic noises to be heard before him, 
 " Make room for the saint and servant of God 1" 1 
 But the good man knew Christ's voice to be a low 
 base of humility, and that it was the noise of hell 
 that invited to complacencies and vanity; and there- 
 fore took the example of the apostles, who, in the 
 midst of the greatest reputation and spiritual ad- 
 vancements, were dead unto the world, and seemed 
 to live in the state of separation. For the true stat- 
 ing our own question, and knowing ourselves, must 
 needs represent us set in the midst of infinite im- 
 perfections, laden with sins, choked with the 
 noises of a polluted conscience — persons fond of 
 trifles, neglecting objects fit for wise men, full of 
 ingratitude, and all such things which in every 
 man else we look upon as scars and deformities, 
 and which we use to single out, and take one alone 
 as sufficient to disgrace and disrepute all the excel- 
 lencies of our neighbour. But if we would esteem 
 them with the same severity in ourselves, and 
 remember with how many such objections our 
 little felicities are covered, it would make us cha- 
 ritable in our censures, compassionate and gentle 
 to others, apt to excuse, and as ready to support 
 their weaknesses ; and in all accidents and chances 
 to ourselves, to be content and thankful, as know- 
 ing the worst of poverty and inconvenience to be a 
 mercy and a splendid fortune in respect of our 
 demerits. I have read, that "when the duke of 
 Candia had voluntarily entered into the incommo- 
 dities of a religious poverty and retirement, he was 
 one day spied and pitied by a lord of Italy, who 
 
 1 S. Hier. in Vit. S. Anton. 
 
222 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 out of tenderness wished him to be more careful 
 and nutritive of his person. The good duke an- 
 swered, ' Sir, be not troubled, and think not that I am 
 ill provided of conveniences : for I send a harbinger 
 before, who makes my lodgings ready, and takes 
 care that I be royally entertained.' The lord asked 
 him who was his harbinger. He answered, 1 The 
 knowledge of myself, and the consideration of what 
 I deserve for my sin, which is eternal torments ; 
 and when with this knowledge I arrive at my 
 lodging, how unprovided soever I find it, methinks 
 it is ever better than I deserve.' " The sum of this 
 meditation consists in believing, and considering, 
 and reducing to practice those thoughts, that we 
 are nothing of ourselves, that we have nothing of 
 our own, that we have received more than ever we 
 can discharge, that we have added innumerable 
 sins, that we can call nothing our own but such 
 things which we are ashamed to own, and such 
 things which are apt to ruin us. If we do nothing 
 contrary to the purpose and hearty persuasion of 
 such thoughts, then we think meanly of ourselves. 
 And in order to it, we may make use of this advice : 
 — to let no day pass without some sad recollection 
 and memory of somewhat which may put us to 
 confusion and mean opinion of ourselves : either 
 call to mind the worst of our sins, or the indis- 
 creetest of our actions, or the greatest of our shame, 
 or the uncivilestof our affronts; any thing to make 
 us descend lower, and kiss the foot of the moun- 
 tain. And this consideration applied also to every 
 tumour of spirit, as soon as it rises, may possibly 
 allay it. 
 
 7. Secondly, Christ's humble man bears con- 
 
CHRIST S SERMON OF HUMILITY. 
 
 223 
 
 tumelies evenly and sweetly, and desires not to be 
 honoured by others. 1 He chooses to do those 
 things that deserve honour and a fair name ; but 
 then eats not of those fruits himself, but transmits 
 them to the use of others, and the glory of God. 
 This is a certain consequence of the other : for he 
 that truly disesteems himself, is content that others 
 should do so too; and he who with some regret 
 and impatience hears himself scorned or under- 
 valued, hath not acquired the grace of humility. 
 Which Serapion in Cassian noted to a young per- 
 son, who perpetually accused himself, with the 
 greatest semblances of humility, but was impatient 
 when Serapion reproved him. " Did you hope 
 that I would have praised your humility, and have 
 reputed you for a saint ? It is a strange perverse- 
 ness to desire others to esteem highly of you, for 
 that in which to yourself you seem most unwor- 
 thy." 2 He that inquires into the faults of his own 
 actions, requiring them that saw them to tell him 
 in what he did amiss, not to learn the fault but to 
 engage them to praise it, cozens himself into pride, 
 and makes humility the instrument. And a man 
 would be ashamed were he told that he used stra- 
 tagems for praise. But so glorious a thing is hu- 
 mility, that pride, to hide her own shame, puts on 
 
 1 Ama nesciri et pro nihilo reputari. — Gerson. — s< Love to be 
 obscure and regarded as of no estimation." 
 
 2 Appetere de humilitate laudem, humilitatis non est virtus, 
 sed subversio. Quid enim perversum magis aut indignius, 
 quam ut inde velis haberi melior, unde tibi videris deterior ? — 
 S. Bernard.—" To seek praise for our humility, is not to possess 
 but to destroy the virtue : for what can be more inconsistent than 
 to wish to be considered the better for that by which we appear 
 worse to ourselves." Ecclus. xii. 11. 
 
224 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 the other's visor ; it being more to a proud man's 
 purposes to seem humble than to be so. And 
 such was the Cynic whom Lucian derided, because 
 that one searching 1 his scrip, in expectation to have 
 found in it mouldy bread or old rags, he discovered 
 a bale of dice, a box of perfumes, and the picture 
 of his fair mistress. Carisianus walked in his 
 gown in the feast of Saturn ; and when all Rome 
 was let loose in wantonness, he put on the long 
 robe of a senator and a severe person ; and yet 
 nothing was more lascivious than he. But the 
 devil's pride prevails sometimes upon the spirit of 
 lust. Humility neither directly nor by conse- 
 quence seeks for praise, and suffers it not to rest 
 upon its own pavement, but reflects it all upon 
 God, and receives all lessenings and instruments 
 of affront and disgrace, that mingle not with sin or 
 indecencies,more willingly than panegyrics. When 
 others have their desires, thou not thine ; the say- 
 ings of another are esteemed, thine slighted ; others 
 ask and obtain, thou beggest and art refused ; they 
 are cried up, thou disgraced and hissed at ; and 
 while they are employed, thou art laid by, as fit 
 for nothing ; or an unworthy person commands 
 thee and rules thee like a tyrant; he reproves thee, 
 suspects thee, reviles thee; canst thou bear this 
 sw eetly, and entertain the usage as thy just por- 
 tion, and as an accident most fit and proper to 
 thy person and condition ? Dost thou not raise 
 theatres to thyself, and take delight in the supple- 
 tories of thy own good opinion, and the flatteries 
 of such whom thou endearest to thee, that their 
 praising thee should heal the wounds of thine ho- 
 nour by an imaginary and fantastic restitution 3 
 
CHRIST S SERMON OF HUMILITY. 225 
 
 He that is not content and patient in affronts, hath 
 not yet learned humility of the holy Jesus. 
 
 8. Thirdly, As Christ's humble man is content 
 in affronts, and not greedy of praise ; so when 
 it is presented to him, he takes no contentment in 
 it : and if it be easy to want praise when it is 
 denied, yet it is harder not to be delighted with it 
 when it is offered. But there is much reason that 
 we should put restraints upon ourselves, lest, if we 
 be praised without desert, we find a greater judg- 
 ment of God ; 1 or if we have done well, and re- 
 ceived praise for it, we lose all our reward, which 
 God hath deposited for them that ' receive not 
 their good things in this life/ For 6 as silver is 
 tried in the melter, and gold in the crucible, so is 
 a man tried in the mouth of him that praises him 
 that is, he is either clarified from his dross, by look- 
 ing upon the praise as a homily to teach and an 
 instrument to invite his duty ; or else, if he be 
 already pure, he is consolidated, strengthened in 
 the sobriety of his spirit, and retires himself closer 
 into the strengths and securities of humility. Nay, 
 this step of humility uses, in very holy persons, to 
 be enlarged to a delight in affronts and disreputa- 
 tion in the world. " Now I begin to be Christ's 
 disciple," said Ignatius the martyr, when in his 
 journey to Rome he suffered perpetual revilings 
 
 1 Tanta enim consideratione trepidat, (David,) ne aut de his 
 in quibus laudatur, et non sunt, majus Dei judicium inveniat ; 
 aut de his in quibus laudatur, et sunt, competens prasmium 
 perdat. S. Greg.—" David trembles, lest the judgment of God 
 should fall more heavily upon him because of those things 
 for which he is falsely praised, or lest he should at last lose the 
 fitting reward of those things for which he is rightly com- 
 mended." 
 
 VOL. III. o 
 
226 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UrON 
 
 and abuse. St. Paul 'rejoiced in his infirmities 
 and reproach :' and all the apostles at Jerusalem 
 went from the tribunal c rejoicing that they were 
 esteemed worthy to suffer shame for the name of 
 Jesus.' 1 This is an excellent condition and degree 
 of humility. But I choose to add one that is less, 
 but in all persons necessary. 
 
 9. Fourthly, Christ's humble man is careful 
 never to speak any thing that may redound to his 
 own praise, unless it be with a design of charity 
 or duty, that either God's glory or the profit of his 
 neighbour be concerned in it ; but never speak- 
 ing with a design to be esteemed learned or ho- 
 nourable. St. Arsenius had been tutor to three 
 Caesars, Theodosius, Arcadius, and Honorius ; but 
 afterwards, when he became religious, no word 
 escaped him that might represent and tell of his 
 former greatness. And it is observable concerning 
 St. Jerome, that although he was of noble extrac- 
 tion, yet in all his own writings there is not the 
 smallest intimation of it. This I desire to be un- 
 derstood only to the sense and purposes of hu- 
 mility, and that we have no designs of vanity and 
 fancy in speaking learnedly, or recounting our ex- 
 terior advantages : but if either the profit of our 
 brother or the glory of God, if either there be piety 
 or charity in the design, it is lawful to publish all 
 those excellencies with which God hath distin- 
 guished us from others. The young marquis of 
 Castilion being to do public exercise in his course 
 of philosophy, made it a case of conscience whe- 
 ther he were bound to dispute his best ; fearing lest 
 
 1 Acts, v. 41. 
 
Christ's sermon of humility. 227 
 
 vanity might transport him in the midst of those 
 praises which his collegiates might give him. It 
 was an excellent consideration in the young gen- 
 tleman : but in actions civil and human, since the 
 danger is not so immediate, and a little compla- 
 cency, becoming the instrument of virtue and en- 
 couragement of studies, may with like care be 
 referred to God as the giver, and celebrate his 
 praises, he might with more safety have done his 
 utmost; it being in some sense a duty to encou- 
 rage others, to give account of our graces and our 
 labours, and all the appendant vanity may quickly 
 be suppressed. A good name may give us oppor- 
 tunity of persuading others to their duty, especially 
 in an age in which men choose their doctrines by 
 the men that preach them : and St. Paul used 
 his liberty when he was zealous for his Corin- 
 thian disciples, but restrained himself when it 
 began to make reflections upon his own spirit. 
 But although a good name be necessary, and 
 in order to such good ends whither it may serve 
 it is lawful to desire it ; yet a great name, and a 
 pompous honour, and a secular greatness hath 
 more danger in it to ourselves than ordinarily it 
 can have of benefit to others. And although a man 
 may use the greatest honours to the greatest purposes, 
 yet ordinary persons may not safely desire them ; 
 because it will be found very hard to have such 
 mysterious and abstracted considerations, as to se- 
 parate all our proper interest from the public end. 
 To which I add this consideration, that the con- 
 tempt of honour, and the instant pursuit of humi- 
 lity, is more effective of the ghostly benefit of 
 others, than honours and great dignities can be, 
 unless it be rarely and very accidentally. 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 10. If we need any new incentives to the prac- 
 tice of this grace, I can say no more, but that humi- 
 lity is truth, and pride is a lie ; that the one glorifies 
 God, the other dishonours him ; humility makes 
 men like angels, pride makes angels to become 
 devils ; that pride is folly, humility is the temper 
 of a holy spirit and excellent wisdom ; that humi- 
 lity is the way to glory ; pride, to ruin and confusion. 
 Humility makes saints on earth, pride undoes 
 them ; humility beatifies the saints in heaven, and 
 the elders throw their crowns at the foot of the 
 throne ; pride disgraces a man among all the so- 
 cieties on earth : God loves one, and Satan solicits 
 the cause of the other, and promotes his own inter- 
 est in it most of all. And there is no one grace in 
 which Christ propounded himself imitable so sig- 
 nally as in this of meekness and humility; for the 
 enforcing of which he undertook the condition of a 
 servant, and a life of poverty, and a death of dis- 
 grace ; and washed the feet of his disciples, and even 
 of Judas himself, that his action might be turned 
 into a sermon to preach this duty, and to make it 
 as eternal as his own story. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O holy and eternal Jesus, who wert pleased to lay aside the 
 glories and incomprehensible majesty which clothed thy infinity 
 from before the beginning of creatures, and didst put on a cloud 
 upon thy brightness, and wert invested with the impure and im- 
 perfect broken robe of human nature, and didst abate those 
 splendours which broke through the veil, commanding devils not 
 to publish thee, and men not to proclaim thy excellencies, and 
 the apostles not to reveal those glories of thine which they dis- 
 
CHRIST'S SERMON OF HUMILITY. 229 
 
 covered encircling thee upon Mount Tabor in thy transfiguration; 
 and didst, by perpetual homilies and symbolical mysterious ac- 
 tions, as with deep characters, engrave humility into the spirits 
 of thy disciples and the discipline of Christianity ; teach us to 
 approach near to these thy glories, which thou hast so covered 
 with a cloud that we might without amazement behold thy ex- 
 cellencies ; make us to imitate thy gracious condescensions ; take 
 from us all vanity and fantastic complacencies in our own per- 
 sons or actions; and when there arises a reputation consequent to 
 the performance of any part of our duty, make us to reflect 
 the glory upon thee, suffering nothing to adhere to our own spirits 
 but shame at our own imperfection, and thankfulness to thee for 
 all thy assistances. Let us never seek the praise of men from 
 unhandsome actions, from flatteries and unworthy discourses; 
 nor entertain the praise with delight, though it proceed from 
 better principles : but fear and tremble, lest we deserve punish- 
 ment, or lose a reward which thou hast deposited for all them 
 tli at seek thy glory and despise their own, that they may imitate 
 the example of their Lord. Thou, O Lord, didst triumph over 
 sin and death ; subdue also my proud understanding and my 
 prouder affections, and bring me under thy yoke ; that I may do 
 thy work, and obey my superiors, and be a servant of all my 
 brethren in their necessities, and esteem myself inferior to all 
 men by a deep sense of my own unworthiness, and in all things 
 may obey thy laws, and conform to thy precedents, and enter into 
 thine inheritance, O holy and eternal Jesus. Amen. 
 
 DISCOURSE XIX. 
 
 Of the Institution and Reception of the Holy Sacra- 
 merit of the Lord's Supper. 
 
 1. As the sun among the stars, and man among 
 the sublunary creatures, is the most eminent and 
 noble, the prince of the inferiors, and their measure, 
 or their guide; so is this action among all the 
 
230 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 instances of religion : it is the most perfect and 
 consummate; it is an union of mysteries, and a 
 consolidation of duties; it joins God and man, and 
 confederates all the societies of men in mutual com- 
 plexions, and the entertainments of an excellent 
 charity ; it actually performs all that could be ne- 
 cessary for man, and it presents to man as great a 
 thing as God could give ; for it is impossible any 
 thing should be greater than himself. And when 
 God gave his Son to the world, it could not be but 
 he should ' give us all things else.' And therefore 
 this blessed sacrament is a consigning us to all fe- 
 licities, because, after a mysterious and ineffable 
 manner, we receive him who is light and life, the 
 fountain of grace, and the sanctifier of our secular 
 comforts, and the author of holiness and glory. 
 But as it was at first, so it hath been ever since : 
 ' Christ came into the world, and the world knew 
 him not '. , so Christ hath remained in the world, by 
 the communication of this sacrament, and yet he is 
 not rightly understood, and less truly valued. But 
 Christ may say to us, as once to the woman of Sa- 
 maria: * Woman, if thou didst know the gift of God, 
 and who it is that speaks to thee, thou wouldst 
 ask him :' so, if we were so wise, or so fortunate to 
 know the excellency of this gift of the Lord, it 
 would fill us full of wonder and adoration, joy and 
 thankfulness, great hopes and actual felicities, 
 making us heirs of glory by the great additions 
 and present increment of grace. 
 
 2. 'After supper Jesus took bread and blessed 
 it,' and made it to be a heavenly gift. He gave 
 them bread, and told them it was his body ; that 
 body which was broken for the redemption of man, 
 for the salvation of the world. St. Paul calls it 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 231 
 
 1 bread* even after consecration : ' The bread which 
 we break, is it not the communication of the body of 
 Christ ?' 1 So that by divine faith we are taught to 
 express our belief of this mystery in these words : 
 " the bread, which is consecrated and made sacra- 
 mental, is the body of our Lord; and the fraction 
 and distribution of it is the communication of that 
 body which died for us upon the cross.'' He that 
 doubts of either of the parts of this proposition, 
 must either think Christ was not able to verify his 
 word, and to make bread by his benediction to be- 
 come to us his body ; or that St. Paul did not well 
 interpret and understand this mystery, when he 
 called it bread. Christ reconciles them both, call- 
 ing himself ' the bread of life :' and if we be of- 
 fended at it, because it is alive, and therefore less 
 apt to become food, we are invited to it because 
 it is bread ; and if the sacrament to others seems 
 less mysterious, because it is bread, we are height- 
 ened in our faith and reverence, because it is life. 
 The bread of the sacrament is the life of our soul; 
 and the body of our Lord is now conveyed to us, 
 being the bread of the sacrament. And if we con- 
 sider how easy it is to faith, and how impossible it 
 seems to curiosity, we shall be taught confidence 
 and modesty ; a resigning our understanding to 
 the voice of Christ and his apostles, and yet ex- 
 pressing our own articles, as Christ did, in indefi- 
 nite significations. And possibly it may not well 
 consist with our duty, to be inquisitive into/the se- 
 crets of the kingdom, which we see by plain event 
 hath divided the church almost as much as the 
 sacrament hath united it; and which can only 
 
 i 1 Cor. x. 16. 
 
232 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 serve the purposes of the school and of evil men, to 
 make questions for that, and factions for these, but 
 not promote the ends of a holy life, obedience 
 or charity. 
 
 3. Some so observe the literal sense of the words, 
 that they understand them also in a natural : some 
 so alter them by metaphors and preternatural sig- 
 nifications, that they will not understand them at 
 all in a proper. We see it, we feel it, we taste it, 
 and we smell it to be bread ; and by philosophy 
 we are led into a belief of that substance whose ac- 
 cidents these are, as we are to believe that to be 
 fire which burns, and flames, and shines; but 
 Christ also affirmed concerning it, ' this is my 
 body ;' and if faith can create an assent as strong 
 as its object is infallible, or can be as certain in its 
 conclusions as sense is certain in its apprehensions, 
 we must at no hand doubt but it is Christ's body. 
 Let the sense of that be what it will, so that we 
 believe those words, and (whatsoever that sense 
 is which Christ intended) that we no more doubt 
 in our faith than we do in our sense; then our 
 faith is not improvable. It is hard to do so much 
 violence to our sense, as not to think it bread ; but 
 it is more unsafe to do so much violence to our 
 faith, as not to believe it to be Christ's body. But 
 it would be considered, that no interest of religion, 
 no saying of Christ, no reverence of opinion, no sa- 
 credness of the mystery is disavowed, if we believe 
 both what we hear and what we see. He that be- 
 lieves it to be bread, and yet verily to be Christ's 
 body, is only tied also by implication to believe 
 God's omnipotence, that he who affirmed it can 
 also verify it. And they that are forward to believe 
 the change of substance, can intend no more but 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 
 
 233 
 
 that it be believed verily to be the body of our 
 Lord. And if they think it impossible to re- 
 concile its being bread, with the verity of being 
 Christ's body, let them remember that themselves 
 are put to more difficulties, and to admit of more 
 miracles, and to contradict more sciences, and to re- 
 fuse the testimony of sense, in affirming the special 
 manner of transubstantiation. And therefore it 
 were safer to admit the words in their first sense, 
 in which we shall no more be at war with reason, 
 nor so much with sense, and not at all with faith. 1 
 
 1 Acceptum panem et distributum discipulis corpus suum 
 ilium fecit, Hoc est corpus meum, dicendo, id est, figura corporis 
 inei. Figura anonfuisset, nisi veritatis esset corpus. Tert. lib. 
 iv. cont. Marcion. c. 40. Quod si quicquid ingreditur in os, in 
 ventrem abit, et in secessum ejicitur, ei ille cibus qui sanctificatur 
 perverbum Dei perque obsecrationem, juxta id quod habet ma- 
 teriale in ventrem abit, et in secessum ejicitur, &c. et haac quidem 
 de typico symboliceque corpore. Origen in xv. cap. S. Matt. Td 
 ovfipoXa th crcoficiTog th fiecnroTiicH K) th alfxarog /ietu rr)v 
 bttlkXtjctlv iTTL^dWerai, ^ trepa ytvtrat, d\\' hk oikhciq s^iVa- 
 rai Qvoeijjg' fisvei yap tiri Ti)g 7rpoTSpag naiag, /cj th G%r}iia- 
 rog, Kf th eidng, k } opoTa 6<ri kj a7rra, ola ^ irpoTtpov ijv. 
 Theod. Dial. 2. Idem disputando contra Eutycbianos, docentes 
 humanam Christi naturam conversum iri in divinam, eodem 
 scil. modo quo panis in corpus Christi, ait, Certe eodem scil. 
 modo, hoc est, nullo. 'O H 2wr?)p b rj^isTEpog, &c Our 
 blessed Saviour, who hath called himself the living Bread, and a 
 Vine, hath also honoured the visible signs with the title and ap- 
 pellation of his body and blood, not changing their nature, but 
 adding to nature grace. — See the Dialog, called a The Immov- 
 able." Sacramenta quae sumimus corporis et sanguinis Christi, 
 divina res est. Propter quod per eadem divinae efficimur consor- 
 tes naturas, et tamen non desinit esse substantia vel natura panis 
 et vini : et certe imago et similitudo corporis et sanguinis Christi 
 in actione mysteriorum celebrantur. P. Gelasius libr. contra 
 Nestorium et Eutychetem. Non quod proprie corpus ejus sit 
 panis, et pcculum sanguis; sedquod mysterium corporis ejus san- 
 guinisque contineant. Eacundus. Sign. Sacramenta quandam 
 similitudinem non haberent earum rerum quarum sunt sacra- 
 menta, omnino sacramenta non essent : Ex hac a. sirnilitudine 
 plerumque ipsarum rerum nomina accipiunt. S. Aug, EpisL 23. 
 
234 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 And for persons of the contradictory persuasion, 
 who, to avoid the natural sense, affirm it only to be 
 figurative, since their design is only to make this 
 sacrament to be Christ's body in the sense of faith, 
 and not of philosophy, they may remember that its 
 being really present does not hinder, but that all 
 that reality may be spiritual ; and if it be Christ's 
 body, so it be not affirmed such in a natural sense 
 and manner it is still only the object of faith and 
 spirit : and if it be affirmed only to be spiritual, 
 there is then no danger to faith in admitting the 
 words of Christ's institution: 'This is my body.' 
 I suppose it to be a mistake, to think whatsoever is 
 real must be natural ; and it is no less to think 
 spiritual to be only figurative : that is too much, 
 and this is too little. Philosophy and faith may 
 well be reconciled ; and whatsoever objection can 
 invade this union, may be cured by modesty. And 
 if we profess we understand not the manner of this 
 
 Idem contra Faustum Manich. lib. x. c. 2. Quod ab omnibus 
 appellatur sacrificium, signum est veri sacrificii, in quo caro 
 Christi post assumptionem per sacramentum memoriae celebratur. 
 Apud Gratianum de Consecrat. dist. ii. c. 48. citatur Augustinus 
 in Libro Sententiarum Prosperi in haec verba. Sicut ergo cceles- 
 tis panis, qui Christi caro est, suo modo vocatur corpus Christi, 
 cum revera sit sacramentum corporis Christi, illius, viz. quod 
 visibile, quod palpabile, mortale in cruce positum est ; vocaturque 
 ipsa immolatio carnis quae sacerdotis manibus fit Christi passio, 
 mors, crucifixio, non rei veritate sed significante mysterio : sic 
 sacramentum fidei quod baptismus intelligitur, fides est. Si 
 ergo haec vasa sanctificata ad privatos usus transferre sic periculo- 
 sum est, in quibusnon est verum corpus Christi, sed mysterium cor- 
 poris ejus continetur ; quanto magis vasa corporis nostri, &c. S. 
 Chrysost. Opere imperf. in Matth. Idem in Epist. ad Csesa- 
 rium, in Biblioth. Pp. Colon. 1618. Sicut n. antequam sancti- 
 ficetur panis, Panem nominamus, divina autem ilium sanctifi- 
 cante gratia, mediante sacerdote, liberatus quidem est ab appel- 
 latione panis, dignus autem habitus est Dominici corporis appel- 
 lationi, etiamsi natura anpisin eo permansit, &c. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 235 
 
 mystery, we say no more but that it is a mystery : 
 if it had been necessary we should have construed it 
 into the most latent sense, Christ himself would 
 have given a clavis, and taught the church to un- 
 lock so great a secret. Christ said, ' This is my 
 body, this is my blood.' St. Paul said, ' The bread 
 of blessing that we break is the communication of 
 the body of Christ, and the chalice which we bless 
 is the communication of the blood of Christ ;' and, 
 ' we are all one body, because we eat of one bread,' 1 
 One proposition as well as the other is a matter of 
 faith, and the latter of them is also of sense ; one is 
 as literal as the other, and he that distinguishes in 
 his belief, as he may place the impropriety upon 
 what part he please, and either say it is improperly 
 called bread, or improperly called Christ's body; 
 so he can have nothing to secure his proposition 
 from error, or himself from boldness, in decreeing 
 concerning mysteries against the testimonies of 
 sense, or beyond the modesty and simplicity ot 
 Christian faith. Let us love and adore the abyss 
 of divine wisdom and goodness, and entertain the 
 sacrament with just and holy receptions ; and then 
 we shall receive all those fruits of it which an ear- 
 nest disputer, or a peremptory dogmatizer, whether 
 he happen right or wrong, hath no warrant to ex- 
 pect upon the interest of his opinion. 
 
 4. In the institution of this sacrament Christ 
 manifested, first, his almighty power; secondly, 
 
 1 1 Cor. x. w, 17. 
 
 Chrysost. notat Apostolum non dixisse panem esse [leroxyv, 
 sed Koivuviav rS <j(o\iaroq Xpi^rS, ut indicaret ita participari 
 corpus Domini, ut fiant unum participans, et res participata, sicut 
 Verbum et Dei Caro. 6 fiersxojv, partem aliquam sibi vendicat, 
 6 Koivwvtiv, totius particeps est. 
 
23G 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 his infinite wisdom ; and thirdly, his unspeakable 
 charity. First, his power is manifest in making 
 the symbols to be the instruments of conveying 
 himself to the spirit of the receiver. He nourishes 
 the soul with bread, and feeds the body with a sa- 
 crament: he makes the body spiritual by his graces 
 there ministered, and makes the spirit to be united 
 to his body by a participation of the divine nature. 
 In the sacrament that body which is reigning in 
 heaven is exposed upon the table of blessing ; and 
 his body which was broken for us is now broken 
 again, and yet remains impassible. Every con- 
 secrated portion of bread and wine does exhibit 
 Christ entirely to the faithful receiver; and yet 
 Christ remains one, while he is wholly ministered 
 in ten thousand portions. So long as we call these 
 mysterious, and make them intricate to exercise 
 our faith, and to represent the wonder of the mys- 
 tery, and to increase our chanty ; our being in- 
 quisitive into the abyss can have no evil purposes. 
 God hath instituted the rite in visible symbols, to 
 make the secret grace as presential and discernible 
 as it might, that by an instrument of sense our 
 spirits might be accommodated as with an exterior 
 object to produce an internal act. But it is the 
 prodigy of a miraculous power, by instruments so 
 easy to produce effects so glorious. This then is 
 the object of wonder and adoration. 
 
 5. Secondly, And this effect of power does also 
 remark the divine wisdom, who hath ordained 
 such symbols, which not only, like spittle and clay 
 toward the curing blind eyes, proclaim an almighty 
 power, but they are apposite and proper to signify 
 a duty, and become to us like the word of life; and 
 from bread they turn into a homily : for therefore our 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 237 
 
 wisest Master bath appointed bread and wine, tbat 
 we may be corporeally united to him; that as the 
 symbols becoming nutriment are turned into the 
 substance of our bodies, so Christ being the food of 
 our souls should assimilate us, making us partakers 
 of the divine nature. It also tells us, that from 
 hence we derive life and holy motion ; * for in him 
 we live, and move, and have our being/ He is the 
 start' of our life, and the light of our eyes, and the 
 strength of our spirit; he is the viand for our journey, 
 and the antepast of heaven. And because this 
 holy mystery was intended to be a sacrament of 
 union, that lesson is morally represented in the 
 symbols ; that as the salutary juice is expressed 
 from many clusters running into one chalice, and 
 the bread is a mass made of many grains of wheat, 
 so we also (as the apostle infers from hence, him- 
 self observing the analogy,) should 'be one bread 
 and one body, because we partake of that one 
 bread.' And it were to be wished that from hence 
 also all Christians would understand a signification 
 of another duty, and that they would often commu- 
 nicate, as remembering that the soul may need a 
 frequent ministration as well as the body its daily 
 proportion. This consideration of the divine wis- 
 dom is apt to produce reverence, humility, and 
 submission of our understanding to the immensity 
 of God's unsearchable abysses. 
 
 6. Thirdly, But the story of the love of our dear- 
 est Lord is written in largest characters, who not 
 only was at that instant busy in doing man the 
 greatest good, even then when man was contriving 
 his death and his dishonour, but contrived to repre- 
 sent his bitter passion to us without any circum- 
 stances of horror, in symbols of pleasure and de- 
 
238 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 light ; that * we may taste and see how gracious 
 our Lord is/ who would not transmit the record of 
 his passion to us in any thing that might trouble us. 
 No love can be greater than that which is so bea- 
 tifical as to bestow the greatest good ; and no love 
 can be better expressed than that which, although 
 it is productive of the greatest blessings, yet is curious 
 also to observe the smallest circumstances. And not 
 only both these, but many other circumstances and 
 arguments of love concur in the holy sacrament. 
 
 1. It is a tenderness of affection that ministers 
 wholesome physic with arts and instruments of 
 pleasure. And such was the charity of our Lord, 
 who brings health to us in a golden chalice ; life, 
 not in the bitter drugs of Egypt, but in spirits and 
 quintessences ; giving us apples of paradise, at the 
 same time yielding food, and health, and pleasure. 
 
 2. Love desires to do all good to its beloved object; 
 and that is the greatest love which gives us the 
 greatest blessings. And the sacrament therefore is 
 the argument of his greatest love ; for in it we re- 
 ceive the honey and the honey-comb, the paschal 
 lamb with his bitter herbs, Christ with all his 
 griefs, and his passion with all the salutary 
 effects of it. 3. Love desires to be remembered, 
 and to have his own object in perpetual re- 
 presentment. And this sacrament Christ de- 
 signed to that purpose, that he, who is not present 
 to our eyes, might always be present to our spirits. 
 4. Love demands love again, and to desire to be 
 beloved is of itself a great argument of love. And 
 as God cannot give us a greater blessing than his 
 love, which is himself with an excellency of rela- 
 tion to us superadded ; so what greater demonstra- 
 tion of it can he make to us, than to desire us to 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 239 
 
 love him with as much earnestness and vehemency 
 of desire, as if we we were that to him which he is 
 essentially to us, the author of our being and our 
 blessing ? 5. And yet to consummate this love, 
 and represent it to be the greatest and most excel- 
 lent, the holy Jesus hath in this sacrament designed 
 that we should be united in our spirits with him, 
 incorporated to his body, partake of his divine 
 nature, and communicate in all his graces : and 
 love hath no expression beyond this, that it desires 
 to be united unto its object. So that what Moses 
 said to the men of Israel, ' What nation is so great, 
 who hath God so nigh unto them, as the Lord our 
 God is in all things for which we call upon him ? 
 we can enlarge in the meditation of this holy sa- 
 crament : for now the Lord our God calls upon us, 
 not only to be nigh unto him, but to be all one 
 with him ; not only as he was in the incarnation, 
 flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone, but also to 
 communicate in spirit, in grace, in nature, in divi- 
 nity itself. 
 
 7. Upon the strength of the premises we may 
 sooner take an estimate of the graces which are 
 conveyed to us in the reception and celebration of 
 this holy sacrament and sacrifice. For as it is a 
 commemoration and representment of Christ's 
 death, so it is a commemorative sacrifice ; as we 
 receive the symbols and the mystery, so it is a 
 sacrament. In both capacities the benefit is next 
 to infinite. First, for whatsoever Christ did at the 
 institution, the same he commanded the church to 
 do in remembrance and repeated rites ; and him- 
 self also does the same thing in heaven for us, 
 making perpetual intercession for his church, the 
 body of his redeemed ones, by representing to his 
 
240 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 Father his death and sacrifice : there he sits a high- 
 priest continually, and offers still the same one 
 perfect sacrifice; that is, still represents it as having 
 been once finished and consummate in order to 
 perpetual and never-failing events. And this also 
 his ministers do on earth ; they offer up the same 
 sacrifice to God, the sacrifice of the cross, by pray- 
 ers, and a commemorating rite and representment 
 according to his holy institution. And as all the 
 effects of grace and the titles of glory were pur- 
 chased for us on the cross, and the actual mysteries 
 of redemption perfected on earth, but are applied 
 to us and made effectual to single persons and 
 communities of men by Christ's intercession in 
 heaven : so also they are promoted by acts, duty, 
 and religion here on earth, that we may be ' work- 
 ers together with God,' 1 (as St. Paul expresses it,) 
 and in virtue of the eternal and all-sufficient sacri- 
 fice may offer up our prayers and our duty, and 
 by representing that sacrifice may send up toge- 
 ther with our prayers an instrument of their gra- 
 ciousness and acceptation. The funerals of a de- 
 ceased friend are not only performed at his first 
 interring, but in the monthly minds and anniver- 
 sary commemorations, and our grief returns upon 
 the sight of a picture, or upon any instance which 
 our dead friend desired us to preserve as his me- 
 morial : we celebrate and exhibit the Lord's death 
 in sacrament and symbol. And this is that great 
 express, which when the church offers to God the 
 Father, it obtains all those blessings which that 
 sacrifice purchased. Themistocles snatched up the 
 son of king Admetus, and held him between him- 
 
 1 2 Cor. vi. 1. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 211 
 
 self and death, to mitigate the rage of the king, 
 and prevailed accordingly. Our very holding up 
 the Son of God, and representing him to his Fa- 
 ther, is the doing an act of mediation and advan- 
 tage to ourselves in the virtue and efficacy of the 
 Mediator. As Christ is a priest in heaven for ever, 
 and yet does not sacrifice himself afresh, nor 
 yet without a sacrifice could he be a priest, but 
 by a daily ministration and intercession repre- 
 sents his sacrifice to God, and offers himself as 
 sacrificed ; so he does upon earth by the ministry 
 of his servants ; he is offered to God ; that is, he is 
 by prayers and the sacraments represented or 
 ' offered up to God as sacrificed which, in effect, 
 is a celebration of his death, and the applying it to 
 the present and future necessities of the church, as 
 we are capable, by a ministry like to his in heaven. 
 It follows then, that the celebration of this sacri- 
 fice be in its proportion an instrument of applying 
 the proper sacrifice to all the purposes which it 
 first designed. 1 It is ministerially and by applica- 
 tion an instrument propitiatory, it is encharistical, 
 it is an homage, and an act of adoration, and it is 
 impetratory, and obtains for us and for the whole 
 church all the benefits of the sacrifice, which is 
 now celebrated and applied : that is, as this rite is 
 the remembrance and ministerial celebration of 
 Christ's sacrifice, so it is destined to do honour to 
 God, to express the homage and duty of his ser- 
 
 1 Iste calix benedictione solenni sacratus, ad totius hominis 
 vitam salutemqueproftcit ; simul medicamentum et holocaustum, 
 ad sanandas infirmitates et purgandas iniquitates, existens. S. 
 Cyp. de ccena Dom. — " That cup, consecrated by the accus- 
 tomed blessing, avails to the life and salvation of the whole man,' 
 and is at the same time a medicine and a sacrifice, both healing 
 diseases and purging sins." 
 
