Commentary on 2 Peter

for short provision: he had invited a number of fiddlers, jesters, players, tumblers, dancers, and must have extraordinary cheare for them. Vtile refused to allow it, Iucundum would have it, and the quarrel grew hot: while Honestum was called to moderate the matter, this rabble came in, took Iucundum's part, snatched the keys out of Vtile's hands, ransack'd the coffers, exhausted the treasure, turned Honesty and Thrift out of doors; sung, danced, and drunk, and threw (as they say) the house out at the windows. Thus the Family broke; for just as Honestum and Vtile went out, Beggary came in. Only these two erected a new house, repaired their estates: to whom not long after, poor Iucundum came a begging; but might not be admitted as one of the Family, only was sent for sometimes to make them merry, and lived on their alms. You see the moral of this Apologue. Cato said; that was a pitiful Common-wealth, where a Trowt was dearer than an Ox: and I may say, that is a lamentable State, where a fiddler and a dancer is better maintained than a Preacher. Not a few families have thus been ruined, I would the rest would take warning. Secondly, It undoes the credit; who will trust an unthrift? As it is true of spiritual, so of worldly things, Habenti dabitur, To him that hath, shall be given. When death, love, and credit would part, they appointed places to find one another. Death says, you shall be sure to find me in great battles or epidemical plagues. Love says, you shall find me among shepherds, where is no talk of dowries. But Credit told them plainly, they that once part with me, shall never find me again. I need not add, how it overthrows the health; to Rot and to Riot, differ but one small letter. Howsoever the voluptuous flatter themselves with having the merrier life, I am sure they have the shorter life. They are but crazy, that have a fen about them, how rotten are they that have a fen within them? He is a right spend-all, that besides all spends himself. The Philosopher that would ask of the frugal Citizen but a penny, beg'd of the Prodigal a talent; and he had his reason for it; because of the one he might beg often, of the other he was like to receive but once, so soon would his estate vanish. The temperate may die, the riotous cannot live: sickness is the daughter of intemperance. Yea, the inordinate life is scarce patient to tarry for sickness; but perisheth by mis-fortune: often in a brutish manner, in their own vomit and ordure, they go sleeping and senseless to hell, having neither Reason, Grace, nor Time to repent, or so much as cry, Lord, have mercy on us. There is no sin which hurts not the sinner; but of all, Riot is the most dispatching: so soon doth it bring men to their end, so often doth it kill them in the act of sin.

2 But more; why should Christians seek pleasure in Intemperance? We have not so learned Christ. S. Paul tells us of them weeping, whose belly is their God. We cannot speak of them without passion and compassion; O that our prayers and tears could recover them! Why should we seek the pleasures of the world, that have a world of pleasures without it? One delights in turning over his white and red dross, another glories in his vain Titles: one takes pleasure in a dainty dish, another in a witty jest: one in a kite, another in a dog: shall these pleasures be our envy, or our scorn? Why do we call ourselves Christians, and rejoice like worldlings? That man solaceth himself in his earthly possessions, because he hath not a foot of Inheritance in heaven: another sports with his hawks and hounds, because he hath no fellowship with Saints and Angels: a third tells over his bags of gold, because he hath no graces to number: another studies delicate dishes, and provides him sweet wines, because he never tasted the cup of salvation: another prides himself in his titular dignity, because he hath no hope of future glory: a last hunts after nothing but mirth, and is then farthest from it, when he thinks himself deepest in it: he cares not how vain his sport is, so it be pleasant; and if he can while away the time, and chase off melancholy, he thinks that day spent happily. If the world be a man's God, Pleasure must needs be his religion.

But shall the Christian be thus cozened? Shall not we disdain these frivolous and lawless delights, that have solid and everlasting comforts? Far better were it to spend our time in tears, than thus to be transported with wanton pleasures. To an holy soul, earthly pleasure is like an importunate fiddler, that without invitation impudently thrusts himself into his chamber, draws and plays, and will not be denied. He may give it the hearing, and that's an high favor: but he dares neither reward nor commend it: yea, he thinks it harsh music, and in his heart secretly condemns it; because he hath far better of his own. When he hath tuned his soul with meditation, he feels a sweet consort within, betwixt God and himself; his part being praise and obedience, and God's part toward him the peace of conscience. This world is like a bad fool in a play; the gross spectators laugh at those jests, whereat the wise man is ready to hiss: he entertains that with scorn, which the rest do with applause. We have the true fountain of joy, let us never stoop to these riotous puddles. Our ends are not the same, why should our ways be so? Some have God, not the world: some have the world, not God: some have neither God nor the world; and some have both. First, some have God, not the world, as Lazarus: his heart was full of divine comforts, whiles his body lacked crumbs. Secondly, some have the world, and not God; as Nabal; who possessed a world of wealth, not a dram of comfort. Thirdly, some have neither God nor the world; nothing but misery here, nothing but torment hereafter. Fourthly, some have both, as Abraham, who was rich while he lived on earth, and dying was glorious in heaven. Let us use the world, but enjoy the Lord; be thankful for these blessings, but rest our hearts on Jesus Christ.

They think it a pleasure, they shall not find it so. Conceit is the charm. Wicked joys are like those locusts, upon whose heads were (not crowns, but) as it were crowns (not of gold, but) like gold: their faces were (not but) as it were faces of men; their hairs (not indeed, but) as the hairs of women: their breast-plates, as it were breast-plates of iron: all these, shadowy, and similitudinary: but verse. 10. There were stings in their tails: not as it were, but true stings indeed. These idolatrous parasites offer sacrifices to the world, as the Philistines did to their Dagon; our god hath delivered our enemy into our hands: they did but think it was Dagon that helped them, it was not. Let us resolve things to their first matter, and so consider them; what is a sumptuous building, but a little burnt earth, or hewed timber? what is a beautiful creature, but the same earth we tread upon, better tempered? What is gold, but a vein of the ground better coloured? What, rich apparel, which man takes up in pride, but that the worm hath egested in scorn? Fame is but smoke, metal but dross, and pleasure but a short vanity. Howsoever too many think all this to be but the voice of a melancholy scholar, yet they shall feel and confess it undeniable truth. The devil is like a Iuglar, that puts the world like a piece of money into thy hand, and bids thee hold fast; whereas he by a liegerdumaine hath formerly got it away, and when thou openest thy hand, there is nothing.

We have seen some as happy as the world could make them, yet of all men the most discontented. Large possessions, goodly houses, beautiful spouses, hopeful children, full purses; yet their life hath been neither the longer, nor the sweeter, nor their hearts the lighter, nor their meals the heartier, nor their nights the quieter, nor their cares the fewer; yea, none more full of complaints. Among men generally, the poorer, the merrier. While I see men at once find wealth, and lose their mirth, as if they could not cease to be poor, but withal they cease to be happy; I cannot but conclude, that riches and content are like two buckets, while one comes up full, the other goes down empty. Yea, I account none so miserable, as they that grow rich by sin, or great by flattery. When wealth comes on the best terms, it is but vain: when upon ill conditions it is a curse. What is a silken coat, when there is a stinging conscience within? Or a high Title to advance the name, when there is a hell in the soul? O that men could see, how much better it is to be poor, than evil; and that there is no comparison between want and sin. It was a Christian choice of a reverend man; Let me rather be in hell without sin, than glorious and wicked upon earth. Vain pleasures, if they could be sound, yet are short: if they could be long, yet they are not sound. Their best is but as a good day between two agues, or a sunshine betwixt two tempests. Laughter concludes in tears; a little pleasure for so much repentance is but a hard penny-worth. The voluptuous man's ground bears no flowers, but either they prick the fingers, or offend the nostrils: if they be sweet, they have their thorns; if fair, yet not without annoyance. The worldling speaks of the Christian, Alas, poor beggar: but the Christian finds him rather worth his pity, than his envy; Alas, poor worldling. Moses rather chose to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasure of sin for a season. I wonder at the faith of Moses; but presupposing his faith, I wonder not at his choice. When the devil shall make this proffer, All these will I give thee; return him Peters answer, Thy gold perish with thee. They that sow in tears, shall reap enjoy: but a world of sensual joys, shall never bring man a good harvest. Gaudent falsis bonis, pereunt veris tormentis. Men call for pleasure, as the Philistines did for Samson, to make them sport; and it pulls down the house upon their heads. Youth, Health, and Wealth being met, would have a dance; and Pleasure must be their minstrel: but in the first change, those three wanton damosels were taken up by three unhappy mates; Age, Sickness, and Poverty: Youth was surprised by Age, Health by Sickness, and Wealth by Poverty: at which sight, Pleasure fled away, and Time delivered them over to Sorrow.

1 Let us think upon this world, as it deserves, with contempt. [Use.] How little can it do for us, and that little, with what deceit? What is thy heart the better, what the merrier, for all these pleasures wherewith it hath befriended thee? When did it offer honey, but a sting withal? Milk and slumber, without a nail and an hammer? Pleasure is like a flattering Host, that promiseth good cheare, but the reckoning pays for all. He that compares the welcome, with the farewell, shall find he had better have fasted. Believe them that have bought their experience dear; it is better to avoid sin Ante gustum, quam post fastidium; before we have tasted; than after we have surfeited. Look we up to that heaven which God hath promised, and Christ hath purchased; being but one half upon earth, let the better part converse above: from thence it came, and thither it is ordained to go. Let us get that resolution, that we are only willing to live, because our time is not yet come to die; pitching our desires upon those pleasures, which have neither bounds nor end; which are certain, though future; whiles these are fickle, though present. Mans heart will not be empty of thoughts; if heaven have taken up the rooms, the world is disappointed. We confess the happiness of salvation, and wish it; but we fasten on this world. Laudamus superna, terrenis fruimur: we fill our mouths with heaven, but our hearts and hands with earth. Paradise is a joyful place; yet when death comes, we are loath to go thither. But if a man were travelling a miry way, on a rainy day, in tempestuous weather, were he not mad that had rather go on still, than yield to be at home? The more hold we take of this world, the more we lose hold of the Lord. Tene certum, dimitte incertum: let us turn from vain pleasure that seeks us, and seek that pleasure which shall forever content, and never cloy us.

2 Instead of taking pleasure in Riot, let us rejoice in Christ. Worldlings offend, that laugh when they should mourn, and Christians offend too; if they droupe when they should be cheerful. God hath done great things for us, wherefore we rejoice; and we sin if we rejoice not. They err in false mirth, and we in causeless heaviness; if while we enjoy the God of salvation, we are sorrowful. Is there any joy without God? And where can God be without joy? When the Lord hath made us happy, he will con us no thanks to make ourselves miserable. Shall we freeze by a warm fire, or starve at a feast? We find God reconciled, Christ our Advocate, the holy Spirit our Comforter, we have peace in our conscience, in heaven an inheritance; we should be both angry and ashamed at ourselves, to ask our hearts that question, Why art thou sad, O my Soul? If we be in Christ, our very bread is a symbol of the bread of life; and our wine, of that cup we shall drink in heaven. What should discomfort us, if Christ be with us? All our joy is not reserved for the next life, some is afforded us on earth: God's greater light doth not extinguish the less. Friends, children, wine, oil, health, liberty, competency, are not given us for discontent. We may not make them God's rivals, but rejoice in them as God's blessings. In themselves they are nothing, in him they are worth our joy. If God had not thought them blessings, he had not bestowed them; and how are they blessings, if we delight not in them? Because we may not take pleasure in everything, shall we therefore take pleasure in nothing? They wrong Christians that forbid them mirth: the Gospel is not such dull metal, but the Tydings of joy to all believers.

Spots they are and blemishes.] In every sin there is not only Reatus, that binds over to punishment: but Contaminatio, a defilement: which makes the sinner not less filthy, than guilty: and even when the guilt is remitted, the filth remains still. A child by his own unruliness hath gotten a hurt or maim; upon his prayers and tears he is spared the punishment; his father may forgive him, but it requires time before the Surgeon can heal him: the hurt is not so soon cured, as the fault is pardoned. David cries, I have sinned, and God answers, I have taken away thy sin; yet there still abides a spot for David's tears; which he must weep thoroughly to wash off. Spots and blemishes; the words are but two, put together with a Conjunction; and I will not put them asunder with a division. The argument of my discourse is corruption, putrefaction, sores and diseases; so that it may be called a spiritual Sermon. No man looks upon ulcers with pleased eyes, yet the Surgeon must see them. We love to behold Gold-smiths stalls well adorned, with choice of plate, of Jewels; not dung-hills: yet the cock in scraping the dung-hill, found a Jewel. We like to see beautiful creatures, not horrid beasts and serpents: yet the Painter made a famous piece of Bucephalus, and the Crocodyle was so curiously shadowed, that in Egypt it was taken for a god, and worshipped. We delight to view flowers of various forms and colors, not weeds: yet to paint a weed to the life, is held a good art. Whatsoever I want of the art, I shall do my endeavor to resolve this short character into divers conclusions.