 VOL. III. R 
 
242 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 vants, to acknowledge his supreme dominion, to 
 give him thanks and worship, to beg pardon, 
 blessings, and supply of all our needs. And its 
 profit is enlarged not only to the persons celebrat- 
 ing, but to all to whom they design it, according 
 to the nature of sacrifices and prayers, and all 
 such solemn actions of religion. 
 
 8. Secondly, If we consider this, not as the act 
 and ministry of ecclesiastical persons, but as the 
 duty of the whole church communicating, that is, 
 as it is a sacrament, so it is like the springs of 
 Eden, from whence issue many rivers ; or the trees 
 of celestial Jerusalem, bearing various kinds of 
 fruit. For whatsoever was offered in the sacrifice 
 is given in the sacrament; and whatsoever the tes- 
 tament bequeaths, the holy mysteries dispense. 
 1. ' He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, 
 abideth in me and I in him ; M Christ in his temple 
 and his resting-place, and the worthy communi- 
 cant in sanctuary and a place of protection ; and 
 every holy soul having feasted at his table may 
 say, as St. Paul, ' I live, yet not I, but Christ 
 liveth in me.' 2 So that 6 to live is Christ:' 3 
 ' Christ is our life,' 4 and he dwells in the body 
 and the spirit of every one that eats Christ's flesh 
 and drinks his blood. Happy is that man that sits 
 at the table of angels, that puts his hand into the 
 dish with the King of all the creatures, and feeds 
 upon the eternal Son of God ; joining things below 
 with things above, heaven with earth, life with 
 death, that mortality might be swallowed up of 
 life, and sin be destroyed by the inhabitation of its 
 greatest conqueror. And now I need not enume- 
 
 1 John, vi. 56. 2 Gal. ii. 20. 
 
 3 Phil. i. 21. 4 Col. iii. iv. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 243 
 
 rate any particulars, since the Spirit of God hath 
 ascertained us that Christ enters into our hearts, 
 and takes possession, and abides there ; that we 
 are made temples and celestial mansions ; that we 
 are all one with our Judge, and with our Redeemer ; 
 that our Creator is bound unto his creature with 
 bonds of charity which nothing can dissolve, 
 unless our own hands break them ; that man is 
 united with God, and our weakness is fortified by his 
 strength, and our miseries wrapped up in the 
 golden leaves of glory. 2. Hence it follows that 
 the sacrament is an instrument of reconciling us to 
 God, and taking off the remanent guilt, and stain, 
 and obligations of our sins. ' This is the blood 
 that was shed for you for the remission of sins. 
 For there is no condemnation to them that are in 
 Christ Jesus.' And such are all they who worthily 
 eat the flesh of Christ : by receiving him, they 
 more and more receive remission of sins, redemp- 
 tion, sanctifi cation, wisdom, and certain hopes of 
 glory. For as the soul, touching and united to the 
 flesh of Adam, contracts the stain of original mi- 
 sery and imperfection ; so much the rather shall 
 the soul united to the flesh of Christ receive pardon 
 and purity, and all those blessed emanations from 
 our union with the second Adam. But this is not 
 to be understood, as if the first beginnings of our 
 pardon were in the holy communion ; for then a 
 man might come with his impurities along with 
 him, and lay them on the holy table, to stain and 
 pollute so bright a presence. No ; first repentance 
 must ' prepare the way of the Lord : ' and in this 
 holy rite those words of our Lord are verified : ( He 
 that is justified let him be justified still that is, 
 here he may receive the increase of grace ; and as 
 
 n 2 
 
244 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 it grows, so sin dies, and we are reconciled by 
 nearer unions and approximations to God. 
 
 9. Thirdly, The holy sacrament is the pledge of 
 glory, and the earnest of immortality. For when 
 we have received him who hath ' overcome death, 
 and henceforth dies no more,' he becomes to us 
 like the tree of life in paradise : and the conse- 
 crated symbols are like the seeds of an eternal du- 
 ration, springing up in us to eternal life, nourish- 
 ing our spirits with grace, which is but the pro- 
 logue and the infancy of glory, and differs from it 
 only as a child from a man. 1 But God first raised 
 up his Son to life, and by giving him to us hath 
 also consigned us to the same state; for 'our life 
 is hid with Christ in God/ 2 u When we lay down 
 and cast aside the impurer robes of flesh, they are 
 then but preparing for glory : and if by the only 
 touch of Christ, bodies were redintegrate and 
 restored to natural perfections, how shall not we 
 live for ever who eat his flesh and drink his 
 blood ? " It is the discourse of St. Cyril : What- 
 soever the Spirit can convey to the body of the 
 church, we may expect from this sacrament : 
 for as the Spirit is the instrument of life and 
 action, so the blood of Christ is the conveyance 
 of his Spirit. 3 And let all the mysterious places 
 of holy Scripture, concerning the effects which 
 Christ communicated in the blessed sacrament, be 
 
 1 'ASavacrLag <pap}iaKOv. apud S. Ingnat. epist ad Ephes. 
 Spes resurrectionis. Optat. Milevir. lib. vi. Contra Parmen. et 
 S. Joan. vi. 54. Qui manducat carnem meam, habet vitam 
 aeternam, et resuscitabo eum in novissimo die. 
 
 2 Colos. iii. 3. 
 
 3 S. Cyril. Alex. lib. iv. in Jo. c. xiv. et Iren. lib. iv. c. 
 
 34. Sic et corpora nostra percipientia Eucharistiam jam non 
 sunt corruptibiiia, spem. resurrectionis habentia. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 
 
 245 
 
 drawn together in one scheme, we cannot but ob- 
 serve, that although they are so expressed as that 
 their meaning may seem intricate and involved, 
 yet they cannot be drawn to any meaning at all, 
 but it is as glorious in its sense as it is mysterious 
 in the expression ; and the more intricate they are, 
 the greater is their purpose; no words being apt and 
 proportionate to signify this spiritual secret and 
 excellent effects of the Spirit. A veil is drawn be- 
 fore all these testimonies, because the people were 
 not able to behold the glory which they cover with 
 their curtain : and f Christ dwelling in us,' and 
 ' giving us his flesh to eat and his blood to drink/ 
 and ' the hiding of our life with God,' and ' the 
 communion of the body of Christ/ and ' Christ be- 
 ing our life/ are such secret glories, that as the fru- 
 ition of them is the portion of the other world, so also 
 is the full perception and understanding of them. 
 For therefore God appears to us in a cloud, and 
 his glories in a veil, that we, understanding more 
 of it by its concealment than we can by its open 
 face, which is too bright for our weak eyes, may 
 with more piety also entertain the greatness by 
 these indefinite and mysterious significations, than 
 we can by plain and direct intuitions, which, like 
 the sun in a direct ray, enlightens the object but 
 confounds the organ. 
 
 10. I should but in other words describe the 
 same glories, if I should add, that this holy sacra- 
 ment does enlighten the spirit of man, and clarify 
 it with spiritual discernings; and as he was to the 
 two disciples at Emmaus, so also to other faithful 
 people ; 4 Christ is known in the breaking of bread :' 
 that it is a great defence against the hostilities of 
 our ghostly enemies, this holy bread being like the 
 
246 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 cake of Gideons camp, overturning the tents of 
 Midian: 1 that it is the relief of our sorrows, the 
 antidote and preservative of souls, the viand of 
 our journey, the guard and passport of our death, 
 the wine of angels; that it is more healthful than 
 rhubarb, more pleasant than cassia; that the bee- 
 tle and lareca of the Indians, the moly or nepenthe 
 of Pliny, the lirinon of the Persians, the balsam of 
 Judsea, the manna of Israel, the honey of Jona- 
 than, are but weak expressions to tell us that this 
 is excellent above art and nature, and that nothing 
 is good enough in philosophy to become its emblem. 
 All these must needs fall very short of those plain 
 words of Christ, ' This is my body.' The other 
 may become the ecstasies of piety, the transporta- 
 tion of joy and wonder, and are like the discourse 
 of St. Peter upon Mount Tabor; he was resolved to 
 say some great thing, but he knew not what : but 
 when we remember that the body of our Lord and 
 his blood is communicated to us in the bread and 
 chalice of blessing, we must sit down and rest our- 
 selves ; for this is the mountain of the Lord, and 
 we can go no further. 
 
 1 1. In the next place it will concern our inquiry 
 to consider how we are to prepare ourselves. For 
 at the gate of life a man may meet with death ; 
 and although this holy sacrament be like manna, 
 in which the obedient find the relishes of obedi- 
 ence, the chaste of purity, the meek persons of 
 content and humility ; yet vicious and corrupted 
 palates find also the gust of death and coloquin- 
 tida. The Syberites invited their women to their 
 
 1 St. Chrysostom says, " We leave that table with the 
 strength of lions, breathing fire, made terrible thereby to de- 
 mons." 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 247 
 
 solemn sacrifices a full year before the solemnity, 
 that they might, by previous dispositions and a 
 long foresight, attend with gravity and fairer order 
 the celebration of the rites. 1 And it was a rea- 
 sonable answer of Pericles, to one that asked him 
 why he, being a philosophical and severe person, 
 came to a wedding trimmed and adorned like a 
 paranymph ; " I come adorned to an adorned per- 
 son," trimmed to a bridegroom. And we also, if 
 we come to the marriage of the Son with the soul, 
 (which marriage is celebrated in this sacred mys- 
 tery,) and have not on a wedding-garment, shall 
 be cast into outer darkness, the portion of undress- 
 ed and unprepared souls. 
 
 12. For from this sacrament are excluded all 
 unbaptized persons, and such who lie in a known 
 sin, of which they have not purged themselves by 
 the apt and proper instruments of repentance. For 
 if the paschal lamb was not to be eaten but by 
 persons pure and clean, according to the sanctifica- 
 tions of the law, the Son of God can less endure 
 the impurities of the spirit, than God could suffer 
 the uncleannesses of the law. St. Paul hath given 
 us instruction in this : ' First let a man examine 
 himself, and so let him eat. For he that eats and 
 drinks unworthily, eats and drinks damnation to 
 himself, not discerning the Lord's body/ 2 That 
 is, although the church of Corinth, by reason of 
 the present schism, the public discipline of the 
 church was neglected, and every man permitted to 
 himself; yet even then no man was disobliged 
 from his duty of private repentance, and holy pre- 
 parations to the perception of so great a mystery ; 
 
 1 Plutarch. Sympos. 
 
 2 1 Cor. xL 28, 29. 
 
248 OF THE (NSTITUTION AND 
 
 that the Lord's body may be discerned from com- 
 mon nutriment. Now nothing can so unhallow 
 and desecrate the rite as the remanent affection to 
 a sin, or a crime unrepented of. And self-exami- 
 nation is prescribed, not for itself, but in order to 
 the abolition of sin and death : for itself is a rela- 
 tive term and an imperfect duty, whose very na- 
 ture is in order to something beyond it. And this 
 was in the primitive church understood to so much 
 severity, that if a man had relapsed after one pub- 
 lic repentance into a foul crime, he was never again 
 readmitted to the holy communion. And the fa- 
 thers of the council of Eliberis call it " a mocking 
 and jesting at the communion of our Lord, to give 
 it once again after repentance and a relapse, and 
 a second or third postulation." 1 And indeed we 
 use to make a sport of the greatest instruments of 
 religion, when we come to them after an habitual 
 vice, whose face we have, it may be, wetted with a 
 tear and breathed upon it with a sigh, and abstain- 
 ed from the worst of crimes for two or three days, 
 and come to the sacrament to be purged, and to 
 take our rise by going a little back from our sin, 
 that afterwards we may leap into it with more vio- 
 lence, and enter into its utmost angle. This is 
 dishonouring the body of our Lord, and deceiving 
 ourselves. Christ and Belial cannot cohabit. But 
 if we have left all our sins, and have no fondness 
 of affection towards them; if we hate them, (which 
 then we shall best known when we leave them, 
 and with complacency entertain their contraries,) 
 then Christ hath washed our feet, and then he in- 
 vites us to his holy supper. Hands dipped in 
 
 » Concil. Eliber. c. 3. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 
 
 249 
 
 blood, or polluted with unlawful gains, or stained 
 with the spots of flesh, are most unfit to handle 
 the holy body of our Lord, and minister nourish- 
 ment to the soul. Christ loves not to enter into 
 the mouth full of cursings, oaths, blasphemies, re- 
 vilings, or evil-speakings ; and a heart full of vain 
 and vicious thoughts stinks like the lake of So- 
 dom : he finds no rest there; and when he enters, 
 he is vexed with the unclean conversation of the 
 impure inhabitants, and flies from thence with the 
 wings of a dove, that he may retire to pure and 
 whiter habitations. St. Justin Martyr, reckoning 
 the predispositions required of every faithful soul 
 for the entertainment of his Lord, says, that " it 
 is not lawful for any to eat the eucharist, but him 
 that is washed in the laver of regeneration for the 
 remission of sins, that believes Christ's doctrines to 
 be true, and that lives according to the discipline 
 of the holy Jesus." 1 And therefore St. Ambrose 
 refused to minister the holy communion to the 
 emperor Theodosius, till by public repentance he 
 had reconciled himself to God and the society of 
 faithful people, after the furious and choleric rage 
 and slaughter committed at Thessalonica. And 
 as this act was like to cancellating and a circum- 
 vallation of the holy mysteries, and in that sense 
 and so far was a proper duty for a prelate, to 
 whose dispensation the rites are committed ; so it 
 was an act of duty to the emperor, of paternal and 
 
 1 St. Basil, lib. ii. de Bapt. c. 3. S. Ambros. lib. vi. c. 37. 
 in Luc. 9. 
 
 See St. Chrysost horn. 83, in Matt, where he says, " That if 
 either a general, a nobleman, or even a king should unworthily 
 approach the Lord's table, he must be rebuked and sent away ; 
 and that he would rather suffer death than treat unworthily the 
 Lord's body." 
 
250 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 tender care; not of proper authority or jurisdic- 
 tion, which he could not have over his prince, but 
 yet had a care and the supravision of a teacher 
 over him; whose soul St. Ambrose had betrayed, 
 unless he had represented his disposition to com- 
 municate in expressions of magisterial or doctoral 
 authority and truth. For this holy sacrament is a 
 nourishment of spiritual life, and therefore cannot 
 with effect be administered to them who are in 
 the state of spiritual death ; it is giving a cordial to 
 a dead man : and although the outward rite be 
 ministered, yet the grace of the sacrament is not 
 communicated ; and therefore it were well that 
 they also abstained from the rite itself. For a fly 
 can boast of as much privilege as a wicked person 
 can receive from this holy feast; and oftentimes 
 pays his life for his access to forbidden delicacies, 
 as certainly as they. 
 
 13. It is more generally thought by the doctors 
 of the church, that our blessed Lord administered 
 the sacrament to Judas, although he knew he sold 
 him to the Jews : some others deny it, and sup- 
 pose Judas departed presently after the sop given 
 him, before he communicated. 1 However it was, 
 Christ, who was Lord of the sacraments, might 
 dispense it as he pleased : but we must mi- 
 nister and receive it according to the rules he 
 hath since described. But it becomes a prece- 
 dent to the church in all succeeding ages; al- 
 though it might also have something in it extra- 
 ordinary and apter to the first institution : for be- 
 cause the fact of Judas was secret, not yet made 
 
 1 Negatura Clemente Rom. 5. Const, c. 16. ab Hilario, c. 30, 
 in Matt, ab Innocentio. lib. iii. de Myster. c. 13, a Ruperto, 
 Hildebrand. Cenoman. et paucis aliis. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 251 
 
 notorious, Christ chose rather to admit him into 
 the rites of external communion, than to separate 
 him with an open shame for a fault not yet made 
 open : for our blessed Lord did not reveal the man 
 and his crime till the very time of ministration, if 
 Judas did communicate. But if Judas did not com- 
 municate, and that our blessed Lord gave him the 
 sop at the paschal supper, or at the interval be- 
 tween it and the institution of its own, it is certain 
 that Judas went out as soon as he was discovered, 
 and left this part of discipline upon record : — that 
 when a crime is made public and notorious, the 
 governors of the church, according to their power, 
 are to deny to give the blessed sacrament, till by 
 repentance such persons be restored. In private 
 sins, or sins not known by solemnities of law, or 
 evidence of fact, good and bad are entertained in 
 public communion : and it is not to be accounted 
 a crime in them that minister it, because they can- 
 not avoid it, or have not competent authority to se- 
 parate persons whom the public act of the church 
 hath not separated. 1 But if once a public separa- 
 tion be made, or that the fact is notorious and the 
 sentence of law is in such cases already declared, 
 they that come, and he that rejects them not, both 
 pollute the blood of the everlasting covenant. And 
 here it is applicable what God spake by the pro- 
 phet, ' if thou wilt separate the precious thing from 
 the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth.' 2 
 
 1 Nec a communione prohibere quenquam possumus, nisi aut 
 sponte confessum, aut in aliquo sive seculari sive ecclesiastico 
 judicio nominatum atque convictum. S. Aug. lib. v. Homil. 
 horn. 50. S. Thomas, iii. p. q. 81. a. 2.— " We cannot prohibit 
 any one from the communion, unless he have voluntarily con- 
 fessed some sin, or have been convicted thereof by a secular or ec- 
 clesiastical judgment." 
 
 * Jer. xv. 19. 
 
25*2 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 But this is wholly a matter of discipline, arbi- 
 trary, and in the power of the church ; nothing in 
 it of divine commandment, but what belong! to the 
 communicants themselves: for St. Paul reproves 
 them that receive disorderly , but gives no orders to 
 the Corinthian presbyters to reject any that present 
 themselves. Neither did our blessed Lord leave any 
 commandment concerning it, or hath the holy 
 Scripture given rules or measures concerning its 
 actual reduction to practice ; neither who are to be 
 separated, nor for what offences, nor by what au- 
 thority, nor who is to be the judge. And indeed it 
 is a judgment that can only belong to God, who 
 knows the secret > of hearts, the degrees of every sin, 
 the beginnings and portions of repentance, the sin- 
 cerity of purposes, by what thoughts and designs 
 men begin to be accepted, who are hypocrites, and 
 who are true men. But when many and common 
 men come to judge, they are angry upon trifling 
 mistakes and weak disputes: they call that sin that 
 angers their party or grieves their interest ; they 
 turn charity into pride, and admonition into ty- 
 ranny ; they set up a tribunal that themselves may 
 sit higher, not that their brethren may walk more 
 securely. And then concerning sins, in most cases 
 they are most incompetent judges; they do not 
 know all their kinds ; they miscal many ; they are 
 ignorant of the ingredient and constituent parts 
 and circumstances ; they themselves make false 
 measures, and give out according to them, when 
 they please ; and when they list not, they can 
 change the balance. When the matter is public, 
 evident, and notorious, the man is to be admonished 
 of his danger by the minister, but not by him to be 
 forced from it : for the power of the minister of holy 
 
RECEPTION oF THE SACRAMENT. 
 
 253 
 
 things is but the power of a preacher and a coun- 
 sellor, of a physician and a guide : it hath in it no 
 coercion or violence, but what is indulged to it by 
 human laws and by consent, which may vary as its 
 principle. 
 
 Add to this, that the grace of God can be^in the 
 work of repentance in an instant; and in what pe- 
 riod or degree of repentance the holy communion 
 is to be administered, no law of God declares; 
 which therefore plainly allows it to every period, 
 and leaves no difference, except where the disci- 
 pline of the church and the authority of the su- 
 preme power doth intervene : for since we do not 
 find in Scripture that the apostles did drive 
 from the communion of holy things even those 
 whom they delivered owr to Sutan or other cen- 
 sures, we are left to consider, that in the nature of 
 the thing, t!i<>sc who are in the state of weakness 
 and infirmity have more need ofthesolemn prayers 
 of the church, and therefore, by presenting them- 
 selves to the In ly sacrament, approach towards that 
 ministry which i> the most effectual cure; espe- 
 cially since the very presenting themselves is an 
 act of religion, and therefore supposes an act of re- 
 pentance ami faith, and other little introductions 
 to it> fair reception. And if they may be prayed 
 for and prayed with, why they may not also be 
 communicated, which is the solemnity of the 
 greatest prayer, is not yet clearly revealed. 
 
 This discourse relates only to private ministry: 
 for when I atrh o that there is no command from 
 Christ, to all his ministers to refuse whom they are 
 pleased to call scandalous, or sinners, I intend to 
 defend good people from the tyranny and arbitrary 
 power of those great companies of ministers, who 
 
254 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 in so many hundred places would have a judica- 
 ture supreme in spirituals, which would be more 
 intolerable than if they had in one province twenty 
 thousand judges of life and death. But when the 
 power of separation and interdiction is only in some 
 more eminent and authorized persons, who take 
 public cognizance of causes by solemnities of law, 
 and exercise their power but in some rare instances,, 
 and then also for the public interest, in which, 
 although they may be deceived, yet they are the 
 most competent and likely judges; much of the 
 inconvenience, which might otherwise follow, is 
 avoided. And then it only remains that they con- 
 sider, in what cases it can be a competent and a 
 proper infliction upon sinners, to take from them 
 that which is the means and ministry of grace and 
 recovery ; whether they have any warrant from 
 Christ, or precedent in the apostles' practice, and , 
 how far. As for the forms and usages of the pri- 
 mitive church, they were hugely different, sometimes 
 for one cause, sometimes for another. Sometimes 
 whole churches have been excommunicated; some- 
 times the criminal and all his household for his 
 offence, as it happened in the excommunication of 
 Andronicus and Thoas, in Synesius, in the year 
 41 1. 1 Sometimes they were absolved and restored 
 by lay-confessors, sometimes by emperors ; as it 
 happened to Eusebius of Nicomedia, and Theognis 
 of Nice, who were absolved by Constantine from 
 the sentence of excommunication inflicted by the 
 Nicene fathers : and a monk did excommunicate 
 Theodosius the younger. 2 So that in this there 
 can be no certainty to make a measure and a rule. 
 
 1 Synes. ep. 79. 
 
 2 Theod.Hist. lib. v. 30. Baron, torn. 5. A. D. 425. Sect. 16. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 255 
 
 The surest way, most agreeable to .the precedents 
 of Scripture and the analogy of the gospel, is, that 
 ' by the word o£ their proper ministry' all sinners 
 should be separate from the holy communion ; that 
 is, threatened by the words of God with damnation, 
 and fearful temporal dangers, if themselves, know- 
 ing an unrepented sin, and a remanent affection to 
 sin to be within them, shall dare to profane that 
 body and blood of our Lord by so impure an ad- 
 dress. The evil is to themselves ; and if the minis- 
 ters declare this powerfully, they are acquitted. 
 But concerning other judgments or separations; 
 the supreme power can forbid all assembling, and 
 therefore can permit them to all, and therefore 
 can deny them or grant them to single persons; 
 and therefore, when he by laws makes separations 
 in order to public benefit, they are to be obeyed. 
 But it is not to be endured that single presbyters 
 should upon vain pretences erect so high a tribunal 
 and tyranny over consciences. 
 
 14. The duty of preparation that I here discourse 
 of, is such a preparation as is a disposition to life. 
 It is not a matter of convenience or advantage, to 
 repent of our sins before the communion, but it is 
 of absolute necessity; we perish if we neglect it; 
 for we eat damnation, and Satan enters into us, 
 not Christ. And this preparation is not the act of 
 a day or a week ; but it is a new state of life : no 
 man that is an habitual sinner must come to this 
 feast till he hath wholly changed his course of life. 
 And then, according as the actions of infirmity 
 have made less or greater invasion upon his peace 
 and health, so are the acts of repentance to be pro- 
 portioned ; in which the greatness of the prevari- 
 cations, their neighbourhood to death, or their fre- 
 
256 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 quent repetition, and the conduct of a spiritual man, 
 are to give us counsel and determination. When a 
 ravening and hungry wolf is destitute of prey, he 
 eats the turf, and loads his stomach with the glebe 
 he treads on ; but as soon as he finds better food, he 
 vomits up his first load. Our secular and sensual 
 affections are loads of earth upon the conscience; 
 and when we approach to the table of the Lord to 
 eat the bread of the elect, and to drink the wine of 
 angels, we must reject sucli impure adhesions; that 
 holy persons, being nourished with holy symbols, 
 may be sanctified, and receive the eternal reward 
 of holiness. 
 
 15. But as none must come hither but they that 
 are in the state of grace, or charity, and the love 
 of God and their neighbours, and that the abolition 
 of the state of sin is the necessary preparation, and 
 is the action of years, and was not accepted as suf- 
 ficient till the expiration of divers years, by the pri- 
 mitive discipline, and in some cases not till the ap- 
 proach of death; so there is another preparation 
 which is of less necessity, which supposes the 
 state of grace, and that oil is burning in our 
 lamps; but yet it is a preparation of ornament, 
 a trimming up the soul, a dressing the spirit with 
 degrees and instances of piety and progresses 
 of perfection. And it consists in setting apart 
 some portion of our time before the communion ; 
 that it be spent in prayer, in meditations, in renew- 
 ing the vows of holy obedience, in examining our 
 consciences, in mortifying our lesser irregularities, 
 in devotions and actions of precise religion; in acts 
 of faith, of hope, of charity, of zeal, and holy de- 
 sires ; in acts of eucharist or thanksgiving, of joy at 
 the approach of so blessed opportunity, and all the 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 
 
 257 
 
 acts of virtue whatsoever, which have indefinite re- 
 lation to this and to other mysteries; but yet are 
 specially to be exercised upon this occasion, because 
 this is the most perfect of external rites, and the 
 most mysterious instrument of sanctification and 
 perfection. There is no time or degree to be de- 
 termined in this preparation ; but they to whom 
 much is forgiven will love much : and they who 
 understand the excellence and holiness of the mys- 
 tery, the glory of the guest that comes to inhabit, 
 and the indecency of the closet of their hearts, by 
 reason of the adherences of impurity, the infinite 
 benefit then designed, and the increase of degrees, 
 by the excellence of these previous acts of holiness, 
 will not be too inquisitive into the necessity of cir- 
 cumstances and measures ; but do it heartily, and 
 devoutly, and reverently, and as much as they can , 
 ever esteeming it necessary, that the actions of so 
 great solemnity should by some actions of piety, 
 attending like handmaids, be distinguished from 
 common employments, and remarked for the prin- 
 cipal and most solemn of religious actions. The 
 primitive church gave the holy sacraments to in- 
 fants immediately after baptism, 1 and by that act 
 transmitted this proposition — that nothing was of 
 absolute necessity, but innocency and purity from 
 sin, and a being in the state of grace. 2 Other ac- 
 tions of religion are excellent additions to the dig- 
 nity of the person and honour of the mystery, but 
 they were such of which infants were not capable. 
 The sum is this ; after the greatest consociation of 
 religious duties for preparation, no man can be suf- 
 
 1 Clem. Rom. lib. viii. Constit. c. 20 ; Concil. Tolet. i. c. 11 ; 
 S. Aug. ep. 23, ad Bonif et ep. 107, et lib. iv. de Trin. c. 10. 
 
 2 Gennadius, lib. iii. de Eccl. Dogmat. c. 53. 
 
 VOL. T!T. S 
 
258 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 ficiently worthy to communicate : let us take care 
 that we be not unworthy, by bringing a guilt with 
 us, or the remanent affection to a sin. 
 
 Est gloriosus sane convictus Dei ; 
 
 Sed illi qui invitatur, non qui invisus est. 
 
 16. When the happy hour is come in which the 
 Lord vouchsafes to enter into us, and dwell with us, 
 and be united with his servants, we must then do 
 the same acts over again with greater earnestness 
 and intention ; confess the glories of God and thy 
 own unworthiness; praise his mercy with ecstasy of 
 thanksgiving and joy; make oblation of thyself, of 
 all thy faculties and capacities; pray, and read, 
 and meditate, and worship : and that thou mayest 
 more opportunely do all this, rise early to meet the 
 bridegroom, pray for special assistance, enter into 
 the assembly of faithful people cheerfully, attend 
 there diligently, demean thyself reverently, and 
 before any other meat or drink, receive the body of 
 thy Saviour with pure hands, with holy intention, 
 with a heart full of joy, and faith, and hope, and 
 wonder, and eucharist. These things I therefore 
 set down irregularly and without method, because 
 in these actions no rule can be given to all persons ; 
 and only such a love and such a religion in general 
 is to be recommended, which will overrun the 
 banks, and not easily stand confined within the 
 margin of rules and artificial prescriptions. Love 
 and religion are boundless ; and all acts of grace 
 relating to the present mystery are fit and propor- 
 tioned entertainments of our Lord. This only re- 
 member, that we are by the mystery of one bread 
 confederated into one body, and the communion of 
 saints ; and that the sacrifice which we then com- 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 259 
 
 memorate was designed by our Lord for the benefit 
 of all his church : let us be sure to draw all faithful 
 people into the society of the present blessing, join- 
 ing with the holy man that ministers in prayers 
 and offerings of that mystery for the benefit of all 
 sorts of men of Christ's catholic church : and it 
 were also an excellent act of Christian communion, 
 and agreeable to the practice of the church in all 
 ages, to make an oblation to God for the poor; 
 that as we are fed by Christ's body, so we also 
 should feed Christ's body, making such returns as 
 we can — a grain of frankincense in exchange for a 
 province, an act of duty and Christian charity as 
 eucharistical for the present grace, that all the 
 body may rejoice and glory in the salvation of the 
 Lord. 
 
 ] 7. After thou hast received that pledge of im- 
 mortality and antepast of glory, even the Lord's 
 body in a mystery, leave not thy Saviour there 
 alone, but attend him with holy thoughts and col- 
 loquies of prayer and eucharist. It was sometime 
 counted infamous for a woman to entertain a se- 
 cond love, till the body of her dead husband was 
 dissolved into ashes, and disappeared in the form 
 of a body : and it were well, that so long as the 
 consecrated symbols remain within us, according to 
 common estimate, we should keep the flame bright, 
 and the perfume of an actual devotion burning, that 
 our communion be not a transient act, but a perma- 
 nent and lasting intercourse with our Lord : but in 
 this every man best knows his own opportunities 
 and necessities of diversion. I only commend earn- 
 estly to practice, that every receiver should make a 
 recollection of himself, and the actions of the day; 
 that he improve it to the best advantage ; thai he 
 
 s 2 
 
260 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 show unto our Lord all the defects of bis bouse, all 
 his poverty and weaknesses : and this let every 
 man do by such actions and devotions which he 
 can best attend, and himself, by the advice of 
 a spiritual man, finds of best advantage. I would 
 not make the practice of religion, especially in 
 such irregular instances, to be an art, or a burden, 
 or a snare to scrupulous persons. What St. Paul 
 said in the case of charity, I say also in this : ' He 
 that sows plentifully shall reap plentifully; and he 
 that sows sparingly shall gather at the same rate : 
 let every man do as himself purposeth in his heart/ 
 Only it were well in this sacrament of love we had 
 some correspondency, and proportionable returns 
 of charity and religious affections. 
 
 18. Some religious persons have moved a ques- 
 tion, whether it were better to communicate often 
 or seldom : some thinking it more reverence to 
 those holy mysteries to come but seldom ; while 
 others say, it is greater religion or charity to come 
 frequently: but I suppose this question does not 
 differ much from a dispute, whether is better to 
 pray often, or to pray seldom. For whatsoever is 
 commonly pretended against a frequent commu- 
 nion, may in its proportion object against a solemn 
 prayer ; remanent affection to a sin, enmity with 
 neighbours, secular avocations to the height of care 
 and trouble ; for these either are great undecencies 
 in order to a holy prayer, or else are direct irregu- 
 larities, and unhallow the prayer : and the celebra- 
 tion of the holy sacrament is in itself and its own 
 formality a sacred, solemn, and ritual prayer, in 
 which we invocate God by the merits of Christ, 
 expressing that adjuration not only in words, but 
 in actual representment and commemoration of his 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 261 
 
 passion : and if the necessities of the church were 
 well considered, we should find, that a daily sacri- 
 fice of prayer and a daily prayer of sacrifice were 
 no more but what her condition requires : and I 
 would to God the governors of churches would 
 take care, that the necessities of kings and king- 
 doms, of churches and states, were represented to 
 God by the most solemn and efficacious interces- 
 sions ; and Christ hath taught us none greater than 
 the praying in the virtue and celebration of his sa- 
 crifice. And this is the counsel that the church 
 received from Ignatius: " Hasten frequently to ap- 
 proach the eucharist, the glory of God : for when 
 this is daily celebrated, we break the powers of 
 Satan, who turns all his actions into hostilities and 
 darts of fire." But this concerns the mnisters of re- 
 ligion, who living in communities and colleges, 
 must make religion the business of their lives, and 
 support kingdoms, and serve the interest of kings 
 by the prayer of a daily sacrifice. And yet in this 
 ministry the clergy may serve their own necessary 
 affairs, if the ministration be divided into courses, 
 as it was by the economy and wisdom of Solomon 
 for the temple. 
 
 19. But concerning the communion of secular 
 and lay persons, the consideration is something 
 different. St. Austin gave this answer to it : "To 
 receive the sacrament every day I neither praise 
 nor reprove : at least let them receive it every 
 Lord's day." 1 And this he spake to husbandmen 
 and merchants. At the first commencement of 
 Christianity, while the fervours apostolical, and the 
 calentures of infant Christendom did last, the whole 
 
 1 Gennadius, c. 54. De Eccl. Dogmat. 
 
262 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 assembly of faithful people communicated every 
 day ; and this lasted in Rome and Spain until the 
 time of St. Jerome: 1 concerning which diligence 
 he gives the same censure which I now recited from 
 St. Austin ; for it suffered inconvenience by rea- 
 son of a declining piety, and the intervening of se- 
 cular interests. But then it came to once a week ; 
 and yet that was not every where strictly observed : 
 but that it be received once every fortnight, St. 
 Jerome counsels very stron'gly to Eustochium, a 
 holy virgin: "Let the virgins confess their sins 
 twice every month, or oftener ; and being fortified 
 with the communion of the Lord's body, let them 
 manfully fight against the devil's forces and at- 
 tempts." Awhile after it came to once a month, 
 then once a year; then it fell from that too; 
 till all the Christians in the west were com- 
 manded to communicate every Easter, by the de- 
 cree of a great council, about five hundred years 
 since. 2 But the church of England, finding that 
 too little, hath commanded all her children to 
 receive thrice every year at least, intending that 
 they should come oftener ; but of this she demands 
 an account. For it hath fared with this sacrament 
 as with other actions of religion, which have de- 
 scended from flames to still fires, from fires to 
 sparks, from sparks to embers, from embers to 
 smoke, from smoke to nothing. And although the 
 public declension of piety is such, that in this pre- 
 sent conjuncture of things it is impossible men 
 should be reduced to a daily communion ; yet that 
 they are to communicate frequently is so a duty, 
 that as no excuse but impossibility can make the 
 
 1 Epist. 80, ad Lucinum. " l Concil. Lau 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 263 
 
 omission innocent, so the loss and consequent want 
 is infinite and invaluable. 
 
 20. For the holy communion being a remem- 
 brance and sacramental repetition of Christ's pas- 
 sion, and the application of his sacrifice to us and 
 the whole catholic church ; as they who seldom 
 communicate, delight not to remember the passion 
 of our Lord, and sin against his very purpose, and 
 one of the designs of institution ; so he cares not 
 to receive the benefits of the sacrifice who so 
 neglects their application, and reducing them to 
 actual profit and reception. " Whence came the 
 sanctimony of the primitive Christians ? whence 
 came their strict observation of the divine com- 
 mandments ? whence was it that they persevered 
 in holy actions with hope and an unweary dili- 
 gence ? from whence did their despising worldly 
 things come, and living with common possession, 
 and the distributions of an universal charity ? 
 Whence came these and many other excellencies, 
 but from a constant prayer, and a daily eucha- 
 rist ? They who every day represented the death 
 of Christ, every day were ready to die for Christ." 
 It was the discourse of an ancient and excellent 
 person. And if we consider this sacrament is in- 
 tended to unite the spirits and affections of the 
 world, and that it is diffusive and powerful to this 
 purpose, (' for we are one body,' saith St. Paul, 
 ' because we partake of one bread,') possibly we may 
 have reason to say, that the wars of kingdoms, the 
 animosity of families, the infinite multitude of law- 
 suits, the personal hatreds, and the universal want 
 of charity, which hath made the world miserable 
 and wicked, may in a great degree be attributed 
 to the neglect of this great symbol and instrument 
 
261 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 of charity. The chalice of the sacrament is called 
 by St. Paul, < the cup of blessing : and if children 
 need every day to beg blessing of their parents, if 
 we also thirst not after this cup of blessing, bless- 
 ing may be far from us. It is called, ( the com- 
 munication of the blood of Christ;' and it is 
 not imaginable that man should love heaven, 
 or felicity, or his Lord, that desires not per- 
 petually to bathe in that salutary stream, the 
 blood of the holy Jesus, the immaculate Lamb of 
 God. 
 
 21. But I find that the religious fears of men 
 are pretended a colour to excuse this irreligion. 
 Men are wicked, and not prepared ; and busy, 
 and full of cares and affairs of the world, and can- 
 not come with due preparation ; and therefore bet- 
 ter not come at all. Nay, men are not ashamed to 
 say, they are at enmity with certain persons, and 
 therefore cannot come. 1. Concerning those per- 
 sons who are unprepared, because they are in a 
 state of sin or uncharitableness ; it is true, they 
 must not come : but this is so far from excusing 
 their not coming, that they increase their sin, and 
 secure misery to themselves, because they do not 
 ( lay aside every weight, and the sin that doth so 
 easily beset them,' that they may come to the mar- 
 riage-supper. It is as if we should excuse our- 
 selves from the duties of charity, by saying we are 
 uncharitable ; from giving alms, by saying we are 
 covetous; from chastity, by saying we are lascivi- 
 ous. To such men it is just that they graze with 
 the goats, because they refuse to wash their hands, 
 that they may come to the supper of the Lamb. 
 2. Concerning those that pretend cares and in- 
 cumbrances of the world : if their affairs make sin 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 265 
 
 and impure affections to stick upon them, they are 
 in the first considerations; but if their office be 
 necessary, just or charitable, they imitate Martha, 
 and choose the less perfect part, when they neglect 
 the offices of religion for duties economical. 3. 
 But the other sort have more pretence and fairer 
 virtue in their outside. They suppose, like the 
 Persian princes, the seldomer such mysterious rites 
 are seen, the more reverence we shall have, and 
 they the more majesty ; and they are fearful lest 
 the frequent attraction of them should make us 
 less to value the great earnests of our redemption 
 and immortality. It is a pious consideration, but 
 not becoming them. For it cannot be that the 
 sacrament be undervalued by frequent reception, 
 without the great unworthiness of the persons so 
 turning Gods grace into lightness, and loathing 
 manna: nay, it cannot be without an unworthy 
 communication ; for he that receives worthily 
 increases in the love of God and religion, and the 
 fires of the altar are apt to kindle our sparks into a 
 flame. And when Christ our Lord enters into us, 
 and we grow weary of him, or less fond of his fre- 
 quent entrance and perpetual cohabitation, it is an 
 infallible sign we have let his enemy in or are pre- 
 paring for it. For this is the difference between 
 secular and spiritual objects, nothing in this world 
 hath any pleasure in it long beyond the hope of it; 
 for the possession and enjoyment is found so emp- 
 ty, that we grow weary of it: but whatsoever is 
 spiritual, and in order to God, is less before we 
 have it, but in the fruition it swells our desires, 
 and enlarges the appetite, and makes us more re- 
 ceptive and forward in the entertainment. And 
 therefore those acts of religion that set us forward 
 
266 
 
 OF THE INSTITUTION AND 
 
 in time, and backward in affection, do declare that 
 we have not well done our duty, but have commu- 
 nicated unworthily: so that the mending of our 
 fault will answer the objection. Communicate 
 with more devotion, and repent with greater con- 
 trition, and walk with more caution, and pray 
 more earnestly, and meditate diligently, and re- 
 ceive with reverence and godly fear ; and we shall 
 find our affections increase together with the spi- 
 ritual emolument: ever remembering that pious 
 and wise advice of St. Ambrose, " Receive every 
 day, that which may profit thee every day; but he 
 that is not disposed to receive it every day, is not 
 fit to receive it every year." 1 
 
 22. And if after all diligence it be still feared 
 that a man is not well prepared, I must say that 
 it is a scruple, that is, a trouble beyond a doubt, 
 and without reason, next to superstition and the 
 dreams of religion: and it is nourished by imagining 
 that no duty is accepted, if it be less than perfec- 
 tion ; and that God is busied in heaven, not only 
 to destroy the wicked, and dash in pieces vessels of 
 dishonour, but to ( break a bruised reed' in pieces, 
 and to cast the smoking flax into the flames of 
 hell. 2 In opposition to which we must know, that 
 nothing makes us unprepared but an evil con- 
 science, a state of sin, or a deadly act : but the 
 lesser infirmities of our life, against which we 
 daily strive, and for which we never have any kind- 
 ness or affections, are not spots in these feasts of 
 charity, but instruments of humility, and stronger 
 
 1 De Sacram. lib. v. c. 4. 
 
 2 St. Chrysostom says, Ci That a pure conscience only deter- 
 mines the fitness of the time for our approaching the Lord's 
 table. 
 
RECEPTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 267 
 
 invitations to come to those rites which are or- 
 dained for corroboratives against infirmities of 
 the soul, and for the growth of the spirit in the 
 strengths of God. For those other acts of prepara- 
 tion which precede and accompany the duty, the 
 better and more religiously they are done, they 
 are indeed of more advantage, and honorary to the 
 sacrament : yet he that comes in the state of grace, 
 though he takes the opportunity upon a sudden 
 offer, sins not. And in such indefinite duties, 
 whose degrees are not described, it is good counsel 
 to do our best ; but it is ill to make them instru- 
 ments of scruple, as if it were essentially necessary 
 to do that in the greatest height, which is only in- 
 tended for advantage and the fairer accommoda- 
 tion of the mystery. But these very acts, if they 
 be esteemed necessary preparations to the sacra- 
 ment, are the greatest arguments in the world that 
 it is best to communicate often ; because the doing 
 of that which must suppose the exercise of so many 
 graces, must needs promote the interest of religion, 
 and dispose strongly to habitual graces by our 
 frequent and solemn repetition of the acts. It is 
 necessary that every communicant be first examin- 
 ed concerning the state of his soul, by himself or 
 his superior; and that very scrutiny is in admir- 
 able order towards the reformation of such irregu- 
 larities which time and temptation, negligence and 
 incuriousness, infirmity or malice, have brought 
 into the secret regions of our will and understand- 
 ing. Now although this examination be therefore 
 enjoined, that no man should approach to the holy 
 table in the state of ruin and reprobation ; and 
 that therefore it is an act not of direct preparation, 
 but an inquiry whether we be prepared or no ; 
 
268 THE INSTITUTION OF THE SACRAMENT. 
 
 yet this very examination will find so many little 
 irregularities, and so many great imperfections, 
 that it will appear the more necessary to repair 
 the breaches and lesser ruins by such acts of piety 
 and religion ; because every communication is in- 
 tended to be a nearer approach to God, a further 
 step in grace, a progress towards glory, and an in- 
 strument of perfection ; and therefore, upon the 
 stock of our spiritual interests, for the purchase of 
 a greater hope, and the advantages of a growing 
 charity, ought to be frequently performed. I end 
 with the words of a pious and learned person : 
 " It is a vain fear and an imprudent reverence, 
 that procrastinates and defers going to the Lord 
 that calls them : n they deny to go to the fire, pre- 
 tending they are cold ; and refuse physic, because 
 they need it. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O blessed and eternal Jesus, who gavest thyself a sacrifice 
 for our sins, thy body for our spiritual food, thy blood to 
 nourish our spirits, and to quench the flames of hell and lust, 
 who didst so love us, who were thine enemies, that thou de- 
 siredst to reconcile us to thee, and becamest all one with us, that 
 we may live the same life, think the same thoughts, love the 
 same love, and be partakers of thy resurrection and immor- 
 tality ; open every window of my soul, that I may be full of 
 light, and may see the excellency of thy love, the merits of thy 
 sacrifice, the bitterness of thy passion, the glories and virtues of 
 the mysterious sacrament. Lord, let me ever hunger and thirst 
 after this instrument of righteousness ; let me have no gust or re- 
 lish of the unsatisfying delights of things below, but let my soul 
 dwell in thee : let me for ever receive thee spiritually, and very 
 frequently communicate with thee sacramentally, and imitate 
 thy virtues piously and strictly, and dwell in the pleasures of 
 
 1 Joan. Gerson. in Magnifica. 
 
CONSIDERATIONS ON THE PASSION. 
 
 2C9 
 
 thy house eternally. Lord, thou hast prepared a table for me, 
 against them that trouble me. Let that holy sacrament of the 
 eucharist be to me a defence and shield, a nourishment, and me- 
 dicine, life and health, a means of sanctiflcation and spiritual 
 growth ; that I, receiving the body of my dearest Lord, may be 
 one with his mystical body, and of the same spirit, united with 
 indissoluble bands of a strong faith, and a holy hope, and a 
 never-failing charity ; that from this veil I may pass into the vi- 
 sions of eternal clarity, from eating thy body to beholding thy 
 face in the glories of thy everlasting kingdom, O blessed and 
 eternal Jesus. Amen. 
 
 Considerations upon the Accidents happening on the 
 Vespers of the Passion. 
 
 I. When Jesus had supped, and sang a hymn, 
 and prayed, and exhorted, and comforted his dis- 
 ciples with a farewell-sermon, in which he repeated 
 such of his former precepts which were now appo- 
 site to the present condition, and reinforced them 
 with proper and pertinent arguments, he went 
 over the brook Cedron, and entered into a garden, 
 and into the prologue of his passion : choosing 
 that place for his agony and satisfactory pains, in 
 which the first scene of human misery was repre- 
 sented, and where he might best attend the offices 
 of devotion preparatory to his death. Besides this, 
 he therefore departed from the house, that he 
 might give opportunity to his enemies' surprise, 
 and yet not incommodate the good man, by whose 
 hospitality they had eaten the paschal lamb. So 
 that he went like a lamb to the slaughter, to the 
 garden as to a prison ; as if by an agreement with 
 his persecutors he had expected their arrest, and 
 stayed there to prevent their further inquiry : for 
 
270 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 so great was his desire to pay our ransom, that 
 himself did assist, by a forward patience and active 
 opportunity towards the persecution : teaching us, 
 that by an active zeal and a ready spirit we assist 
 the designs of God's glory, though in our own suf- 
 ferings and secular infelicities. 
 
 2. When he entered the garden, he left his dis- 
 ciples at the entrance of it, calling with him only 
 Peter, James, and John : ' he withdrew himself 
 from the rest about a stone's cast, and began to be 
 exceeding heavy.' He was not sad till he had 
 called them, (for his sorrow began when he pleased:) 
 which sorrow he also chose to represent to those 
 three who had seen his transfiguration, the earnest 
 of his future glory, that they might see of how 
 great glory for our sakes he disrobed himself ; and 
 that they also might, by the confronting those con- 
 tradictory accidents, observe, that God uses to 
 dispense his comforts, the irradiations and emis- 
 sions of his gloiy, to be preparatives to those sor- 
 rows with which our life must be allayed and sea- 
 soned ; that none should refuse to partake of the 
 sufferings of Christ, if either they have already 
 felt his comforts, or hope hereafter to wear his 
 crown : and it is not ill-observed, that St. Peter, 
 being the chief of the apostles, and doctor of the 
 circumcision, St. John, being a virgin, and St. 
 James, the first of the apostles that was martyred, 
 were admitted to Christ's greatest retirements and 
 mysterious secrecies, as being persons of so singu- 
 lar and eminent dispositions, to whom, according 
 to the pious opinion of the church, especial coronets 
 are prepared in heaven ; besides the great crown of 
 righteousness, which in common shall beautify the 
 heads of all the saints : meaning this, that doctors, 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION. 
 
 271 
 
 virgins, and martyrs, shall receive, even for their 
 very state of life and accidental graces, more emi- 
 nent degrees of accidental glory ; like as the sun, 
 reflecting upon a limpid fountain, receives its rays 
 doubled, without any increment of its proper and 
 natural light. 
 
 3. Jesus began to be exceeding sorrowful, to be 
 sore amazed, and sad even to death. And because 
 he was now to suffer the pains of our sins, there 
 began his passion, whence our sins spring. From 
 an evil heart and a prevaricating spirit all our sins 
 arise : and in the spirit of Christ began his sorrow ; 
 where he truly felt the full value and demerit of 
 sin, which we think not worthy of a tear or a 
 hearty sigh ; but he groaned and fell under the 
 burden. But therefore he took upon him this sad- 
 ness, that our imperfect sorrow and contrition 
 might be heightened in his example, and accepted 
 in its union and confederacy with his. And Jesus 
 still designed a further mercy for us; for he sanc- 
 tified the passion of fear, and hallowed natural 
 sadnesses, that we might not think the infelicities 
 of our nature, and the calamities of our temporal 
 condition to become criminal, so long as they make 
 us not omit a duty, nor dispose us to the election 
 of a crime, nor force us to swallow a temptation, 
 nor yet to exceed the value of their impulsive 
 cause. He that grieves for the loss of friends, and 
 yet had rather lose all the friends he hath than 
 lose the love of God, hath the sorrow of our Lord 
 for his precedent. And he that fears death, and 
 trembles at its approximation, and yet had rather 
 die again than sin once, hath not sinned in his 
 fear ; Christ hath hallowed it, and the necessitous 
 
272 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 condition of his nature is his excuse. But it were 
 highly to be wished, that in the midst of our 
 caresses and levities of society ; in our festivities 
 and triumphal merriments, when we laugh at folly 
 and rejoice in sin, we would remember, that for 
 those very merriments our blessed Lord felt a bitter 
 sorrow ; and not one vain and sinful laughter, but 
 cost the holy Jesus a sharp pang and throe of pas- 
 sion. 
 
 4. Now that the holy Jesus began to taste the 
 bitter cup, he betook him to his great antidote, 
 which himself, the great physician of our souls, 
 prescribed to all the world to cure their calamities, 
 and to make them pass from miseries into virtue, 
 hat so they may arrive at glory. He prays to his 
 neavenly Father ; he kneels down, and not only 
 so, but falls flat upon the earth, and would in hu- 
 mility and fervent adoration have descended low as 
 the centre : he prays with an intention great as his 
 sorrow, and yet with a dereliction so great, and a 
 conformity to the divine will so ready, as if it had 
 been the most indifferent thing in the world for 
 him to be delivered to death, or from it : for though 
 his nature did decline death, as that which hath a 
 natural horror and contradiction to the present in- 
 terest of its preservation, yet when he looked upon 
 it as his heavenly Father had put it in the order of 
 redemption of the world, it was that baptism which 
 he was straitened till he had accomplished. And 
 now there is not in the world any condition of 
 prayer which is essential to the duty, or any cir- 
 cumstances of advantage to its performance, but 
 were concentred in this one instance ; humility of 
 spirit, lowliness of deportment, importunity of de- 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION. 
 
 273 
 
 sire, a fervent spirit, a lawful matter, resignation to 
 the will of God, great love, the love of a son to his 
 father, (which appellative was the form of his ad- 
 dress,) perseverance, (he went thrice, and prayed 
 the same prayer.) It was not long, and it was so 
 retired as to have the advantages of a sufficient so- 
 litude and opportune recollection ; for he was with- 
 drawn from the most of his disciples : and yet not 
 so alone as to lose the benefit of communion ; for 
 Peter and the two Boanerges were near him. Christ 
 in this prayer, which was the most fervent that he 
 ever made on earth, intending to transmit to all 
 the world a precedent of devotion to be transcribed 
 and imitated; that we should cast all our cares 
 and empty them in the bosom of God, being con- 
 tent to receive such a portion of our trouble back 
 again, which he assigns us for our spiritual emolu- 
 ment. 
 
 5. The holy Jesus having in a few words poured 
 out torrents of innocent desires, was pleased still 
 to interrupt his prayer, that he might visit his 
 charge, that little flock which was presently after 
 to be scattered : he was careful of them in the 
 midst of his agonies ; — -they in his sufferings were 
 fust asleep. He awakens them, gives them com- 
 mand to watch and pray ; that is, to be vigilant in 
 the custody of their senses, and observant of all 
 accidents, and to pray that they may be strength- 
 ened against all incursions of enemies and tempta- 
 tions; and then returns to prayer; and so a third time, 
 his devotion still increasing with his sorrow. And 
 when his prayer was full, and his sorrow come to a 
 great measure, after the third, God sent his ' angel 
 to comfort him :' and by that act of grace then only 
 expressed, hath taught us to continue our devotions 
 
 VOL. III. T 
 
274 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 bo long as our needs last. It may be God will not 
 send a comforter till the third time ; that is, after a 
 long expectation, and a patient sufferance, and a 
 lasting hope : in the interim God supports us with 
 a secret hand, and in his own time will refresh 
 the spirit with the visitations of his angels, with 
 the emissions of comfort from the Spirit, the Com- 
 forter. And know this also, that the holy angel, 
 and the Lord of all the angels, stands by every 
 holy person when he prays : and although he 
 draws before his glories the curtain of a cloud, yet 
 in every instant he takes care we shall not perish, 
 and in a just season dissolves the cloud, and 
 makes it to distil in holy dew, and drops sweet 
 as manna, pleasant as nard, and wholesome as the 
 breath of heaven. And such was the consolation 
 which the holy Jesus received by the ministry of 
 the angel, 1 representing to Christ, the Lord of the 
 angels, how necessary it was that he should die 
 for the glory of God ; that in his passion, his jus- 
 tice, wisdom, goodness, power, and mercy should 
 shine ; that unless he died all the world should 
 perish, but his blood should obtain their pardon; 
 and that it should open the gates of heaven, re- 
 pair the ruin of angels, establish a holy church, be 
 productive of innumerable adoptive children to his 
 Father, whom himself should make heirs of glory ; 
 and that his passion should soon pass away — his 
 Father hearing and granting his prayer, that the 
 cup should pass speedily, though indeed it should 
 
 1 Confortatus est, sed tali conforfcatione qua? dolorem non mi- 
 nuit, sed magis auxit ; confortatus enim est ex fructus magnitu- 
 dine, non subtracta doloris amantadine. Beda in Luc. 22. — 
 " He was comforted with a consolation which diminished not, 
 but rather augmented his pain ; for he was comforted by the 
 greatness of the result, the bitterness of the grief remaining." 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION 
 
 275 
 
 pass through him ; that it should be attended and 
 followed with a glorious resurrection, with eternal 
 rest and glory of his humanity, with the exaltation 
 of his name, with a supreme dominion over all the 
 world, and that his Father should make him King 
 of kings, and Prince of the catholic church. These, 
 or whatsoever other comforts the angel ministered, 
 were such considerations which the holy Jesus knew, 
 and the angel knew not but by communication 
 from that God to whose assumed humanity the 
 angel spake; yet he was pleased to receive com- 
 fort from his servant, just as God receives glory 
 from his creatures, and as he rejoices in his own 
 works, even because he is good and gracious, and 
 is pleased so to do; and because himself had caused 
 a voluntary sadness to be interposed between the 
 habitual knowledge and the actual consideration of 
 these discourses. And we feel a pleasure when a 
 friendly hand lays upon our wound the plaister 
 which ourselves have made, and applies such in- 
 struments and considerations of comfort which we 
 have in notion and an ineffective habit, but cannot 
 reduce them to act, because no man is so apt to be 
 his own comforter : which God hath therefore per- 
 mitted, that our need should be the occasion of a 
 mutual charity. 
 
 6. It was a great season for the angels coming, 
 because it was a great necessity which was incum- 
 bent upon our Lord; for his sadness and his 
 agony was so great, mingled and compounded of 
 sorrow and zeal, fear and desire, innocent nature 
 and perfect grace, that he sweat drops as great as 
 if the blood had started through little undis- 
 cerned fontinels, and outrun the streams and 
 
270 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 rivers of his cross. Euthymius 1 and Theophy- 
 lact 2 say, that the evangelists use this as a tragical 
 expression of the greatest agony, and an unusual 
 sweat; it being usual to call the tears of the greatest 
 sorrow ' tears of blood.' But from the beginning 
 of the church it hath been more generally appre- 
 hended literally, and that some blood, mingled with 
 the serous substance, issued from his veins in so 
 great abundance that they moistened the ground 
 and bedecked his garment, which stood like a new 
 firmament studded with stars, portending an ap- 
 proaching storm. Now ' he came from Bozrah 
 with his garments red and bloody.' And this agony 
 verified, concerning the holy Jesus, those words 
 of David : ' I am poured out like water, my bones 
 are dispersed, my heart in the midst of my body is 
 like melting wax,' saith Justin Martyr. 3 Venerable 
 Bede saith, that the descending of these drops of 
 blood upon the earth, besides the general purpose, 
 had also a particular relation to the present infir- 
 mities of the apostles ; that our blessed Lord ob- 
 tained of his Father, by the merits of those holy 
 drops, mercies and special support for them ; and 
 that effusion redeemed them from the present par- 
 ticipation of death. 4 And St. Austin meditates, 
 that the body of our Lord, all overspread with drops 
 of bloody sweat, did prefigure the future state of 
 martyrs; and that his body mystical should be clad 
 in a red garment variegated with the symbols of 
 labour and passion, sweat and blood ; by which 
 
 1 In cap. 24. Matt. 2 In 22 Lucae. 
 
 3 Justin. Mart. Dial. Tryph. Athanas. lib. vi. de Beat, filii 
 Dei. Aug, lib. vi. c. 5. de Conseer. Evang. Hier. lib. de Trad. 
 Heb. Iren. lib. iv. c 31. contra haeres. Idem aiunt Dionys. 
 Alex. Aymonius, Epiphan, et alii. 
 
 * Lib. vi. in Luc. 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION. 
 
 277 
 
 himself was pleased to purify his church, and pre- 
 sent her to God holy and spotless. What collate- 
 ral designs and tacit significations might be de- 
 signed by this mysterious sweat I know not : cer- 
 tainly it was a sad beginning of a most dolorous 
 passion. And such griefs, which have so violent, 
 permanent, and sudden effects upon the body, 
 which is not of a nature symbolical to interior and 
 immaterial causes, are proclaimed by such marks 
 to be high and violent. We have read of some 
 persons, that the grief and fear of one night hath 
 put a cover of snow upon their heads, as if the la- 
 bours of thirty years had been extracted, and the 
 quintessence drank off in the passion of that night* 
 But if nature had been capable of a greater or more 
 prodigious impress of passion than a bloody sweat, 
 it must needs have happened in this agony of the 
 holy Jesus, in which he undertook a grief great 
 enough to make up the imperfect contrition of all 
 the saints, and to satisfy for the impenitencies of 
 all the world. 
 
 7. By this time the traitor Judas was arrived at 
 Gethsemane; and being in the vicinage of the gar- 
 den, Jesus rises from his prayers, and first calls his 
 disciples from their sleep, and by an irony seems 
 to give them leave to sleep on, but reproves their 
 drowsiness when danger is so near, and bids them 
 'henceforth take their rest;' meaning, if they could 
 for danger, which was now indeed come to the 
 garden doors. But the holy Jesus, that it might 
 appear he undertook the passion with choice and a 
 free election, not only refused to fly, but called his 
 apostles to rise, that they might meet his murder- 
 ers, who came to him with swords and staves, as if 
 they were to surprise a prince of armed outlaws 
 
278 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 whom without force they could not reduce. So 
 also might butchers do well to go armed, when 
 they are pleased to be afraid of lambs, by calling 
 them lions. Judas only discovered his Master's 
 retirements, and betrayed him to the opportunities 
 of an armed band ; for he could not accuse his 
 Master of any word or private action, that might 
 render him obnoxious to suspicion or the law : for 
 such are the rewards of innocence and prudence, 
 that the one secures against sin, the other against 
 suspicion and appearances. 
 
 8. The holy Jesus had accustomed to receive 
 every of his disciples, after absence, with entertain- 
 ment of a kiss, which was the endearment of per- 
 sons, and the expression of the oriental civility : and 
 Judas was confident that his Lord would not reject 
 him, whose feet he had washed at the time when he 
 foretold this event, and therefore had agreed to sig- 
 nify him by this sign ; and did so, beginning war 
 with a kiss, and breaking the peace of his Lord by 
 the symbol of kindness. Which because Jesus 
 entertained with much evenness and charitable 
 expressions, calling him 6 friend,' he gave evidence, 
 that if he retained civilities to his greatest enemies, 
 In the very acts of hostility, he hath banquets, and 
 crowns, and sceptres for his friends, that adore him 
 with the kisses of charity, and love him with the sin- 
 cerity of an affectionate spirit. But our blessed Lord, 
 besides his essential sweetness and serenity of spi- 
 rit, understood well how great benefits himself and 
 all the world were to receive by occasion of that act 
 of Judas : and our greatest enemy does by accident 
 to holy persons the offices of their dearest friends; 
 telling us our faults without a cloak to cover their 
 deformities, but out of malice laying open the cir- 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION. 
 
 279 
 
 cumstances of aggravation, doing us affronts, from 
 whence we have an instrument of our patience, 
 and restraining us from scandalous crimes, lest we 
 become ' a scorn and reproof to them that hate us.' 
 And it is none of God's least mercies that he per- 
 mits enmities amongst men, that animosities and 
 peevishness may reprove more sharply, and correct 
 with more severity and simplicity, than the gentle 
 hands of friends, who are apterto bind our wounds 
 up, than to discover them and make them smart. 
 But they are to us an excellent probation how 
 friends may best do the offices of friends, if they 
 would take the plainness of enemies in accusing, 
 and still mingle it with the tenderness and good 
 affections of friends. But our blessed Lord called 
 Judas, ' friend,' as being the instrument of bringing 
 him to glory, and all the world to pardon, if they 
 would. 
 
 9. Jesus himself begins the inquiry, and leads 
 them into their errand, and tells them he was 
 Jesus of Nazareth whom they sought. But this 
 also, which was an answer so gentle, had in it a 
 strength greater than the eastern wind or the voice 
 of thunder : for God was in that still voice, and it 
 struck them down to the ground. And yet they, 
 and so do we, still persist to persecute our Lord, 
 and to provoke the eternal God, who can with the 
 breath of his mouth, with a word or a sign, or a 
 thought, reduce us into nothing, or into a worse 
 condition, even an eternal duration of torments, 
 and cohabitation with a never-ending misery. And 
 if we cannot bear a soft answer of the merciful 
 God, how shall we dare to provoke the wrath of 
 the almighty Judge ? But in this instance there 
 was a rare mixture of effects, as there was in 
 
280 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 Christ of natures ; the voice of a man, and the 
 power of God. For it is observed by the doctors 
 of the primitive ages, that from the nativity of oui 
 Lord to the day of his death, the divinity and hu- 
 manity did so communicate in effects, that no 
 great action passed, but it was like the sun shining 
 through a cloud, or a beauty with a thin veil drawn 
 over it, they gave illustration and testimony to 
 each other. 1 The holy Jesus was born a tender 
 and a crying infant ; but is adored by the magi as 
 a king, by the angels as their God. He is circum- 
 cised as a man ; but a name is given him to sig- 
 nify him to be the Saviour of the world. He flies 
 into Egypt like a distressed child under the con- 
 duct of his helpless parents ; but as soon as he 
 enters the country, the idols fall down and confess 
 his true divinity. He is presented in the temple 
 as the son of man ; but by Simeon and Anna he is 
 celebrated with divine praises for the Messias, the 
 Son of God. He is baptized in Jordan as a sinner ; 
 but the Holy Ghost descending upon him pro- 
 claimed him to be the well-beloved of God. He is 
 hungry in the desert as a man ; but sustained his 
 body without meat and drink for forty days toge- 
 ther by the power of his divinity. There he is 
 tempted of Satan as a weak man; and the angels 
 of light minister unto him as their supreme Lord. 
 And now, a little before his death, when he was to 
 take upon him all the affronts, miseries and exina- 
 nitions of the most miserable, he receives testimonies 
 from above, which are most wonderful : for he 
 was transfigured upon Mount Tabor, entered tri- 
 umphantly into Jerusalem, had the acclamations 
 
 1 S. Cyril. S. Athanas. S. Leo, &c. 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION. 
 
 281 
 
 of the people ; when he was dying, he darkened 
 the sun ; when he was dead, he opened the sepul- 
 chres ; when he was fast nailed to the cross, he 
 made the earth to tremble ; now, when he suffers 
 himself to be apprehended by a guard of soldiers, 
 he strikes them all to the ground only by replying 
 to their answer, that the words of the prophet might 
 be verified : * Therefore my people shall know my 
 name ; therefore they shall know in that day, that 
 I am he that doth speak, behold it is I. M 
 
 10. The soldiers and servants of the Jews having 
 recovered from their fall, and risen by the permis- 
 sion of Jesus, still persisted in their inquiry after 
 him, who was present, ready, and desirous to be 
 sacrificed. He therefore permitted himself to be 
 taken, but not his disciples ; for he it was that set 
 them their bounds; and he secured his apostles to 
 be witnesses of his sufferings and his glories ; and 
 this work was the redemption of the world, in 
 which no man could have an active share, he 
 alone was to tread the wine-press ; and time enough 
 they should be called to a fellowship of sufferings. 2 
 But Jesus went to them, and they bound him with 
 cords : and so began our liberty and redemption 
 from slavery and sin, and cursings and death. 
 But he was bound faster by bands of his own ; his 
 Fathers will, and mercy, pity of the world, pro- 
 phecies, and mysteries, and love held him fast . 
 and these cords were as strong as death ; and the 
 cords which the soldiers' malice put upon his holy 
 hands were but symbols and figures, his own com- 
 passion and affection were the morals. But yet 
 he undertook this short restraint and condition of 
 
 1 Isaiah, lii. 6. 
 
 2 S. Cyril. 
 
2S2 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE 
 
 a prisoner, that all sorts of persecution and exte- 
 rior calamities might be hallowed by his suscep- 
 tion, and these pungent sorrows should like bees 
 sting him, and leave their sting behind, that all 
 the sweetness should remain for us. Some melan- 
 cholic devotions have from uncertain stories added 
 sad circumstances of the first violence done to our 
 Lord ; that they bound him with three cords, and 
 that with so much violence, that they caused blood 
 to start from his tender hands ; that they spat then 
 also upon him with a violence and incivility like 
 that which their fathers had used towards Hur, the 
 brother of Aaron, whom they choked with impure 
 spittings into his throat, because he refused to con- 
 sent to the making a golden calf. These particu- 
 lars are not transmitted by certain records. Cer- 
 tain it is, they wanted no malice, and now no 
 power ; for the Lord had given himself into their 
 hands. 
 