1 All men are spotted, originally from their parents: of actual spots themselves are the parents. So foul are all by nature, that they can neither be good, nor see good; nec assequi mandatum, nec consequi remedium. If thou ask how thou camest by it; thou art beholding for it to thy father, he to his father, all to Adam, Adam to Eve, and Eve to the devil. There is no evil which our natural incleannesse would not admit, if God restrained not. Every actual sin is a spot to the soul: a lustful look is a spot to the eye: a bribe taken is a spot to the hand: he that unjustly gets or keeps away another's right, is worse than a thief burned in the hand. Church-dues detained is a spot to the estate, that cannot be washed out from the sacrilegious man or his heritage: every oath or lie is a spot on the tongue: every malicious thought is a spot on the breast: every riotous draught is a spot on the throat: every idolatrous cringe is a spot on the knees. You will say these spots are not visible, not seen on the body: no, for hypocrisy is a white skin drawn over them, which from our dull eyes hides their appearance. But to God they are visible, to whom all hearts are more transparent than any diaphanous glass is to us. And at the last day, all these spots shall show themselves, (when all secrets shall be legible) in their odious forms. Now as it is in some mortal infection, the spots appear not in the flesh, but strike inward to the heart, and kill it. If all our internal spots should break out, we could not endure one another. The whole world would be an Hospital, and every man a Lazar. God calls for sacrifice, the Priest presents it, but it must be without blemish: we have no sacrifice to offer but ourselves, and how will he accept a spotted man, that required an unspotted beast? This is one step.

2 The whole world is spotted, that is, another step: in the universal blemishes of nature let us read our own. When I consider the great and good work of God in the Creation, making all things for man, and man for himself, I think of the people's acclamation to the same workman, in a new and greater work of our Redemption; He hath done all things well. He hath done, such is his Power: All things, such is his Wisdom: Well, such is his Goodness. First, we have the work of Christ, Fecit: then the universality of the work, Omnia: Lastly, the nature of that universality, Bene. When I look upon the present world, I find a great alteration; foulness and corruption in those Creatures, which were from God of so pure a constitution. He made the world so fair, that he loved it; but when man had took it in hand, he began to loathe it. All flesh had corrupted his way: Corrupted, that is the turpitude: All flesh, that is the latitude. The morning saw all things very good, the evening of the same day saw spots and blemishes in all Creatures. To charge God with this degeneration, is the highest blasphemy: coldness may sooner arise from fire, than any evil from the fountain of Goodness. Indeed there is a penal evil; and this he acknowledgeth his own: there is a criminal evil, which we call a radical, causal one; this is ours. This last is an unrighteous action, which pleaseth man, and displeaseth God: the other is a just suffering, that pleaseth God, and displeaseth man. The punishment of sin is not properly an evil, but a good action of Justice; dishonoring the guilty Creature, to honor his holy Maker. As we say of war, It is a destroyer of nature in Individuo, but a preserver of it in Catholico.

Of this foul and spotted evil, Deus non est Autor, sed ulter. How then came these spots? An enemy hath done this, sowing tares upon the Wheat. Which shows first, that good was before evil, for it is Superseminatio, a sowing upon: good had the priority, though evil hath now got the superiority. Next, that evil is an accident, not a nature; but such an accident as hath quite spoiled nature, as rust mars the gold. That as we say of a Prince, though he be Deus in terris, yet he is but Deus terrenus; though a god before men, yet but a man before God. So our whole natural condition, which was Angelical in respect of the beasts, is now but (as it were) bestial in respect of the Angels. I do not intend by this, according to the dotage of some new Philosophers, that every irregularity on earth puts a star out of order in the firmament: that every adulterous act here, sticks a blot upon the Moon there: that our pride and ambition hath brought the Sun lower than it was: that he either slackes or mends his pace, as we grow dull or forward in God's service. For the stars keep their courses, the Moon hath no more blemishes than she had a thousand years ago: the Sun is neither come nearer, nor gone further off, but keeps the same line wherein God bade it run at the first: the heavens are as clear, and the planets as regular in their wanderings, as ever: the celestial bodies admit of no qualities. If all our sins were set as spots on the Sun, Iamdudum Sol nobis pice us apparüisset; it had been as black as pitch before this time. But this I say, The whole Creature groaneth under the bondage of our corruption: and the world was once so foul with our iniquities, that the Maker scoured it with an Inundation of water; and again, it is so grown so filthy, that he will purify it with a deluge of fire, in the day of Judgment.

3 But if every man be spotted, who shall then enter into heaven, seeing into that City no unclean thing shall come? This is true, yet many that have been unclean persons, are since admitted. They went not in impure; Such ye were, (as could not enter) but ye are cleansed, saith Paul to his Corinthians. They were all naturally unclean, yet many of them are now in heaven; but before they entered, they were washed. I list not to uncover the spots of God's Saints; let them be buried in the dust with their bodies: yet their souls are in Heaven: how got they thither? They washed them, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Washed, therefore they had been foul: Made them white, therefore they were of a stained color before. If God should look for a spotlesnesse here, whom should he look upon? Is any man's heart pure? no, he shall have cause to his death-bed of redoubling that prayer, Create in me a clean heart, O God. And his Confessor may still preach to him that Text, Wash thy heart from iniquity, that thou mayest be saved. And who can say, He hath clean hands? Say his heart were clean, say his hands, yet be his feet clean? They stand next the earth, therefore are aptest to soil. For this purpose Christ washed his Disciples feet, and thus commented on it, and interpreted his own action; He that is washed, needeth not save to wash his feet. Out of the Bath a man comes washed all over, yet some gravel will stick on his feet.

He is not of an earthen constitution, that hath no earthly affection. Christ took our flesh, took it without spot, without spot he kept it; no man else ever received it so, or kept it so. Hate the garment spotted by the flesh; yet the flesh it self is this garment, and it spots it self with it self. Job was a holy man, yet he confesseth after all this washing, that his own clothes would make him abhorred. David holy, yet he desired to be washed with Hyssop. The Church is said to have no Spot: yet every particular limb of that fair and spotless body, every soul in that Church is full of spots. Yea, Christ himself hath spots, not by nature, but by imputation; not his own, but ours; he took all our stains and deformities; He became sin for us: for us he was made full of spots, that we in him might be spotless. The Grace of God may go a great way in our souls, and yet not leave us without spots. Mercies may fall in abundant showers on our hearts, and yet not mollify all our hardness. Those holy fires may consume a great deal of our dross, not all. Corrections are a Bath to purge us from the foul corruptions we gather by walking in this dirty world; yet Israel confesseth, they were not cleansed from the iniquity of Peor to this day. God may heal our wounds, and yet leave scars; purge our blood, and yet leave spots. But there is no spot so foul, which repentance cannot wash off; this shall make a man lift up his face without spot. And Saint Paul prays for his Thessalonians, that they might be presented blameless at the coming of Christ; which he would never have begged, if he knew it never could be granted. Not to have no spot here, but to have no spot imputed hereafter, is the happiness of a Christian.

4 We have all spots, but these are spots: for the Apostle speaks not of their actions here, but their persons: not the blemishes of the men, but that the men themselves are blemishes. This is a high degree of sin, to be wholly turned into sin. The Leopard is full of spots, but the Leopard is not a spot, nor is the spot a Leopard. Many a body is diseased, but the body is one thing, the disease another: but when the whole body is turned into a disease, it in a manner ceaseth to be a body. When the clouds let fall their showers by drops, we call it a Rain: but when all those drops are met in one channel, it is no more a rain now, but a flood. They have committed so many sins, that for the numb • r and continuitie of them, they cease to be sinners, and are very sins. As the Prophet Micah calls it not the idolatry of Jerusalem, but the Jerusalem of idolatry. The case seemed desperate, when there was no soundness, nothing but corruption; and David says, There is no whole part in my flesh; and Job is said to be so full of ulcers, that a pins point could not be thrust between them. If this were other than an emphatical expression of their malady, it was strange that the whole flesh should be one coagulated ulcer. Yet was this bile but upon the flesh, and there was life within: but here the whole soul and body becomes one botch; as Lucan spake of a wounded body, Totum est pro vulnere corpus: no more a body, but a wound: no more sinful Creatures, but Creatures that be sins. If there were not several degrees of sin on earth, there should not be several measures of torment in hell. When travellers ride together in a dirty way, all are dashed, but some more or less than others, according to their more or less circumspection or advantage. Vice is said (in the Fable) to have in her garden a subterraneous vault; out of which she could convey foul water, to soil the curious spectators; which was of different operations in the staining. They that were defiled with the aspersions of wantonness, were sooner dried; they that with pride, covetousness, ambition, quite spoiled their garments: they that with envy, treachery, homicide, sacrilege; could never get out the spots, but were fain to cast their clothes into the fire. Spots may be sized in so deep, as not to be purged but with the fire of hell.

5 To whom do these appear spots and blemishes? First, to God, who hath pure eyes, and can abide no unclean thing. He hates filthiness in his own, though he do not hate his own for filthiness, because he respects them in Christ: but in the reprobate he so abhors the sin, that he hates even the sinner for it. It was for the sin of man, that God repented he made man: thus it offends the first Person. These spots drew from Christ a sweat of blood in the Garden, and the blood of his life on the Cross; so they offend the second Person. They also grieve the holy Ghost; who looking for the fruit of joy and peace, and such sweet perfumes, finds the stench of sordid corruptions.

2 To the Angels; they despise not a diseased body, nor an infected house, if a holy soul dwell there. No plague shall come nigh thy dwelling, for he shall give his Angels charge over thee. They are set not only to keep us and the plague asunder, but still to keep us though we light in a house together. They do not scorn to take Lazarus his soul out of an ulcerous body. It is not sickness, but sin, from which they turn their faces. But now, should Angels stand by sinners in their acts of uncleanness? Must an Angel wait upon a proud popinjay, while she is dressing her self by the glass? While men ply their drunken carouses in tavernes, do they look that their Angels should fly up and down the room? Iniquities be sport for devils, but an eye-sore to the Angels; they that rejoice at a sinners conversion, do rather grieve at his aberration.

3 To good men, whom nothing pleaseth, that displeaseth their Maker. While the world is laughing, David is mourning for them; Mine eyes gush out rivers of waters, because they keep not thy Law. Men turn from Lazars and lepers, and refuse to visit visited houses: yet Tutius morbi, quàm vitii consortium: it is better dwelling with good men in an unwholesome climate, than in the purest air with unclean persons; as Lot, in bona terrâ cum gente mala.

4 To bad men: for howsoever sinners love to be evil themselves, yet they would have others good to them. Nero, that took such pleasure in shedding blood, when his own turn came, complained. He that delights in polluting the marriage-bed of others, would not have his own abused. The thief would not have his own goods stolen; the proud man is said to carry a dagger, to stab him that is prouder. No wicked man doth wish to suffer, what he takes pleasure to do. We read of four lepers that kept company together, but it was upon a desperate adventure; neither could endure others leprosy. He that hath the most corrupt lungs, complains of another's offensive breath. Naaman the Captain of the host of the Syrian king, was a great man with his master, and honorable, and a mighty man in valor, But he was a Leper. A great warrior, an honorable Courtier, yet a Leper: The leprosy was a nasty and loathsome disease, yet this odious and wearisome condition lights upon a great person. Now, what was all his glory, with his leprosy? They that honor'd him, avoided him; and he was abhorred of those that flattered him. The basest slave of Syria would not change skins with him, though he might have his honor to boot. So men given to villainies are shunned of those that are little other than villanous. These spots are infectious, more than the plague-tokens; and though they please other dissolute souls here, yet they shall curse them in hell, because their example is the cause of their greater torment.

5 To the creatures; for God made them to serve man, and to wait upon him in the service of God: now when man turns himself out of God's service, all the creatures in serving him are (as it were) turned out of God's service too, and grieve that they are compelled to wait upon a wrong master.

6 They are offensive to the very damned in hell; which seemeth strange, but it is true. That rich man, not out of charity to his brethren, but favor to himself, requested that warning might be given to his brethren; least as his example increased their sins, their sins should advance his torments.

7 But now lastly, do they not offend themselves? No, the sick man may feel, the dead does not. Who knows the spots on his own face, but either by the reflection of a glass, or by the relation of others? The Lazar or Leper cannot choose but abhor himself: how little pleasure did that Syrian Peer take to be stooped unto by others, while he hated to see himself? While his hand could not move to his mouth, without his own detestation? But this is a spiritual disease, festering inwards: when the conscience is unclasped, and these spots break forth; as when the bottomless pit was opened, the locusts flew out; and sin shall write her inscription on the doors; not as in visited houses, Lord have mercy on us; but in the chambers of despair, All mercy is fled from us; it will be fearful.

6 Sin is of a defiling quality; like a be-myred dog, when it fawnes upon us, it fowls us. It may in this one thing be compared to fire, it converts matter into it self. Staine a cloth, or die it into another color, yet still it remains a cloth: the body turns meat into it self, is not turned into the meat: only as fire can convert a burning material into fire, so sin turns a man into sin, that he is no more a man, but a very spot. Corporal leprosies have been healed by natural means; and blemishes that art cannot cure, yet it hath devices to hide. But for these blemishes, there is nothing in nature to cure them, nothing in art to cover them. If honor could do it, Naaman had been no Leper. A noble sinner is but a noble spot. If riches, Nabal had not been branded for a churl: but heaps of wealth laid upon heaps of wickedness, make but a great dunghill. Can perfumes? Civet indeed will make a dog smell as sweet as his master: but a vicious life doth more stink through a garnished body, than a rotten body doth through perfumed garments. Can beauty? No, even when there appears no blemish in the outward skin, yet through a lascivious demeanour the beauty it self becomes a blemish. Nay, can Profession it self hide or heal the spiritual leprosies? Rome dresseth herself in the robes and titles of the chaste spouse of Christ, yet is she not still that scarlet Whore? The Jesuits have been saucy with the name of Jesus, are they not still that mystery of iniquity? Saul did prophesy in the College, was he not still a blot in the world? Many are beautiful as the sons of the morning in their profession, that are still black birds, children of the night in their conversation. As Sigismund the Emperor said of Julian the Cardinal, Legate at the Council of Basil, when he was highly commended to him, Tamen Romanus est, yet he is a Roman. So we may say of an hypocrite, when he is praised for his zealous devotion, Tamen macula est, yet he is a blemish. Men of foul and corrupt manners shall find nothing in nature or art, that shall keep them from being, and being called spots.

7 Open and notorious offenders ought to be denied these holy feasts, to be put from the Sacrament; and instead of communicating with us, to pass under the censure of excommunication from us; till in penitent tears they have cleansed their pollutions. Spots in the life are worse than spots in the face: if such sluttish aspersions appear on the skin, will any man come to the Church before he hath washed his face? These are not members, but spots of the body; we pare off such excrescent blemishes that the body may be perfect. They may be in the decree of God members of Christ, they are not so yet in the judgment of man: we call not a wart on the flesh, a part of the body. Indeed it is true, Servi est invitare, Dei est separare: yet the Minister calls in some, whom the master casts out. Matth. 22.13. We may not put the sign of Christ's body into a drunken hand, nor offer the Symbole of his blood to a bloody and malicious heart; nor the Sacrament of peace and love to them that hate both love and peace. We do not only say, come not hither if ye be such, but we must not suffer you to come hither if we know you to be such. We wash our hands before we take our temporal food, and shall we not cleanse our hearts before we receive our spiritual? The dead body of Christ was wrapped in clean linen, and is not his living body worthy of a clean conscience? The body and blood of the Lord doth make us holy, and is it not our default if the same should make us guilty? Read and compare John. 6.54. with 1 Cor. 11.29. How contrary are these effects of the same thing in divers men? Even as life and death, heaven and hell, salvation and perdition, eternal joy and eternal fire. O that man for a little filthy lust, the pleasure of his sense, or indulgence to his affections, should convert heavenly food to his own bane. He that comes a penitent, departs an innocent: they that come with all their unwashed blemishes, with a thousand woes return; the supper of life is to them a bloody banquet.

Observe what preparation was required for receiving of the Law. For time, three days: if so much time must be spent in preparing to take it, our whole life is short enough to prepare a reckoning for it. That was the word of a command, Paul calls it the ministration of death: this is the word of Promise, the promise of Christ and salvation with him. If that required three days, which was all terror: what time of preparation is due to this that is all comfort? When our souls are at the best, yet our approach to God requires particular addresses, and new preparations: it is well if the whole Lent can prepare our hearts for Easter: and they that do not fit themselves before they come, had better have kept away. For matter, all Israel must be sanctified: what was the cause? Seven weeks they had been out of Egypt, yet all this while Egypt was not gone out of them: the Egyptian vices, together with their flesh-pots, stuck still in their memories, in their appetites. They had passed by many waters, of the Red Sea, of Marah, of that gushed out of the Rock; yet the infection of Egypt was not washed off: therefore they must be sanctified. Doth not this charge lie as close upon us? Now is the time we draw near unto God in a special manner: he often preacheth to us, and we hear him: we often call upon him, and he hears us: but now we come one step nearer, as it were to take him by the hand, and convey him in these holy symbols to our heart. Sin is never safe, but then most dangerous when we bring it into the presence of God. If it comes along with us to the communion table, it shall not only frustrate what we do, but endanger us to a worse estate than we brought thither. At all times we must be holy, but then especially when we present ourselves to the holy eyes of our Maker. Who dares kiss the Kings hand with a foul mouth? We wash before our private meals it home daily; but when we are to eat with some great Person, we scour our hands with bals. We cannot be too holy when we come to feed with our Savior, yea to feed upon him. When he is a guest, we are but the Host: but when we are his guests, he is both the Host and the Feast, even the cheare it self. Now if they must be so sanctified to receive the Law, how holy should we be to receive the grace of the Gospel? Yea, not only their persons, but their very clothes must be cleansed. As they that come out of infected houses, air their garments: their clothes smelt of Egypt, and must be washed. But why their clothes? and why washed? Garments are not capable of sin; if they were, water would not cleanse them. The danger was neither in their skins, nor in their coats, yet they must be washed, that they might learn by the cleanness of their clothes, with what souls to appear before God. Because they were more in danger of being foul, than of being bare, they are washed to begin their age in purity.

At this solemn time men use to put on their best garments; a custom which we approve, rather than reprove: it is fit our reverence to the Presence of God should be seen in our very vestures. Devotion takes no pleasure to dwell slovenly; like Galba's wit, under a deformed roof. Christ doth not condemn external cleanness, when he prefers inward holiness. It is not pulchritudo pellu, but turpitudo cordis, that comes under censure. A crystal glass doth well, but we do not use to put mud into it. But what is a neat suit with foul and ragged linings, a white skin with a filthy soul? Rather than not to have the face fair, too many use lotions and colors to blanch it: Feciam Deus fecit, pictam diabolus infecit. Yet both within and without, we should be cleanly. But especially God looks to the pureness of that part which resembles himself. He made every creature juxta genus suum, after his kind: man in the image of himself. A whited or adorned clay is not his image; the God of Spirits looks to the spirit, that that be holy and humble; both. For some will be holy, and not humble: but all the pureness of their minds, will not bear out the stiffness of their knees. If they want reverence, pretend what they will, I shall hardly credit their holiness. Others seem humble, but they forget to be holy: so some guest sit down with the rest, but they have no stomach.

In a word, Accipite loti, accipite laeti; with cleansed hands, and joyful hearts. Let not Christ be forced upon you, but stretch out a thankful hand to receive him. Si non receptor es, deceptor es, thou coozenest thine own soul. Adsit mentaliter, cum haberi non potest sacramentaliter. But when the feast is prepared, and we invited, let us come. Let us avoid spots, that we be not defiled: bewail our spots, that they may be pardoned: and resolve against all spots hereafter, that we may be comforted.

8 We may not abstain from the Sacrament; because there be spots and blemishes in the Society: It is true, these spots should be removed; say they are not, shall we therefore remove ourselves? To them the holy bread is bane, to thee it is Salvation. The unworthy receiver eateth and drinketh damnation to himself; Sibi, non tibi, To himself, not to thee. If we communicate with evil men, and not in evil things, we have no harm. Woe were us, if we should live in the danger of all men's sins: we have enough of our own, we need not borrow of others. Every man shall bear his own burden▪ ours is not so light, that we should call for more weight, and undertake what God never imposed. It was enough for him that was God and man, to bear the iniquity of us all; it is no task for us: alas, we faint under the least of our own. Nor can others sins become ours by toleration or connivence, but by imitation and indulgence. If each man's known blemish be every man's, then is every son of Adam as public a person as his father was. We were all in Adam, stood or fell in him; there must be some difference between the Root and the Branches. My fathers sin is not mine, much less my neighbors. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father. Unless a spotted soul could blemish the Sacrament, it is to my believing heart the bread of Life. The Church of Thyatira had many blots, yet the Holy Ghost lays on them none other burden but this, That which thou hast already, hold fact til • I come. He bids them not leave the Church, but hold fast their own.

But a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? It is true by the infection of it: but it only soureth them that partake it, not those that dislike it. Am I become an adulterer, because an adulterer communicates with me? Am I guilty of excess, because he that was yesterday drunk, today eats with me soberly? Charity would think that no man brings his sin along with him to the Sacrament; but rather, hath formerly exonerated his soul by repentance. Whiles we dislike, resist, reprove, and mourn for it, it cannot be ours. The Corinthians had these love-feasts, and in them gross and sinful disorders; yet Paul doth not say, Abstain from the Sacrament till they be reformed. No, he corrects the abuse, but he commands the act. That you come together for the worse, I praise you not: but that you come together, I praise you. God hath commanded us to hear and receive; where did he ever say, Except you must come among sinners? Their uncleanness can no more defile us, than our holiness can excuse them. We are invited to a feast; if but a napkin or a trencher be misplaced, or a dish ill carved, we fly off from the table in a fume, and never stay to thank our Host. O that men would be but sober, and either less curious, or more charitable.

9 As all sins are spots, so some have a more special resemblance, as carrying in them a natural poison and filthiness. Such particular instances we find in the Scriptures, wherein God discovered the spots in their consciences, by sticking spots on their carcases. The Egyptians and Magicians contest with Moses, and are struck with a scab on their faces. It is against men's lusts that we fight, and for their lusts they contend against us; spots they would defend, and therefore God lays on them such spots from which they shall not defend themselves. I never knew men oppose God's Messengers, but once before their death they complained of their gettings. Miriam's foul tongue is punished with a foul face. She would have been as glorious as her brother Moses, now every Israelite sees his face glorious, hers leprous. The venom of her tongue would have eaten into the reputation of her Prince, therefore the venom of leprosy eats into her flesh. Both Moses and Miriam had need of veils, the one to shadow his glory, the other to hide her deformity. And indeed, deformity is the fit cure of pride: she scorned Zipporah the Midianite for not being so fair as her self, now the Midianite will not change complexions with her. Pride and envy are two fatal spots, they seldom scape infamy; the divine Justice will cast filth in their faces. Let them that be proud because they are well-favor'd, think on Miriam: the beauty that is held with affectation, shall perish with contempt: God hath spots for the proudest face.

Of this cup drank Gehazi; seeing he would needs take part of Naaman's money, he shall take part with him in his leprosy. These were heavy talents for Gehazi: he had far better have kept a light purse and a homely coat, with a found body and a clean soul. The talents were never heavy till now: two of Naaman's servants bore them for him before, now Gehazi must bear them himself alone. He desired a load of treasure, and he hath loaded himself with a curse: he would have two suits, and he hath got a third to boot; one more than he looked for, an unchangeable suit; that shall last as long as his skin, that shall clothe him with shame, and be ever lothsomely white, noisomely unclean. The sins of Gehazi were covetousness, fraud, sacrilege; and all passengers shall read these in leprous characters. What be more truly the sins of this City, than these three of Gehazi? Sacrilege, in which it hath justified all the world: covetousness in our hearts, fraud in our hands, who complains not of? These be the spots of our souls; and hath not God answered them all, over and over again, with spots on our carcases? Have we not been plagued for these injuries, with stinging and stinking leprosies? Have our own persons only bore the punishment? no, but as Gehazi's sin was not only read in his flesh, but in his posterities; so even the children have drunk of the Fathers cup.

Lastly, for application; our land is too full of these spots; it is more populous of blemishes, than of inhabitants. There is a tale of Saint Bridget, that she heard the blessed Virgin saying to her Son, Rome is a fruitful land: to whom he answered, It is so indeed, sed zizaniae tantum, only fruitful of tares. If a man were in Tartary, he might see abundance of men, but all black-Moors: we have store of Christians, but a great number of them be spotted Christians: yea, not a few be rather spots than Christians. Our sins multiply faster than our people: Oh that there were any comparison between their numbers; for one man hath a great number of sins. We had but some families of Papists; now they talk of whole colonies, streets, and lanes, and parishes of the brood of that spotted harlot. Drunkards were as rare as wolves, now they are as common as hogs. Whores were like owls, only night-birds; now they keep open house, pay scot and lot with their honest neighbors. Hugo Cardinalis said of Innocentius when he departed from Lions, that whereas there were four Stews at his coming thither, he had left them but one; marry that reached from one end of the city to the other; Vrbs est jam tota lupanar. With spotted lives we profess that unspotted Lamb.