 11. St. Peter, seeing his Master thus ill used, 
 asked, 'Master, shall we strike with the sword ?' 
 and, before he had his answer, cut off the ear of 
 Malchus. Two swords there were in Christ's 
 family, and St. Peter bore one, either because he 
 was to kill the paschal lamb, or, according to the 
 custom of the country, to secure them against 
 beasts of prey, which in that region were frequent, 
 and dangerous in the night. But now he used it 
 in an unlawful war : he had no competent autho- 
 rity ; it was against the ministers of his lawful 
 prince; and against our prince we must not draw 
 a sword for Christ himself, himself having for- 
 bidden us. As his ( kingdom is not of this world,' 
 so neither were his defences secular. He could 
 have called for many legions of angels for his 
 
VESPERS OF THE PASSION. 283 
 
 guard, if he had so pleased ; and we read that 
 one angel slew one hundred and eighty-five thou- 
 sand armed men in one night ; and therefore it 
 was a vast power which was at the command of our 
 Lord ; and he needs not such low auxiliaries as an 
 army of rebels, or a navy of pirates, to defend his 
 cause. He first lays the foundation of our happi- 
 ness in his sufferings, and hath ever since supported 
 religion by patience and suffering, and in poverty, 
 and in all the circumstances and conjunctures of 
 improbable causes. Fighting for religion is cer- 
 tain to destroy charity, but not certain to support 
 faith. St. Peter therefore may use his keys, but 
 he is commanded to put up his sword ; and he did 
 so ; and presently he and all his fellows fairly ran 
 away. And yet that course was much the more 
 Christian ; for though it had in it much infirmity, 
 yet it had no malice. In the meantime the Lord 
 was pleased to touch the ear of Malchus, and he 
 cured it ; adding to the first instance of power, in 
 throwing them to the ground, an act of miraculous 
 mercy, curing the wounds of an enemy made by a 
 friend. But neither did this pierce their callous 
 and obdurate spirits; but they led him in uncouth 
 ways, and through the brook Cedron, 1 in which it 
 is said the ruder soldiers plunged him, and passed 
 upon him all the affronts and rudenesses which an 
 insolent and cruel multitude could think of, to sig- 
 nify their contempt and their rage. And such is 
 the nature of evil men, who, when they are not 
 softened by the instruments and arguments of 
 grace, are much hardened by them : such being 
 the purpose of God, that either grace shall cure 
 
 1 Psalm ex. ult. 
 
284 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS ON THE PASSION. 
 
 sin, or accidentally increase it ; that it shall either 
 pardon it, or bring it to greater punishment. For 
 so I have seen healthful medicines, abused by the 
 incapacities of a healthless body, become fuel to a 
 fever, and increase the distemperature from indis- 
 position to a sharp disease, and from thence to the 
 margin of the grave. But it was otherwise in Saul, 
 whom Jesus threw to the ground with a more 
 angry sound than these persecutors ; but Saul rose 
 a saint, and they persisted devils, and the grace of 
 God distinguished the events. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 I. 
 
 O holy Jesus, make me, by thy example, to conform to the 
 will of that eternal God who is our Father, merciful and graci- 
 ous ; that I may choose all those accidents which his providence 
 hath actually disposed to me ; that I may know no desires but 
 his commands, and his will ; and that, in all afflictions, I may 
 fly thither for mercy, pardon, and support, and may wait for de- 
 liverance in such times and manners which the Father hath re- 
 served in his own power, and graciously dispenses according to 
 his infinite wisdom and compassion. Holy Jesus, give me the 
 gift and spirit of prayer ; and do thou, by thy gracious interces- 
 sion, supply my ignorances and passionate desires and imperfect 
 choices, procuring and giving to me such returns of favour 
 which may support my needs, and serve the ends of religion 
 and the spirit, which thy wisdom chooses, and thy passion hath 
 purchased, and thy grace loves to bestow upon all thy saints 
 and servants. Amen. 
 
 II. 
 
 Eternal God, sweetest Jesu, who didst receive Judas with the 
 affection of a Saviour, and sufFeredst him to kiss thy cheek, with 
 the serenity and tranquillity of God ; and didst permit the 
 soldiers to bind thee, with patience exemplary to all ages of 
 
ON THE SCOURGING OF JESUS. 
 
 285 
 
 martyrs ; and didst cure the wound of thy enemy with the cha- 
 rity of a parent, and the tenderness of an infinite pity ; O kiss 
 me with the kisses of thy mouth, embrace me with the entertain- 
 ments of a gracious Lord, and let my soul dwell and feast in 
 thee who art the repository of eternal sweetness and refreshments. 
 Bind me, O Lord, with those bands which tied thee fast, the 
 chains of love; that such holy union may dissolve the cords of 
 vanity, and confine the bold pretensions of usurping passions, 
 and imprison all extravagancies of an impertinent spirit, and lead 
 sin captive to the dominion of grace and sanctified reason : that I 
 also may imitate all the parts of thy holy passion, and may- by 
 thy bands get my liberty, by thy kiss enkindle charity, by the 
 touch of thy hand and the breath of thy mouth have all my 
 wounds cured and restored to the integrity of a holy penitent, 
 and the purities of innocence ; that I may love thee, and please 
 thee, and live with thee for ever, O holy and sweetest Jesu. 
 Amen. 
 
 Considerations upon the Scourging and other Accidents 
 happening from the Apprehension till the Cruci- 
 fixion of Jesus, 
 
 1. The house of Annas stood in the Mount 
 Sion, and in the way to the house of Caiaphas ; 
 and thither he was led as to the first stage of their 
 triumph for their surprise of a person so feared 
 and desired ; and there a naughty person smote 
 the holy Jesus upon his face, for saying to Annas 
 that he had made his doctrine public, and that all 
 the people were able to give account of it: to 
 whom the Lamb of God showed as much meekness 
 and patience in his answer, as in his answer to 
 Annas he had showed prudence and modesty : for 
 now that they had taken Jesus, they wanted a 
 crime to object against him, and therefore were de- 
 sirous to snatch occasion from his discourses, to 
 
286 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 which they resolved to tempt him, by questions 
 and affronts ; but his answer was general and in- 
 definite, safe and true, enough to acquit his doc- 
 trine from suspicions of secret designs, and yet se- 
 cure against their present snares ; for now himself, 
 who always had the innocence of doves, was to 
 join with it the prudence and wariness of serpents; 
 not to prevent death, (for that he was resolved to 
 suffer,) but that they might be destitute of all ap- 
 pearance of a just cause on his part. Here it was 
 that Judas received his money ; and here, that 
 holy face which was designed to be that object in 
 the beholding of which much of the celestial glory 
 doth consist ; that face which the angels stare upon 
 with wonder, like infants at a bright sun-beam, was 
 smitten extrajudicially by an incompetent person, 
 with circumstances of despite, in the presence of 
 a judge, in a full assembly, and none reproved the 
 insolency and the cruelty of the affront : for they 
 resolved to use him as they use wolves and tigers, 
 with all things that may be destructive, violent, 
 and impious: and in this the injury was height- 
 ened, because the blow was said to be given by 
 Malchus, an Idumean slave, 1 and therefore a con- 
 temptible person ; but far more unworthy by his 
 ingratitude ; for so he repaid the holy Jesus for 
 working a miracle, and healing his ear. But so 
 the Scripture was fulfilled : f He shall give his 
 body to the smiters, and his cheeks to the nippers, 
 saith the prophet Isaiah ; and ' they shall smite the 
 cheek of the judge of Israel,' saith Micah. And 
 this very circumstance of the passion Lactantius 
 
 1 Malchus Idumaeis missus captivus ab oris. Vide Episc. 
 Cremon. lib. ii. Christeidos. Isai. 1. 6; Micah. v. 1. 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 287 
 
 affirms to have been foretold by the Erythraean 
 sibyl. 1 But no meekness or indifferency could 
 engage our Lord not to protest his innocency : 
 and though following his steps we must walk in 
 the regions of patience, and tranquillity, and ad- 
 mirable toleration of injuries ; yet we may repre- 
 sent such defences of ourselves, which by not re- 
 sisting the sentence may testify that our suffering 
 is undeserved : and if our innocency will not pre- 
 serve our lives, it will advance our title to a better ; 
 and every good cause ill-judged shall be brought 
 to another tribunal to receive a just and unerring 
 sentence. 
 
 2. Annas having suffered this unworthy usage 
 towards a person so excellent, sent him away to 
 Caiaphas, who had formerly, in a full council, re- 
 solved he should die;* yet now palliating the de- 
 sign with the scheme of a tribunal, they seek out 
 for witnesses, and the witnesses are to seek for alle- 
 gations ; and when they find them, they are to 
 seek for proof, and those proofs were to seek for 
 unity and consent, and nothing was ready for their 
 purposes; but they were forced to use the sem- 
 blance of a judicial process, that, because they 
 were to make use of Pilate's authority to put him 
 to death, they might persuade Pilate to accept of 
 their examination and conviction, without further 
 inquiry. But such had been the excellency and 
 exemplary piety and prudence of the life of Jesus, 
 that if they pretended against him questions of 
 their law, they were not capital in a Roman court; 
 
 1 Lib. iv. Instit. cap. 18. 
 
 2 Victor, in S. Mart. 
 
288 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 if they affirmed that he had moved the people to 
 sedition, and affected the kingdom, they saw that 
 all the world would convince them of false testi- 
 mony. At last, after many attempts, they accused 
 him for a figurative speech, a trope which they 
 could not understand ; which, if it had been spoken 
 in a literal sense, and had been acted too accord- 
 ing to the letter, had been so far from a fault that 
 it would have been a prodigy of power ; and it 
 had been easier to raise the temple of Jerusalem, 
 than to raise the temple of his body. In the mean- 
 time, the Lamb of God left his cause to defend itself 
 under the protection of his heavenly Father ; not 
 only because himself was determined to die, but 
 because if he had not, those premises could never 
 have inferred it. But this silence of the holy Jesus 
 fulfilled a prophecy; it made his enemies full of 
 murmur and amazement, it made them to see that 
 he despised the accusations as certain and apparent 
 calumnies ; but that himself was fearless of the 
 issue, and in the sense of morality and mysteries 
 taught us not to be too apt to excuse ourselves, 
 when the semblance of a fault lies upon us, unless 
 by some other duty we are obliged to our defences ; 
 since he who was most innocent was most silent : 
 and it was expedient, that as the first Adam in- 
 creased his sin by a vain apology, the silence and 
 sufferance of the second Adam should expiate and 
 reconcile it. 
 
 3. But Caiaphas had a reserve which he knew 
 should do the business in that assembly ; he ad- 
 jured him, by God, to tell him if he were the 
 Christ. The holy Jesus, being adjured by so sacred 
 a name, would not now refuse an answer, lest it 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 289 
 
 might not consist with that honour which is due to 
 it, and which he always paid ; and that he might 
 neither despise the authority of the high-priest, nor 
 upon so solemn occasion be wanting to that great 
 truth which he came down to earth to persuade to 
 the world. And when three such circumstances 
 concur, it is enough to open our mouths, though we 
 let in death ; and so did our Lord — confessed him- 
 self to be the Christ, the Son of the living God. 
 And this the high-priest was pleased, as the design 
 was laid, to call blasphemy; and there they voted 
 him to die. Then it was the high-priest rent his 
 clothes ; the veil of the temple was rent when the 
 passion was finished, the clothes of the priests at 
 the beginning of it; and as that signified the de- 
 parting of the synagogue, and laying religion open, 
 so did the rending the garments of Caiaphas pro- 
 phetically signify that the priesthood should be 
 rent from him, and from the nation. 1 And thus 
 the personated and theatrical admiration at Jesus 
 became the type of his own punishment, and con- 
 signed the nation to deletion : and usually God so 
 dispenses his judgments, that when men personate 
 the tragedies of others, they really act their own. 
 
 4. Whilst these things were acting concerning 
 the Lord, a sad accident happened to his servant, 
 Peter; for being engaged in strange and evil com- 
 pany, in the midst of danger, surprised with a 
 question, without time to deliberate an answer, to 
 find subterfuges, or to fortify himself, he denied his 
 Lord shamefully, with some boldness at first; and 
 this grew to a licentious confidence, and then to 
 impudence, and denying with perjury, that he 
 knew not his Lord, who yet was known to him as 
 
 1 Origen. idem ait, S. Hier. 
 VOL. III. T T 
 
290 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 bis own heart, and was dearer than his eyes, and 
 for whom he professed, but a little before, he would 
 die ; but did not do so till many years after : but 
 thus he became to us a sad example of human in- 
 firmity ; and if the prince of the apostles fell so 
 foully, it is full of pity, but not to be upbraided, if 
 we see the fall of lesser stars. 1 And yet that we 
 may prevent so great a ruin, we must not mingle 
 with such company who will provoke or scorn us 
 into sin ; and if we do, yet we must stand upon 
 our guard that a sudden motion do not surprise us : 
 or if we be arrested, yet let us not enter further in 
 our sin, like wild beasts intricating themselves by 
 their impatience ; for there are some who, being 
 ashamed and impatient to have been engaged, take 
 sanctuary in boldness, and a shameless abetting it; 
 so running into the darkness of hell to hide their 
 nakedness. But he also by returning, and rising 
 instantly, became to us a rare example of penitence ; 
 and his not lying long in the crime did facilitate his 
 restitution : for the Spirit of God being extinguished 
 by our works of darkness, is like a taper, which if, as 
 soon as the flame is blown out, it be brought to the 
 fire, it sucks light, and without trouble is rekindled; 
 but if it cools into death and stiffness, it requires 
 a longer stay and trouble. The holy Jesus in the 
 midst of his own sufferings forgot not his servant's 
 danger, but was pleased to look upon him when 
 the cock crew ; and the cock was the preacher, and 
 the look of Jesus was the grace that made his ser- 
 mon effectual; and because he was but newly 
 
 1 "Ov rpoirov at gkicu tolq Gb)\xa<5iv s7rovrai. htioq ai apap- 
 riai tolq ipvxcug aicoXsSscnv. Agapet. Diac Capit. Admonit. 
 fi9. Leo Serm. 9, de Pass. Dora, et Euthym. in hunc locum.— 
 " In the same manner as shadows follow bodies, so do sins the 
 soul." 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 291 
 
 fallen, and his habitual love of his Master though 
 interrupted, yet had suffered no natural abatement, 
 he returned with the swiftness of an eagle to the 
 embraces and primitive affections of his Lord. 
 
 5. By this time suppose sentence given, Caia- 
 phas prejudging all the Sanhedrim ; for he first 
 declared Jesus to have spoken blasphemy, and the 
 fact to be notorious, and then asked their votes ; 
 which whoso then should have denied, must have 
 contested the judgment of the high-priest, who by 
 the favour of the Romans was advanced, (Valerius 
 Gratus, who was president of Judea, having been 
 his patron,) and his faction potent, and his malice 
 great, and his heart set upon this business: all 
 which inconveniences none of them durst have suf- 
 fered, unless he had had the confidence greater than 
 of an apostle at that time. But this sentence was but 
 like strong dispositions to an enraged fever ; he was 
 only declared apt and worthy for death, they had 
 no power at that time to inflict it; but yet they 
 let loose all the fury of madmen and insolency of 
 wounded, smarting soldiers; and although, from 
 the time of his being in the house of Annas till 
 the council met, they had used him with studied 
 indignities ; yet now they renewed and doubled 
 the unmercifulness and their injustice, to so great 
 a height that their injuries must needs have been 
 greater than his patience, if his patience had been 
 less than infinite. For thus man's redemption 
 grows up as the load swells which the holy Jesus 
 bare for us ; for these were our portion, and we, 
 having turned the flowers of paradise into thistles, 
 should for ever have felt their infelicity, had not 
 Jesus paid the debt. But he, bearing them upon 
 his tender body with an even and excellent and 
 
 u 2 
 
292 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 dispassionate spirit, offered up these beginnings 
 of sufferings to his Father, to obtain pardon 
 even for them that injured him, and for all the 
 world. 
 
 6. Judas now seeing that this matter went fur- 
 ther than he intended it, repented of his fact. For 
 although evil persons are in the progress of their 
 iniquity invited on by new arguments, and sup- 
 ported by confidence and a careless spirit; yet 
 when iniquity is come to the height, or so great a 
 proportion that it is apt to produce despair or an 
 intolerable condition, then the devil suffers the 
 conscience to thaw and grow tender, but it is the 
 tenderness of a bile, it is soreness rather than a 
 new disease; and either it comes when the time of 
 repentance is past, or leads to some act which shall 
 make the pardon to be impossible ; and so it hap- 
 pened here. For Judas, either impatient of the 
 shame or of the sting, was thrust on to despair of 
 pardon, with a violence as hasty and as great as 
 were his needs. And despair is very often used like 
 the bolts and bars of hell-gates ; it seizes upon them 
 that had entered into the suburbs of eternal death by 
 an habitual sin, and it secures them against all re- 
 treat. And the devil is forward enough to bring a 
 man to repentance, provided it be too late ; and Esau 
 wept bitterly and repented him; and the five fool- 
 ish virgins lift up their voice aloud when the gates 
 were shut; and in hell men shall repent to all eter- 
 nity. But I consider the very great folly and in- 
 felicity of Judas : it was at midnight he received 
 his money in the house of Annas; betimes in 
 that morning he repented his bargain : he threw 
 the money back again, but his sin stuck close, and 
 it is thought to a sad eternity. Such is the pur- 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXON. 
 
 293 
 
 chase of treason and the reward of covetousness ; 
 it is cheap in its offers, momentary in its posses- 
 sion, unsatisfying "in the fruition, uncertain in the 
 stay, sudden in its departure, horrid in the remem- 
 brance, and a ruin, a certain and miserable ruin is 
 in the event. When Judas came in that sad condi- 
 tion, and told his miserable story to them that set 
 him on work, they let him go away unpitied : he 
 had served their ends in betraying his Lord, and 
 those that hire such servants use to leave them in 
 the disaster, to shame and to sorrow ; and so did 
 the priests; but took the money, and refused to 
 put it into the treasury, because it was 6 the price 
 of blood ;' but they made no scruple to take it from 
 the treasury to buy that blood. Any thing seems 
 lawful that serves the ends of ambitious and bloody 
 persons, and then they are scrupulous in their 
 cases of conscience when nothing of interest does 
 intervene ; for evil men make religion the servant 
 of interest; and sometimes weak men think that it 
 is the fault of the religion, and suspect that all of 
 it is a design, because many great politics make it 
 so. The end of the tragedy was, that Judas died 
 with an ignoble death, marked with the circum- 
 stances of a horrid judgment, and perished by the 
 most infamous hands in the world ; that is, by his 
 own. 1 Which if it be confronted against the ex- 
 cellent spirit of St. Peter, who did an act as con- 
 tradictory to his honour and the grace of God as 
 could be easily imagined ; yet taking sanctuary 
 in the arms of his Lord, he lodged in his heart 
 for ever, and became an example to all the world 
 of the excellency of the divine mercy, and the 
 
 1 S. August, de civit. Dei, lib. i. c. 17. 
 
294 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 efficacy of a holy hope, and a hearty, timely, and 
 an operative repentance. 
 
 7. But now all things were ready for the pur- 
 pose, the high-priest and all his council go along 
 with the holy Jesus to the house of Pilate, hoping 
 he would verify their sentence, and bring it to ex- 
 ecution, that they might once be rid of their fears, 
 and enjoy their sin and their reputation quietly. 
 St. Basil affirms, that the high-priest caused the 
 holy Jesus to be led with a cord about his neck; 
 and in memory of that, the priests for many ages 
 wore a stole about theirs. 1 But the Jews did it 
 according to the custom of the nation, to signify 
 he was condemned to death : they desired Pilate 
 that he would crucify him, they having found him 
 worthy. And when Pilate inquired into the par- 
 ticulars, they gave him a general and indefinite 
 answer; ' If he were not guilty, we would not have 
 brought him unto thee they intended not to make 
 Pilate judge of the cause, but executor of their 
 cruelty. But Pilate had not learned to be guided 
 by an implicit faith of such persons, which he 
 knew to be malicious and violent; and therefore 
 still called for instances and arguments of their 
 accusation. And that all the world might see with 
 how great un worthiness they prosecuted the Mes- 
 sias, they chiefly there accused him of such crimes 
 upon which themselves condemned him not, and 
 which they knew to be false, but yet likely to move 
 Pilate, if he had been passionate or inconsiderate 
 in his sentences ; ' he offered to make himself a 
 king.' This discourse happened at the entry of 
 the Praetorium; for the Jews, who had no con- 
 
 1 In Mystagog. Eccles. Autho. Com. in Marc. apud. S. 
 Hieron. 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 295 
 
 science of killing the King of heaven, made a con- 
 science of the external customs and ceremonies of 
 their law, which had in them no interior sanctity, 
 which were apt to separate them from the nations, 
 and remark them with characters of religion and 
 abstraction : it would defile them to go to a Roman 
 forum, where a capital action was to be judged ; 
 and yet the effusion of the best blood in the world 
 was not esteemed against their religion ; so violent 
 and blind is the spirit of malice, which turns hu- 
 manity into cruelty, wisdom into craft, diligence 
 into subornation, and religion into superstition. 
 
 8. Two other articles they alleged against him ; 
 but the first concerned not Pilate, and the second 
 was involved in the third, and therefore he chose 
 to examine him upon this only, of his being a 
 king. To which the holy Jesus answered, that it 
 is true he was a king indeed, but ' not of this 
 world his throne is heaven, the angels are his 
 courtiers, and the whole creation are his subjects: 
 his regiment is spiritual, his judicatories are the 
 courts of conscience and church tribunals, and at 
 doomsday, the clouds: the tribute which he de- 
 mands are conformity to his laws, faith, hope, and 
 charity; no other gabels but the duties of a holy 
 spirit, and the expresses of a religious worship, and 
 obedient will, and a consenting understanding. 
 And in all this Pilate thought the interest of 
 Caesar was not invaded. For certain it is, the dis- 
 cipline of Jesus confirmed it much, and supported 
 it by the strongest pillars. And here Pilate saw 
 how impertinent and malicious their accusation 
 was. And we who declaim against the unjust 
 proceedings of the Jews against our dearest Lord, 
 should do well to take care that we, in accusing any 
 
296 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 of our brethren either with malicious purpose, or 
 with an uncharitable circumstance, do not commit 
 the same fault which in them we so hate and ac- 
 cuse. Let no man speak any thing of his neighbour 
 but what is true. And yet if the truth be height- 
 ened by the biting rhetoric of a satirical spirit, ex- 
 tended and drawn forth in circumstances and arts 
 of aggravation, the truth becomes a load to a guilty 
 person, is a prejudice to the sentence of the judge, 
 and hath not so much as the excuse of zeal, much 
 less the charity of Christianity. Sufficient to every 
 man is the plain story of his crime : and to excuse 
 as much of it as we can, would better become us, 
 who perish unless we be excused for infinite irregu- 
 larities. But if we add this also, that we accuse our 
 brethren before them that may amend them and 
 reform their error, if we pity their persons, and do 
 not hate them, if we seek nothing of their disgrace, 
 and make not their shame public, but when the 
 public is necessarily concerned, or the state of the 
 man's sin requires it, then our accusations are 
 charitable ; but if they be not, all such accusations 
 are accepted by Christ with as much displeasure, 
 in proportion to the degree of the malice and the 
 proper effect, as was this accusation of his own 
 person. 
 
 9. But Pilate having pronounced Jesus inno- 
 cent, and perceiving he was a Galilean, sent him to 
 Herod, as being a more competent person to deter* 
 mine concerning one of his own jurisdiction. 
 Herod was glad at the honour done to him, and 
 the person brought him, being now desirous to see 
 some miracle done before him. But the holy 
 Jesus spake not one word there, nor did any sign ; 
 so to reprove the sottish carelessness of Herod, 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 297 
 
 who, living in the place of Jesus's abode, never had 
 seen his person or heard his sermons. And if we 
 neglect the opportunities of grace, and refuse to 
 hear the voice of Christ in the time of mercy and 
 divine appointment, we may arrive at that state of 
 misery in which Christ will refuse to speak one 
 word of comfort to us ; and the homilies of the 
 gospel shall be dead letters, and the spirit not at 
 all refreshed, nor the understanding instructed, 
 nor the affections moved, nor the will determined ; 
 but because we have, during all our time, stopped 
 our ears, in his time God will stop his mouth, and 
 shut up the springs of grace, that we shall receive 
 no refreshment, or instruction, or pardon, or feli- 
 city. Jesus suffered not himself to be moved at 
 the pertinacious accusations of the Jews, nor the 
 desires of the tyrant, but persevered in silence, till 
 Herod and his servants despised him and dismissed 
 him. For so it became our high-priest, who was 
 to sanctify all our sufferings, to consecrate affronts 
 and scorn, that we may learn to endure contempt, 
 and to suffer ourselves in a religious cause to be 
 despised ; and when it happens in any other, to re- 
 member that we have our dearest Lord for a prece- 
 dent of bearing it with admirable simplicity and 
 equanimity of deportment. And it is a mighty 
 stock of self-love that dwells in our spirits, which 
 makes us of all afflictions most impatient of this. 
 But Jesus endured this despite, and suffered this 
 to be added, that he was exposed, in scorn, to the 
 boys of the streets. For Herod caused him to be 
 arrayed in white, sent him out to be scorned by the 
 people, and hooted at by idle persons, and so he 
 remitted him to Pilate. And since that accident 
 to our Lord, the church hath not undecently chose 
 
298 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 to clothe her priests with albs or white garments ; 
 and it is a symbolical intimation and represent- 
 ment of that part of the passion and affront which 
 Herod passed upon the holy Jesus. And this is 
 so far from deserving a reproof, that it were to be 
 wished all the children of the church would imi- 
 tate all those graces which Christ exercised when 
 he wore that garment, which she hath taken up in 
 ceremony and thankful memory ; that is, in all their 
 actions and sufferings be so estranged from secular 
 arts and mixtures of the world, so intent upon reli- 
 gion, and active in all its interests, so indifferent to 
 all acts of providence, so equal in all chances, so 
 patient of every accident, so charitable to enemies, 
 and so undeterred by exterior events, that nothing 
 may draw us forth from the severities of our reli- 
 gion, or entice us from the retirement of a recol- 
 lected and sober and patient spirit, or make us to 
 depart from the courtesies of piety, though for 
 such adhesion and pursuit we be esteemed fools, 
 or ignorant, or contemptible. 
 
 10. When Pilate had received the holy Jesus, 
 and found that Herod had sent him back uncon- 
 demned, he attempted to rescue him from their 
 malice, by making him a donative and a freed 
 man at the petition of the people. But they prefer- 
 red a murderer and a rebel, Barabbas, before him : 
 for themselves being rebels against the King of 
 heaven, loved to acquit persons criminal in the 
 same kind of sin, rather than their Lord, against 
 whom they took up all the arms that they could 
 receive from violence and perfect malice ; ' desiring 
 to have him crucified who raised the dead, and to 
 have the other released who destroyed the living.' 
 And when Pilate saw they were set upon it he 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 299 
 
 consented, and delivered him first to be scourged ; 
 which the soldiers executed with violence and un- 
 relenting hands, opening his virginal body to na- 
 kedness, and tearing his tender flesh, till the pave- 
 ment was purpled with a shower of holy blood. 1 It 
 is reported in the ecclesiastical story, that when 
 St. Agnes and St. Barbara, holy virgins and mar- 
 tyrs, were stripped naked to execution, God, pity- 
 ing their great shame and trouble to have their 
 nakedness discovered, made for them a veil of 
 light, and sent them to a modest and desired death. 
 But the holy Jesus, who chose all sorts of shame 
 and confusion, that by a fulness of suffering he 
 might expiate his Father's anger, and that he 
 might consecrate to our sufferance all kind of 
 affront and passion, endured even the shame of 
 nakedness at the time of his scourging, suffering 
 himself to be divested of his robes, that we might 
 be clothed with that stole he put off. For there- 
 fore he took on him the state of sinning Adam, and 
 became naked, that we might first be clothed with 
 righteousness, and then with immortality. 
 
 11. After they had scourged him without re- 
 morse, ' they clothed him with purple, and crowned 
 him with thorns, and put a cane in his hands, for 
 a sceptre, and bowed their knees before him/ and 
 ' saluted him ' with mockery, with a ' Hail, King of 
 the Jews !' and they ' beat him,' and ' spat upon 
 him:' and then Pilate brought him forth, and 
 showed this sad spectacle to the people ; hoping 
 this might move them to compassion, who never 
 loved to see a man prosperous, and are always 
 troubled to see the same man in misery. But the 
 
 1 S. Aug. tract, xv. in Joann. 
 
300 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 earth, which was cursed for Adam's sake, and was 
 sowed with thorns and thistles, produced the full 
 harvest of them ; and the second Adam gathered 
 them all, and made garlands of them, as ensigns of 
 his victory which he was now in pursuit of against 
 sin, the grave, and hell. And we also may make 
 our thorns, which are in themselves pungent and 
 dolorous, to be a crown, if we bear them patiently, 
 and unite them to Christ's passion, and offer them 
 to his honour, and bear them in his cause, and 
 rejoice in them for his sake. And indeed, after 
 such a grove of thorns growing upon the head of 
 our Lord, to see one of Christ's members soft, deli- 
 cate, and effeminate, is a great indecency, next to 
 this of seeing the Jews use the King of glory with 
 the greatest reproach and infamy. 
 
 12. But nothing prevailing, nor the innocence of 
 Jesus, nor his immunity from the sentence of 
 Herod, nor the industry and diligence of Pilate, 
 nor the misery nor the sight of the afflicted Lamb 
 of God, at last (for so God decreed to permit it, 
 and Christ to suffer it) Pilate gave sentence of 
 death upon him, having first washed his hands. Of 
 which God served his end, to declare the innocence 
 of his Son, of which in this whole process he was 
 most curious, and suffered not the least probability 
 to adhere to him : yet Pilate served no end of his, 
 nor preserved any thing of his innocence. He 
 that rails upon a prince, and cries, Saving your 
 honour, you are a tyrant ; and he that strikes a 
 man upon the face, and cries him mercy, and un- 
 does him, and says it was in jest, does just like 
 that person that sins against God, and thinks 
 to be excused by saying it was against his 
 conscience; that is, washing our hands when 
 
TILL THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 301 
 
 they are stained in blood ; as if a ceremony of pu- 
 rification were enough to cleanse a soul from the 
 stains of a spiritual impurity. So some refuse not 
 to take any oath in times of persecution, and say 
 it obliges not, because it was forced, and done 
 against their will ; as if the doing of it were washed 
 off by protesting against it : whereas the protesting 
 against it declares me criminal, if I rather choose 
 not death than that which I profess to be a sin. 
 But all the persons which co-operated in this 
 death, were in this life consigned to a fearful judg- 
 ment after it. The Jews took the blood (which 
 Pilate seemed to wash off) ' upon themselves and 
 their children;' and the blood of this paschal 
 Lamb stuck upon their forehead, and marked them, 
 not to escape, but to fall under the sword of the 
 destroying angel ; and they perished either by a 
 more hasty death, or shortly after in the extirpa- 
 tion and miserable ruin of their nation. And 
 Pilate who had a less share in the crime, yet had 
 a black character of a secular judgment : for not 
 long after he was by Vitellius, the president of 
 Syria, sent to Rome to answer to the crimes ob- 
 jected against him by the Jews, whom to please he 
 had done so much violence to his conscience ; 
 and by Caesars sentence he was banished to Vienna, 
 deprived of all his honours, where he lived inglo- 
 riously, till, by impatience of his calamity, he killed 
 himself with his own hand. And thus the blood of 
 Jesus, shed for the salvation of the world, became 
 to them a curse ; and that which purifies the saints, 
 stuck to them that shed it, (and mingled it not with 
 the tears of repentance,) to be a leprosy loathsome 
 and incurable. So manna turns to worms, and the 
 wine of angels to vinegar and lees, when it is re- 
 
302 ACCIDENTS FROM THE APPREHENSION 
 
 ceived into impure vessels, or tasted by wanton 
 palates ; and the sun itself produces rats and ser- 
 pents, when it reflects upon the dirt of Nilus. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O holy and immaculate Lamb of God, who wert pleased to 
 suffer shame and sorrow, to be brought before tribunals, to be 
 accused maliciously, betrayed treacherously, condemned unjustly, 
 and scourged most rudely, suffering the most severe and most un- 
 handsome inflictions which could be procured by potent, subtle, 
 and extremest malice ; and didst choose this out of love greater 
 than the love of mothers, more affectionate than the tears of joy 
 and pity dropped from the eyes of most passionate women, by 
 these fontinels of blood issuing forth life and health and pardon 
 upon all thine enemies ; teach me to apprehend the baseness of 
 sin, in proportion to the greatest of those calamities which my 
 sin made it necessary for thee to suffer, that I may hate the cause 
 of thy sufferings, and adore thy mercy, and imitate thy charity, 
 and copy out thy patience and humility, and love thy person to 
 the uttermost extent and degrees of my affections. Lord, what 
 am I, that the eternal Son of God should suffer one stripe for 
 me ? But thy love is infinite. And how great a misery is it to 
 provoke by sin so great a mercy, and despise so miraculous a 
 goodness, and to do fresh despite to the Son of God ? But our 
 sins are innumerable, and our infirmities are mighty. Dearest 
 Jesu, pity me, for I am accused by my own conscience, and am 
 found guilty ; I am stripped naked of my innocence, and bound 
 fast by lust, and tormented with stripes and wounds of enraged 
 appetites. But let thy innocence excuse me, the robes of thy 
 righteousness clothe me, thy bondage set me free, and thy stripes 
 heal me: that thou being my advocate, my physician, my 
 patron, and my Lord, I may be adopted into the union of thy 
 merits, and partake of the efficacy of thy sufferings, and be 
 crowned as thou art, having my sins changed to virtues, and my 
 thorns to rays of glory under thee our head, in the participation 
 of eternity, () holy and immaculate Lamb of God. Amen. 
 
OF A DUE PREPARATION FOR DEATH. 303 
 
 DISCOURSE XX. 
 Of Death, and the due Manner of Preparation to it. 
 
 L The Holy Spirit of God hath in Scripture re- 
 vealed to us but one way of preparing' to death, and 
 that is, by a holy life ; and there is nothing in all 
 the book of life, concerning this exercise of address 
 to death, but such advices which suppose the dying 
 person in a state of grace. St. James indeed coun- 
 sels, that in sickness we should send for the minis- 
 ters ecclesiastical, and that they ' pray over us,' and 
 that we ' confess our sins, and they shall be for- 
 given ;' 1 that is, those prayers are of great efficacy 
 for the removing the sickness, and taking off that 
 punishment of sin, and healing them in a certain 
 degree, according to the efficacy of the ministry, 
 and the dispositions or capacities of the sick per- 
 son. But we must know that oftentimes univer- 
 sal effects are attributed to partial causes ; be- 
 cause by the analogy of Scripture we are taught, 
 that all the body of holy actions and ministries are 
 to unite in production of the event, and that without 
 that adunation one thing alone cannot operate : but 
 because no one alone does the work, but by an united 
 power, therefore indefinitely the effect is ascribed 
 sometimes to one, sometimes to another; meaning, 
 that one as much as the other, that is, all together, 
 are to work the pardon and the grace. But the 
 doctrine of preparation to death we are clearest 
 taught in the parable of the ten virgins. 2 Those 
 who were wise stood waiting for the coming of the 
 bridegroom, their lamps burning ; only when the 
 
 1 Jam, v. 14, &c. 
 
 2 Matt. xxv. 
 
304 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 Lord was at hand, the notice of his coming 
 published, they trimmed their lamps ; and they, so 
 disposed, went forth, and met him, and entered 
 with him into his interior and eternal joys. They 
 whose lamps did not stand ready beforehand, ex- 
 pecting the uncertain hour, were shut forth, and 
 bound in darkness. 'Watch, therefore, (so our 
 Lord applies and expounds the parable,) for ye 
 know not the day nor the hour of the coming of 
 the Son of man.' 1 Whenever the arrest of death 
 seizes us, unless before that notice we had oil 
 in our vessels, that is, grace in our hearts, ha- 
 bitual grace, (for nothing else can reside or 
 dwell there, an act cannot inhabit or be in a vessel,) 
 it is too late to make preparation. But they who 
 have it, may and must prepare ; that is, they must 
 stir the fire, trim the vessel, make it more actual in 
 its exercise and productions, full of ornament, ad- 
 vantages, and degrees. And that is all we know from 
 Scripture concerning preparation. 
 