We know there is a spotted fever that rageth and rangeth among us, in which we may read our spotted courses. How justly doth God retaliate to us our sins; spot for spot, blemish for blemish, for the hidden spots of our souls, these visible spots on our bodies. I do not censure the persons sick of that disease; God forbid: there be greater sinners that scape than some that suffer. A good man may die of that plague, which was bred by others sins. Of a poison • d fountain in the way, the innocent passenger may miscarry, as well as the guilty; the true man as the thief. Yet from a general visitation we may gather a general Instruction. By a fever that discovers it self in spots, God punisheth our undiscover'd sins; thus he cries quittance with us. The spots declare the sickness to be a malignant and pestilential disease: and by these tokens the Physicians see more clearly what to do: you will say, There is comfort in that: but most commonly all they can do, comes to nothing, there is no comfort in that. It is some benefit for a man to know his enemy; but withal to know him too hard for him, is small benefit. It is a poor step toward recovery, when our spots do only tell us that we are worse than we thought ourselves. Indeed it is well, if God's marks upon us, can be our marks to God, and like symptoms of death direct us to the Fountain of Life: if this Judgment can make way for mercy, as a strong wind clears the air for the Sunshine. To say, the house is visited, God's tokens and marks be there, the spots are upon them, keeps off friends; for few men dare visit where God hath visited. But though they dare not come, under pretence of being pestiducts to others, yet the Lord fails not to visit his with compassion, as with affliction. Many a man hath been saved that had God's marks upon him: but he is a weft and stray, in a woeful state, upon whom God hath not set his marks. Paul professeth that he bore about in his body the marks of the Lord Jesus, and this was his joy. David hath it, Shew some good token on me for good; there is then a token for good, a token of goodness: and the heat of a fever working on the body may be but the chafing of the wax, that God may set the seal of Salvation upon it. Howsoever, let us pray for them that have these spots on their bodies, God comfort them: and no less heartily for ourselves that have these spots on our souls, God amend us.

[Uses.] 1 Learn to see thy spots: many have unknown sins, as a man may have a moale on his back, and himself never know it. Lord, cleanse me from my secret faults. But have we not spots whereof we are not ignorant? In diseases, sometimes nature is strong enough to put forth spots, and there she cries to us by these outward declarations, that we are sick; sometime she cannot do it but by the force of cordials. Sometime conscience of her self shows us our sins; sometimes she cannot but by medicines, arguments that convince us out of the holy Word. Some can see, and will not; as Balaam: some would see, and cannot; as the Eunuch: some neither will nor can, as Pharaoh: some both can, and will, as David. We may know the malice of a man by his confession, yet we do not know whether there be not as much malice remaining in him after his confession; we are sure of his hatred, not of his repentance. Many a one knows his fault, yet loves it. It is poor comfort to know much danger, and not to know that that is the worst. A woman is eased by being delivered, and she forgets her pains at the birth of a Son: but could she read his future story; how ill a a man, perhaps how ill a son, he would prove; I doubt whether the ease of her body would recompense the grief of her mind. What am I the better to know my calamity, if I know not the way to comfort? Such a knowledge would but increase sorrow, and be a purchase clogged with more encombrances.

Yet is it the first degree toward recovery, to see our spots, though upon the sight we have a touch of despair. There be some virtues that cannot be exercised but in trouble. We must be poor and want, before we can exercise the virtue of thankfulness: we must be miserable and in anguish, before we can exercise the virtue of patience: so we must be sinners and have spots, yea, we must see those spots, and feel those sins, before we can exercise the Grace of Repentance. If we did not cry, we should die, and by our crying we come to live: though we dig deep, yet the gold is worth our labor. What must we do next?

2 Confess these spots. Our corporal blemishes we hide from men's sight, and that with modesty: none but beggars expose their sores, to move compassion. And we do not amiss to hide our infirmities also from public view; seeing every sin doubles it own malignity by being offensive. But if we hide our spots from God, we and our spots shall perish together. The spots that God hateth, are the spots that man hideth. He that carveth a piece of wood, covers the spots; as the Painter hid the scar in Agamemnons face; and many living pieces are painted for the same purpose. Yea, there be some that study to be spotted, as if they thought themselves then fairest, when they are foulest. Jacob practiced an invention to procure spots on his sheep; and these invent, meditate, project how to procure spots in their souls. And yet when they have them, they are as careful to hide them; if God can find them, so it is; he shall not know it from their mouth. These are idolaters of their own stains, in love with their own foulenesses, and conceal them as Rachel did her fathers gods. But he that hideth his sins shall not prosper. There is a voluntary confession, the language of a tender conscience: and there is a confession upon the rack, when the smart of our sides opens our lips. Jacob sought to bring spots on his lambes, and God did prosper his rods: when affliction can bring us to confess our spots, then God doth prosper his own rods. Until we tell the heavenly Physician our spots, he applies no medicine; unless we cal that a medicine, which drives us to tell them. But without discovery of our disease, how should there be a recovery of our health? In the Courts of human Justice the safest plea is, Non feci, Not guilty: but in the Court of Conscience, Peccavi, Guilty: Lord, have mercy on me a sinner.

3 It is madness to confess ourselves foul, and not to wash; therefore let us • ndeavour our own cleansing: that as our Apostasy hath blurred our pureness, • o our renovation may put out our apostasy; and as sin defiled nature, so grace may destroy sin. In our making there was work for God only; in our marring there was work for ourselves only; in our restoring there is work for God and ourselves together. To do this, Sprinkling will not serve: so Agrippa stood within the shower of Christianity, and had some aspersions of it; he was almost persuaded to be a Christian: as the dew stands in drops on the blasted grass. If sprinkling could make a cloth clean, we should never stand to wash it. Nor is Dipping sufficient; so Nicodemus had an immersion in the river of Grace: but Christ tells him, Except he be borne of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God: he must have a better scouring ere he get in: Some look into the Church, but have not the Power to tarry; here's a dip and away. Nor will half-washing do it, or washing by halves; like Ephraim's cake, half-turned, dow-back'd. Men may be loti, and not mundi; washed, and not clean. Hypocrites cozen many, but none so much as themselves. Indeed dipping or sprinkling shall be effectual, when the Spirit of God applies it. Once dipping in the pool of Bethesda, cured; and the blood of the new Covenant is called the Blood of sprinkling. I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean. It is no more with God, but as the Prophet said to Naaman, Wash and be clean. Non tenetur ad media, in tribuendo remedia. But for us, when we put our souls to washing, let us be sure there is water enough; as John baptized in Aenon, because there was much water. Our Fonts are made large enough to dip the Infant, but Charity dispenseth with Ceremony. Let thine eyes gush out a stream of penitent tears, to bathe▪ and purge thy Conscience from these spots. I wash my bed, and water my couch with my tears, saith David; tears enow to run down from his bed to his couch. Many guests were invited to that great supper, yet there was room: he sends for more, takes them up from the hedges and highwayes, and rests not bidding till the rooms were full. So invite Graces to thy soul; bid Repentance, a heart-easing guest; bid faith, a cheerful guest; humility, charity, patience, zeal, till thy house be filled. Be not washed without, and foul within: hypocrites are but painted tombs; look on them, they please your eyes: look into them, they offend your nostrils. Some have washed their faces, not their hands; so Judas his face kisseth Christ, but his foul hand betrays him. Some have washed their hands, not their faces; so Pilate washed his hands, yet with his mouth condemned the Innocent. Some have washed their eyes, not their ears; they presume to understand so much of their own Judgments, that they scorn to hear any Preacher. Some have washed their ears, not their eyes; they come to hear, but their eyes are full of uncleanness. Some have washed only one side; like Plaises; you see a white side, turn them over, and they show you the black. Others have washed all but their feet; and those Propter situm & transitum, for place and motion, are foul still. But let us leave no part unwashed on earth, as we desire that no part should be excluded from heaven.

4 To conclude, there is only one Fountain to purge all these spots; the blood of the Lamb. For this purpose was Christ baptized, even to wash us. There was in him neither fore-skin of corruption, to need the knife; nor filthiness, to need the water: he came not to be his own Savior, but ours. We were all uncleanness; he would therefore have that done to his most pure body, which might be of force to cleanse our most impure souls. His Baptism gives virtue to ours: yea, it doth not only wash the souls of men, but it washeth that very water whereby we are washed. By that act the water became clean and holy, and can both cleanse and hallow us. If the handkerchiefes that touched the Apostles had power of cure; how much more that water which the sacred body of Christ touched? His first baptising was with water, his last with blood; both of them wash the world from their sins. If we manifest them to him by an humble confession, he will take them from us to himself by a merciful translation. The spots of every believer belong to the body of his Savior: for this purpose he came to the earth, even to assume them. So that when we deplore our spots, we do but present him with his own: and till we do so, we with-hold his right. He doth challenge the sins of all humble penitents to be his by imputation, and by imputation we challenge in faith his righteousness to be ours. O Christ, take from us that foulness of our own, which would condemn us; and give us that holiness of thine, which is only able to save us. Amen.

Sporting themselves in their deceivings.] These words asunder describe to us a varlet and a fool, and both together make up a devil. To sin in deceiving is the part of a lewd wit: to make sport with sinning, is the part of a foolish heart. It is easy to deceive, to deceive a friend, to deceive under the profession of friendship: to make this a sport, is most wicked. We have an Achitophel in the one, an Hanun in the other, a Belial in both. First, consider them asunder.

Their deceivings.] He that is resolved to make no matter of his Conscience, may easily find matter enough for his cozenage. But is there no deceit justifiable? Be there not piae frauds? peccata compensativa? as when a virgin is saved f • om ravishment, a man from murder, by a lie? There is no intentional good can bear out a formal evil. I know it is good to prevent sin; but not to prevent it with sin. The Egyptian mid-wives were taught by the fear of God to disobey that bloody command: to say, they had warrant for so foul a deed, they knew would be no excuse. God had said to their hearts, Thou shalt not kill: this voice was louder than Pharaohs. Thus far I commend their obedience in disobeying: but to help themselves with a lie, I dare not commend their excuse. In not killing, they feared God: in dissembling, they feared Pharaoh. There was weakness in their pretence, goodness in their practice. Yet God blessed them, and rewards with good their very not doing of evil. But here, let not men lay the thanks upon the sin, which is due to the virtue. Let us • s • ribe things to their right causes: their mercy was recompensed, their lie or deceiving was but pardoned. Mical delivered David through a window: thus fa • re she did like David's wife. Then answered her father, that he threatened to kill her, if she freed him not; here she began to be Saul's daughter. In keeping him from the guilt of innocent blood, she did well; but not in closing it up with a l • e. But as she loved her husband better than her father, so she loved her self better than her husband. She saved her husband by a wile, and now she saves her self by a lie. Thus she loseth half the thanks of her good service, by devising a sl • nder of her husband, to quit her self, and delude her father.

Thus David himself deceived Abimelech: he that overcame the Bear, Lion, Giant, is overcome with fear. Long had he gone upright, yet now begins to halt with the Priest of God, and draws from him by a falsehood that favor, that shall cost him his life. O what would we have given afterwards to redeem this oversight? Thus to Achish he feigned himself mad, and thought it the best use of his reason, to dissemble the loss of the use of his reason. I find such acts of deception in the Saints, I find infirmity in those acts, but malice, and avarice, and dishonest fraud, I find not.

Wicked Deceit is another thing; that beguiles men of what they have, with a vain hope of that they never shall have. When the simple go to the market, the subtle then get money. Deceit is ever bad enough, but then worse when it is disguised with an oath. They that cannot tell how to begin praying, know not when to make an end of swearing. The Jews durst scarce mention the Name of God in a truth, our deceivers stick not to call it into a falsehood. Some think that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 comes of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , for truth lies hidden: and deceivers endeavor all possible means to keep it hidden still. Like Potiphar's wife, they have only the garment of an honest man, to prove their dishonest cause. Pueri talis, viri Sacramentis: whosoever devised the sentence, Rome takes up the practice. They have Pictures and Pageants to deceive some, formal gravity to deceive others, false oaths to deceive all. There is a generation of Deceivers, Flatterers; whose profession is to catch dotterels: these by maintaining men's works, work our their own maintenance. The devils special agents, that deform men by commending their deformities. Ravens feed but upon dead carcases, these upon living souls. Of all wild beasts, the tyrant is the worst: of all tame beasts, the flatterer. The tradesman deceives me of my money, but the flatterer coozens me of my virtue, yea of my salvation. They are summer-birds, they never sing in winter: take off the idol, gold, they kick the asse with their heels, instead of bending their knees. Vermin run not away faster from an house on fire, nor lice from a dead body, than they from poverty. Alexander Severus being certified how one Turinus, under color and pretence of his interest with the Emperor, had abused the people, promising things he never performed; fastened him to a stake in the market place, and smothered him to death with smoke; the crier proclaiming, Fumo pereat, qui fumum vendidit. They that deceive men of their estates by adulterate wares or false promises, are the brokers of falsehood: but they that obtrude Popish trash instead of God's truth, and deceive men's consciences, are the special agents of Antichrist. The former have lost all worth of trust; but from the other, the wisdom of heaven deliver us.