 2. And indeed, since all our life we are dying 
 and this minute in which I now write, death di- 
 vides with me, and hath got the surer part and more 
 certain possession, it is but reasonable that we 
 should always be doing the offices of preparation. 
 If to-day we were not dying, and passing on to our 
 grave, then we might with more safety defer our 
 work till the morrow. But as fuel in a furnace, in 
 every degree of heat and reception of the flame, is 
 converting into fire and ashes, and the disposing it 
 to the last mutation, is the same work with the last 
 instance of its change ; so is the age of every day a 
 beginning of death, and the night composing us 
 
 1 Matt. xiii. 25. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 305 
 
 to sleep bids us go to our lesser rest ; because that 
 night, which is the end of the preceding day, is but 
 a lesser death : and whereas now we have died so 
 many days, the last day of our life is but the dying 
 of so many more; and when that last day of dying 
 will come we know not. There is nothing then add- 
 ed but the circumstance of sickness, which also hap- 
 pens many times before ; only men are pleased to 
 call that death which is the end of dying, when we 
 cease to die any more. And therefore to put off 
 our preparation till that which we call death, is to 
 put off the work of all our life, till the time comes 
 in w hich it is to cease and determine. 
 
 3. But to accelerate our early endeavour, (be- 
 sides what hath been formerly considered upon the 
 proper grounds of repentance,) I here reinforce the 
 consideration of death in such circumstances which 
 are apt to engage us upon an early industry. First, 
 Iconsider, that no man is sure that he shall not die 
 suddenly ; and therefore, if heaven be worth secur- 
 ing, it were fit that we should reckon every day the 
 vespers of death; and therefore, that, according to 
 the usual rites of religion, it be begun and spent with 
 religious offices. And let us consider, that those 
 many persons who are remarked in history to have 
 died suddenly, either were happy by an early 
 piety, or miserable by a sudden death. And if un- 
 certainty of condition be an abatement of felicity, 
 and spoils the good we possess, no man can be 
 happy but he that hath lived well; that is, who hath 
 secured his condition by an habitual and living 
 piety : for since God hath not told us we shall not 
 die suddenly, is it not certain he intended we 
 should prepare for sudden death, as well as against 
 
 VOL. III. X 
 
306 
 
 OF DUE PREPARATION 
 
 death clothed in any other circumstances ? Fabius, 
 surnamed Pictor, was choked with a hair in a mess 
 of milk; Anacreon with a raisin; cardinal Colonna 
 with figs crusted with ice ; Adrian the Fourth with a 
 fly; DrusiusPompeius with a pear; Domitius Afer, 
 Quintilian's tutor, with a full cup; Casimire the Se- 
 cond, king of Polonia, with a little draught of wine; 
 Amurath with a full goblet;Tarquinius Priscus with 
 a fish-bone. For as soon as a man is born, that which 
 in nature only remains to him is to die : and if we 
 differ in way or time of our abode, or the manner 
 of our exit, yet we are even at last. And since it 
 is not determined by a natural cause which way 
 w r e shall go, or at what age, a wise man will sup 
 pose himself always upon his death-bed : and such 
 supposition is like making of his will ; he is not 
 the nearer death for doing it, but he is the readier 
 for it when it comes. 
 
 4. Saint Jerome said well, " He deserves not the 
 name of a Christian, who will live in that state of 
 life in which he will not die." And indeed it is a 
 great venture to be in an evil state of life, because 
 every minute of it hath a danger : and therefore a 
 succession of actions, in every one of which he may 
 as well perish as escape, is a boldness that hath no 
 mixture of wisdom or probable venture. How 
 many persons have died in the midst of an act of 
 sport, or at a merry-meeting ! Grimoaldus, a Lom- 
 bard king, died with shooting of a pigeon ; Thales, 
 the Milesian, in the theatre ; Lucia, the sister of 
 Aurelius the emperor, playing with her little son, 
 was wounded in her breast with a needle, and 
 died. Benno, bishop of Adelburg, with great cere- 
 mony and joy consecrating St. Michael's church, 
 
FOR DEATH, 
 
 307 
 
 was crowded to death by the people ; 1 so was the 
 duke of Saxony, at the inauguration of Albert I. 
 The great lawyer Baldus, playing with a little dog, 
 was bitten upon the lip, instantly grew mad, and 
 perished. Charles the Eighth, of France, seeing 
 certain gentlemen playing at tenniscourt, swooned, 
 and recovered not. Henry II. was killed running 
 at tilt. Ludovicus Borgia with riding the great 
 horse ; and the old Syracusan, Archimedes, was 
 slain by a rude soldier, as he was making diagrams 
 in the sand, which was his greatest pleasure. How 
 many men have died laughing, or in the ecstasies 
 of a great joy. Philippides the commedian, and 
 Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, died with joy at 
 the news of a victory. 2 Diagoras of Rhodes, and 
 Chilo, the philosopher, expired at the embraces of 
 their sons, crowned with an olympic laurel. 3 Po- 
 lycrita Naxia, being saluted the saviouress of her 
 country; 4 Marcus Juventius, when the senate de- 
 creed him honours ; the emperor Conrade the Se- 
 cond, when he triumphed, after the conquest of 
 Italy, had a joy bigger than their heart, and their 
 fancy swelled it till they burst and died. 5 Death 
 can enter in at any door. Philistion of Nice died 
 with excessive laughter; so did the poet Philemon, 
 being provoked to it only by seeing an ass eat figs. 
 And the number of persons who have been found 
 suddenly dead in their beds, is so great, that as it 
 engages many to a more certain and regular devo- 
 tion for their compline, so it were well it were pur- 
 sued to the utmost intention of God ; that is, that 
 all the parts of religion should with zeal and assi- 
 
 1 Crantzius, lib. iii. c. 51. Matthiol in Dioscor. 
 
 « Plin. lib. vii. c. 53. 3 Cicer. 1. Tusc. 
 
 4 Plut. et. Gel. de Illust. mulier. 5 Cusp in. 
 
 x 2 
 
308 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 duity be entertained and finished, that, as it be- 
 comes wise men, we never be surprised with that 
 we are sure will some time or other happen. A 
 great general in Italy, at the sudden death of Al- 
 fonsus of Ferrara; and Lodovico Corbinelli, a-t the 
 sight of the sad accident upon Henry II. of France, 
 now mentioned, turned religious, and they did 
 what God intended in those deaths. It concerns 
 us to be curious of single actions, because even in 
 those shorter periods we may expire and find our 
 graves. But if the state of life be contradictory to 
 our hopes of heaven, it is like affronting of a can- 
 non before a beleagured town a month together ; it 
 is a contempt of safety, and a rendering all reason 
 useless and unprofitable. But he only is wise, 
 who, having made death familiar to him by expect- 
 ation and daily apprehension, does at all instants 
 go forth to meet it. The wise virgins ( went forth 
 to meet the bridegroom,' for they were ready. Ex- 
 cellent therefore is the counsel of the son of Sirach: 
 ' Use physic or ever thou be sick. Before judg- 
 ment examine thyself, and in the day of visitation 
 thou shalt find mercy. Humble thyself before 
 thou be sick, and in the time of sins show repent- 
 ance. Let nothing hinder thee to pay thy vows in 
 due time, and defer not until death to be justified.' 1 
 5. Secondly, I consider, that it often hap- 
 pens, that in those days of our last visitation, 
 which many men design for their preparation 
 and repentance, God hath expressed, by an ex- 
 terior accident, that those persons have deceived 
 themselves, and neglected their own salvation. 
 St. Gregory reports of Chrysaurius, a gentleman 
 
 1 Ecclus. xvii. 19, &c. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 309 
 
 in the province of Valeria, rich, vicious, and witty, 
 lascivious, covetous and proud, that being cast upon 
 his death-bed, he fancied he saw evil spirits coming 
 to arrest him and drag him to hell. He fell into 
 great agony and trouble, shrieked out, called for 
 his son, who was a very religious person, flattered 
 him, as willing to have been rescued by any thing : 
 but perceiving his danger increase, and grow- 
 ing desperate, he called loud, with repeated cla- 
 mours, " Give me respite but till the morrow," and 
 with those words he died, there being " no place 
 left for his repentance, though he sought it care- 
 fully with tears and groans." 1 The same was the 
 case of a drunken monk, whom venerable Bede 
 mentions. Upon his death-bed he seemed to see 
 hell opened, and a place assigned him near to Cai- 
 aphas and those who crucified our dearest Lord. 
 The religious persons that stood about his bed, 
 called on him to repent of his sins, to implore the 
 mercies of God, and to trust in Christ : but he 
 answered, with reason enough, " This is no time to 
 change my life ; the sentence is passed upon me, 
 and it is too late." 2 And it is very considerable 
 and sad which Petrus Damianus tells of Gunizo, a 
 factious and ambitious person, to whom, it is said, 
 the tempter gave notice of his approaching death ; 
 but when any man preached repentance to him, 
 out of a strange incuriousness, or the spirit of re- 
 brobation, he seemed like a dead and unconcerned 
 person ; in all other discourses he was awake 
 and apt to answer : 3 for God had shut up the 
 gates of mercy, that no streams should issue forth 
 to quench the flames of hell ; or else had shut up 
 
 1 Homil. i2 5 in Evang. « Lib. v. c. 15, Hist. Gent. Anglor, 
 3 Biblioth. Ss. Pp. torn. iii. 
 
310 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 the gates of reception and entertainment, that it 
 should not enter. Either God denies to give 
 them pardon when they call, or denies to them 
 a power to call ; they either cannot pray, or 
 God will not answer. Now since these stories 
 are related by men, learned, pious, and eminent 
 in their generations, and because they served 
 no design but the ends of piety, and have in 
 them nothing dissonant from revelation, or the fre- 
 quent events of providence, we may upon their 
 stock consider, that God's judgments and visible 
 marks being set upon a state of life, although they 
 happen but seldom in the instances, yet they are of 
 universal purpose and signification. Upon all 
 murderers God hath not thrown a thunder-bolt, nor 
 broke all sacrilegious persons upon the wheel of an 
 inconstant and ebbing estate, nor spoken to every 
 oppressor from heaven in a voice of thunder, nor 
 cut off all rebels in the first attempts of insurrec- 
 tion : but because he hath done so to some, we are 
 to look upon those judgments as divine accents 
 and voices of God, threateuing all the same crimes 
 With the like events, and with the ruins of eternity. 
 For though God does not always make the same 
 prologues to death, yet by these few accidents hap- 
 pening to single persons, we are to understand his 
 purposes concerning all in the same condition : it 
 was not the person so much as the state which God 
 then remarked with so visible characters of his dis- 
 pleasure, 
 
 6. And it seems to me a wonder, that since from 
 all the records of Scripture, urging the uncertainty 
 of the day of death, the horror of the day of judg- 
 ment, the severity of God, the dissolution of the 
 world, the certainty of our account, still from all 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 these premises the spirit of God makes no other 
 inference, but that we watch, and stand in a rea- 
 diness, that we ' live in all holy conversation and 
 godliness,' 1 and that there is no one word concern- 
 ing any other manner of an essentially necessary pre- 
 paration, none but this ; yet that there are doctrines 
 commenced, and rules prescribed, and offices set 
 down, and suppletories invented by curates of 
 souls, how to prepare a vicious person, and upon 
 his death-bed to reconcile him to the hopes and 
 promises of heaven. Concerning which I desire 
 that every person would but inquire, where any 
 one promise is recorded in Scripture concerning 
 such addresses, and what articles Christ hath drawn 
 up between his Father and us concerning a prepa- 
 ration begun upon our death-bed : 2 and if he shall 
 find none, (as most certainly from Genesis to the 
 Revelation there is not a word concerning it, but 
 very much against it,) let him first build his hopes 
 upon this proposition — that a holy life is the only 
 preparation to a happy death ; and then we can, 
 without danger, proceed to some other consider- 
 ations. 
 
 7. When a good man, or a person concerning 
 whom it is not certain he hath lived in habitual 
 vices, comes to die, there are but two general ways 
 of intercourse with him ; the one, to keep him from 
 new sins; the other, to make some emendations of 
 the old : the one, to fortify him against special 
 weaknesses and proper temptations of that estate ; 
 and the other, to trim his lamp, that by excellent 
 actions he may adorn his spirit, making up the 
 
 1 Matt. xxv. 13 and xxiv, 42 ; Mark, xiii. 33; 2 Pet. iii. 11. 
 
 a Tecum prius ergo voluta haec animo ante tubas : gale- 
 
 atum sero duelli poenitet. Juven. Sat.]. 
 
312 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 omissions of his life, and supplying the imperfec- 
 tions of his estate, that his soul may return into the 
 hands of his Creator as pure as it can; every degree 
 of perfection being an advantage so great, as that 
 the loss of every the least portion of it cannot be re- 
 compensed with all the good of this world. Con- 
 cerning the first, the temptations proper to this 
 estate are either weakness in faith, despair, or pre- 
 sumption : for whatsoever is besides these, as it is 
 the common infelicity of all the several states of 
 life, so there are oftentimes arguments of an ill con- 
 dition, of immortification of vicious habits, and 
 that he comes not to this combat well prepared ; 
 such as are covetousness, unwillingness to make 
 restitution, remanent affections to his former vices, 
 an unresigned spirit, and the like. 
 
 8. In the ecclesiastical story we find many dying 
 persons mentioned, who have been very much afflict- 
 ed with some doubts concerning an article of faith. 
 St. Gregory, in an epistle he wrote to St. Austin, 
 instances in the temptation which Eusebius suf- 
 fered upon his death-bed. 1 And although some- 
 times the devil chooses an article that is not 
 proper to that estate, knowing that every such 
 doubt is well enough for his purpose, because of 
 the incapacity of the person to suffer long disputes, 
 and of the jealousy and suspicion of a dying and 
 weak man, fearing lest every thing should cozen 
 him ; yet it is commonly instanced in the article 
 of the resurrection, or the state of separation or re- 
 union. And it seems to some persons incredible, 
 that from a bed of sickness, a state of misery, a 
 cloud of ignorance, a load of passions, a man 
 
 1 Deprasconio S. Hieron. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 313 
 
 should enter into the condition of a perfect under- 
 standing, great joy, and an intellectual life, a con- 
 versation with angels, a fruition of God ; the 
 change is greater than his reason ; and his faith 
 being in conclusion tottering like the ark, and 
 ready to fall, seems a pillar as unsafe and unable 
 to rely on, as a bank of turf in an earthquake. 
 Against this a general remedy is prescribed by 
 spiritual persons : that the sick man should appre- 
 hend all changes of persuasion which happened to 
 him in his sickness, contradictory to those assents 
 which in his clearest use of reason he had, to be 
 temptations and arts of the devil. And he hath 
 reason so to think, when he remembers how many 
 comforts of the Spirit of God, what joys of religion, 
 what support, what assistances, what strengths he 
 had in the whole course of his former life, upon 
 the stock of faith, and interest of the doctrine of 
 Christianity. And since the disbelieving the 
 promises evangelical at that time can have no 
 end of advantage, and that all wise men tell him 
 it may have an end to make him lose the title to 
 them, and do him infinite disadvantage; upon 
 the stock of interest and prudence he must reject 
 such fears, which cannot help him, but may ruin 
 him. For all the works of grace which he did 
 upon the hopes of God, and the stock of the divine 
 revelations, (if he fails in his hold upon them,) 
 are all rendered unprofitable. And it is certain, 
 if there be no such thing as immortality and resur- 
 rection, he shall lose nothing for believing there 
 is ; but if there be, they are lost to him for not be- 
 lieving it. 
 
 9. But this is also to be cured by proper argu- 
 ments. And there is no Christian man but hath 
 
314 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 within him, and carries about him, demonstrations 
 of the possibility, and great instances of the credi- 
 bility of those great changes, which these tempted 
 persons have no reason to distrust, but because 
 they think them too great and too good to be true. 
 And here, not only the consideration of the divine 
 power and his eternal goodness is a proper anti- 
 dote, but also the observation of what we have 
 already received from God. To be raised from 
 nothing to something is a mutation not less than 
 infinite; and from that which we were in our first 
 conception to pass, into so perfect and curious bo- 
 dies, and to become discursive, sensible, passionate, 
 and reasonable, and next to angels, is a greater 
 change, than from this state to pass into that ex- 
 cellency and perfection of it which we expect as 
 the melioration and improvement of the present. 
 For this is but a mutation of degrees, that of sub- 
 stance : this is more sensible, because we have per- 
 ception in both states ; that is of greater distance, 
 because in the first term we were so far distant 
 from what we are, that we could not perceive what 
 then we were, much less desire to be what we now 
 perceive; and yet God did that for us unasked, 
 without any obligation on his part, or merit on 
 ours; much rather then may we be confident of 
 this alteration of accidents and degrees, because 
 God hath obliged himself by promise ; he hath dis- 
 posed us to it by qualities, actions, and habits, 
 which are to the state of glory as infancy is to 
 manhood, as elements are to excellent discourses, 
 as blossoms are to ripe fruits. And he that hath 
 wrought miracles for us, preserved us in dangers, 
 done strange acts of providence, sent his Son to 
 take our nature, made a virgin to bear a son, and 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 315 
 
 God to become man, and two natures to be one in- 
 dividual person, and all in order to this end of 
 which we doubt, hath given so many arguments of 
 credibility, that if he had done any more, it would 
 not have been left in our choice to believe or not 
 believe; and then much of the excellency of our 
 faith would have been lost. Add to this, that we 
 are not tempted to disbelieve the Roman story, or 
 that Virgil's iEneids were writ by him, or that we 
 ourselves are descended of such parents; because 
 these things are not only transmitted to us by such 
 testimony which we have no reason to distrust, but 
 because the tempter cannot serve any ends upon 
 us by producing such doubts in us : and therefore 
 since we have greater testimony for every article 
 of faith, and to believe it is of so much concern- 
 ment to us, we may well suspect it to be an arti- 
 fice of the devil to rob us of our reward ; this pro- 
 ceeding of his being of the same nature with all his 
 other temptations, which in our life-time, like fiery 
 darts, he threw into our face, to despoil us of our glo- 
 ry, and blot out the image of God imprinted on us. 
 
 10. Secondly, If the devil tempts the sick person 
 to despair, he who is by God appointed to minister 
 a word of comfort, must fortify his spirit with con- 
 sideration and representment of the divine good- 
 ness, manifest in all the expresses of nature and 
 grace, of providence and revelation; that God 
 never f extinguishes the smoking flax, nor breaks 
 the bruised reed ;' that a constant and a hearty en- 
 deavour is the sacrifice which God delights in ; 
 that in the firmament of heaven there are little 
 stars, and they are most in number, and there are 
 but few of the greatest magnitude ; that there are 
 children and babes in Christ, as well as strong men, 
 
310 
 
 'of a due preparation 
 
 and amongst these there are great difference ; that 
 the interruptions of the state of grace by inter- 
 vening crimes, if they were rescinded by repent- 
 ance, there were great danger in the interval, but 
 served as increment of the divine glory, and argu- 
 ments of care and dilgence to us at the restitution. 
 These and many more are then to be urged, when 
 the sick person is in danger of being swallowed up 
 with over-much sorrow ; and therefore to be in- 
 sisted on in all cases as the physician gives him 
 cordials, that we may do charity to him and minis- 
 ter comfort, not because they are always necessary, 
 even in the midst of great sadnesses and discom- 
 forts. For we are to secure his love to God, that 
 he acknowledge the divine mercy, that he believe 
 the article of remission of sins, that he be thankful 
 to God for the blessings which already he hath 
 received, and that he lay all the load of his discom- 
 fort upon himself, and his own incapacities of 
 mercy : and then the sadness may be very great, 
 and his tears clamorous, and his heart broken all 
 in pieces, and his humility lower than the earth, 
 and his hope indiscernible, and yet no danger to 
 his final condition. Despair reflects upon God, 
 and dishonours the infinity of his mercy. And if 
 the sick person do but confess that God is not at all 
 wanting in his promises, but ever abounding in his 
 mercies, and that it is want of the condition on his 
 own part that makes the misery, and that if he had 
 done his duty, God would save him ; let him be 
 assisted with perpetual prayers, with examples of 
 lapsed and returning sinners, whom the church 
 celebrates for saints, such as Mary Magdalen, Ma- 
 ry of Egypt, Afra, Thasis, Pelagia ; let it be often 
 inculcated to him, that as God's mercy is of itself 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 317 
 
 infinite, so its demonstration to us is not deter- 
 mined to any certain period, but bath sucb lati- 
 tudes in it and reservations, which as they are apt 
 to restrain too great boldness, so also to become 
 sanctuaries to disconsolate persons ; let him be in- 
 vited to throw himself upon God upon these 
 grounds, that he who is our Judge is also our Ad- 
 vocate and Redeemer, that he knows and pities our 
 infirmities, and that our very hoping in him does 
 endear him, and he will deliver us the rather for 
 our confidence, when it is balanced with reverence 
 and humility : and then all these supernumerary 
 fears are advantageous to more necessary graces, 
 and do more secure his final condition than they 
 can disturb it. 
 
 11. When St. Arsenius was near his death, he 
 was observed to be very tremulous, sad, weeping, 
 and disconsolate. The standers-by asked the rea- 
 son of his fears, wondering that he, having lived in 
 great sanctity for many years, should not now re- 
 joice at the going forth of his prison. The good 
 man confessed the fear, and withal said it was no 
 other than he had always borne about with him 
 in the days of his pilgrimage ; and what he 
 then thought a duty, they had no reason now to 
 call either a fault or a misery. Great sorrows, 
 fears, and distrustings of a man's own condi- 
 tion, are oftentimes but abatements of confidence, 
 or a remission of joys and gaieties of spirit; they 
 are but like salutary clouds, dark and fruitful : 
 and if the tempted person be strengthened in a 
 love of God, though he go not further in his hopes 
 than to believe a possibility of being saved, than to 
 say, u God can save him, if he please," and to 
 pray that he will save him, his condition is a state 
 
318 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 of grace : it is like a root in the ground, trod upon, 
 humble, and safe, not so fine as the state of flow- 
 ers; yet that which will spring up in as glorious a 
 resurrection as that which looks fairer, and pleases 
 the sense, and is indeed a blessing-, but not a 
 duty. 
 
 12. But there is a state of death-bed which 
 seems to have in it more question, and to be of 
 nicer consideration : a sick person after a vicious 
 and base life. And if upon whatsoever he can do, 
 you give him hopes of a pardon, where is your pro- 
 mise to warrant it ? If you do not give him hopes, 
 do you not drive him to despair, and ascertain his 
 ruin, to verify your proposition ? To this I answer, 
 that despair is opposed to hope, and hope relies 
 upon the divine promises ; and where there is no 
 promise, there the despair is not a sin, but a mere 
 impossibility. The accursed spirits, which are 
 sealed up to the judgment of the last day, can- 
 not hope ; and he that repents not cannot hope 
 for pardon. And therefore if all which the state 
 of death-bed can produce be not the duty of re- 
 pentance, which is required of necessity to pardon, 
 it is not in such a person properly to be called 
 despair, any more than it is blindness in a stone 
 that it cannot see : such a man is not within the 
 capacities of pardon. And therefore all those acts 
 of exterior repentance, and all his sorrow and reso- 
 lution and tears of emendation, and other prepara- 
 tives to interior repentance, are like oil poured 
 into mortal wounds ; they are the care of the phy- 
 sician, and these are the cautions of the church, 
 and they are at no hand to be neglected. For if 
 they do not alter the state, they may lessen the 
 judgment, or procure a temporal blessing : and if 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 319 
 
 the person recover, they are excellent beginnings 
 of the state of grace ; and if they be purified in a 
 happy opportunity, will grow up into glory. 
 
 13. But if it be demanded, whether in such 
 cases the curate be bound to give absolution ; I 
 can give no other answer but this, that if he lie 
 under the censure of the church, the laws of the 
 church are to determine the particular : and I 
 know no church in the world but uses to absolve 
 death-bed penitents upon the instances of those 
 actions of which their present condition is capable ; 
 though in the primitive ages in some cases they 
 denied it. But if the sick person be under no po- 
 sitive censure, and is bound only by the guilt of 
 habitual vice, if he desires the prayers of the 
 church, she is bound in charity to grant them, to 
 pray for pardon to him, and all other graces in 
 order to salvation : and if she absolves the peni- 
 tent, towards God it hath no other efficacy but of a 
 solemn prayer. And therefore it were better that all 
 the charity of the office were done and the solem- 
 nity omitted ; because in the earnest prayer she 
 co-operates to his salvation as much as she can ; 
 and by omitting the solemnity distinguishes evil 
 livers from holy persons, and walks securely, whilst 
 she refuses to declare him pardoned whom God 
 hath not declared to be so. 1 And possibly that 
 form of absolution which the churches of the west 
 now use, being indicative, and declaratory of a 
 present pardon, is for the very form sake not to be 
 
 1 Pcenitentia qus ab infirmo petitur, infirma est ; pcenitentia 
 quae a moriente tantum petitur, timeo ne et ipsa moriatur. S. 
 Aug. Serm. de temp. Vide eund. lib. L homil. 41. — " The 
 penitence of the infirm is infirm ; and the penitence of the 
 dying is, I fear, like to die." 
 
320 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 used to death-bed penitents after a vicious life : 
 because if any thing more be intended in the form 
 than a prayer, the truth of the affirmation may be 
 questioned ; and an ecclesiastical person hath no 
 authority to say to such a man, " I absolve thee 
 but if no more be intended but a prayer, it is better 
 to use a mere prayer and common form of address, 
 than such words which may countenance unse- 
 cure confidences, evil purposes, and worse lives. 
 
 14. Thirdly, If the devil tempts a sick person, 
 who hath lived well, to presumption, and that he 
 seems full of confidence and without trouble ; the 
 care that is then to be taken is to consider the 
 disease, and to state the question right. For at 
 some instants and periods God visits the spirit of 
 a man, and sends the imission of a bright ray into 
 him ; and some good men have been so used to 
 apprehensions of the divine mercy, that they have 
 an habitual cheerfulnsss of spirit and hopes of sal- 
 vation. St. Jerome reports that Hilarion, in a 
 death-bed agony, felt some tremblings of heart, till 
 reflecting upon his course of life, he found comforts 
 springing from thence by a proper emanation, and 
 departed cheerfully; 1 and Hezekiah represented to 
 God in prayer the integrity of his life, and made it 
 the instrument of his hope. And nothing of this 
 is to be called presumption, provided it be in 
 persons of eminent sanctity and great experience, 
 old disciples and the more perfect Christians. But 
 because such persons are but seldom and rare, it 
 the same confidence be observed in persons of com- 
 
 1 Egredere, anima, quid times? septuaginta prope annis 
 serviisti Christo, et jam moritimes ? S. Hier. in Vita Hilar — 
 " Why, O soul, dost thou fear to depart ? Hast thou served 
 Christ for seventy years, and yet fear to die ?" 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 321 
 
 mon imperfection and an ordinary life, it is to be 
 corrected and allayed wi4:h consideration of the 
 divine severity and justice, and with the strict 
 requisites of a holy life, with the deceit of a man's 
 own heart, with consideration and general remem- 
 brances of secret sins, and that the most perfect 
 state of life hath very great needs of mercy, and 
 i if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall 
 the ungodly and the sinner appear V 1 And the 
 spirit of the man is to be promoted and helped in 
 the increase of contrition, as being the proper dele- 
 tery to cure the extravagancies of a froward and 
 intemperate spirit. 
 
 15. But there is a presumption commenced upon 
 opinion, relying either upon a persuasion of single 
 predestination, or else (which is worse) upon ima- 
 ginary securities, that heaven is to be purchased 
 upon conditions easier than a day's labour, and that 
 an evil life may be reconciled to heaven by the in- 
 tervening of little or single acts of piety or repent- 
 ance. If either of them both have actually pro- 
 duced ill life, to which they are apt, or apt to be 
 abused, the persons are miserable in their condi- 
 tion, and cannot be absolutely remedied by going 
 about to cure the presumption ; that was the cause 
 of all, but now it is the least thing to be consi- 
 dered. His whole state is corrupted ; and men will 
 not by any discourses or spiritual arts used on 
 their death-beds be put into a state of grace; 
 because then is no time to change the state, and 
 there is no mutation then but by single actions. 
 From good to better a dying man may proceed, but 
 
 1 Vae vitae etiam laudabili, si sine misericordia discutias earn. 
 S. Aug. lib. ix. Confess. — "Woe to the best life, if judged 
 without mercy." 
 
 VOL. III. Y 
 
322 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 not from the state of reprobation to the life of grace. 
 And yet it is good charity to unlose the bonds of 
 Satan, whereby the man is bound and led captive 
 at his will, to take off the presumption by destroying 
 the cause ; and then let the work of grace be set as 
 forward as it can, and leave the event to God ; for 
 nothing else is left possible to be done. But if the 
 sick man be of a good life, and yet have a degree 
 of confidence beyond his virtue, upon the fancy of 
 predestination, it is not then a time to rescind his 
 opinion by a direct opposition, but let him be 
 drawn off from the consideration of it, by such 
 discourses as are apt to make him humble and pe- 
 nitent ; for they are the most apt instruments to 
 secure the condition of the man, and attemper his 
 spirit. These are the great temptations incident to 
 the last scene of our lives ; and are therefore more 
 particularly suggested by the tempter, because they 
 have in them something contrary to the universal 
 effect of a holy life, and are designs to interpose 
 between the end of the journey and the reception 
 of the crown. And therefore it concerns every 
 man who is in a capacity of ' receiving the end of 
 his faith, the salvation of his soul/ to lay up in the 
 course of his life, something against this great day 
 of expense, that he may be better fortified with the 
 armour of the Spirit against these last assaults of 
 the devil, that he may not shipwreck in the haven. 
 
 16. Eschewing evil is but the one half of our 
 work, we must also do good. And now, in the few 
 remanent days or hours of our life, there are certain 
 exercises of religion which have a special relation 
 to this state, and are therefore of great concern- 
 ment to be done, that we may make our condition 
 as certain as we can, and our portion of glory 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 323 
 
 greater, and our pardon surer, and our love to 
 increase, and that our former omissions and 
 breaches be repaired, with a condition in some 
 measure proportionable to those great hopes which 
 we then are going to possess. And first, let the 
 sick person, in the beginning of his sickness, and 
 in every change and great accident of it, make acts 
 of resignation to God, and entirely submit himself 
 to the divine will ; remembering, that sickness may, 
 to men properly disposed, do the work of God, 
 and produce the effect of the Spirit, and promote 
 the interest of his soul, as well as health, and often- 
 times better ; as being in itself and by the grace of 
 God apt to make us confess our own impotency 
 and dependencies, and to understand our needs of 
 mercy, and the continual influences and supports 
 of heaven ; to withdraw our appetites from things 
 below, to correct the vanities and insolencies of an 
 impertinent spirit, to abate the extravagancies of 
 the flesh, to put our carnal lusts into fetters and 
 disability, to remember us of our state of pilgri- 
 mage, that this is our way, and our stage of trouble 
 and banishment, and that heaven is our country ; 
 for so sickness is the trial of our patience, a fire to 
 purge us, an instructor to teach us, a bridle to 
 restrain us, and a state inferring great necessities 
 of union and adhesions unto God. And as upon 
 these grounds we have the same reason to accept 
 sickness at the hands of God, as to receive physic 
 from a physician ; so it is argument of excellent 
 grace to give God hearty thanks in our disease, 
 and to accept it cheerfully, and with spiritual joy. 
 
 17. Some persons create to themselves excuses 
 of discontent, and quarrel not with the pain, but 
 the ill consequents of sickness. It makes them 
 
 y 2 
 
324 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 troublesome to their friends ; and consider not that 
 their friends are bound to accept the trouble, as 
 themselves to accept the sickness ; that to tend the 
 sick is at that time allotted for the portion of their 
 work, and that charity receives it as a duty, and 
 makes that duty to be a pleasure. And however, 
 if our friends account us as a burden, let us also 
 accept that circumstance of affliction to ourselves 
 with the same resignation and indirTerency as we 
 entertain its occasion, the sickness itself; and pray 
 to God to enkindle a flame of charity in their 
 breasts, and to make them compensation for the 
 charge and trouble we put them to ; and then the 
 care is at an end. But others excuse their discon- 
 tent with a more religious colour, and call the 
 disease their trouble and affliction, because it im- 
 pedes their other parts of duty; they cannot preach, 
 or study, or do exterior assistances of charity and 
 alms, or acts of repentance and mortification. 
 But it were w r ell if we could let God propor- 
 tion out our work, and set our task ; let him 
 choose what virtues we shall especially exercise; 
 and when the will of God determines us, it is 
 more excellent to endure afflictions with patience, 
 equanimity, and thankfulness, than to do actions 
 of the most pompous religion, and laborious or 
 expensive charity : not only because there is 
 a deliciousness in actions of religion and choice, 
 which is more agreeable to our spirit than the toler- 
 ation of sickness can be, which hath great reward, 
 but no present pleasure; but also because our suf- 
 fering and our employment is consecrated to us 
 when God chooses it, and then there is no mixture 
 of imperfection or secular interest, as there may be 
 in other actions even of an excellent religion, when 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 325 
 
 ourselves are the choosers. And let us also remem- 
 ber, that God hath not so much need of thy works 
 as thou hast of patience, humility, and resignation. 
 St. Paul was a far more considerable person than 
 thou canst be, and yet it pleased God to shut him 
 in prison for two years ; and in that interval God 
 secured and promoted the work of the gospel : 
 and, although Epaphroditus was an excellent mi- 
 nister, yet God laid a sickness upon him, and even 
 in his disease gave him work enough to do, though 
 not of his own choosing. And therefore fear it not 
 but the ends of religion or duty will well enough 
 proceed without thy health ; and thy own eternal 
 interest, when God so pleases, shall better be served 
 by sickness, and the virtues which it occasions, 
 than by the opportunities of health, and an ambu- 
 latory, active charity. 
 