Sporting themselves.] It is hard when the fool can find no bable to play withal, but sin: casting firebrands, and arrows, and death; and then jeeres it, Am I not in sport? If Samson fire the shockes of the Philistines, and Absalom Joab's barley fields, is this in sport? We read 2 Sam. 2.14. Both the commanders were cruel, both so inured to blood, that they make but a sport of killing. Custom brings sin to be so familiar, that the horror of it is turned into pleasure; and homicide is held but a sport. Cockes indeed, and dogs often fight and tear one another, to make men sport: but that men should bruise one another to make sport for their own kind, is no Christian, if it could be a rational course. Cham derides his fathers nakedness: it should have been his sorrow, he makes it his sport. It is ill for a man to make himself merry with that which angers God. While the Philistines will find nothing to play upon but Samson, Samson finds nothing to revenge himself upon but the Philistines. When the wicked laugh at sins with delight, God laughs at them, but with scorn. Yea such sport on earth, is the only sport for the fiends in hell. While men be hammering sin, the Tempter stands at their elbow: while they are acting sin, he sits in their bosom: all this while he is a working: but when they have done it, and make a sport of it, the devil himself makes holy-day. The common pretence for the foulest abuses, is but sport. The sacred Word of God is profaned: tax the violaters of that Majesty; alas, it was but in jest. Business of State may not be made the business of the Stage: and shall that which God prizeth like Himself, be sacrilegiously turned to a jest? More safely may the Satire play with the fire, or the fly with the candle. O charm your mouths from jesting with that which is given to save your souls. No fugitive abroad does so much harm, as a detracter or jeerer at home. They that write of creatures naturally disposed to the ruin of man, do as well mention the flea as the viper: because though the flea cannot kill, yet it doth what harm it can: so these licentious jesters utter all the venom they have. But non patitur ludum fama, fides, oculus; those three can abide no jest.

If sin were rightly considered, it were more worthy our tears, than our sport: the fool laughs at it, but the Saint weeps for it. David wept buckets of tears for his own sins, but whole rivers for others. The world is like Jonah: for him was the storm raised, yet he only was asleep: godly mourners are like the mariners, crying to God for mercy. Jerusalem made a sport of Christ, Christ wept over Jerusalem. If we weep not for the sins of the land, nobody else will: sinners themselves will not weep: they spend the evening in jollity, go to bed in security, and rise again without any further repentance, than that they call a cup of repentance, small drink to cool their intemperat heat. For their sakes Judgments are upon us, and yet they of all men are least sensible of them. The fire of wrath is kindled, and they do but warm themselves at the flame. Who must come with pailes of water in this combustion, but they that mourn in Zion, and for Zion? Turn to me, saith the Lord, with weeping; where did he ever allow us to come laughing? A horrible incest was committed among the Corinthians, and ye saith Paul, are puffed up, & have not rather mourned. Alas, that men should look merrily on that sin, which heaven beholds with sore eyes! Though Christ forbad the daughters of Jerusalem to weep for him, who was holy; yet he commanded them to weep for themselves, who were sinners. He that knew what sin was, and felt it so sharply, is not reported ever to have laughed; often you have him weeping, the chief mourner. When he came to Jerusalem in triumph, yet he wept over it. Neither the solemnity of time, nor joy of the people, nor those loud acclamations, could either drown his voice, but still he lifted it up; nor dry his eyes, but still he wept. If we truly knew our sins, our sport would be turned into tears; yea, and the more we weep, the better we know our sins. As Solomon said, he that increaseth knowledge, increaseth sorrow; so he that increaseth sorrow, increaseth his knowledge. A penny in the bottom of a bason of water seems as big as a shilling: it seemeth so, it is not so. But our sins steeped in tears seem as indeed they are; yea indeed they are greater than they can seem. As wine drowns cares, so doth sport sins; they are little, easy, light, and slight to those that are merry with them: but when instead of sport in our deceivings, we begin to bleed for that sport, then the remembrance of them is grievous unto us, the burden of them is intolerable. Now we that have turned our grace into sin, and our sin into sport, let us turn our sport into sorrow, that God may turn our sorrow into joy.

Thus we have considered them asunder, now both together: where we have two principal observations. 1 All Deceit is sinful. 2 Religious deceit is intolerable.

1 Fraud is no laughing matter, and he that deceives another, doth much more deceive himself: nor could he think it a sport, did he foresee who should have the worst in the end. Shew me that falseharted Politician, that hath not consulted shame to his own house. Look upon Achitophel, whose counsel was as the oracle of God: see him advising Absalom to abuse his Fathers Concubines. What an hellish depth was in the advice of that Israelitish Machiavel! If Absalom be a traitor, yet he is a son: nature may return to it self: Absalom may relent, David may remit, what then shall become of us? Therefore he finds him out an act uncapable of forgiveness, to secure the conspiracy. Who would think that so lewd a man had ever sat at King David's Council-table? Yet was he wise enough to advise others, not to be good to himself. Policy and grace have one Author, but they do not always go upon one errand, nor to one person. David falls to his prayers, Lord, turn the wisdom of Achitophel into foolishness: and loe, one short ejaculation of innocence shall overturn this deep foundation of policy. God hath furnished his creatures with power to war, even against Himself; but he is wise enough to confound their devices: and while they reap shame by the abuse, he will have honor by the gift. Vainely doth Achitophel hope to strengthen evil with worse, to make treason fortunate by incest. He was one of David's deepest counselors, yet one of David's shallowest fools, that said in his heart, there is no God. Now what was the success? he meant to deceive David, he shall deceive himself. He strove for the highest renown of wisdom, and runs into the grossest extremity of madness. Hushai's counsel is allowed for better; and now Achitophel is beaten at his own weapon, he can live no longer. He goes home a worse asse than that which carried him, and puts the halter about his own neck. In this glass let politic sinners read their own destiny; they are to themselves the most desperate fools. If the supreme Judge could be deceived, fraud had some hope: but seeing he is just, it makes the own mittimus to hell.

Had Judas any better success in his deceiving, that betrayed Christ with a kiss? Ab osculo incipitur bellum, & per pacis indicium pacis rumpitur Sacramentum: From the fairest flower of courtesy, this spider sucks the deadliest poison of treachery, Joab's kiss was a preface to a stab; and Nero kissed his mother even when he meant to bathe his hands in her blood; and Judas hath the same key to his horrid treason. It is bad fallere fallentem, to deceive the deceiver, howsoever some blanch it: for another's sin may hurt us, it is our own sin that condemns us: and because another man would do me a mischief, must I therefore do myself one? Burn myself to keep him from the heat of the fire? But Judas thought to deceive him, qui nec falli novit, nec fallere; that was both God and Man: a man most innocent, and therefore would not deceive: a God omniscient, and therefore would not be deceived. To beguile a harmless man, was doli improbitas, dishonesty: but to offer this to the all-seeing God, was doli impietas, Atheism. But what was the end of this deceit? he re-delivers the hire of his treachery, and saves the hangman a labor, by making away himself. Christ was well acquainted with such deceivers; Master, saith a Pharisee, Scimus quia verax es, we kn •• thou art true: when he could have silenced him, Hypocrite, Scio quia mendaxes, I know thou art false. Satan is that old Deceiver; and was so successful with the first Adam, that he durst set upon the second. He saw him depend upon his Fathers providence in the matter of nourishment, therefore tries him in a matter of miraculous preservation. Throw thyself down, &c. He that can sustain thee without bread, can preserve thee in this precipice. The roof of the Temple was an hundred and thirty cubits high; this was a pinnacle above the roof. From this Pyramis the cunning Sophister persuades him to make proof of his God-head, by the break-neck of his manhood. The gloss of the deceit was to show a miracle, that he might believe him; the meaning was to break his neck, that he might laugh at him. This is the way to proclaim thy Deity, to get credit in the world; men's eyes shall teach their faith, that there is more in thee than a man: and for danger, there is none; what can hurt the Son of God? Wherefore serves the guard of Angels, charged with thy safety? Thus in one act thou mayest be both safe and famous: trusting thy Fathers providence, and those serviceable spirits, cast thyself down. How strong was this deceit, if it had lighted upon a son of Adam, that was not the Son of God?

2 But deceits are then most abominable, when they shroud themselves under the wing of Religion; for such we shall prove these. There is no such devil, as he that looks like an Angel. Copper would never cozen us, if it had not the tincture of gold. Thus the sons of Jacob dealt with Hamor, Gen. 34.13. Revenge is their meaning, that is bad enough: to hide their cruelty with craft, worse: but to hide their craft with Religion, worst of all. The smiling malice is most deadly: and hatred gloss'd with dissimulation discovers it self in the most prodigious mischief. We will agree with you, if you will be circumcised. Here was God in the mouth, in the heart a devil. Never was any project so bloody, as that is coloured with religion. The better vice shows, the worse it is; and the worse it is, the better it desires to show. A Sacrament is intended, not to the good of the soul, but to the murder of the body: O religious cozenage! Did the sons of Jacob deceive alone? no, they dissemble with Shechem, and Shechem with his people; Shall not their wealth be ours? The one pretended religion, and meant murder: the other pretended profit, and meant pleasure. They prevail with Shechem, and Shechem with the city. The conceit of commodity is a powerful oratory: not any love to the Sacrament, no not to Shechem, but the hope of gain, makes them prodigal of their blood in so painful a condition: they are content to smart, so they may gain. What was the end of this deceit? They receive a Sacrament, and their bane withal; and their first drops of blood are a preparative to the whole stream. Thus they are paid for a purpose of deceiving. Do the other escape? no, their sin lived, after the city was spoiled. It was a horrible impiety, instead of honoring a holy sign, to take advantage by it. How did those deceived Hivites die cursing that Sacrament, which had betrayed them! even their curses were the others sins. I would the children of Rome were like the children of Jacob in anything else but this; but in this only they are like them, and in nothing else. Did they not eat their sacrament upon a bargain of blood? Do not their bloody practices make all reasonable souls abhor their religion? Is not Religion their pretence, and murder their end? Why then is all this killing of kings, ruining of countries, massacring of cities, blowing up of states? For the Catholic cause, they confess; and by the catholic authority, they cannot deny. O who can more than pity them, that forsake Christ the Prince of peace, and either choose no God, or a bloody one?

Take another example. Abner revolts from Ishbosheth in a discontent, and persuades Israel to the change; and fetcheth his motive from the oracle of God. He knew this well enough before, and smothered it for his own turn; now for his own turn he publisheth it. He knew this decree for David while he opposed him; now he wins the heart of Israel by showing God's charter for him. If Ishbosheths title to the Crown were bad, why did Abner maintain it? If good, why did he forsake it? Was his conscience better informed? No, but his mind was changed. Saul's son had disgraced him, therefore now he is for David: he is become loyal for David's sake, and become David's for God's sake. No man ever heard Abner godly till then; and he had not been so then for any conscience of goodness, but for opportunity of revenge. Pride hath made many English malcontents the Almsmen of Rome: here their ambitious desires are crossed, therefore they fly hence in a snuff: treachery is their aim, and hither they bring it in the shape of Religion. O that they could see how odious it is, to make Devotion a stalking horse for policy! What was Abner's end? Whom David dismisseth in peace, Joab repaies with death. Of all men, the religious dissembler shall be sure of plagues.

Thus Absalom first deceives the people, and therein his father. The people by insinuations; that considering his godly person and magnificent state, how affable he was to suitors, how humble in his greatness, how diligent in searching their causes, how full of pity to their complaints, how great his love of justice, and care of the common-wealth was; they conclude, the world hath not so complete a Prince as Absalom. Thus like a close traitor, he stole not his fathers goods, but his fathers people's hearts. He deceived his father by a vow, made forty years before, to be paid, in Hebron. He carried peace in his name, war in his heart; and to perfect his treachery, nothing will serve but a cloak of Religion. The devout man hath made a vow a great while ago, and now the toy takes him, he must perform it. The good old king blesseth God for blessing him with so godly a son; who indeed had never more deeply renounced all goodness, than now he talks of Religion. This guilt of piety set on the rough metal of his conspiracy, takes with his father against his father, with the people against their king: so his father sends him away with one blessing, and they entertain him with another. What is the end of this deceit? The just meed of all traitors: his Mule and his treason leave him hanging between heaven and earth. Bring me word, that I may come and worship him; saith Herod to the Sages. Another devout Machiavel, like the devil confessing Christ. How horrible was this villainy, to mask it self under a show of piety! Herod will worship him, that's the pretence: Herod will worrey him, that's the meaning. The cunning hypocrite never intends so ill, as when he speaks fairest. What was the event of this politic deceiving? First, God mocks him, then the Sages mock him. God besots him, that he could not find the way to so horrible a mischief. Why else did he not send some of his bloody Assassins to Bethlehem? Why did he not employ his Courtiers, rather than trust strangers? Why, seeing the matter so nearly concerned him in his opinion, and the journey was so small from Jerusalem, did he not go himself in person? why did he not rather prevent their journey, than hazard their disappointment? All the courtesy he meant that new-borne King, was but to cut his throat; and will he trust foreigners with this inquiry? Such a fool is the craftiest Politician, when God will blind him. These Messengers come no more back to Herod, with their news. He had mocked the wise men, and now God makes the wise men to mock him. He sends to inquire of them, whom he sent to inquire of Christ, and they are gone. How doth he rage, and fret, and curse himself, for trusting strangers in so important a business? How would he revenge their false play, how would he torment them, if he could catch them? Thus he palpably finds himself gull'd by those, whom he meant to deceive.

Thus doth God's Justice often punish illusion with illusion: they that nourish a purpose to deceive, shall be deceived indeed. Think of these examples, ye that make Religion your Messenger, and mischief your errand. It is a disease whereof this generation is sick at the very heart. Hypocrites make use of God for their own purposes: they frequent the Church with the devoutest Saints, but it is that the Saints may take them for devout: they pray with the godly, but to prey upon the godly. You shall not miss him at the lecture in the forenoon, but it is in hope to find some of you at his shop in the after-noon: and then, he that received in so much truth at his ears, hath not one word of truth in his mouth. Alas, too many make that divine business but a color for their own designs. Over-fair shows are a just argument of unsoundness: no natural face hath so fair a white, and clear a red, as that which is painted. While we see men notoriously zealous, we may be charitably suspicious. For wicked hypocrites care not to play with God, that they may mock men. The more soul a project is, the fairer visor it seeks: those monopolies that undo the Commonwealth, have the most colorable pretences to benefit it. But as Christ said, Qui vos recipit, me recipit; so in effect, Qui vos decipit, me decipit: He that receiveth you, receiveth me: and he that deceiveth you, deceiveth me: and he must rise betimes that over-reaches his Maker. Let me shut up all with discovering to you three sorts of Deceivers.

1 The deceivers of souls; such are the Romish Seminaries. They tell you of a Savior called Christ; but they mean the Pope; for his word must stand, when Christ's Word is thrust behind the door. They say, his judgment is infallible: yet Pope John the twelfth made Deacons in a stable, a boy of ten years old a bishop, the Lateran a stews, degraded his Predecessors shavelings, made them confess, Episcopus meus nihil sibi habuit, nihil mihi dedit, prayed to Jupiter and Venus, and drank a health to the devil. Not a few of that race were as bad, yet Papists will believe they cannot err; are they not worthy to be deceived? They say, that the Church cannot subsist without the Pope her Head; yet was that Chair ten years empty. We use to say, Great head, little wit; but certainly, no head, no wit. Whence should their Church have her wit, when she was bereaved of her head? The Irish men are not troubled with venomous beasts, for this they must be beholding to Saint Patrick: yea he is said to have obtained of God, that no Irish man should abide the coming of Antichrist: yet their great masters are ashamed of it, and never allege it to clear the Pope from being Antichrist. They will show Pilgrims that go to Jerusalem, a three corner'd stone; and make them believe it is that very Stone spoken of in the Psalm; The Stone which the builders refused, &c. A monk, among other relicts, boasted that he could show some of the hairs that fell from the Seraphical Angel, when he imprinted the five wounds of Christ on the body of Saint Francis: yea, gave out, that he had brought from the East some of the sound of the bells that hung in Solomon's Temple. Be not these pretty coozenages?

But too gross to deceive us, too bungerly for these times: therefore (as old tricks of cheating can do no good) they find out new: which is a short cut, an absolute denial of all truth that is not for them. They do not dethrone kings, nor suborn parricides, nor pardon incests and murders, nor worship images, nor disgrace the Scriptures, nor forswear by equivocations, nor prefer the mother to the Son, nor set States in combustion, nor make the eating of flesh on forbidden days damnable, and uncleanness every day venial; not they: though we know they do all this, yet when they deny it, they look we should believe them. A reverend bishop of this land dies an orthodox Catholic, a professed Protestant, as he lived: yet they disperse books, and tell the world, he died in the Romish faith. A common liar should not be believed; men know them so, yet trust them. O ye besotted English, why will you be thus deceived? The devils hand is in it, their hand is in it, your own hand is in it; but above all, God hath a hand in it; who justly gives them up to believe a lie, that would not receive the Truth.

2 The deceivers of the Church, that make it nothing to defraud their Maker. Joseph was twice stripped of his garments; first by the violence of envy, then of lust: the first time, of necessity; the next, of choice in conveniency. His brethren took away his coat, to deceive his Father: his Mistress kept his coat, to deceive his Master. First, the policy of Rome took one garment from us, which the Policy of State took again from them. We had still a poor coat left, the remainder that escaped impropriating: now sacrilege keeps away that too, The first we could not save by law, this last we cannot redeem without law: and that is a remedy worse than the disease. That first rent had the color of pleasing God; this other, of punishing us. The world doth charge us with pride and covetousness, and therefore surchargeth us with beggary and emptiness. Joseph may plead, but is not heard; and our case is as bad; we may deny the Justice of the fact, but we scarce dare accuse the offenders. Hanun misused David's Ambassadors, and shaved off one half of their beards, and cut off their garments to the middle; exposing them to the derision of all beholders. The Israelites were forbidden a shaven beard, or a short garment: to despite their law, they are sent away with both. Man hath a double ornament to his body; one of nature, the other of art: the natural ornament is the hair, the artificial is apparel: in both these are David's servants abused. But is not David sensible of it? Doth he not feel himself dishonored in their persons? Will he only hide it, and not revenge it? We are God's Messengers to the world, and the world returns us so to God. Surely, as David could not but feel his own cheeks shaven, his own coat cut, in his Ambassadors: so the Lord cannot but appropriate that injury to himself, which is offered to his Ministers. By the universal Law of nations, Ambassadors are free; that office hath in the name sufficient protection, nor was it ever wronged without a revenge. Do not the notorious contempts cast upon us below, concern our great Master above? Is it possible, he should not feel them, not revenge them? Yes, David revengeth it on Ammon to the full; for cutting his Messengers coats, Joab and his army cut their throats: and certainly, God will not let such indignity pass unpunished.

3 The deceivers of men, in regard of their estates; contrary to God's flat prohibition, Defraud no man. Wherein and how far any man hath thus deceived, his Conscience will tell him: unless by the long habit of cozenage, he hath also learned to cozen his conscience. Fraud is theft, and a thief (we say) no man can endure to be any long time, for his conscience; but how if his conscience it self be turned thief? Howsoever deceivers think to get a patrimony of riches by fraud, as they pretend Jacob got the Birth-right; yet it will not be so lucky to them as Rebekah's pasty, they shall not (with Jacob) get the blessing by it. The crafty Fox hug'd himself to think how he had coozened the Crow of her breakfast: but when he had eaten it, and found himself poisoned with it, he wished the Crow her own again. Wealth got by deceit is like a piece of buttered Sponge, (an Italian trick) it goes down glib, but in the stomach swell • , and will never be gotten out again. It is not stable; aut ipsis acquirentibus est peritura, aut ab haeredibus dissipanda. Turnus had been spared, but for his Belt: when that was found about him, it cost him his life. So when other sins might find mercy, Christ seeing the cognizance of fraud, begins to strike; Pallas, te hoc vulnere Pallas immolat, one torture more for that. It is an observation set upon the house of Desmond in Ireland, that Maurice Thomas the first Earl raised it by injustice, and by injustice Girald the last Earl of that race ruined it. The gains a man gets by deceiving, at last he may put in his eye, and yet see himself miser • ble. Sin is the greatest cheater in the world, for it deceives the deceiver: ye, as Haman built his own galhouse, it makes a snare to entrap others, but is sure to confound the sinner. The seed of this sin, as of all other, is in every man by nature; The heart of man is deceitful: and while he thinks there is no deceit in it, even in that he is most of all deceived.

Find out this Thief, apprehend him, convict him, condemn him, yea execute him; yea, fraudi ne credas, ne mortuae quidem; bury him, lest his very death deceive thee. It is one brand of the wicked, When thou sawest a thief, thou consentedū to him. Many see a thief abroad, and consent not: but the most dangerous thief is at home, within us, there we consent. Elisha had a thief to his servant, but he followed him at an inch, and found out his brokage. Thus pursue thy fraud, meet it at every turning, cross it with resolution, plague it with restitution: wish thy Heart, as that Roman built his house, not close to do things unseen, but open to the view of passengers, to show that honest dealing dwells there. Fraud is both Latro and Latrocinium, a theft to others, a thief to a man's self: as falsus in Latin signifies both the deceived, and the deceiver. It steals away his grace, his peace, his conscience, his blessing in this life, and his hope of glory in the life to come. The day of the Lord shall come as a thief too: and if it take a man with his thefts about him, no heart can think how terribly it will handle him. We have wronged no man, we have corrupted no man, we have defrauded no man. Thrice happy conscience that can speak this in sincerity. That steward hath no • deceived God in his trust, and God will not deceive him of his reward, eternal blessedness in JESUS CHRIST.

While they feast with you.] A certain kind of feasts is much spoken of by the Apostles, Paul, Peter, Jude; Love-feasts. This is a Festival time, yea the greatest of all Christian feasts: every Sabbath is a feast, this as it is a Sabbath of Sabbaths, so a feast of feasts. The day of the Sabbath was changed for the honor of Christ's Resurrection; and this is the day for whose honor the Sabbath was changed. Something therefore I take liberty to speak of this occasion. Feasts may be distinguished into three kinds, Holy, Civil, and Profane. The form • must be, the next may be, the last should not be. The first are commanded, the second allowed, the third prohibited. The first is a feast to God, the next for man, the third to the devil.

I begin with holy Feasts. Religion is not tied to time, yet cannot Religion be publicly exercised without a due time allotted for it. It is necessary to consider every great blessing of God, and it is kindly and convenient to consider it in the day it was wrought: then to repeat it with thankfulness, is to do opus dici in die suo. Otherwise the revolution of time would eat out the memory of these precious benefits. The Jews, among many, had three solemn Festivals every year, by God's institution: the Passover, Pentecost, and Feast of Tabernacles. 1 Of Tabernacles, in remembering that Israel dwelt in Tents forty years. Even that walk of theirs must not be forgotten in their rest. So much memory of our weary pilgrimage here, as may stand with the perfection of our joy in heaven, shall be reserved. 2 The Passover, to remember them of their deliverance from the Egyptian bondage: freedom from such a servitude deserves a solemn and set time of gratitude. 3 Pentecost, in remembrance of the law given on Mount Sinai. God wrote it, that it might be legible: wrote it in stone that it might be durable: honored the day with an annual feast, that it might be memorable. Thus the Christian Church, among the rest, celebrates three principal feasts. Christmas, in honor of Christ's Nativity, then was he borne to the earth. Easter, in honor of his Resurrection, then was he borne from the earth. Whitsuntide, in honor of the mission of the holy Ghost, by whom we are new borne to the kingdom of heaven. And we still retain two names of the three, Passover and Pentecost. Such is the accordance of the two Testaments, that those two Jewish feasts, and our two Christian, agree, both in signification, and in time.

1 For signification, their Passover and Pentecost are types of our Easter and Whitsuntide. For the former, God did pass over the doors where the blood of the Paschal lamb was sprinkled. What signifies it? That God will pass over our sins in the day of wrath, if he find our souls sprinkled with the blood of Christ, That Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. That night Moses led Israel out of Egypt, this day Christ brings us out of the house of bondage. When he rose from the grave, this was the full conquest of all our enemies, for the last enemy is death. For their Pentecost, it was a memorial of the law, which is a hidden Gospel. And our Whitsuntide is a memorial of the Gospel, which is a revealed law. The Law was given on Mount Sinai, the Gospel on Mount S on: the Law written in tables of stone, the Gospel in tables of flesh; I will write my Law in their hearts; so run the terms of the new Covenant. On their Pentecost, the Law was given in fire and smoke, obscurity was mingled with terror. On our Pentecost, the Gospel was given in fire without smoke, befitting the light and clearness of the Truth. Fire, not in flashes, but in Tongues: not to terrify, but to teach. Thus the promulgation of the Law makes way for the Gospel: first we must feel the terrors of Sinai, before we have the comforts of Zion, the gracious consolations of the holy Ghost. If therefore they had a Festival for the Law, the Ministry of death; good reason we should have one for the Gospel, which is the Power of God to salvation. Christmas is a merry time, then we sing and feast. Easter is a solemn time, then we communicate and feast spiritually. Whitsuntide is a triumphant and flourishing time, not only for height of the season, but for the Churches confirmation by the descension of the holy Ghost: Quod abeuntem Christum non amisimus, & venientem Spiritum possidemus.