 18. When thou art resigned to God, use fair and 
 appointed means for thy recovery. Trust not in 
 thy spirit upon any instrument of health : as thou 
 art willing to be disposed by God, so look not for 
 any event upon the stock of any other cause or 
 principle. Be ruled by the physician and the peo- 
 ple appointed to tend thee ; that thou neither be- 
 come troublesome to them, nor give any sign of 
 impatience or a peevish spirit. But this advice 
 only means, that thou do not disobey them out of 
 any evil principle : and yet, if reason be thy guide 
 to choose any other aid, or follow any other coun- 
 sel, use it temperately, prudently, and charitably. 
 It is not intended for a duty, that thou shouldst 
 drink oil instead of wine, if thy minister reach it 
 to thee, as did St. Bernard ; nor that thou shouldst 
 accept a cake tempered with linseed-oil instead of 
 
326 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 oil of olives, as did F. Stephen, mentioned by Ruffi- 
 nus : but that thou tolerate the defects of thy ser- 
 vants, and accept the evil accidents of thy disease, 
 or the unsuccessfulness of thy physician's care, as 
 descending on thee from the hands of God. Asa 
 was noted in Scripture, that in ' his sickness he 
 sought not to the Lord, but to the physicians.' 1 
 Lewis the XI. of France was then the miserablest 
 person in his kingdom, when he made himself 
 their servant, courting them with great pensions 
 and rewards; attending to their rules as oracles, 
 and from their mouths waited for the sentence of 
 life or death. We are, in these great accidents, 
 especially to look upon God as the disposer of the 
 events, which he very often disposes contrary to 
 the expectation we may have of probable causes : 
 and sometimes without physic we recover, and 
 with physic and excellent applications we grow 
 worse and worse ; and God it is that makes the re- 
 medies unprosperous. In all these and all other 
 accidents, if we take care that the sickness of the 
 body derive not itself into the soul, nor the pains 
 of one procure impatience of the other, we shall 
 alleviate the burden, and make it supportable and 
 profitable : and certain it is, if men knew well to 
 bear their sicknesses humbly towards God, charit- 
 ably towards their ministers, and cheerfully in them- 
 selves, there were no greater advantage in the world 
 to be received than upon a sick bed ; and that alone 
 hath in it the benefits of a church, of a religious as- 
 sembly, of the works of charity and labour : and 
 since our soul's eternal well-being depends upon the 
 
 * 2 Chron. xvi. 12. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 32? 
 
 charities and providence and veracity of God, and 
 we have nothing to show for it but his word and 
 goodness, and that is infinitely enough ; it is but 
 reason we be not more nice and scrupulous about 
 the usage and accommodation of our body. If we 
 accept, at God's hands, sadness and dryness of affec- 
 tion and spiritual desertion patiently and with in- 
 differency, it is unhandsome to express ourselves 
 less satisfied in the accidents about our body. 
 
 19. But if the sickness proceed to death, it is a 
 new charge upon our spirits, and God calls for a 
 final and entire resignation into his hands. And 
 to a person who was of humble affections, and in 
 his life-time of a mortified spirit, accustomed to 
 bear the yoke of the Lord, this is easy ; because he 
 looks upon death not only as the certain condition 
 of nature, but as a, necessary transition to a state of 
 blessedness, 1 as the determination of his sickness, 
 the period of human infelicities, the last change of 
 condition, the beginning of a new, strange, and ex- 
 cellent life, a security against sin, a freedom from 
 the importunities of a tempter, from the tyrannies 
 of an imperial lust, from the rebellion of concupis- 
 cence, from the disturbances and tempests of the 
 irascible faculty, and from the fondness and child- 
 ishness of the concupiscible ; and St. Ambrose 
 says well, " the troubles of this life and the dangers 
 are so many, that in respect of them death is a re- 
 medy, and a fair, proper object of desires." And 
 we find that many saints have prayed for death, 
 
 1 No/jt£av fxlv yap deT tov IvSafis fi'iov wg av aKfirjv 
 Kvofievtov eivai. tov Savarov ykvtmv elg tov ovrojg ftlov k, 
 tov ivdaifiova toXq QiXovotyrjcrcKn.— " In this life we are but in 
 the womb of existence. Death, to the wise man, is a being in- 
 deed born to life and happiness." 
 
328 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 that they might not see the persecutions and great 
 miseries incumbent upon the church : and if the 
 desire be not out of impatience, but of charity, 
 and with resignation, there is no reason to reprove 
 it. Elias prayed that God would take his life, that 
 he might not see the evils of Ahab and Jezebel, 
 and their vexatious intendments against the pro- 
 phets of the Lord. 1 And St. Austin, upon the in- 
 cursion of the Vandals into Africa, called his clergy 
 together, and at their chapter told them, " he had 
 prayed to God either to deliver his people^ from the 
 present calamity, or grant them patience to bear it, 
 or that he would take him out of the world, that 
 he might not see the miseries of his diocess;" 2 
 adding, that God had granted him the last : and 
 he presently fell sick, and died in the siege of his 
 own Hippo. And if death in many cases be de- 
 sirable, and for many reasons, it is always to be 
 submitted to, when God calls. And as it is always 
 a misery to fear death, so it is very often a sin, or 
 the effect of sin. If our love to the world hath 
 fastened our affections here, it is a direct sin ; and 
 this is by the son of Sirach noted to be the case of 
 rich and great personages : ' How bitter, O death, 
 is thy remembrance to a man that is at rest in his 
 possessions !' 3 But if it be a fear to perish in the 
 ruins of eternity, they are not to blame for fearing, 
 but that their own ill lives have procured the fear. 
 And yet there are persons in the state of grace, 
 who yet, because they are in great imperfection, 
 have such lawful fears of death, and of entering 
 upon an uncertain sentence, which must stand 
 eternally irreversible, be it good or bad, that they 
 
 1 1 Kings, xix. 4. 2 In Vita S. Aug. c. 16. 
 
 3 Ecclus. xli. 1. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 3*29 
 
 may with piety and care enough pray David's 
 prayer : ' O spare me a little, that I may recover 
 my strength, before I go hence and be no more 
 seen/ But in this and in all other cases death 
 must be accepted without murmur, though without 
 fear it cannot. A man may pray to be delivered 
 from it ; and yet, if God will not grant it, he must 
 not go as one hailed to execution. But if with all 
 his imperfect fears he shall throw himself upon 
 God, and accept his sentence as righteous, whether 
 it speak life or death ; it is an act of so great ex- 
 cellency, that it may equal the good actions of 
 many succeeding and surviving days. And perad- 
 venture a longer life will be yet more imperfect, 
 and God therefore puts a period to it, that thou 
 may est be taken into a condition more certain, 
 though less eminent. However, let not the fears of 
 nature, or the fear of reason, or the fears of humi- 
 lity, become accidentally criminal, by a murmur 
 or a pertinacious contesting against the event, 
 which we cannot hinder, but ought to accept by 
 an election secondary, rational, and pious; and 
 upon supposition that God will not alter the sen- 
 tence passed upon thy temporal life : always re- 
 membering, that in Christian philosophy death 
 hath in it an excellency of which the angels are 
 not capable : for by the necessity of our nature we 
 are made capable of dying for the holy Jesus; and 
 next to the privilege of that act, is our willing- 
 ness to die at his command : which turns necessity 
 into virtue, and nature into grace, and grace to 
 glory. 
 
 20. When the sick person is thus disposed, let 
 him begin to trim his wedding-garment, and dress 
 his lamp with the repetition of acts of repentance, 
 perpetually praying to God for pardon of his sins, 
 
330 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 representing to himself the horror of them, the 
 multitude, the obliquity, being helped by argu- 
 ments apt to excite contrition, by repetition of pe- 
 nitential psalms and holy prayers. And he may, 
 by accepting and humbly receiving his sickness at 
 Gods hand, transmit it into the condition of an 
 act or effect of repentance ; acknowledging himself 
 by sin to have deserved and procured it, and pray- 
 ing that the punishment of his crimes may be here, 
 and not reserved for the state of separation, and 
 for ever. 
 
 21. But above all single acts of this exercise, we 
 are concerned to see that nothing of other men's 
 goods stick to us, but let us shake it off as we 
 would a burning coal from our flesh ; for it will 
 destroy us, it will carry a curse with us, and 
 leave a curse behind us. Those who by thy means 
 or importunity have become vicious, exhort to 
 repentance and holy life ; those whom thou hast 
 cozened into crimes, restore to a right understand- 
 ing ; those who are by violence and interest led 
 captive by thee to any undecency, restore to their 
 liberty, and encourage to the prosecution of holi- 
 ness. 1 Discover and confess thy fraud and unlaw- 
 ful arts, cease thy violence, and give as many ad- 
 vantages to virtue as thou hast done to viciousness. 
 Make recompense for bodily wrongs, such as are 
 wounds, dismemberings, and other disabilities. 
 Restore every man (as much as thou canst) to that 
 good condition from which thou hast removed 
 him : restore his fame, give back his goods, return 
 the pawn, release forfeitures, and take off all unjust 
 
 1 Deteriores sunt qui vitam moresque bonorum corrumpunt, 
 
 his qui substantias et praedia diripiunt. S. Gregory "They 
 
 who corrupt society and manners, are worse tb*m tbev who seize 
 our property.'" 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 331 
 
 invasions or surprises of his estate; pay debts ; satisfy 
 for thy fraud and injustice as far as thou canst, and 
 as thou canst, and as soon ; or this aione is weight 
 enough, no less than a mill-stone about thy neck. 
 But if the dying man be of God, and in the state of 
 grace, that is, if have lived a holy life, repented 
 seasonably, and have led a just, sober, and religious 
 conversation in any acceptable degree, it is to be 
 supposed he hath no great account to make for un- 
 pretended injuries and unjust detentions : for if he 
 had detained the goods of his neighbour fraudulently 
 or violently without amends, when it is in his power 
 and opportunity to restore, he is not the man we 
 suppose him in this present question. And al- 
 though in all cases he is bound to restore according 
 to his ability, yet the act is less excellent when it is 
 compelled ; and so it seems to be, if he have con- 
 tinued the injustice till he is forced to quit the 
 purchase. However, if it be not done till then, let 
 it be provided for then. And that I press this 
 duty to pious persons at this time, is only to oblige 
 them to a diligent scrutiny concerning the lesser 
 omissions of this duty, in the matter of fame, or 
 lesser debts, or spiritual restitution ; or that those 
 unevennesses of account which were but of late 
 transaction may now be regulated ; and that what- 
 soever is undone in this matter, from what prin- 
 ciple soever it proceeds, whether of sin, or only of 
 forgetfulness, or of imperfection, may now be made 
 as exact as we can, and are obliged ; and that those 
 excuses which made it reasonable and lawful to de- 
 fer restitution, as want of opportunity, clearness of 
 ability, and accidental inconvenience, be now laid 
 aside, and the action be done or provided for in 
 the midst of all objections and inconvenient cir- 
 
332 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 cumstances, rather than to omit it, and hazard to 
 perform it. 
 
 22. Hither also I reckon resolutions and forward 
 purposes of emendation and greater severity, in 
 case God return to us hopes of life : which there- 
 fore must be re-enforced, that we may serve the 
 ends of God, and understand all his purposes, and 
 make use of every opportunity : every sickness laid 
 upon us being with a design of drawing us nearer 
 to God ; and even holy purposes are good actions 
 of the spirit, and principles of religion. And 
 though alone they cannot do the work of grace, or 
 change the state, when they are ineffectual ; that is, 
 when either we will not bring them into act, or that 
 God will not let us ; yet to a man already in the 
 state of grace they are the additions of something 
 good, and are like blowing of coals, which although 
 it can put no life into a dead coal, yet it makes a 
 live coal shine brighter, and burn clearer, and adds 
 to it some accidental degrees of heat. 
 
 23. Having thus disposed himself to the peace 
 of God, let him make peace with all those in whom 
 he knows or suspects any minutes of anger, or 
 malice, or displeasure towards him ; submitting 
 himself to them with humility whom he unworthily 
 hath displeased, asking pardon to them who say 
 they are displeased, and offering pardon to them 
 that have displeased him : and then let him crave 
 the peace of holy church . For it is all this while 
 to be supposed that he hath used the assistance and 
 prayers, the counsel and the advices of a spiritual 
 man, and that to this purpose he hath opened to him 
 the state of his whole life, and made him to under- 
 stand what emendations of his faults he hath made, 
 what acts of repentance he hath done, how lived 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 333 
 
 after his fall and reparation, and that he hath sub- 
 mitted all that he did or undid to the discerning of 
 a holy man, whose office it is to guide his soul in 
 this agony and last offices. All men cannot have 
 the blessing of a wise and learned minister, and 
 some die where they can have none at all ; yet 
 it were a safer course to do as much of this as we 
 can, and to a competent person, if we can ; if we 
 cannot, then to the best we have, according as we 
 judge it to be of spiritual advantage to us : for in 
 this conjuncture of accidents it concerns us to be 
 sure, if we may, and not to be deceived, where we 
 can avoid it ; because we shall never return to life 
 to do this work again. And if after this inter- 
 course with a spiritual guide, we be reconciled by 
 the solemn prayer of the church, the prayer of ab- 
 solution, it will be of great advantage to us: we 
 depart with our Father's blessing, we die in the ac- 
 tual communion of the church, we hear the sen- 
 tence of God applied after the manner of men, and 
 the promise of pardon made circumstantiate, mate- 
 rial, present, and operative upon our spirits, and 
 have our portion of the promise which is recorded 
 by St. James, that ' if the elders of the church 
 pray over a sick person' fervently and effectually, 
 (add solemnly,) ' his sins shall be forgiven him 
 that is, supposing him to be in a capacity to re- 
 ceive it ;) because such prayers of such a man f are 
 very prevalent.' 1 
 
 24. All this is, in a spiritual sense, ' washing the 
 hands in innocency and then let him * go to the 
 altar,' Let him not, for any excuse less than im- 
 possibility, omit to receive the holy sacrament ; 
 
 1 Jam. v. 14, 15. 
 
334 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 which the fathers, assembled in the great Nicene 
 council, have taught all the Christian world to call 
 <( the most necessary provisions for our last jour- 
 ney;" 1 which is the memory of that death by which 
 we hope for life ; which is the seed of immortality 
 and resurrection of our bodies ; which unites our 
 spirit to Christ; which is a great defensative against 
 the hostilities of the devil; which is the most so- 
 lemn prayer of the church, united and made ac- 
 ceptable by the sacrifice of Christ, which is then 
 represented and exhibited to God ; which is the 
 great instrument of spiritual increase and the 
 growth of grace ; which is duty and reward, food 
 and physic, health and pleasure, deletery and cor- 
 dial, prayer and thanksgiving, an union of myste- 
 ries, the marriage of the soul, and the perfection of 
 all the rites of Christianity. Dying with the holy sa- 
 crament in us, is a going to God with Christ in our 
 arms, and interposing him between us and his an- 
 gry sentence. But then we must be sure that we 
 have done all the duty, without which we cannot 
 communicate worthily. For else Satan comes in the 
 place of Christ, and it is a horror not less than in- 
 finite to appear before God's tribunal, possessed in 
 our souls with the spirit of darkness. True it is, that, 
 by many laws of the church, the bishop and the 
 minister are bound to give the holy eucharist to 
 every person who in the article or apparent danger 
 of death desires it, provided that he hath submitted 
 himself to the imposition and counsels of the bishop 
 or guide of his soul, that, in case he recovers, he 
 may be brought to the peace of God and his church, 
 
 1 Uepl fie ru)v iZodevovrcov 6 7ra\aicog Kj Kavovucbg vdfiog 
 <pv\ax^V^^ai it) vvv m w<re el rig t^odevei, r« rtXevrais 
 dvayKaiordra sQodia fxr) ct7ro^epei(79ai Cone. Nicen. can. 13. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 335 
 
 by such steps and degrees of repentance by which 
 other public sinners are reconciled. But to this 
 gentleness of discipline and easiness of admi- 
 nistration, those excellent persons who made the 
 canons thought themselves compelled by the rigour 
 of the Novatians : 1 and because they admitted not 
 lapsed persons to the peace of the church upon any 
 terms, though never so great, so public, or so penal 
 a repentance; therefore these not only remitted 
 them to the exercise and station of penitents, but 
 also to the communion. But the fathers of the 
 council of Eliberis denied this favour to persons who 
 after baptism were idolaters : * either intending this 
 as a great argument to affright persons from so 
 great a crime ; or else believing that it was unpar- 
 donable after baptism, a contradiction to that state 
 which we entered into by baptism and the cove- 
 nant evangelical. However, I desire all learned 
 persons to observe it, and the less learned also to 
 make use of it, that those more ancient councils of 
 the church which commanded the holy commu- 
 nion to be given to dying persons, meant only 
 such, which according to the custom of the church, 
 were under the conditions of repentance ; that is, 
 such to whom punishment and discipline of divers 
 years were enjoined; and if H happened they 
 died in the interval, before the expiration of their 
 time of reconciliation, then they admitted them to 
 the communion. 3 Which describes to us the doc- 
 
 1 Concil. Nicen. can. ecd. cone. Ancyr. c. 6. Cone. Aurelian. ii. 
 c. 12. 
 
 2 Cone. Elib. c. 1. 
 
 3 Mara doKifiacriag b ^ttigkoitoq S7no6r(o. Concil. Nicen. c. 
 13. TxTsg'sTri opip dsxS fivaL. Cone. Anc. c. 9. De his qui 
 in pcenitentia positi vita excesserunt, piacuit nullum communione 
 vacuum debere dimitti. Cone. Aurel. 2 n. .2. 
 
336 
 
 OF A DUE PREPARATION 
 
 trine of those ages when religion was purer, and dis- 
 cipline more severe, and holy life secured by rules 
 of excellent government ; that those only were fit 
 to come to that feast, who before their last sickness 
 had finished the repentance of many years, or at 
 least had undertaken it. 1 I cannot say it was so 
 always, and in all churches ; for as the disciples, 
 grew slack, or men's persuasions had variety, so 
 they were more ready to grant repentance, as well 
 as absolution to dying persons: but it was other- 
 wise in the best times, and with severer prelates. 
 And certainly it were great charity to deny the 
 communion to persons who have lived viciously 
 till their death ; provided it be by competent autho- 
 rity, and done sincerely, prudently, and without 
 temporal interest : to other persons, who have lived 
 good lives, or repented of their bad, though less 
 perfectly, it ought not to be denied, and they less 
 ought to neglect it. 
 
 25. But as every man must put himself, so also 
 he must put his house in order; make his will, if he 
 have an estate to dispose of; and in that he must 
 be careful to do justice to every man, and charity 
 to the poor, according as God hath enabled him. 
 And though charity is then very late, if it begins 
 not earlier ; yet if this be but an act of an ancient 
 habit, it is still more perfect, as it succeeds m 
 time, and superadds to the former stock. And 
 among other acts of duty let it be remembered, that 
 it is excellent charity to leave our will and desires 
 clear, plain, and determinate, that contention and 
 lawsuits may be prevented by the explicate de- 
 claration of the legacies. At last and in all in- 
 
 * VideConcil. Eliber.c. 46, etc. 69. 
 
FOR DEATH. 
 
 337 
 
 stances and periods of our following days, let the 
 former good acts be renewed ; let God be praised 
 for all his graces and blessings of our life ; let him 
 be entreated for pardon of our sins ; let acts of love 
 and contrition, of hope, of joy, of humility, be the 
 work of every day which God still permits us : 
 always remembering to ask remission for those sins 
 we remember not. And if the condition of our 
 sickness permit it, let our last breath expire with 
 an act of love ; that it may begin the charities of 
 eternity, and like a taper burnt to its lowest base, 
 it may go out with a great emission of light, 
 leaving a sweet smell behind us to perfume our 
 coffin ; and that these lights, newly made brighter, 
 or trimmed up in our sickness, may shine about 
 our hearse, that they may become arguments of a 
 pious sadness to our friends, (as the charitable 
 coats which Dorcas made were to the widows,) and 
 exemplary to all those who observed, or shall 
 hear of our holy life and religious death. But if it 
 shall happen that the disease be productive of evil 
 accidents, as a disturbed fancy, a weakened under- 
 standing, wild discoursings, or any deprivation of 
 the use of reason, it concerns the sick person, in 
 the happy intervals of a quiet untroubled spirit, to 
 pray earnestly to God that nothing may pass from 
 him, in the rages of a fever or worse distemper, 
 which may less become his duty, or give scandal, 
 or cause trouble to the persons in attendance ; and 
 if he shall also renounce and disclaim all such 
 evil words which his disease may speak, not him- 
 self, he shall do the duty of a Christian and a pru- 
 dent person. And after these preparatives he may 
 with piety and confidence resign his soul into the 
 hands of God, to be deposited in holy receptacles 
 
 VOL. III. z 
 
338 OF A DUE PREPARATION FOR DEATH. 
 
 till the day of restitution of all things; and in the 
 mean time, with a quiet spirit, descend into that 
 state which is the lot of Caesars, and where all 
 kings and conquerors have laid aside their glories. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O eternal and holy Jesus, who by death hast overcome death, 
 and by thy passion hast taken out its sting, and made it to be- 
 come one of the gates of heaven, and an entrance to felicity ; 
 have mercy upon me now and at the hour of my death : let thy 
 grace accompany me all the days of my life, that I may, by a 
 holy conversation, and an habitual performance of my duty, 
 wait for the coming of our Lord, and be ready to enter with thee 
 at whatsoever hour thou shalt come. Lord, let not my death be in 
 any sense unprovided, nor untimely, nor hasty, but after the com- 
 mon manner of men, having in it nothing extraordinary but an ex- 
 traordinary piety, and the manifestation of a great and miraculous 
 mercy. Let my senses and understanding be preserved entire till the 
 last of my days, and grant that I may die the death of the righte* 
 ous, having first discharged all my obligations of justice, leaving 
 none miserable and unprovided in my departure ; but be thou 
 the portion of all my friends and relatives, and let thy blessing 
 descend upon their heads, and abide there, till they shall meet 
 me in the bosom of our Lord. Preserve me ever in the commu- 
 nion and peace of the church ; and bless my death- bed with the 
 opportunity of a holy and spiritual guide, with the assistance 
 and guard of angels, with the perception of the holy sacrament, 
 with patience and dereliction of my own desires, with a strong 
 faith and a firm and humble hope, with just measures of repent- 
 ance, and great treasures of charity to thee, my God, and to all the 
 world ; that my soul in the arms of the holy J esus may be de- 
 posited with safety and joy, there to expect the revelations of thy 
 day, and then to partake the glories of thy kingdom, O eternal 
 and holy Jesus. Amen. 
 
ON THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 339 
 
 Considerations upon the Crucifixion of the holy Jesus* 
 
 1. When the sentence of death pronounced 
 against the Lord was to be put in execution, the 
 soldiers pulled off the robe of mockery, the scarlet 
 mantle which in jest they put upon him, and put 
 on his own garments. But, as Origen observes, 
 the evangelist mentioned not that they took off 
 the crown of thorns : what might serve their inte- 
 rest they pursue, but nothing of remission or mer- 
 cy to the afflicted Son of man. But so it became 
 the King of sufferings, not to lay aside his imperial 
 thorns, till they were changed into diadems of 
 glory. But now Abel is led forth by his brother 
 to be slain. A gay spectacle to satisfy impious 
 eyes, who would not stay behind, but attended and 
 waited upon the hangman to see the catastrophe 
 of this bloody tragedy. But when piety looks on, 
 she beholds a glorious mystery. 1 Sin laughed to 
 see the King of heaven and earth, and the great 
 lover of souls, instead of the scepter of his king- 
 dom, to bear a tree of cursing and shame. But 
 piety wept tears of pity, and knew they would 
 melt into joy, when she should behold that cross, 
 which loaded the shoulders of her Lord, afterward 
 sit upon the scepters, and be engraved and signed 
 upon the foreheads of kings. 
 
 2. It cannot be thought but the ministers of 
 Jewish malice used all the circumstances of afflic- 
 tion, which in any case were accustomed towards 
 malefactors and persons to be crucified ; and there- 
 fore it was, that in some old figures we see our 
 
 1 S. Aug. Tract. 119, in Joan. 
 
 z 2 
 
340 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 blessed Lord described with a table, appendant to the 
 fringe of his garment, set full of nails and pointed 
 iron ; for so sometimes they afflicted persons con- 
 demned to that kind of death. And St. Cyprian 
 affirms that Christ did stick to the wood that he 
 carried, being galled with the iron at his heels, and 
 nailed even before his crucifixion. 1 But this and 
 the other accidents of his journey and their malice 
 so crushed his wounded, tender, and virginal body, 
 that they were forced to lay the load upon a Cy- 
 renian, fearing that he should die with less shame 
 and smart than they intended him. But so he was 
 pleased to take man unto his aid, not only to repre- 
 sent his own need and the dolorousness of his pas- 
 sion, but to consign the duty unto man, that we must 
 enter into a fellowship of Christ's sufferings, taking 
 up the cross of martyrdom when God requires us, 
 enduring affronts, being patient under affliction, 
 loving them that hate us, and being benefactors to 
 our enemies, abstaining from sensual and intem- 
 perate delight, forbidding to ourselves lawful fes- 
 tivities and recreations of our weariness, when we 
 have an end of the spirit to serve upon the ruins 
 of the body's strength, mortifying our desires, 
 breaking our own will, not seeking ourselves, be- 
 ing entirely resigned to God. These are the cross, 
 and the nails, and the spear, and the whip, and all 
 the instruments of a Christian's passion. And we 
 may consider, that every man in this world shall 
 in some sense or other bear a cross, few men es- 
 cape it, and it is not well with them that do; but 
 they only bear it well that follow Christ, and 
 tread in his steps, and bear it for his sake, and 
 
 1 S. Cypr. de Pass. 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 34 1 
 
 walk as he walked ; and he that follows his own 
 desires, when he meets with a cross there, (as it is 
 certain enough he will,) bears the cross of his con- 
 cupiscence, and that hath no fellowship with the 
 cross of Christ. By the precept of bearing the 
 cross we are not tied to pull evil upon ourselves, 
 that we may imitate our Lord in nothing but in 
 being afflicted ; or to personate the punitive exer- 
 cises of mortification and severe abstinences which 
 were eminent in some saints, and to which they 
 had special assistances, as others had the gift of 
 chastity, and for which they had special reason, 
 and, as they apprehended, some great necessities : 
 but it is required that we bear our own cross ; 1 
 so said our dearest Lord. For when the cross of 
 Christ is laid upon us, and we are called to mar- 
 tyrdom, then it is our own, because God made 
 it to be our portion : and when, by the necessities 
 of our spirit, and the rebellion of our body, 
 we need exterior mortifications and acts of self- 
 denial, then also it is our own cross, because 
 our needs have made it so : and so it is when 
 God sends us sickness or any other calamity, what- 
 ever is either an effect of our ghostly needs, or the 
 condition of our temporal estate, it calls for our 
 sufferance, and patience, and equanimity. For 
 'therefore Christ hath suffered for us/ saith St. 
 Peter, ' leaving us an example, that we should 
 follow his steps,' 2 who bore his cross as long as he 
 could ; and when he could no longer, he mur- 
 mured not, but sank under it : and then he was 
 content to receive such aid, not which he chose 
 himself, but such as was assigned him. 
 
 1 Matt. xvi. 24. 
 
 2 1 Pet. ii. 21. 
 
342 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 3. Jesus was led out of the gates of Jerusalem, 
 that he might become the sacrifice for persons 
 without the pale, even for all the world. 1 And the 
 daughters of Jerusalem followed him with pious 
 tears till they came to Calvary; — a place difficult in 
 the ascent, eminent and apt for the publication of 
 shame, a hill of death and dead bones, polluted 
 and impure ; — and there beheld him stripped naked 
 who clothes the fields with flowers, and all the 
 world with robes, and the whole globe with the 
 canopy of heaven; and so dressed, that now every 
 circumstance was a triumph. 2 By his disgrace he 
 trampled upon our pride ; by his poverty and na- 
 kedness he triumphed over our covetousness and 
 love of riches ; and by his pains chastised the deli- 
 cacies of our flesh, and broke in pieces the fetters 
 of concupiscence. For as soon as Adam was 
 clothed, he quitted Paradise ; and Jesus was made 
 naked, that he might bring us in again. And we 
 also must be despoiled of all our exterior adhe- 
 rences ; that we may pass through the regions of 
 duty and divine love to a society of blessed spirits, 
 and a clarified, immortal, and beatified estate. 
 
 4. There they nailed Jesus with four nails, fixed 
 his cross in the ground, which with its fall into the 
 place of its station gave infinite torture by so vio- 
 lent a concussion of the body of our Lord, which 
 rested upon nothing but four great wounds ; where 
 he was designed to suffer a long and lingering tor- 
 ment. 3 For crucifixion, as it was an exquisite 
 pain, sharp and passionate, so it was not of quick 
 effect towards taking away the life. St. Andrew 
 
 1 Heb. xiii. 13. - Athanas. de Pass, et Cruce Domini. 
 3 ksWi (povrjeg Et£ dopv rtTpa7r\evpov. Nonn. 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 
 
 343 
 
 was two whole days upon the cross ; and some 
 martyrs have upon the cross been rather starved, 
 and devoured with birds, than killed with the 
 proper torment of the tree. But Jesus took all his 
 passion with a voluntary susception, God heighten- 
 ing it to great degrees of torment supernaturally ; 
 and he laid down his life voluntarily, when his Fa- 
 ther's wrath was totally appeased towards mankind. 
 
 5. Some have fancied, that Christ was pleased 
 to take something from every condition of which 
 man ever was or shall be possessed ; taking immu- 
 nity from sin from Adam's state of innocence, pu- 
 nishment and misery from the state of Adam 
 fallen, the fulness of grace from the state of reno- 
 vation, and perfect contemplation of the divinity 
 and beatific joys from the state of comprehension 
 and the blessedness of heaven : meaning, that the 
 humanity of our blessed Saviour did, in the sharp- 
 est agony of his passion, behold the face of God, 
 and communicate in glory. But I consider that, 
 although the two natures of Christ were knit by a 
 mysterious union into one person, yet the natures 
 still retain their incommunicable properties. Christ, 
 as God, is not subject to sufferings, as a man he 
 is the subject of miseries; as God he is eternal, 
 as man, mortal and commensurable by time; as 
 God, the supreme lawgiver, as man, most humble 
 and obedient to the law ; and therefore that the 
 human nature was united to the divine, it does not 
 infer that it must in all instances partake of the 
 divine felicities, which in God are essential, to 
 man communicated without necessity, and by an 
 arbitrary dispensation. Add to this, that some 
 virtues and excellencies were in the soul of Christ 
 which could not consist with the state of glorified 
 
344 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 and beatified persons ; such as are humility, po- 
 verty of spirit, hope, holy desires ; all which having 
 their seat in the soul, suppose even in the supremest 
 faculty a state of pilgrimage ; that is, a condition 
 which is imperfect, and in order to something be- 
 yond its present. For therefore ' Christ ought to 
 suffer/ (saith our blessed Lord himself,) and 'so 
 enter into his glory. 3 1 And^St. Paul affirms, that 
 ' we see Jesus made a little lower than the angels, 
 for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and 
 honour/ 4 And again, ' Christ humbled himself, 
 and became obedient unto death, even the death of 
 the cross : wherefore God also hath highly exalted 
 him, and given him a name above every name.' 3 
 Thus his present life was a state of merit and 
 work, and as a reward of it, he was crowned with 
 glory and immortality ; his name was exalted, his 
 kingdom glorified ; he was made the Lord of all 
 the creatures, the first fruits of the resurrection, the 
 exemplar of glory, and the prince and head of the 
 catholic church ; and because this was his recom- 
 pence, and the fruits of his humility and obedience, 
 it is certain it was not a necessary consequence and 
 a natural efflux of the personal union of the god- 
 head with the humanity. This I discourse to this 
 purpose, that we may not in our esteem lessen the 
 suffering of our dearest Lord, by thinking he had 
 the supports of actual glory in the midst of all his 
 sufferings. For there is no one minute or ray of 
 glory but its fruition does outweigh and make us 
 insensible of the greatest calamities, and the spirit 
 of pain which can be extracted from all the infeli- 
 
 1 Luke, xxiv. 26, secundum vulg. interp. 2 Heb. ii. 9. 
 3 Phil. ii. 8, 9. 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 
 
 345 
 
 cities of this world. True it is, that the greatest 
 beauties in this world are receptive of an allay of 
 sorrow, and nothing can have pleasure in all capa- 
 cities. The most beauteous feathers of the birds of 
 paradise, the ostrich, or the peacock, if put into 
 our throat, are not there so pleasant as to the eye. 
 But the beatific joys of the least glory of heaven 
 take away all pain, ' wipe away all tears from our 
 eyes ;' and it is not possible that at the same instant 
 the soul of Jesus should be ravished with glory, 
 and yet abated with pains grievous and afflictive. 
 On the other side, some say that the soul of Jesus 
 upon the cross suffered the pains of hell, and all 
 the torments of the damned ; and that without 
 such sufferings it is not imaginable he should pay 
 the price which God's wrath should demand of us. 
 But the same that reproves the one does also repre- 
 hend the other; for the hope that was the support 
 of the soul of Jesus, as it confesses an imperfection 
 that is not consistent with the state of glory, so it 
 excludes the despair that is the torment proper to 
 accursed souls. Our dearest Lord suffered the 
 whole condition of humanity, ' sin only excepted;' 
 and freed us from hell with suffering those sad 
 pains, and merited heaven for his own humanity, 
 as the head, and all faithful people, as the mem- 
 bers of his mystical body. And therefore his life 
 here was only a state of pilgrimage, not at all 
 trimmed with beatific glories. Much less was he 
 ever in the state of hell, or upon the cross felt the 
 formal misery and spirit of torment which is the 
 portion of damned spirits ; because it was impos- 
 sible Christ should despair, and without despair it 
 is impossible there should be a hell But this is 
 highly probable, that in the intention of degrees 
 
346 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 and present anguish, the soul of our Lord might 
 feel a greater load of wrath than is incumbent in 
 every instant upon perishing souls. For all the 
 sadness which may be imagined to be in hell, con- 
 sists in acts produced from principles that cannot 
 surpass the force of human or angelical nature; 
 but the pain which our blessed Lord endured for 
 the expiation of our sins, was an issue of an united 
 and concentred anger, was received into the heart 
 of God and man, and was commensurate to the 
 whole latitude of the grace, patience, and cha- 
 rity of the Word incarnate. 
 