2 As they agree for substance, so for the very time of delivery: the ancient Jews kept our feasts, and we still keep theirs. First, their Passover and our Easter is kept at the same time: so fitly, to their coming from the bondage of Egypt, doth answer Christ's coming from under the bondage of death. Even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us: that spotless Lamb, whereof one bone might not be broken. Next, their Pentecost and our Whitsuntide, on the very same day. Their Pentecost was fifty days after their Passover, and our Whitsuntide is fifty days after our Easter: from which number of days, it hath the name, Pentecost. The very day that God came down in fire and thunder to deliver the Law, the holy Ghost came down upon the Apostles in fiery tongues, for the propagation of the Gospel. Now as our feasts be the same, so be our Sacraments. We do all eat of the same spiritual meat, and drink of the same spiritual drink. The same. 1 In objecto; the same Christ in both: not one God in the Law, another in the Gospel; not a bloody one there, a merciful one here, as Marcion blasphemed. But Jesus Christ the same, yesterday, and today, and forever. Only a darker Christ there, a clearer Christ here, but still the same. 2 Idem non signis, sed significatis: in the Passover the Lamb of God was prefigured, in the Lord's Supper he is exhibited: they saw him, we have him. 3 Identitate nominis; so Circumcision is called Baptism, and Baptism Circumcision; and the Lord's Supper, the Passover. 4 The same in efficacy, their effect is all one: their faith received Christ before he came, in as full virtue as we do now he is come. But if the body of Christ be really in the Supper, why was not the Lamb so transubstantiated in the Passover? For Paul says, It was the same. They never say, in Baptism the water is turned into blood; why then say they so of the wine in the Eucharist? This is my body, which is broken for you. There is Subjectum, Th •• , this Bread: Praedicatum, my Body: Copula, Is: and the exposition, which is broken for you. There is Bread, and there is the Body: the Bread is not the Body, therefore an holy sign of it. We receive a mystical, yet the true body of Christ: not in veritate rei, sed in significante mysterio. Thus be our Sacraments the same: indeed they had also Manna, and water from the Rock; both which signified Christ: they were fed with Sacraments. Their bread was Sacramental, whereof they communicated every day: who complains of receiving often, when the Israelites received daily? Their drink was Sacramental; surely from them the Church of Rome never learned a dry communion. Twice hath the Rock yielded them water of refreshing: the true Rock is Christ, and he yields it always. Out of his side issued that bloody stream, whereby the thirst of all believers is comfortably quenched. They thirsted with repining, let us thirst with faith our spiritual Rock shall abundantly satisfy our souls; yea even sustain us till this water be changed into that new wine which we shall drink with him in his Fathers kingdom.

We have seen the harmony and accordance between both the Testaments, now let us return to the feast of the Day. Some difference may seem to be in the Evangelists, about the time when Christ did eat the Passover. Three of them say, on the first day of the Passover: but we read in Saint John's Gospel, before the feast of the Passover. To reconcile these; first, some say, that Christ did not eat the Passover that year: and their reason is glorious, because himself was the Paschal Lamb then to be offered. But this is frivolous, for it is manifest, he did eat it. Secondly, some say, the Passover is taken for the whole time of seven days, and that he did eat it one of the seven. But this is apparently false; for after the Jews had apprehended him, they would not enter into the Judgment hall, for fear of being defiled, but that they might eat the Passover. Christ had that day (before) eaten it, therefore before the seven. Thirdly, others say, he did eat it one night before the Jews, and that he did so, to thrust a sword into Judas his hand, to accuse him for an innovator, and law-breaker. But they that were fain to take up a false accusation against him, rather than none, would have triumphed in this. Besides, the Disciples would have questioned the reason of such an alteration, and the master of the house would have found some fault. And which is above all, the Fulfiller of the Law, and that so punctually, would not have failed in a chief point, so main a circumstance, and that so immediately before his death: and this supposition still sticks in the stomachs of the Jews.

Briefly then we conclude thus. He did eat it on the due and true day, the fourteenth of the month. But then how failed the Jews? for both cannot stand, seeing Christ and they did eat it on several days? It is answered thus: since the Captivity, when the Passover fell on the Sabbath Eve, they put it off to the Sabbath day: so it was called Sabbatum magnum, an high day, because that feast fell upon it. For this reason they took down the dead bodies from the crosses; for if these two feasts had fallen immediately together on several days, they had had no opportunity to bury their dead. But why did not Judas accuse him of this? God so disposed it, that his heart being fraught with malice did not observe it. Some think it was left arbitrary, that who so would, might eat it on the Even, or put it off to the Sabbath. Thus are the Evangelists reconciled. Before the Passover, saith John; that is, before the people did eat it by their Tradition. At the Passover, say the rest, that is, on the day of Institution, when Moses commanded it. So Christ died in the Feast of Passover, that the Type and the Truth might agree together. They took him at night, arraigned, condemned, afflicted, and crucified him, before the end of the next day: this was strange haste: but what bounds are there to desperate madness? They meant nothing but death to him, but God hath this day turned it into life to us.

Surely, even the Angels in heaven keep these Paschal solemnities with joy: the glory of that victorious Lion, who hath triumphed over death and hell, is even to them matter of rejoicing. It is the Sabbath of the new world, our Passover from everlasting death to life: our true Jubilee, the first day of our week, and the chief in our Kalendar. Herein our Phenix rose from his ashes, our Eagle renewed his feathers, the first begotten of the dead was borne from the womb of the earth. Christ, like the Sun eclipsed by the Moon, got himself out by his Resurrection: and as the Sun by the Moon, he was darkened by them to whom he gave light. His death did justify us, his Resurrection did justify his death. He buried the Law with himself, and both with honor: he raised up the Gospel with himself, and both with glory. His Resurrection was the first stone of the foundation; In Christ all shall be made alive: and the last stone of the roof, for God assures us he shall come to Judgment, by this token, that he raised him up from the dead. The devil danced on his grave for joy; when he had him there once, he thought him sure enough: but he rose again, and trampled on the devils throne with triumph. This is Christianorum propria fides; the Jews believe him dead, not living: we believe that he is risen, and sits at the right hand of God. As Moses led the people to Canaan Per desertum, so Christ led us to heaven Per Sepulchrum. His Resurrection is not only Objectum fidei nostrae, the object of our faith: but Exemplum Spei nostrae, the example of our Hope: We all carry mortality about us, and the strongest man is but like Nebuchadnezzar's Image; though his head be of gold, and his ribs of brass, yet his feet are of clay: a stone thrown at the feet overturns this great Image, and down falls man. But ero mors tua, mors: durst death kill Christ? Christ therefore shall kill death. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most miserable. But Spes vitae immortalis est vita vitae mortalis: the hope of life immortal is the life of our life mortal. Death and the grave swallow all, and then burst: as crammed covetousness disgorgeth it self by a prodigal heir.

The Jews craved a sign, and had it: yet then spake against it, or wondered at it. To us it shall be more than a sign, it shall have wonder, and wonder enough; but we will not lose our fruit or part therein for a world. Him, that this day rose from the clods, we expect from the clouds, to raise our bodies, to perform his promises, to finish our faith, to perfect our glory, and to draw us unto himself. I do not say, Come see the place where they laid him, that is empty: but Come see the place where he is, Here is the Lord. I say not with Mary, Abstulerunt Dominum, They have taken away the Lord, and I know not where they have laid him: he is personally in heaven, he is mystically, sacramentally, yea in a spiritual sense, he is really here. Himself said, Desiderando desideravi, I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you. Desiderando desideremus, let us earnestly desire to eat this Sacrament with him. God said once, Accipite & manducate, take and eat of every tree but one; but man then mistook the fruit, he did eat and fell. He now says again, Accipite & manducate, Take and eat, this is my body, which is given for you; let us not mistake, but eat and live forever. And The body of our Lord Jesus Christ which was given for us, preserve our bodies and souls into everlasting Life.

As God spake to the fish, and it cast up Jonah, commanded the earth, and it delivered up Jesus; so he will speak to all creatures, and they shall not detain one dust of our bodies. There shall be a dry ground for this valley of tears, a land of the living for this Golgotha of the dead, a settled Mansion for this moveable Pavilion. Christ had his Easter day by himself, there shall be one general Easter day for us all: when the wicked shall rise to contempt, the faithful to eternity of days. Here shall be no terror to affright us, no sorrow to afflict us, no sickness to distemper us, no death to dissolve us, no sin to endanger, for evermore.

2 The next are civil Feasts: when the soul hath been feasted with God, the body may be feasted with the creatures of God: when the mistress hath dined, the servant may sit down. Every Sabbath is a feast, but this is an exceeding day. When we hear the Word, we have a good spiritual meal: but the Sacrament is an extraordinary Banquet; wherein the best cheare of heaven is set on the Table, and the faithful soul feeds more liberally on Jesus Christ. We do not feast every day; that was the Epicures brand; he fared deliciously every day: so nor every day communicate: there may be satiety even in sacred things, and the soul cloyed as well as the body. These Love-feasts were before the Lord's Supper, where the Communicants brought every man his provision to one place, and they did eat together: giving thanks to God, and bestowing the remainder on the poor. Thus were they intended for the increase of Love: but what foul abuses crept in, Saint Paul notes and condemns; one is hungry, and another is drunken. Riot and intemperance is an ill preparation for so holy a business.

First therefore begin with God; a full body makes an unwieldy soul; but a feasted soul will keep a temperate body. First drink at Christ's wine-cellar, before thou touch thine own. Not that I obtrude the Popish custom upon you, which puts a necessity of fasting before: because forsooth they would receive their God into a clear stomach, next their heart. Cannot Christ come into the heart, if there be meat in the stomach? This is as if a man could not come to the Steeple for the sound of the bells. Or as the merry Cardinal said to his fellows in the Conclave, when they could not agree about the Election of the Pope; Let us untile the house, quia Spiritus Sanctus nequit ad nos per tot tecta ingredi, because the holy Ghost cannot get in to us through so many tiles. A weak stomach helped by refection is as capable of Christ as a fasting superstition. Indeed if men can forbear, it were best to have the first morsel Sacramental: but it is the soul, not the body, that receives Panem Dominum, Christ himself. In this point I praise this City, that they begin their feasts with a Sermon, as Jethro began his with a sacrifice. First serve the Lord, then eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and give the rest to the poor. Some have been as fond on the other side; they will eat nothing that whole day after the Sacrament; as if they wronged that holy food, if they thought it would not keep them a whole day. In former times, some would not wash a whole week after their baptising; as if men should refuse to wash a day or two after their trimming by the Barber. But these be fond singularities: Let us keep the day holy, keep ourselves holy, in the strength of the most Holy; that we may confess the virtue of this blessed Sacrament in the sanctity of our future deportment and conversation.

Feasts have their seasonable allowance: the bounty of God reacheth not only to our life, but to our contentment: nor doth he afford us only the bread of sufficiency, but of pleasure; that we may more than live, even live happy. The blessed Virgin at the marriage in Cana, perceived a defect of wine, and she tells Christ, They had wine enough for a meal, not enough for a feast: and if there was not wine enough, there was enough water: water to quench thirst, if not wine to cheare the spirits. Yet she complains the want of wine, and is troubled with the very lack of superfluity. Christ gives her rough words, but answers her faith with gracious deeds; the feast shall be supplied with wine, if six pots full (of two or three firkins a-piece) can do it. To turn one of these vessels of water into wine had been a sufficient proof of his power, and perhaps enough for the present necessity: yet he makes wine enough to serve above an hundred guests, had they been then but newly sat down. It was a feast; that quantity at another time had been superfluous, which is now but necessary. That hand of infinite munificence regards not only our need, but our honest affluence. We are sullen guests, if we scant ourselves where God hath been liberal; and from the Table of his bounty depart hungry. We are unworthy guests, if we riot upon his abundance, and turn his plenty into wantonness. To fast when he invites us to feed, is our sin: to be fuller than he allows us, is our sin and our shame: to be pleased no ways, neither full nor fasting, is our sin, our shame, and unhappiness. The Philistines in their feast called for Samson to make them sport: take heed that Samson be not your mirth, make not Religion your fiddle. God doth not therefore so liberally give us temporal things, that we being full should abuse spiritual things. David vowed that he would not forget Jerusalem in his mirth: and in their mirth there be some that remember Jerusalem, but it is with a sacrilegious frumpe. Yea, too often, they do not only in their mirth remember Jerusalem, but they make Jerusalem their mirth; and holiness is wounded through the name of Puritan. Call Godliness by what name they will, it is too good to be jested with: and when profane men are thus in jest, God will be in earnest. And here we fitly fall upon

3 Profane feasts: I call them so, where God is not placed at the upper end of the table: where he is forgotten in the beginning, neglected in the midst, at the latter end dishonored. We find such feasts in former times, we find them all concluding in horror. The house fell down upon Job's children, while they were feasting. Their sin is not specified, yet their father feared, sanctified them, and interceded for them, after their meetings. The upshot of their last feast was destruction: I mean, on their bodies, I dare not say so of their souls. The F • thers think otherwise; and allege for it this observation. At the first Job had 7000 sheep, 3000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 she-asses. After his reparation, he had 14000 sheep, 6000 camels, a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand she-asses. But in his first estate, and his last too, he had but seven sons and three daughters. The number of his cattle was doubled, the number of his children remained the same. Children are dearer than riches; why then is his wealth doubled, and not his progeny? They say, his beasts according to the condition of beasts, utterly perished; but the souls of his children were saved. So then, as he had twice so much substance, he had twice so many children also; ten whereof were with him on earth, and the other ten with God in Heaven.

Nabal held a feast in his house like the feast of a king. Commonly there is nothing more plentiful than a Churls feast. He was merry, and feared no mischief; as if he had never angered David. That mighty Champion was at the foot of the hill, coming to cut his throat; yet Nabal was feasting without fear or wit, and drinking drunk with his sheep-shearers. Full little do sinners know, how near their jollity is to perdition. Judgment is often at the threshold, while drunkenness and surfeit are at the table. Abigail's wisdom suspended the present ruin, but this feast would not off of Nabal's stomach: the report of his wife puts him into a swoon the next morning, and within ten days after that swoon ends in death: and that heart, which wine had made as light as a feather, dies as heavy as a stone. Belshazzar made a feast for his Lord's, and drunk wine to it. On a sudden, his countenance was changed, and his knees smote one against another. What an alteration was here? a sumptuous and presumptuous banquet ends in trembling and astonishment. He had the most glorious cupboard of plate in the world, for which he might thank the spoils of the Temple: we read of many boules, not of much wine: but in our feasts, a great deal of wine is turned over with a few boules. Nabal cannot abound, but he must be drunk: excess is a true argument of folly. We use to say, When drink is in, wit is out but if wit were not first out, so much drink would not be let in. But I have held you too long at a feast, unless my cheare were better. The Jews by a custom did challenge at their feast of Passover, the release of one malefactor; whereupon they chose Barabbas, and refused Christ. So do you at this feast, turn out Barabbas, lust, riot, malice, injustice, covetousness, uncharitableness, profaneness, and all those sins which make up a malefactor, a Barabbas: and then in another sense than Pilate meant, I shall deliver to you the Lord Jesus, not to be crucified by you, but presented in this holy Sacrament as crucified before you. Thus you shall see his body broken, his blood poured out, not to his pain, bu • your comfort; not his death, but the remembrance of his death. He took the bitterness of that, that we might have the sweetness of this: he died for us once, that we by Him might live forever.

Deceiving while they feast with you.] Feasting hath ever been held a note of friendship; Convivae, Convoti: we invite none to our tables, but either such as are, or such as we would make our friends. David speaks of a wonder, of a mo • ster: My friend that did eat of my bread, hath lift up his heel against me. Elias wou d n • t do violence to the very Raven that was his purveyor. But for a man to feed upon his neighbors meat, and to eat his Host in his heart, it is such a prodigy of unthankfulness, that nature her self is sick of him. Some sly polititian, as Absalom, may make a feast for him whom he means to kill: some cunning Usurer may make a feast for those prodigal heirs whom he means to undo: some ambitious aspirer, for them whom he means to undermine: some prurient letcher, f • r those women whom he means to corrupt: A feast is made for laughter, saith Solomon: yet all feasts are not for laughter, yea some are for slaughter; not for society, but for satiety; not for delight, but deceit; not for love, but for lust. So the luxurious makes a feast, that he may lay his guests on the floor. The end of a feast is not seldom the beginning of a fray: therefore some interpret our English phrase, To pledge, To defend: the drinker supposed to be in danger, and he to whom he drinks, engaging or interposing himself betwixt him and harm. Feasts are not always safe; for if a man have no other enemy, he hath himself: his own riot may do him that mischief which another forbears. These were called Love-feasts: their intent was feasting for love, yet some came for love of feasting. One was hungry, and another was drunken. In these last, was not the fullness of love, but the love of fullness. Thus the first institution did languish into corruption; and they became luxurious, some were drunken: uncharitable, others were hungry; the poor got nthing: and fraudulent, they had thieves among themselves, whose plausible insinuation made way for their pestilent circumvention. The hypocrite would bring his dish; but it was either to tempt a woman to his lust, or to deceive a man of his goods, or to spoil him of his wits. Let me conclude all with three observations.

1 It is odious to feast with men on purpose to make them drunk. It is usually said that we taught the Germans to fight, and they taught us to drink: and we have both proved apt scholars, too forward proficience; if they be tall fighters, we are stout drinkers. But shall men be so desperate, as not to think themselves welcome to a feast, unless they be sent home drunk? Many have lost their lives, because they would not be drunk; noble Uriah was made drunk, ye • could not save his. King David had abused his wife, and his project was to shelter it with the name of her husband. Uriah had protested against feasting at home, against uxorious delights: he could not be won with words, therefore now the Courtiers must try him with wine. A king begins to him, and he must pledge i • . I do not think that he intended any excess, but to obey. But wine is a mocker, it goes plausibly in, but who can imagine how it will work? It steals in like a Lamb, but then rageth like a Lion: he that admits that traitor, shall complain of a surprisal too late. Well, even good Uriah is made drunk; the holiest soul may be overtaken: he is a rare Rechabite that never drank but when he was thirsty. There is hope now that these pots will send him home; so common is it for wine to prepare men to the bed of lust. Uriah was made drunk, that he might desire his own wife; many husbands are so drench'd, that other men may have access to their wives. What was the issue? the aim fails, grace is stronger than wine, the fury of the grape cannot carry Uriah to his own bed. The graceless attempter sometime fails in his project. David meant by procuring the sin of another, to hide his own; he shall not. Often have we heard of those that sought to overthrow others, soonest overtaken themselves. Whose is the chief offense? Uriah's drunkenness is more David's sin, than his own: sober David is worse than drunken Uriah. Woe to him that gives his neighbor drink to discover his shame; yea, he shall discover his own shame. He that gives a man wine to deceive him, is first drunk in soul, before he can procure the others bodily distemper. If we should compare them; the one is as a sinner, the other as the tempter: the one yields weakly, the other intends willfully. Lots daughters gave their father wine to provoke him, but themselves were first drunk with that lust of provocation. The husband is drenched, that his bed may be polluted; the adulterer is more intoxicate with sin, than the other can be with wine. Even the drunken temperance of some abhors that wickedness, which the sober intemperance of others desires. Say other purposes be left out, and nothing is intended but victory; is he the valiant man that can drink most? David's Worthies were honored for their deeds of arms, not for their great draughts. He that makes a man drunk to deceive him, to turn another into a beast, makes himself a devil.

2 To cozen men under the color of amity, is the most execrable villainy. Feasting implies friendship, friendship admits of no deceit. Nulla capitalior pestis quam familiaris inimicus. Nothing is more easy than this deceit, nothing more unpard • nable. Nothing more easy, Facilius ab amico decipi possum, quàm amico diffidere. My friend may sooner mischief me, than I can mistrust my friend. Nothing more ha • efull, because he doth that as a friend, which he could not have done as an enemy. The manner of doing specificates and aggravates moral actions, saith the School; so doth the very instrument. If I strike a man with a sword, it is presumed that I meant to kill him: not so, if I strike him with a reed; because a reed is no probable instrument of death. He that deceives me under the name if a friend, shows that he took that name only to deceive me. There is no fence for the pistoll that is charged with the bullet of friendship. Hilary compares it to a razor in the hand of a counterfeit barber; Praeparata ad ornatum, vertitur ad homicidium. Uriah must be se • in the forefront of the battle; honor is pretended to him, murder is meant. He was a valiant soldier, and before he had the title of David's worthy, he dearly earned it. It was not a great Ladies letter; nor that which got the Captain his Burgeship, that gave him that reputa • ion; but a noble courage in difficult exploits. David sent for him, made him royally welcome, and he was worthy of it; worthy indeed to have leaned his head near the golden Scepter, and to have died in his Princes bosom, not by his Princes prodition. But now that all this seeming favor and honor should tend to his ruin, O how foul a deed was it even of that holy Saint! His renown was as great as had been his dangers, and his valor beyond them both: and even in this last attempt that cost him his life, if his followers had not been more treacherous than his enemies were numerous, he had come off with victory. Now poor Uriah is not so muc • conquered, as betrayed: nor fell he by his enemies, but by his friends. Yet is 〈◊〉 neither the first, nor the last, that hath thus perished.

David himself had such a plot put upon him by Saul. Be thou valiant, and fight the Lord's battles, and I will give thee my elder daughter Merab to wife; for he said, my hand shall not be upon him, &c. David was grown so gracious with the people, th •• the king durst not offer him personal violence; therefore he hires him into the jaws of death, by no less a price than his eldest daughter. What could be spoken more honorably, more graciously? A king could not offer a more noble gi • t than his own daughter, nor desire a more gracious recompense, than to fight the Lord's battles. What a Saint, what a friend was Saul? yet he did never mean so much mischief to David, so much unfaithfulness to God, as in this offer. A good man is never safe from the false-hearted: for when they make the fairest weather, then is the greatest danger. Whatsoever the color was, Saul meant nothing to David but death. Yet doth this falsehood discover it self, for Merab was not given to David, but to Adriel. Seeing all these dangers could not effect what Saul desired, himself will not effect what he promised. Yet still he will be a friend, and he hath now another daughter for David; though the younger, yet the more affectionate, she was as sick of love, as her father was of hate, toward him. Saul is glad of this, his daughter could never live to do him better service: if she can betray David, David shall have his good will to marry her. Thus doth this false-hearted king sacrifice his own child to his envy; and hopes that her honest and sincere love shall betray her worthy and innocent husband. It is so storied of a late Emperor of Turkey, that he married his own daughter to a Bashaw on the one day, and then after a nights pleasure, sent for his head the next morning. Are there none that care not to cast away a daughter on their friend, for their own ends? Such is the rage of desperate malice, that rather than not ruin those they hate, they will do it through the sides of their own children. Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. No man so much hates his professed foe, as he does his dissembling friend, when that shadowed villainy declares it self. We pray, from the hands of all our enemies, and (of all our enemies) from the hands of our deceitful friends, good Lord deliver us.

3 To boast of all this mischief, when it is done, doubles the lewdness; to glory in their shame. Wicked men glory in that which shall everlastingly cast them from glory: and make that their sport on earth, which in hell shall be their torment. One glories in his strange attire, as if that were matter of pride, which makes him ridiculous. What glory takes the Owl, that she is not fashioned like other birds? Another glories in his perfumed garments; and thinks everyone that sees him or smells him, must needs be in love with him. Another, to hear himself talk, or to read his own lines; though he bungle up such stuff as tires the most patient ear. Yet the asse takes no pleasure in his own braying. Another to bring out an oath with a grace, as if to offend God, and to poison his own mouth, were an honor to him. Another to tell of his cheats, and how many he hath gull'd; and yet the gull knows not that he hath most of all coozened himself. Another, to tell of his whoredoms, and to keep a scroll of their names, into which catalogue he puts those whom he never saw, and so makes himself a worse devil than he is. Every time he boasts of his adultery, he does again commit it; yea, this report shall have a worse vengeance than the act. Herostratus burnt the Temple of Diana in a bravery, and for a bravery he relates it. You shall hear the gallant swear that such an one is a brave valiant Gentleman; why? he killed such a man. So Cain was a brave valiant Gentleman, because he slew his brother Abel. Another, in giving weak brains a drench, to see them wallow in their beastliness: this is to brag how far they are become the devils children.

Alas, that a man should make sport at sin! Doth the Peacock glory in his foul feet? Do not his proud feathers come down when they are in his eyes? Doth the Buck, after his coupling with the female, lift up his horns, and walk proudly to the Lawnes? no, he so hates himself after the stench of his commixture, that he droopes in some solitary ditch; and till the pool, or some shower of rain hath thoroughly washed him, he forbears his food. Omne vitium, eo ipso quod est vitium, contra naturam est. And are we enamored of that which the very beasts hate? Takes the devil a pride or glory, that he is banished out of heaven? Doth he make a sport of his torment, or play with his chain? No, but he rather curseth God, Angels, and men, who live in the kingdom of light, while he is confined to the dungeon of darkness. What coward is there, that will brag or glory that he was beaten? If we could see the baseness of sin, we would have little stomach to make sport with it. Now the Lord open our eyes to see, and sanctify our hearts to detest it. Amen.