 6. And now behold the priest and the sacrifice 
 of all the world laid upon the altar of the cross, 
 bleeding, and tortured, and dying, to reconcile his 
 Father to us : and he was arrayed with ornaments 
 more glorious than the robes of Aaron. The crown 
 of thorns was his mitre, the cross his pastoral starF, 
 the nails piercing his hands were instead of rings, 
 the ancient ornament of priests, and his flesh rased 
 and chequered with blue and blood, instead of the 
 parti-coloured robe. But as this object calls for 
 our devotion, our love and eucharist to our dearest 
 Lord ; so it must needs irreconcile us to sin, which 
 in the eye of all the world brought so great shame, 
 and pain, and amazement upon the Son of God, 
 when he only became engaged by a charitable 
 substitution of himself in our place ; and therefore 
 we are assured, by the demonstration of sense and 
 experience, it will bring death and all imaginable 
 miseries, as the just expressions of God's indigna- 
 tion and hatred. For to this we may apply the 
 word's of our Lord in the prediction of miseries to 
 Jerusalem : « If this be done in the green tree, 
 what shall be done in the dry ? ' For it is certain, 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 347 
 
 Christ infinitely pleased his Father even by becom- 
 ing the person made guilty in estimate of law ; and 
 yet so great charity of our Lord, and the so great 
 love and pleasure of his Father, exempted him 
 not from suffering pains intolerable. And much 
 less shall those escape who provoke and displease 
 God, and 1 despise so great salvation/ which the 
 holy Jesus hath wrought with the expense of blood, 
 and so precious a life. 
 
 7. But here we see a great representation and 
 testimony of the divine justice, who was so angry 
 with sin, who had so severely threatened it, who 
 does so essentially hate it, that he would not spare 
 his only Son, when he became a conjunct person, 
 relative to the guilt, by undertaking the charges of 
 our nature. For although God hath set down in 
 holy Scripture the order of his justice, and the 
 manner of its manifestation, that one soul should 
 not perish for the sins of another; 1 yet this is 
 meant for justice and for mercy too : that is, 
 he will not curse the son for the father's fault, 2 
 or in any relation whatsoever substitute one person 
 for another, to make him involuntarily guilty; but 
 when this shall be desired by a person that cannot 
 finally perish, and does a mercy to the exempt 
 persons, and is a voluntary act of the suscipient, 
 and shall in the event also redound to an infinite 
 good, it is no deflexion from the divine justice to 
 excuse many by the affliction of one, who also for 
 that very suffering shall have infinite compensa- 
 tion. We see that for the sin of Cham all his 
 posterity were accursed : the subjects of David 
 died with the plague, because their prince num- 
 
 » Ezek. xviii. 2, 3, 4, &c. 
 
 * Deut. xxiv. 16. 
 
348 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 bered the people : idolatry is punished in the 
 children of the fourth generation : Saul's seven 
 sons were hanged for his breaking the league of 
 Gibeon ; and Ahab's sin was punished in his pos- 
 terity, he escaping, and ' the evil was brought 
 upon his house in his son's days.' In all these 
 cases, the evil descended upon persons in near re- 
 lation to the sinner, and was a punishment to him, 
 and a misery to these ; and were either chastise- 
 ments also of their own sins ; or, if they were not, 
 they served other ends of providence, and led the 
 afflicted innocent to a condition of recompence, 
 accidentally procured by that infliction. But if for 
 such relation's sake and economical and political 
 conjunction, as between prince and people, the 
 evil may be transmitted from one to another ; much 
 rather is it just, when by contract a competent and 
 conjunct person undertakes to quit his relative. 
 Thus, when the hand steals, the back is whipped ; 
 and an evil eye is punished with a hungry belly. 
 Treason causes the whole family to be miserable ; 
 and a sacrilegious grandfather hath sent a locust to 
 devour the increase of the nephews. 
 
 8. But in our case it is a voluntary contract, and 
 therefore no injustice; all parties are voluntary. 
 God is the supreme Lord, and his actions are the 
 measure of justice : we, who had deserved the pu- 
 nishment, had great reason to desire a Redeemer; 
 and yet Christ, who was to pay the ransom, was 
 more desirous of it than we were, for we asked it 
 not before it was promised and undertaken. But 
 thus we see that sureties pay the obligation of the 
 principal debtor, and the pledges of contracts have 
 been, by the best and wisest nations, slain, when 
 the articles have been broken : the Thessalians 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 
 
 349 
 
 slew two hundred and fifty pledges ; the Romans 
 three hundred of the Volsci, and threw the Ta- 
 rentines from the Tarpeian rock. 1 And that it 
 may appear Christ was a person in all senses com- 
 petent to do this for us, himself testifies, that he 
 had ' power over his own life, to take it up or lay 
 it down.' 2 And therefore, as there can be nothing 
 against the most exact justice and reason of laws 
 and punishments, so it magnifies the divine mercy, 
 who removes the punishment from us, who of ne- 
 cessity must have sunk under it; and yet makes 
 us to adore his severity, who would not forgive us 
 without punishing his Son for us ; to consign unto 
 us his perfect hatred against sin, to conserve thesa- 
 credness of his laws, and to imprint upon us great 
 characters of fear and love. The famous Locrian, 
 Zaleucus, made a law, that all adulterers should 
 lose both their eyes. His son was first unhappily 
 surprised in the crime ; and his father, to keep a 
 temper between the piety and soft spirit of a pa- 
 rent, and the justice and severity of a judge, put 
 out one of his own eyes, and one of his son's. 3 So 
 God did with us : he made some abatement, that 
 is, as to the person with whom he was angry, but 
 inflicted his anger upon our Redeemer, whom he 
 essentially loved, to secure the dignity of his sanc- 
 tions and the sacredness of obedience ; so marry- 
 ing justice and mercy by the intervening of a 
 commutation. Thus David escaped by the death 
 of his son, God choosing that penalty for the ex- 
 
 1 Livius, vide L. Si quis rerara. D. de custod. et exhib. 
 reorum. L. si a reo D. de fidejussoribus. 
 8 John, x. 18. 
 
 3 Apud Diodor. Sicul. et iEliari. "Iva fir) 6 vecivigkcq 
 rv(p\io9y rtXeioQ, ^ 'iva fit) hcupdapy to a7ra^ KEKvpiofisvov 
 
350 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 piation ; and Cimon offered himself to prison, to 
 purchase the liberty of his father, Miltiades. It 
 was a filial duty in Cimon, and yet the law was 
 satisfied. And both these concurred in our great 
 Redeemer. For God, who was the sole arbitrator, 
 so disposed it ; and the eternal Son of God sub- 
 mitted to this way of expiating our crimes ; and it 
 became an argument of faith and belief of the 
 great article of remission of sins, and other its 
 appendant causes, and effects, and adjuncts: it 
 being wrought by a visible and notorious passion. 
 It was made an encouragement of hope ; for ' he 
 that spared not his own Son' to reconcile us, ' will 
 with him give all things else' to us so reconciled : 
 and a great endearment of our duty and love, as it 
 was a demonstration of his. And in all the changes 
 and traverses of our life, he is made to us a great 
 example of all excellent actions and all patient 
 sufferings. 
 
 9. In the midst of two thieves, three long hours 
 the holy Jesus hung clothed with pain, agony, and 
 dishonour; all of them so eminent and vast, that 
 he who could not but hope, whose soul was en- 
 chased with divinity, and dwelt in the bosom of 
 God, and in the cabinet of the mysterious Trinity, 
 yet had a cloud of misery so thick and black 
 drawn before him, that he complained as if God 
 had forsaken him. But this was ' the pillar of a 
 cloud,' which conducted Israel into Canaan. And 
 as God behind the cloud supported the holy Jesus, 
 and stood ready to receive him into the union of his 
 glories ; so his soul, in that great desertion, had in- 
 ternal comforts, proceeding from consideration of 
 all those excellent persons which should be adopt- 
 ed into the fellowship of his sufferings, which 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 
 
 351 
 
 should imitate his graces, which should communi- 
 cate in his glories. And we follow this cloud to 
 our country, having Christ for our guide. And 
 though he trod the way, leaning upon the cross, 
 which, like the staff of Egypt, pierced his hands; 
 yet it is to us a comfort and support, pleasant to 
 our spirits as the sweetest canes, strong as the pil- 
 lars of the earth, and made apt for our use by hav- 
 ing been borne and made smooth by the hands of 
 our elder brother. 
 
 10. In the midst of all his torments, Jesus only 
 made one prayer of sorrow, to represent his sad 
 condition to his Father ; but no accent of murmur, 
 no syllable of anger against his enemies : instead 
 of that he sent up a holy, charitable, and effective 
 prayer for their forgiveness; and by that prayer 
 obtained of God that within fifty-five days eight 
 thousand of his enemies were converted. So po- 
 tent is the prayer of charity, that it prevails above 
 the malice of men, turning the arts of Satan into 
 the designs of God ; and when malice occasions 
 the prayer, the prayer becomes an antidote to ma- 
 lice. And by this instance our blessed Lord con- 
 signed that duty to us, which in his sermons he 
 had preached, that we should forgive our enemies, 
 and pray for them ; and by so doing, ourselves are 
 freed from the stings of anger, and the storms of a 
 revengeful spirit; and we oftentimes procure ser- 
 vants to God, friends to ourselves, and heirs to the 
 kingdom of heaven. 
 
 1 1. Of the two thieves that were crucified together 
 with our Lord, the one blasphemed ; the other had 
 at that time the greatest piety in the world, except 
 that of the blessed virgin ; and particularly had 
 such a faith, that all the ages of the church could 
 
352 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPON 
 
 never show the like. 1 For when he saw Christ ' in 
 the same condemnation* with himself, crucified by 
 the Romans, accused and scorned by the Jews, 
 forsaken by his own apostles, a dying, distressed 
 man, doing at that time no miracles to attest 
 his divinity or innocence ; yet then he confesses 
 him to be a Lord, and a King, and his Saviour. 
 He confessed his own shame and unworthiness; 
 he submitted to the death of the cross; and, by 
 his voluntary acceptation and tacit volition of it, 
 made it equivalent to as great a punishment of his 
 own susception. He showed an incomparable mo- 
 desty, begging but for a remembrance only ; he 
 knew himself so sinful, he durst ask no more. He 
 reproved the other thief for blasphemy ; he con- 
 fessed the world to come, and owned Christ pub- 
 licly ; he prayed to him, he hoped in him, and 
 pitied him, showing an excellent patience in this 
 sad condition. And in this I consider, that be- 
 sides the excellency of some of these acts, and the 
 goodness of all, the like occasion for so exemplary 
 faith never can occur; and until all these things 
 shall in these circumstances meet in any one man, 
 he must not hope for so safe an exit, after an evil 
 life, upon the confidence of this example. But 
 now Christ had the key of paradise in his hand 
 and God blessed the good thief with this opportu- 
 nity of letting him in, who at another time might 
 have waited longer, and been tied to harder con- 
 
 1 Latro non semper praedonem aut grassatorem denotat, sed 
 militem, qui fortassis ob zelum J udaeorum aliquid contra leges 
 
 Romanas fecerat: alioqui vir fuit non omnino malus. 
 
 Titubaverunt qui viderunt Christum mortuos suscitantem ; cre- 
 didit ille qui videbat secum in ligno pendentem. Recolamus 
 fidem latronis, quam non invenit Christus post resurrectionem 
 in discipulis suis. S. August. Serm 144, de Tempore. 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 
 
 353 
 
 ditions. And indeed it is very probable that be 
 was much advantaged by the intervening accident 
 of dying at the same time with Christ ; there be- 
 ing a natural compassion produced in us towards 
 the partners of our miseries. For Christ was not 
 void of human passions, though he had in them 
 no imperfection or irregularity ; and therefore 
 might be invited by the society of misery, the ra- 
 ther to admit him to participate his joys. And 
 St. Paul proves him to be ' a merciful high-priest,' 
 because * he was touched with a feeling of our in- 
 firmities;' the first expression of which was to this 
 blessed thief : Christ and he together sat at the 
 supper of bitter herbs, and Christ paid his sym- 
 bol, promising that he should that day be together 
 with him in paradise. 
 
 12. By the cross of Christ stood the holy virgin 
 mother, upon whom old Simeon's prophecy was 
 now verified ; for now she felt * a sword passing- 
 through her very soul.' 1 She stood without cla- 
 mour and womanish noises, sad, silent, and with 
 a modest grief, deep as the waters of the abyss 
 but smooth as the face of a pool ; full of love 
 and patience, and sorrow and hope. Now she 
 was put to it to make use of all those excellent 
 discourses her holy Son had used to build up her 
 spirit, and fortify it against this day. Now she 
 felt the blessings and strengths of faith ; and she 
 passed from the griefs of the passion to the expec- 
 tation of the resurrection, and she rested in this 
 death as in a sad remedy ; for she knew it recon- 
 ciled God with all the world. But her hope drew 
 a veil before her sorrow ; and though her grief was 
 
 1 S. Ambrose, lib, x. in Luc. 
 VOL. III. A A 
 
354 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS UPOV 
 
 great enough to swallow her up, yet her love was 
 greater, and did swallow up her grief. But the 
 sun also had a veil upon his face, and taught us to 
 draw a curtain before the passion, which would be 
 the most artificial expression of its greatness; whilst 
 by silence and wonder we confess it great beyond 
 our expression, or, which is all one, great as the 
 burden and baseness of our sins ; and with this 
 veil drawn before the face of Jesus, let us suppose 
 him at the gates of paradise, calling with his last 
 words, in a loud voice, to have them opened, that 
 the King of glory might come in. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 I. 
 
 O holy Jesus, who for our sakes didst suffer incomparable 
 anguish and pains, commensurate to thy love and our miseries, 
 which were infinite, that thou mightest purchase for us blessings 
 upon earth, and an inheritance in heaven ; dispose us by love, 
 thankfulness, humility, and obedience, to receive all the benefit 
 of thy passion ; granting unto us and thy whole church remis- 
 sion of all our sins, integrity of mind, health of body, competent 
 maintenance, peace in our days, a temperate air, fruitfulness of 
 the earth, unity and integrity of faith, extirpation of heresies, 
 reconcilement of schisms, destruction of all wicked counsels in- 
 tended against us ; and bind the hands of rapine and sacrilege, 
 that they may not destroy the vintage, and root up the vine itself. 
 Multiply thy blessings upon us, sweetest Jesus ; increase in us 
 true religion, sincere and actual devotion in our prayers, patience 
 in troubles, and whatsoever is necessary to our soul's health, or 
 conducing to thy glory. Amen. 
 
 IT. 
 
 O dearest Saviour, I adore thy mercies, and thy incomparable 
 iove, expressed in thy so voluntary susception and affectionate suf- 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS. 
 
 355 
 
 fering such horrid and sad tortures, which cannot be remembered 
 without a sad compassion : the waters of bitterness entered into 
 thy soul, and the storms of death and thy Father's anger broke 
 thee all in pieces. * And what shall I do, who by my sins have 
 so tormented my dearest Lord ? What contrition can be great 
 enough, what tears sufficiently expressive, what hatred and de- 
 testation of my crimes can be equal and commensurate to those 
 sad accidents which they have produced ? Pity me. O Lord, 
 pity me, dearest God ; turn those thy merciful eyes towards me, 
 O most merciful Redeemer : for my sins are great, like unto thy 
 passion, full of sorrow and shame, and a burden too great for me 
 to bear. Lord, who hast done so much for me, now only speak 
 the word, and thy servant shall be whole. Let thy wounds 
 heal me, thy virtues amend me, thy death quicken me ; that I 
 in this life, suffering the cross of a sad and salutary repentance, in 
 the union and merits of thy cross and passion, may die with 
 thee, and rest with thee, and rise again with thee, and live with 
 thee for ever, in the possession of thy glories, O dearest Saviour 
 Jesus. Amen. 
 
 A A 2 
 
356 
 
 OF THE RESURRECTION 
 
 SECTION XVI. 
 
 Of the Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus. 
 
 ]. While it was yet early in the morning, upon 
 the first day of the week, Mary Magdalen and 
 Mary, the mother of James and Salome, brought 
 sweet spices to the sepulchre, that they might again 
 embalm the holy body; (for the rites of embalming 
 among the Hebrews used to last forty days; 1 ) and 
 their love was not satisfied with what Joseph had 
 done. They therefore hastened to the grave ; and 
 after they had expended their money, and bought 
 the spices, then begin to consider, who shall re- 
 move the stone : but yet they still go on, and their 
 love answers the objection, not knowing how it 
 should be done, but yet resolving to go through all 
 the difficulties ; but never remember to take care 
 to pass the guards of soldiers. But when they came 
 to the sepulchre, they found the guard affrighted 
 and removed, and the stone rolled away : for there 
 had a little before their arrival been a great earth- 
 quake, and f an angel descending from heaven 
 rolled away the stone, and sat upon it;' 2 and for 
 
 1 Gen. 1. ; Tacit. Annal. lib. xxi. 
 
 2 Aurora lucis rutilat, 
 Coelum laudibus intonat, 
 Mundus exultans jubilat, 
 Gem ens infernus ululat ; 
 Cum rex ille fortissimus, 
 Mortis confractis viribus, 
 Pede conculcans Tartara, 
 Solvit a poena miseros. 
 Ille qui clausus lapide 
 Custoditur sub milite, 
 Triumphans pompa nobili, 
 Victor surgit de funere. 
 
 Hymn. Paschal. 
 
AND ASCENSION OF JESUS. 
 
 357 
 
 fear of him the guards about the tomb became 
 astonished with fear, and were like dead men : 
 and some of them ran to the high -priests, and told 
 them what had happened. But they now, resolving 
 to make their iniquity safe and unquestionable by 
 a new crime, hire the soldiers to tell an incredible 
 and a weak fable, that his disciples came by night 
 and stole him away : against which accident the 
 wit of man could give no more security than them- 
 selves had made. The women entered into the se- 
 pulchre, and missing the body of Jesus, Mary 
 Magdalen ran to the eleven apostles, complaining 
 that the body of our Lord was not to be found. 
 Then Peter and John ran as fast as they could to 
 see : for the unexpectedness of the relation, the 
 wonder of the story, and the sadness of the person, 
 moved some affections in them, which were kindled 
 by the first principles and sparks of faith, but were 
 not made actual and definite, because the faith was 
 not raised to a flame : they looked into the sepul- 
 chre, and finding not the body there, they returned. 
 By this time Mary Magdalen was come back, and 
 the women who stayed, weeping for their Lord's 
 body, saw two angels sitting in white, the one at 
 the head, and the other at the feet; at which unex- 
 pected sight they trembled, and bowed themselves : 
 but an angel bid them not to fear; telling them, 
 that Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, was 
 also risen, and was not there ; and called to mind 
 what Jesus had told them in Galilee concerning his 
 crucifixion, and resurrection the third day. 
 
 2. And Mary Magdalen turned herself back, 
 and saw Jesus ; but supposing him to be the 
 gardener, she said to him, ' Sir, if thou hast borne 
 him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and 
 
358 
 
 OF THE RESURRECTION 
 
 I will take him away. But Jesus said unto her, 
 Mary.' Then she knew his voice, and with ecstasy 
 of joy and wonder was ready to have crushed his feet 
 with her embraces. But he commanded her not to 
 touch him, but go to his brethren, and say, ' I as- 
 cend unto my Father and to your Father, to my 
 God and your God." Mary departed with satisfac- 
 tion beyond the joys of a victory or a full vintage, 
 and told these things to the apostles ; but the narra- 
 tion seemed to them as talk of abused and fantastic 
 persons. About the same time Jesus also appeared 
 unto Simon Peter. Towards the declining of the 
 day, two of his disciples going to Emmaus, sad, 
 and discoursing of the late occurrences, Jesus puts 
 himself into their company, and upbraids their in- 
 credulity, and expounds the Scriptures, that Christ 
 ought to suffer, and rise again the third day ; and 
 in the breaking of bread disappeared ; and so was 
 known to them by vanishing away, whom present 
 they knew not. And instantly they hasted to 
 Jerusalem, and told the apostles what had hap- 
 pened. 
 
 3. And while they were there, that is, the same 
 day, at evening, when the apostles were assem- 
 bled, all save Thomas, ' secretly, for fear of the 
 Jews, the doors being shut, Jesus came and stood 
 in the midst of them. They were exceedingly 
 troubled, supposing it had been a spirit.' But 
 Jesus confuted them by the philosophy of their 
 senses ; by ' feeling his flesh and bones, which spirits 
 have not :' for he gave them his benediction, ' show- 
 ing them his hands and his feet.' At which sight 
 they rejoiced with exceeding joy, and began to 
 be restored to their indefinite hopes of some fu- 
 ture felicity, by the return of their Lord to life : and 
 
AND ASCENSION OF JESUS. 
 
 359 
 
 there he first breathed on them, giving them the 
 Holy Ghost, and performing the promise twice 
 made before his death, the promise of the keys, or 
 of binding and loosing ; saying, f Whosesoever sins 
 ye remit, they are remitted to them ; and whose- 
 soever sins ye retain, they are retained. And that 
 was the second part of clerical power with which 
 Jesus instructed his disciples, in order to their 
 great commission of preaching and government ec- 
 clesiastical. These things were told to Thomas, 
 but he ' believed not,' and resolved against the be- 
 lief of it. unless he might f put his finger into his 
 hands, and his hand into his side.' Jesus there- 
 fore, on the octave of his resurrection, appeared 
 again to the apostles met together, and makes de- 
 monstration to Thomas, in conviction and reproof of 
 his unbelief ; promising a special benediction to all 
 succeeding ages of the church ; for they are such 
 who ' saw not, and yet have believed.' 
 
 4. But Jesus, at his early appearing, had sent an 
 order by the women, that the disciples should go 
 into Galilee ; and they did so, after a few days. 
 And Simon Peter being there, went a fishing, and 
 six other of the apostles with him, to the sea of Ti- 
 berias, where they ' laboured all night, and caught 
 nothing.' Towards ' the morning, Jesus appeared 
 to them,' and bade them ' cast the net on the right 
 side of the ship which they did, and ' enclosed an 
 hundred and fifty-three great fishes :' by which 
 prodigious draught John, the beloved disciple, per- 
 ceived f it was the Lord.' At which instant ' Peter 
 threw himself into the sea,' and went to Jesus ; and 
 when the rest were come to shore, they dined with 
 broiled fish. After dinner, Jesus, taking care for 
 those scattered sheep which were dispersed over 
 
360 
 
 OF THE RESURRECTION 
 
 the face of the earth, that he might gather them into 
 one sheepfold under one shepherd, asked Peter, 
 4 Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than 
 these ? Peter answered, Yea, Lord ; thou that know- 
 est all things, knowest that I love thee. Then 
 Jesus said unto him, Feed my lambs/ And Jesus 
 asked him the same question, and gave him the 
 same precept, the second time, and the third time : 
 for it was a considerable and a weighty employ- 
 ment, upon which Jesus was willing to spend all 
 his endearments and stock of affections that Peter 
 owed him, even upon the care of his little flock. 
 And after the entrusting of this charge to him, he 
 told him, that the reward he should have in this 
 world, should be a sharp and an honourable mar- 
 tyrdom ; and withal checks Peter's curiosity in bu- 
 sying himself about the temporal accidents of other 
 men ; and enquiring what should become of John, 
 the beloved disciple, Jesus answered this question 
 with some sharpness of reprehension, and no satis- 
 faction : f If I will that he tarry till I come, what 
 is that to thee ?' Then they fancied that he should 
 not die ; but they were mistaken : for the intima- 
 tion was expounded and verified, by St. Johns sur- 
 viving the destruction of Jerusalem : for after the 
 attempts of persecutors, and the miraculous escape 
 of prepared torments, he died a natural death in a 
 good old age. 
 
 5. After this, Jesus having appointed a solemn 
 meeting for all the brethren that could be collected 
 from the dispersion, and named a certain mountain 
 in Galilee, ' appeared to five hundred brethren at 
 once :' and this was his most public and solemn 
 manifestation. And while some doubted, Jesus 
 came, according to the designation, and spake to 
 
AND ASCENSION OF JESUS. 
 
 361 
 
 the eleven ; sent them to ' preach to all the world 
 repentance and remission of sins in his name ;' pro- 
 mising f to be with them to the end of the world.' 
 He appeared also unto James, but at what time 
 is uncertain; save that there is something concern- 
 ing it in the gospel of St. Matthew, which the Na- 
 zarenes of Beraea used, and which it is likely them- 
 selves added out of report ; for there is nothing of 
 it in our Greek copies. The words are these: 
 " When the Lord had given the linen in which he 
 was wrapped, to the servant of the high-priest, he 
 went and appeared unto James. For James had 
 vowed, after he had received the Lord's supper, 
 that he would eat no bread till he saw the Lord 
 risen from the grave. Then the Lord called for 
 bread, he blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to 
 James the Just, and said, My brother, eat bread ; 
 for the Son of man is risen from the sleep of death." 
 So that by this it should seem to be done upon the 
 day of the resurrection. But the relation of it by 
 St. Paul puts it between the appearance which he 
 made to the five hundred, and that last to the 
 apostles, when he was to ascend into heaven. Last 
 of all, when the apostles were ' at dinner, he ap- 
 peared to them, upbraiding their incredulity :' and 
 ' then he opened their understanding, that they 
 might discern the sense of Scripture ;' and again 
 commanded them to preach the gospel to all the 
 world ; giving them power ' to do miracles, to cast 
 out devils, to cure diseases :' and instituted the sa- 
 crament of baptism, which he commanded should, 
 together with the sermons of the gospel, be ad- 
 ministered ' to all nations, in the name of the 
 Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.' 
 Then he led them into Juclea, and they came to 
 
OF THE RESURRECT TO V. 
 
 Bethany, and from thence to the Mount Olivet : 
 and he commanded them to stay in Jerusalem till 
 the Holy Ghost, ' the promise of the Father, should 
 descend upon them,' which should be accomplished 
 in a few days; and then they should know the 
 times and the seasons, and all things necessary for 
 their ministration and service, and propagation of 
 the gospel. And while he ' discoursed many 
 things concerning the kingdom,' behold a cloud 
 came and parted Jesus from them, and carried him 
 in their sight up into heaven, where he sits at the 
 right hand of God, blessed for ever. Amen. 
 
 6. While his apostles ' stood gazing up to hea- 
 ven, two angels appeared to them, and told them, 
 that ' Jesus should come in like manner as he was 
 taken away ;' viz. with glory and majesty, and in 
 the clouds, and with the ministry of angels. Amen. 
 * Come, Lord Jesus; come quickly.' 
 
 Ad. SECTION XVI. 
 
 Considerations upon the Accidents happening in the 
 interval after the Death of the holy Jesus, until his 
 Resurrection, 
 
 1. The holy Jesus promised to the blessed thief, 
 that he should ' that day be with him in paradise ;' 
 which therefore was certainly a place or state of 
 blessedness, because it was a promise ; and in the 
 society of Jesus, whose penal and afflictive part of 
 his work of redemption was finished upon the cross. 
 Our blessed Lord did not promise he should that 
 day be with him in his kingdom ; for that day it 
 was not opened, and the everlasting doors of those 
 
ACCIDENTS AFTER THE DEATH OF JESUS. 363 
 
 interior recesses were to be shut till after the resur- 
 rection, that himself was to ascend thither, and 
 make way for all his servants to enter, in the same 
 method in which he went before us. Our blessed 
 Lord ' descended into hell,' 1 saith the creed of the 
 apostles, from the sermon of St. Peter, as he from 
 the words of David ; that is, into the state of sepa- 
 ration and common receptacle of spirits, according 1 
 to the style of Scripture. But the name of ' hell' 
 is no where in Scripture an appellative of the king- 
 dom of Christ, of the place of final and supreme 
 glory. But concerning the verification of our Lords 
 promise to the beatified thief, and his own state of 
 separation, we must take what light we can from 
 Scripture, and what we can from the doctrine of 
 the primitive church. St. Paul had two great re- 
 velations : he was ' rapt up into paradise,' and 
 he was 1 rapt up into the third heaven :' and these 
 he calls ' visions and revelations;' not one, but cli- 
 vers: 2 for paradise is distinguished from the hea- 
 ven of the blessed, being itself a receptacle of holy 
 souls, made illustrious with visitation of angels, 
 and happy by being a repository of such spirits, 
 who at the day of judgment shall go forth into 
 eternal glory. In the interim, Christ hath trod all 
 the paths before us ; and this also we must pass 
 through, to arrive at the courts of heaven. Justin 
 Martyr said, it was the doctrine of heretical per- 
 sons, to say that the souls of the blessed, instantly 
 upon the separation from their bodies, enter into 
 the highest heaven. 3 And Irenseus makes heaven, 
 
 1 Symbolum Aquileiense, et ex eo Romanum hodiernum. 
 
 2 Methodius Cont. Origen. apud Epiphan. Idem ait Moses 
 Barcephas, lib. de Paradiso, p. iv. cap. 7. 
 
 3 Dial. adv. Tryphon. 
 
364 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 and the intermediate receptacle of souls to be dis- 
 tinct places; both blessed, but hugely differing in 
 degrees. 1 Tertullian is dogmatical in the assertion, 
 that till the voice of the great archangel be heard, and 
 as long as Christ sits at the right hand of his Father, 
 making intercession for the church, so long blessed 
 souls must expect the assembling of their brethren, 
 the great congregation of the church, that they 
 may all pass from their outer courts into the inward 
 tabernacle, the holy of holies, to the throne of God.* 
 And as it is certain that no soul could enter into 
 glory before our Lord entered, by whom we hope 
 to have access ; so it is most agreeable to the pro- 
 portion of the mysteries of our redemption, that we 
 believe the entrance into glory to have been made 
 by our Lord at his glorious ascension ; and that his 
 soul went not thither before then, to come back 
 again, to be contracted into the span of humanity, 
 and dwell forty days in his body upon earth. But 
 that he should return from paradise, that is, from 
 the common receptacle of departed spirits who died 
 in the love of God, to earth again, had in it no 
 lessening of his condition, since himself in mercy 
 called back Lazarus from thence ; and some others 
 also returned to live a life of grace, which in all 
 senses is less than the least of glories. Sufficient it 
 is to us, that all holy souls departing go into the 
 hands, that is, into the custody of our Lord ; that 
 they * rest from their labours, that their works 
 
 1 Lib. v. cap. 3. 
 
 2 Lib. de Anima ; et de Prescript. Idem Sentiunt Scriptor. 
 Resp.ad Orthod. q. J6. S. Greg. Nazianz. Orat. 10. S. Chry- 
 sost. Horn. 15, in Matth. S. Arabr. in Micheam. Cyrilli Li- 
 turg. Epiphan. ep. apud S. Hier. Theodoretus. Theophylactus, 
 et vett. passim. 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 365 
 
 shall follow them 1 and overtake them too, at the 
 day of judgment : that they are happy presently ; 
 that they are visited by angels ; that God sends, as 
 he pleases, excellent irradiations and types of glory 
 to entertain them in their mansions: 2 that their 
 condition is secured : but the crown of righteous- 
 ness is laid up against the great clay of judgment, 3 
 and then to be produced, and given to St. Paul, 
 and to all that love the coming of our Lord ; that 
 is, to all who either here in duty, or in their re- 
 ceptacles, with joy and certain hope, long for the 
 revelation of that day. At the day of judgment 
 Christ will f send the angels, and they shall gather 
 together the elect from the four winds;' 4 and all 
 the refuse of men, evil persons, they shall throw 
 into everlasting burning. Then our blessed Lord 
 shall call to the elect to enter into the kingdom, 
 and reject the cursed into the portion of devils; 
 for whom the fire is but now prepared in the inter- 
 val, For ' we must all appear before the judg- 
 ment-seat of Christ,' saith St. Paul ; ' that every 
 man may receive in his body according as he hath 
 done, whether it be good or evil.' 5 Out of the body 
 the reception of the reward is not : and therefore 
 St. Peter affirms, that f God hath delivered the evil 
 angels into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto 
 judgment.' 6 And St. Jude saith, that ' the angels 
 
 1 Rev. xiv. 13. 
 
 2 Just. Mart. 75, inter quasst. ad Gentiles : says, " That the 
 good are immediately after death carried into paradise, where 
 they behold the faces of angels and the vision of Christ." 
 
 3 2 Tim. iv. 8. 4 Matt. xiii. 41 ; xxiv. 31. 
 
 5 2 Cor. v. 10. "Iva KOfxi^rat ekcltoq rd'idia rS (Tw/jarog 
 sic quidam Cod. ra did th gwiacitoc. sic communiter, et rectius. 
 t; 2 Pet. ii. 4. 
 
366 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 which kept not their first faith, but left their first 
 habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains, 
 under darkness, unto the judgment of the great 
 day.' 1 And therefore the devils expostulated with 
 our blessed Saviour, 1 Art thou come to torment us 
 before the time ?' 2 And the same also he does to 
 evil men, 'reserving the unjust unto the day of 
 judgment to be punished.' 3 For since the actions 
 which are to be judged are the actions of the whole 
 man, so also must be the judicature. And our 
 blessed Saviour intimated this to his apostles: 1 In 
 my Father's house are many mansions : but I go to 
 prepare a place for you. And if I go away, I will 
 come again, and take you unto me ; that where I 
 am, there ye may be also/ 4 At Christ's second 
 coming this is to be performed. 5 Many outer 
 courts, many different places or different states 
 there may be; and yet there is a place whither 
 holy souls shall arrive at last, which was not then 
 ready for us ; and was not to be entered into, until 
 the entrance of our Lord had made the preparation ; 
 and that is certainly the highest heaven, called by 
 St. Paul, the third heaven : because the other re- 
 ceptacles were ready, and full of holy souls, pa- 
 triarchs, and prophets, and holy men of God ; con- 
 cerning whom St. Paul affirms expressly, that ' the 
 fathers received not the promises ; God having 
 provided some better thing for us, that they with- 
 out us should not be made perfect :' 6 therefore cer- 
 
 1 Jude, 6. 2 Matt. viii. 29. 
 
 3 2 Pet. ii. 9. Lactant. lib. vii. c. 21, says, " Let it not be sup- 
 posed that the souls of men are immediately judged ; for they 
 are detained in one common receptacle till the time appointed for 
 judgment" 
 
 4 John, xiv. 2, 3. 5 Satiabor cum apparueris. Psal. xvii. 15. 
 6 Heb. xi. 40 ; Irenaens, lib. v. adv. Haeres. ad. fin. Origen. 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 367 
 
 tain it is that their condition was a state of imper- 
 fection ; and yet they were placed in paradise, in 
 Abraham's bosom ; and thither Christ went, and 
 the blessed thief attended him. And then it was 
 that Christ made their condition better. For though 
 still it be a place of relation in order to something 
 beyond it, yet the term and object of their hope is 
 changed. They sat in the regions of darkness, ex- 
 pecting that great promise made to Adam and the 
 patriarchs, the promise of the Messias : but when 
 he that was promised came, he preached to the 
 spirits in prison ; he communicated to them the 
 mysteries of the gospel, the secrets of the kingdom, 
 the things hidden from eternal ages ; and taught 
 them to look up to the glories purchased by his 
 passion, and made the term of their expectation be 
 his second coining, and the objects of their hope 
 the glories of the beatific vision. And, although 
 the state of separation is sometimes in Scripture 
 called heaven, and sometimes hell ; (for these words 
 in Scripture are of large significations;) yet it is 
 never called the third heaven, nor the hell of the 
 damned : for although concerning it nothing is 
 clearly revealed, or what is their portion till the 
 day of judgment ; yet it is intimated in a parable, 
 that between good and evil spirits, even in the 
 state of separation, there is distance of place. Cer- 
 tain it is, there is great distance of condition : and 
 as the holy souls in their regions of light are full of 
 love, joy, hope, and longing for the coming of the 
 great day ; so the accursed do expect it with an in- 
 
 Hom. 7, in Levit. ; Chrysostom. Horn. 39, in 1 Cor. ; Theodo- 
 ret; Theophyl.; Oecumeniusin Heb. 11 ; S. Aug. lib. i. ; Ke- 
 tract. c. 14 ; Victorin. Mart, in c. 6 ; Apoc. Ambros. de bono 
 Mortis, c. 10, 11. 
 
368 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 supportable amazement, and are presently torment- 
 ed with apprehensions of the future. Happy are 
 they that through paradise pass into the kingdom ; 
 who from their highest hope pass to the greatest 
 charity ; from the state of a blessed separation to 
 the mercies and gentle sentence of the day of judg- 
 ment, 1 which St. Paul prayed to God to grant 
 Onesiphorus ; and more explicitly for the Thessa- 
 lonians, ' that their w r hole spirit, and soul, and 
 body, be preserved blameless unto the coming of 
 our Lord Jesus.' * And I pray God to grant the 
 same to me, and all faithful people whatsoever. 
 
 2. As soon as the Lord had given up his Spirit 
 into the hands of God, the veil of the temple was 
 rent; the angels, guardians of the place, deserted 
 it ; the rites of Moses were laid open, and the en- 
 closures of the tabernacle were disparked ; the earth 
 trembled, the graves were opened, and all the old 
 world and the old religion were so shaken towards 
 their first chaos, that if God had not supported the 
 one, and reserved the other for an honourable 
 burial, the earth had left to support her children, 
 and the synagogue had been thrown out to an in- 
 glorious exposition and contempt. But yet in 
 these symbols these were changed from their first 
 condition, and passed into a new dominion; all 
 old things passed away, and all things became 
 new ; the earth and the heavens were reckoned as 
 a new creation ; they passed into another kingdom, 
 under Christ their Lord; and as before the creatures 
 
 1 2 Tim. i. 18. 
 
 2 1 Thess. v. 23 ; vide Trena?um in hunc locum, lib. v. c 6, 
 adv. Basres. ubi probat absque unione corporis, animae etspiritus, 
 
 hominem non esse. 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 369 
 
 were servants of human necessities, they now be- 
 come servants of election, and in order to the ends 
 of grace, as before of nature; Christ having now 
 the power to dispose of them in order to his king- 
 dom, and by the administration of his own wisdom. 
 And at the instant of these accidents, God so de- 
 termined the persuasions of men, that they referred 
 these prodigies to the honour of Christ, and took 
 them as testimonies of that truth, for the affirma- 
 tion of which the high-priest had condemned our 
 dearest Lord. And although the heart of the 
 priest rent not, even then when rocks did tear in 
 pieces; yet the people who saw the passion smote 
 their breasts, and returned, and confessed Christ. 1 
 
 3. The graves of the dead were opened at the 
 death, but the dead bodies of the saints that slept 
 arose not till the resurrection of our Lord : 2 for he 
 was the first-fruits, and they followed him as in- 
 stant witnesses, to publish the resurrection of their 
 head ; which it is possible they declared to those to 
 whom they appeared in the holy city. And amongst 
 these, the curiosity or pious credulity of some have 
 supposed Adam and Eve, Abraham, Isaac, and 
 Jacob ; who therefore were careful to be buried in 
 the land of promise, as having some intimation or 
 hope that they might be partakers of the earliest 
 glories of the Messias, in whose faith and distant 
 expectation they lived and died. And this calling 
 up of company from their graves, did publish to 
 all the world, not only that the Lord himself was 
 risen, according to his so frequent and repeated 
 predictions, but that he meant to raise up all his 
 
 1 S. Ambros. lib. x. in Lucam. 
 
 2 Euseb. Emls. Horn. 6 3 de. Pasch. 
 VOL. JIT. B B 
 
370 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 servants ; and that all who believe in him should 
 be partakers of the resurrection. 1 
 
 4. When the soldiers observed that Jesus was 
 dead, out of spite and impotent ineffective malice, 
 one of them pierced his holy side with a spear ; 
 and the rock being smitten, it gushed out with 
 water and blood ; 2 streaming forth two sacraments 
 to refresh the church, and opening a gate that all 
 his brethren might enter in, and dwell in the heart 
 of God. And so great a love had our Lord, that 
 he suffered his heart to be opened ; to show, that 
 as Eve was formed from the side of Adam, so was 
 the church to be from the side of her Lord, re- 
 ceiving from thence life and spiritual nutriment ; 
 which he ministered in so great abundance, and 
 suffered himself to be pierced, that all his blood 
 did stream over us, until he made the fountain 
 dry, and reserved nothing of that by which he 
 knew his church was ' to live, and move, and have 
 her being.' Thus the stream of blood issued out 
 to become a fountain for the sacrament of the 
 chalice, and water gushed out to fill the fonts of 
 baptism and repentance. The blood, being the 
 testimony of the divine love, calls upon us to die 
 for his love, when he requires it ; and the noise of 
 the water calls upon us to purify our spirits, and 
 present our conscience to Christ, ' holy and pure, 
 without spot or wrinkle.' The blood running upon 
 us, makes us to be of the cognation and family of 
 God ; and the water quenches the flames of hell, 
 and the fires of concupiscence. 
 
 5. The friends and disciples of the holy Jesus, 
 
 1 'EXvTp&VTO TTCLVTtQ o\ S'llCaiOl HQ KCLTITTHV 6 ScLVCtTOQ. 
 
 2 S. Cyr. Catech. et Chrysost. Horn. 88, in 27 Mat. 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 371 
 
 having devoutly composed his body to burial 
 anointed it, washed it, and condited it with spices 
 and perfumes, laid it in a sepulchre hewn from a 
 rock in a garden : which (saith Euthymius) was 
 therefore done, to represent that we were by this 
 death returned to paradise, and the gardens of 
 pleasures and divine favours, from whence, by the 
 prevarication of Adam, man was expelled. Here 
 he finished the work of his passion, as he had begun 
 it, in a garden; and the place of the sepulchre, 
 being a rock, serves the ends of pious succeeding 
 ages : for the place remains in all changes of go- 
 vernment, of wars, of earthquakes, and ruder acci- 
 dents, to this day, as a memorial of the sepulchre 
 of our dearest Lord, as a sensible and proper con- 
 firmation of the persuasions of some persons, and 
 as an entertainment of their pious fancy, and reli- 
 gious affections. 
 
 '6. But now it was that in the dark and undis- 
 cerned mansions there was a scene of the greatest 
 joy and the greatest horror represented, which yet 
 was known since the first falling of the morning 
 stars. Those holy souls whom the prophet Ze- 
 chariah calls ' prisoners of hope, lying in the lake 
 where there is no water;' 1 that is, no constant 
 stream of joy to refresh their present condition, 
 (yet supported with certain showers and gracious 
 visitations from God, and illuminations of their 
 hope,) now that they saw their Redeemer come to 
 change their condition, and to improve it into the 
 neighbourhoods of glory and clearer revelation, 
 must needs have the joy of intelligent and beati- 
 
 i Zech. ix. 11, 12. 
 
 B B 2 
 
372 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 fled understandings, of redeemed captives, of men 
 forgiven after the sentence of death, of men satis- 
 fied after a tedious expectation, enjoying and 
 seeing their Lord, whom for so many ages they had 
 expected. But the accursed spirits, seeing the 
 darkness of their prison shine with a new light, 
 and their empire invaded, and their retirements of 
 horror discovered, wondered how a man durst ven- 
 ture thither, or if he were a God, how he should 
 come to die. But the holy Jesus was like that 
 body of light, receiving into himself the reflection 
 of all the lesser rays of joy which the patriarchs 
 felt, and being united to his fountain of felicity, 
 apprehended it yet more glorious. He now felt 
 the effects of his bitter passion to return upon him 
 in comforts, every hour of which was abundant 
 recompence for three hours' passion upon the cross ; 
 and became to us a great precedent, to invite us to 
 a toleration of the acts of repentance, mortification, 
 and martyrdom, and that, in times of suffering, 
 we live upon the stock and expense of faith ; as 
 remembering, that these few moments of infelicity 
 are infinitely paid with every minute of glory, and 
 yet that the glory which is certainly consequent, 
 is so lasting and perpetual, that it were enough, in 
 a lower joy, to make amends by its continuation of 
 eternity. And let us but call to mind what 
 thoughts we shall have when we die, or are dead ; 
 how we shall then, without prejudice, consider, 
 that if we had done our duty, the trouble and the 
 affliction would now be past, and nothing remain 
 but pleasures and felicities eternal ; and how infi- 
 nitely happy we shall then be, if we have done 
 our duty, and how miserable if not ; all the plea- 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 373 
 
 sures of sin disappearing, and nothing surviving, 
 but a certain and everlasting torment. 1 Let us 
 carry alway the same thoughts with us which must 
 certainly then intervene, and we shall meet the 
 holy Jesus, and partake of his joys, which over- 
 flowed his holy soul when he first entered into the 
 possession of those excellent fruits and effects of 
 his passion. 
 
 7. When the third day was come, the soul of 
 Jesus returned from paradise, and the visitation of 
 separate spirits, and re-entered into his holy body, 
 which he by his divine power did redintegrate, 
 filling his veins with blood, healing all the wounds, 
 excepting those five of his hands, feet, and side, 
 which he reserved as trophies of his victory, and 
 arguments of his passion. And as he had com- 
 forted the souls of the fathers with the presence 
 of his Spirit, so now he saw it to be time to bring 
 comfort to his holy mother, to re-establish the tot- 
 tering faith of his disciples, to verify his promise, 
 to make demonstration of his divinity, to lay some 
 superstructures of his church upon the foundation 
 of his former sermons, to instruct them in the mys- 
 teries of his kingdom, to prepare them for the recep- 
 tion of the Holy Ghost. And as he had, in his state 
 of separation, triumphed over hell, so in his resur- 
 rection he set his foot upon death, and brought it 
 under his dominion ; so that although it was not 
 yet destroyed, yet it is made his subject. It hath 
 as yet the condition of the Gibeonites, who were 
 not banished out of the land, but they were made 
 ' drawers of water and hewers of wood :' so is death 
 made instrumental to Christ's kingdom, but it 
 
 1 Musonius apud A. Gellium, lib. xvi. c. 1. 
 
374 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 abides still, and shall till the day of judgment; 
 but shall serve the ends of our Lord, and pro- 
 mote the interests of eternity, and do benefit to the 
 church. 
 
 8. And it is considerable, that our blessed Lord 
 having told them that after three days he would 
 rise again, yet he shortened the time as much as 
 was possible, that he might verify his own predic- 
 tion, and yet make his absence the least trouble- 
 some. He rises ' early in the morning, the first 
 day of the week.' For so our dearest Lord abbre- 
 viates the days of our sorrow, and lengthens the 
 years of our consolation. For he knows that a 
 day of sorrow seems a year, and a year of joy 
 passes like a day ; and therefore God lessens the 
 one and lengthens the other, to make this perceived 
 and that supportable. Now the temple which the 
 Jews destroyed, God raised up in six-and-thirty 
 hours. But this second temple was more glorious 
 than the first; for now it was clothed with robes of 
 glory and clarity, agility and immortality. And 
 though, like Moses descending from the mount, he 
 wore a veil, that the greatness of his splendour 
 might not render him unapt for conversation with 
 his servants ; yet the holy Scripture affirms that 
 he was ' now no more to see corruption ;' meaning, 
 that now he was separate from the passibility and 
 affections of human bodies, and could suffer St. 
 Thomas to thrust his hand into the wound of his 
 side, and his finger into the holes of his hands, 
 without any grief or smart. 
 
 9. But although the graciousness and care of the 
 Lord had prevented all diligence, and satisfied all 
 desires, returning to life before the most forward 
 faith could expect him ; yet there were three 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 375 
 
 Marys went to the grave so early, that they pre- 
 vented the rising of the sun ; and though with 
 great obedience they staid till the end of the sab- 
 bath, yet, as soon as that was done, they had other 
 parts of duty and affection, which called with 
 greatest importunity to be speedily satisfied. And 
 if obedience had not bound the feet of love, 
 they had gone the day before ; but they became 
 to us admirable patterns of obedience to the di- 
 vine commandments. For though love were 
 4 stronger than death/ yet obedience was stronger 
 than love, and made a rare dispute in the spirits of 
 those holy women, in which the flesh and the spirit 
 were not the litigants, but the spirit and the spirit ; 
 and they resisted each other as the angel-guardian 
 of the Jews resisted the tutelar angel of Persia, 
 each striving who should with most love and zeal 
 perform their charge ; and God determined : and 
 so he did here too. For the law of the sabbath 
 was then a divine commandment ; and although 
 piety to the dead, and to such a dead, was ready to 
 force their choice to do violence to their will, bear- 
 ing them upon wings of desire to the grave of the 
 Lord ; yet at last they reconciled love with obe- 
 dience : for they had been taught, that love is 
 best expressed in keeping of the divine command- 
 ments. But now they were at liberty ; and sure 
 enough they made use of its first minute, and 
 going so early to see Christ, they were sure they 
 should find him. 
 
 10. The angels descended guardians of the se- 
 pulchre ; for God sent his guards too, and they 
 affrighted the watch appointed by Pilate and the 
 priests. But when the women came, they spake 
 like comforters, full of sweetness and consolation, 
 
376 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 laying aside their affrighting glories ; as knowing it 
 is the will of their Lord, that they should minister 
 good to them that love him. But a conversation 
 with angels could not satisfy them who came to 
 look for the Lord of the angels, and found him not. 
 And when the Lord was pleased to appear to 
 Mary Magdalen, she was so swallowed up with 
 love and sorrow, that she entered into her joy and 
 perceived it not ; she saw the Lord, and knew him 
 not. For so, from the closets of darkness they that 
 immediately stare upon the sun, perceive not the 
 beauties of the light, and feel nothing but amaze- 
 ment. But the voice of the Lord opened her eyes, 
 and she knew him and worshipped him, but was 
 denied to touch him, and commanded to tell the 
 apostles. For therefore God ministers to us com- 
 forts and revelations ; not that we may dwell in 
 the sensible fruition of them ourselves alone, but 
 that we communicate the grace to others. But 
 when the other women were returned and saw the 
 Lord, then they were all together admitted to the 
 embracement, and to kiss the feet of Jesus : for God 
 hath his opportunities and periods which at ano- 
 ther time he denies : and we must then rejoice in 
 it when he vouchsafes it ; and submit to his divine 
 will, when he denies it. 
 
 11. These good women had the first-fruits of the 
 apparition : for their forward love, and the passion 
 of their religion, made greater haste to entertain a 
 grace, and was a greater endearment of their per- 
 sons to our Lord than a more sober, reserved, and 
 less active spirit. This is more safe, but that is re- 
 ligious ; this goes to God by the way of under- 
 standing, that by the will ; this is supported by 
 discourse, that by passions; this is the sobriety of the 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 377 
 
 apostles, the other was the zeal of the holy women 
 And because a strong fancy and an earnest passion, 
 fixed upon holy objects, are the most active and 
 forward instruments of devotion, as devotion is of 
 love; therefore we find that God hath made great 
 expressions of his acceptance of such dispositions. 
 And women, and less knowing persons, and ten- 
 der dispositions, and pliant natures, will make up 
 a greater number in heaven, than the severe, and 
 wary, and enquiring people; who sometimes love 
 because they believe, and believe because they can 
 demonstrate, but never believe because they love. 
 When a great understanding, and a great affection 
 meet together, it makes a saint great, like an apos- 
 tle ; but they do not well who make abatement of 
 their religious passions by the severity of their under- 
 standing. It is no matter by which we are brought 
 to Christ, so wc love him and obey him : but if the 
 production admit of degrees, that instrument is the 
 most excellent which produces the greatest love. 
 And although discourse and a sober spirit be in it- 
 self the best, yet we do not always suffer that to be 
 a parent of as great religion as the good women 
 make their fancy, their softness, and their passion. 
 
 12. Our blessed Lord appeared next to Simon : 
 and though he and John ran forth together, and St. 
 John outran Simon ; although Simon Peter had 
 denied and forsworn his Lord, and St. John never 
 did, and followed him to his passion and his death ; 
 yet Peter had the favour of seeing Jesus first. 
 Which some spiritual persons understand as a tes- 
 timony, that penitent sinners have accidental emi- 
 nencies and privileges sometimes indulged to them 
 beyond the temporal graces of the just and inno- 
 cent, as being such who not only need defensatives 
 
378 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 against the remanent and inherent evils even of re- 
 pented sins, and their aptnesses to relapse ; but 
 also because those who are true penitents, who un 
 derstand the infiniteness of the divine mercy, and 
 that for a sinner to pass from death to life, from 
 the state of sin into pardon and the state of grace, 
 is a greater gift, and a more excellent and improba- 
 ble mutation, than for a just man to be taken into 
 glory; 1 out of gratitude to God, and endearment for 
 so great a change, added to a fear of returning 
 to such danger and misery, will reinforce all their 
 industry and double their study, and observe more 
 diligently, and watch more carefully, and ' redeem 
 the time/ and make amends for their omissions, and 
 oppose a good to the former evils, besides the du- 
 ties of the present employment ; and then, com- 
 monly, the life of a holy penitent is more holy, 
 active, zealous, and impatient of vice, and more 
 rapacious of virtue and holy actions, and arises to 
 greater degrees of sanctity, than the even and mo- 
 derate affections of just persons, who (as our bles- 
 sed Saviour's expression is) ' need no repentance 
 that is, no change of state, nothing but a persever- 
 ance, and an improvement of degrees. ' There is 
 more joy in heaven, before the angels of God, over 
 one sinner that repenteth, than over ninety and 
 nine just persons that need it not;* for, ' where sin 
 hath abounded, there doth grace superabound ;' 2 
 and that makes joy in heaven. 
 
 13. The holy Jesus having received the affections 
 of his most passionate disciples, the women and St. 
 
 1 u It is a greater wonder," says St. Augustine iC that a sinner 
 should pass from a state of sin to a state of grace, than that he 
 should pass from this world into heaven" 
 
 2 Luke, xv. 7» 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 379 
 
 Peter, puts himself upon the way into the company 
 of two good men going to Emmaus, with troubled 
 spirits and a reeling faith, shaking all its upper 
 building, but leaving some of its foundation firm. 
 To them the Lord discourses of the necessity of 
 the death and resurrection of the Messias, and 
 taught them not to take estimate of the counsels of 
 God by the designs and proportions of man : for 
 God, by ways contrary to human judgment, brings 
 to pass the purposes of his eternal providence. 
 The glories of Christ were not made pompous by 
 human circumstances ; his kingdom was spiritual ; 
 he was to enter into felicities through the gates 
 of death ; he refused to do miracles before Herod, 
 and yet did them before the people ; he confuted 
 his accusers by silence; and did not descend from 
 the cross when they offered to believe in him if he 
 would, but left them to be persuaded by greater 
 arguments of his power, the miraculous circum- 
 stances of his death, and the glories of his resur- 
 rection ; and by walking in the secret paths of di- 
 vine election, hath commanded us to adore his 
 footsteps, to admire and revere his wisdom, to be 
 satisfied with all the events of providence, and to 
 rejoice in him, if by afflictions he makes us holy, 
 if by persecutions he supports and enlarges his 
 church, if by death he brings us to life. So we ar- 
 rive at the communion of his felicities, we must 
 let him choose the way ; it being sufficient that he 
 is our guide, and our support, and our ' exceeding 
 great reward/ For therefore Christ preached to 
 the two disciples, going to Emmaus, the way of the 
 cross, and the necessity of that passage, that the 
 wisdom of God might be glorified, and the conjec- 
 tures of man ashamed. But whilst his discourse 
 
r>80 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 lasted, they knew him not; but in the breaking of 
 bread he discovered himself. For he turned their 
 meal into a sacrament, and their darkness to light; 
 and having to his sermon added the sacrament, 
 opened all their discerning faculties, the eyes of 
 their body and their understanding too ; to repre- 
 sent to us, that when we are blessed with the op- 
 portunities of both those instruments, we want no 
 exterior assistance to guide us in the way to the 
 knowing and enjoying of our Lord. 
 
 14. But the apparitions which Jesus made were 
 all upon the design of laying the foundation of all 
 Christian graces; for the begetting and establish- 
 ing faith and an active confidence in their persons, 
 and building them up on the great fundamentals 
 of the religion. And therefore he appointed a 
 general meeting upon a mountain in Galilee, that 
 the number of witnesses might not only dissemi- 
 nate the fame, but establish the article of the re- 
 surrection ; for upon that are built all the hopes of 
 a Christian ; and ' if the dead rise not, then we are 
 of all men the most miserable,' in quitting the pre- 
 sent possessions, and entertaining injuries and af- 
 fronts without hopes of reparation. But we lay 
 two gages in several repositories : the body in the 
 bosom of the earth, the soul in the bosom of God ; 
 and as we here live by faith, and lay them down 
 with hope, so the resurrection is a restitution of 
 them both, and a state of reunion. And therefore 
 although the glory of our spirits without the body 
 were joy great enough to make compensation for 
 more than the troubles of all the world ; yet be- 
 cause one shall not be glorified without the other, 
 they being of themselves incomplete substances, 
 and God having revealed nothing clearly concern- 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 381 
 
 ing actual and complete felicities till the clay of 
 judgment, when it is promised our bodies shall 
 rise; therefore it is that the resurrection is the 
 great article upon which we rely, and which Christ 
 took so much care to prove and ascertain to so 
 many persons; because if that should be disbe- 
 lieved with which all our felicities are to be re- 
 ceived, we have nothing to establish our faith, or 
 entertain our hope, or satisfy our desires, or make 
 retribution for that state of secular inconveniences 
 in which, by the necessities of our nature, and the 
 humility and patience of our religion, we are en- 
 gaged. 
 
 15. But I consider that Holy Scripture only in- 
 structs us concerning the life of this world and the 
 life of the resurrection, the life of grace and the 
 life of glory, both in the body ; that is, a life of 
 the whole man : and whatsoever is spoken of the 
 soul, considers it as an essential part of man, re- 
 lating to his whole constitution, not as it is of itself 
 an intellectual and separate substance ; for all its 
 actions which are separate and removed from the 
 body are relative and incomplete. Now because 
 the soul is an incomplete substance, and created in 
 relation to the body, and is but a part of the 
 whole man, if the body were as eternal and incor- 
 ruptible as the soul, yet the separation of the one 
 from the other would be, as now it is, that which 
 we call natural death ; and supposing that God 
 should preserve the body for ever, or restore it at 
 the day of judgment to its full substance and per- 
 fect organs, yet the man would be dead for ever, 
 if the soul for ever should continue separate from 
 the body. So that the other life, that is, the state 
 of resurrection, is a reuniting soul and body. 
 
382 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 And although, in a philosophical sense, the resur- 
 rection is of the body, that is, a restitution of our 
 flesh and blood and bones, and is called resur- 
 rection, as the entrance into the state of resurrection 
 may have the denomination of the whole ; yet in 
 the sense of Scripture the resurrection is the resti- 
 tution of our life, the renovation of the w hole man, 
 the state of reunion ; and, until that be, the man 
 is not, but he is dead, and only his essential parts 
 are deposited and laid up in trust ; and therefore 
 whatsoever the soul does or perceives in its in- 
 complete condition, is but to it as embalming 
 and honourable funerals to the body, and a safe 
 monument to preserve it in order to a living 
 again ; and the felicities of the interval are wholly 
 in order to the next life. And therefore, if there 
 were to be no resurrection, as these intermediate 
 joys should not be at all, so as they are, they are 
 but relative and incomplete : and therefore all our 
 hopes, all our felicities depend upon the resurrec- 
 tion ; without it we should never be persons, men 
 or women : and then the state of separation could 
 be nothing but a phantasm, trees ever in blossom, 
 never bearing fruit, corn for ever in the blade, 
 eggs always in the shell, a hope eternal never to 
 pass into fruition ; that is, for ever to be deluded, 
 for ever to be miserable. And therefore it was an 
 elegant expression of St. Paul, ' Our life is hid 
 with Christ in God;' 1 that is, our life is passed 
 into custody, the dust of our body is numbered, 
 and the spirit is refreshed, visited, and preserved in 
 celestial mansions : but it is not properly called 
 a life ; for all this while the man is dead, and 
 
 1 Coloss. iii 3. 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 383 
 
 shall then live when Christ produces this hidden 
 life at the great day of restitution. But our faith 
 of all this article is well wrapped up in the w ords 
 of St. John : ' Beloved, now are we the sons of 
 God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall 
 be ; but we know that when he shall appear, we 
 shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is/ 1 
 The middle state is not it which Scripture hath 
 propounded to our faith, or to our hope ; the reward 
 is then when Christ shall appear ; but in the mean- 
 time the soul can converse with God and with 
 angels, just as the holy prophets did in their 
 dreams, in which they received great degrees of 
 favour and revelation. 2 But this is not to be reck- 
 oned any more than an entrance or a waiting for 
 the state of our felicity. And since the glories of 
 heaven is the great fruit of election, we may consi- 
 der that the body is not predestinate, nor the soul, 
 alone, but the whole man ; and, until the parts 
 embrace again in an essential complexion, it can- 
 not be expected either of them should receive the 
 portion of the predestinate. But the article and 
 the event of future things is rarely set in order by 
 St. Paul : ' But ye are come into the Mount Sion, 
 and to the city of the living God, the heavenly 
 Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of 
 angels, to the general assembly and church of the 
 first-born, which are written in heaven, and to God, 
 the judge of all, (and then follows after this gene- 
 ral assembly, after the Judge of all appears,) to the 
 
 1 1 John, iii. 2. 
 
 2 "Orav iv t<£ vttv&v k<x6' kavrriv yevrjcrrfTat r) 4>vxv, tots 
 rrjv idiov a7ro\a£S(ra (pvciv, Trpofiavrtverai re jcj 7rpo«yo- 
 pevEL rd fxsWovra' Toiavri) de ic, kv rqj Kara rbv Savarov 
 %apiZt(T$ai tujv crwjuarwv. — Arist. apud Sext. Empiric. 
 
384 
 
 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 spirits of just men made perfect;' 1 that is, re- 
 united to their bodies, and entering" into glory. 
 The beginning of the contrary opinion brought 
 some new practices and appendant persuasions 
 into the church, or at least promoted them much. 
 For those doctors who, receding from the primitive 
 belief of this article, taught that the glories of 
 heaven are fully communicated to the souls before 
 the clay of judgment, did also, upon that stock, 
 teach the invocation of saints, whom they believed 
 to be received into glory ; and insensibly also 
 brought in the opinion of purgatory, that the less 
 perfect souls might be glorified in the time that 
 they assigned them. But the safer opinion and 
 more agreeable to piety, is that which I have now 
 described from Scripture and the purest ages of the 
 church. 
 
 16. When Jesus appeared to the apostles, he 
 gave them his peace for a benediction ; and when 
 he departed, he left them peace for a legacy ; and 
 gave them, according to two former promises, the 
 power of making peace, and reconciling souls to 
 God by a ministerial act ; so conveying his Father's 
 mercy, which himself procured by his passion, and 
 actuates by his intercession and the giving of his 
 grace, that he might comply with our infirmities, 
 and minister to our needs by instruments even 
 and proportionate to ourselves ; making our breth- 
 ren the conduits of his grace, that the excellent 
 effect of the Spirit might not descend upon us, as 
 the law upon Mount Sinai, in expresses of greatness 
 and terror, but in earthen vessels, and images of 
 infirmity ; so God manifesting his power in the 
 
 » Heb. xii. 22, 23. 
 
UNTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 385 
 
 smallness of the instrument, and descending' to 
 our needs, not only in giving the grace of pardon, 
 but also in the manner of its ministration. And 
 I meditate upon the greatness of this mercy, by 
 comparing this grace of God, and the blessing of 
 the judgment and sentence we receive at the 
 hand of the church, with the judgment which 
 God makes at the hour of death upon them who 
 have despised this mercy, and neglected all the 
 other parts of their duty. The one is a judgment 
 of mercy, the other of vengeance : in the one the 
 devil is the accuser, and heaven and earth bear 
 witness; in the other the penitent sinner accuses 
 himself : in that the sinner gets a pardon, in the 
 other he finds no remedy : in that all his good 
 deeds are remembered and returned, and his sins 
 are blotted out; in the other all his evil deeds 
 are represented with horror and a sting, and re- 
 main for ever : in the first the sinner changes his 
 state for a state of g;race, and only smarts in some 
 temporal austerities and acts of exterior mortifica- 
 tion ; in the second his temporal estate is changed 
 to an eternity of pain : in the first the sinner suffers 
 the shame of one man or one society, which is 
 sweetened by consolation, and homilies of mercy 
 and health ; in the latter, all his sins are laid open 
 before all the world, and himself confounded in 
 eternal amazement and confusions ; in the judg- 
 ment of the church, the sinner is honoured by all 
 for returning to the bosom of his mother, and the 
 embraces of his heavenly Father; in the judgment 
 of vengeance he is laughed at by God, and mocked 
 by accursed spirits, and perishes without pity : in 
 this he is prayed for by none, helped by none, com- 
 forted by none, and he makes himself a companion 
 
 VOL. III. C C 
 
386 ACCIDENTS FROM THE DEATH 
 
 of devils to everlasting ages ; but in the judg- 
 ment of repentance and tribunal of the church, 
 the penitent sinner is prayed for by the whole 
 army of militant saints, and causes joy to all the 
 church triumphant. And to establish this tribu- 
 nal in the church, and to transmit pardon to peni- 
 tent sinners, and a salutary judgment upon the 
 person and the crime, and to appoint physi- 
 cians and guardians of the soul, was one of the de- 
 signs and mercies of the resurrection of Jesus. 
 And let not any Christian man, either by false 
 opinion or an unbelieving spirit, or an incurious 
 apprehension, undervalue or neglect this ministry, 
 which Christ hath so sacredly and solemnly estab- 
 lished. Happy is he that dashes his sins against 
 the rock upon which the church is built, that the 
 church gathering up the planks and fragments of 
 the shipwreck, and the shivers of the broken heart, 
 may reunite them ; pouring oil into the wounds 
 made by the blows of sin, and restoring, with 
 meekness, gentleness, care, counsel, and authority, 
 persons overtaken in a fault. For that act of mi- 
 nistry is not ineffectual which God hath promised 
 shall be ratified in heaven ; and that authority is 
 not contemptible which the holy Jesus conveyed, 
 by breathing upon his church the Holy Ghost. 
 But Christ intended that those whom he had made 
 guides of our souls, and judges of our consciences, 
 in order to counsel and ministerial pardon, should 
 also be used by us in all cases of our souls ; and 
 that we go to heaven the way he hath appointed ; 
 that is, by offices and ministries ecclesiastical. 
 
 17. When our blessed Lord had so confirmed 
 the faith of the church, and appointed an ecclesias- 
 tical ministry, he had but one work more to do 
 
17NTIL THE RESURRECTION. 
 
 387 
 
 upon earth, and that was the institution of the holy 
 sacrament of baptism ; which he ordained as a 
 solemn initiation and mysterious profession of the 
 faith upon which the church is built ; making it a 
 solemn publication of our profession, the rite of 
 stipulation or entering covenant with our Lord, 
 and the solemnity of the paction evangelical, in 
 which we undertake to be disciples to the holy 
 Jesus; that is, to believe his doctrine, to fear his 
 threatenings, to rely upon his promises, and to 
 obey his commandments all the days of our life. 1 
 And he for his part actually performs much, and 
 promises more ; he takes off all the guilt of our pre- 
 ceding days, purging our souls and making them 
 clean as in the day of innocence ; promising withal, 
 that if we perform our undertaking, and remain in 
 the state in which he now puts us, he will conti- 
 nually assist us with his Spirit, prevent and 
 attend us with his grace ; he will deliver us from 
 the power of the devil ; he will keep our souls in 
 merciful, joyful, and safe custody, till the great day 
 of the Lord ; he will then raise our bodies from the 
 grave, he will make them to be spiritual and im- 
 mortal, he will re-unite them to our souls, and 
 beatify both bodies and souls in his own kingdom, 
 admitting them into eternal and unspeakable glo- 
 ries. 2 All which that he might verify and prepare 
 respectively, in the presence of his disciples he 
 ascended into the bosom of God, and the eternal 
 comprehensions of celestial glory. 
 
 1 Mark, xvi. 16; Acts, ii. 38; xxii. 16; Rom. vi. 3, 4; 
 Eph. iv. 5, &c. ; 1 Cor. xii. 13; Col. ii. 13; Gal. iii. 27; 
 1 Pet. iii. 21. 
 
 2 Matt, xxviii. 20. 
 
388 
 
 THE DEATH AND RESURRECTION. 
 
 THE PRAYER. 
 
 O holy and eternal Jesus, who hast overcome death, and tri- 
 umphed over all the powers of hell, darkness, sin, and the grave, 
 manifesting the truth of thy promises, the power of thy divinity, 
 the majesty of thy person, the rewards of thy glory, and the 
 mercies and excellent designs of thy evangelical kingdom, by thy 
 glorious and powerful resurrection, preserve my soul from eternal 
 death, and make me to rise from the death of sin, and to live the 
 life of grace ; loving thy perfections, adoring thy mercy, pursuing 
 the interest of thy kingdom, being united to the church under 
 thee our head, conforming to thy holy laws, established in faith, 
 entertained and confirmed with a modest, humble, and certain 
 hope, and sanctified by charity ; that I, engraving thee in my 
 heart, and submitting to thee in my spirit, and imitating thee in 
 thy glorious example, may be partaker of thy resurrection, which 
 is my hope and my desire, the support of my faith, the object of 
 my joy, and the strength of my confidence. In thee, holy 
 Jesus, do I trust: I confess thy faith, I believe all that thou 
 hast taught ; I desire to perform all thy injunctions, and my own 
 undertaking. My soul is in thy hand, do thou support and 
 guide it, and pity my infirmities : and when thou shalt reveal 
 thy great day, show to me the mercies and effects of thy advoca- 
 tion, and intercession, and redemption. Thou shalt answer for 
 me, O Lord my God ; for in thee have I trusted: let me never 
 be confounded. Thou art just, thou art merciful, thou art gra- 
 cious and compassionate, thou hast done miracles and prodigies of 
 favour to me and all the world. Let not those great actions and 
 sufferings be ineffective, but make me capable and receptive of 
 thy mercies, and then I am certain to receive them. I am thine, 
 O save me : thou art mine, O holy Jesus ; O dwell with me for 
 ever ; and let me dwell with thee, adoring and praising the eter- 
 nal glories of God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 J, Rickerby, Printer, Sherbourn Lane.