Commentary on 2 Peter

GOD is a just Master, and will pay all men their wages according to their work. They that do the business he sets them about, shall have a blessed recompense: none of his servants were ever losers by him. The ungodly indeed set themselves on work; yet howsoever, he will pay them their wages; but it is such a reward, as they would thank him to go without: a righteous wages, for an unrighteous service. God shall pay all: Satan may be his executioner, but God is the Judge. The executioner cannot lay on a stroke more than the Judge appoints. Wicked men, properly, do pay when they are paid: when God pays them, he pays himself of them: and this shall be to the uttermost farthing. So the unmerciful servant was bound over, till he should pay all his d • e. At once they both receive their wages, and pay their debts.

Wages is understood to be an equal retribution, a reward proportionable to the work: and is either ex pacto, what is covenanted; Didst thou not agree with me for a penny? or ex merito, what is earned, The laborer is worthy of hire. Equality of recompense defines wages: if it be too much, and above desert, it is munificence: if too little, and short of desert, it is injustice. The Jews might give forty stripes, they would give but nine and thirty, for fear of excess. They were commanded to restore fourfold: some of them, as Zacchaeus, did quintuple it; for fear of the defect. But there is neither defect, nor excess, in a just reward. Man may fault in this, God cannot; he pays just wages; not a dram too light, not a scruple too heavy. Every man shall receive according to his works. With the same measure that ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

This Wages of unrighteousness must be considered, In Tali, and In Tanto: Such, for the Quality: So much, for the Equalitie. In congruo, for the fitness; In condigno, for the fullness, not an Arithmetical Portion, every man alike: but a Geometrical Proportion, every man his due. So that we have two things: The Manner, and the Measure, of this wages.

The Scripture is copious in these retaliations. Nile was instead of heaven to Egypt; the clouds did not so much favor them, as the river: this did moisten their ground, and quench their thirst: and their confidence was not in heaven, but in Nile. Loe, Nile was turned into blood: that which was their succor shall be their horror. He that measures the sea in his fist, scorns that a poor river should be his rivall. In this element was the whole trust of their provision; and now this cannot be endured for the corruption. When their palates would taste it, their eyes abhor it. Their drought calls for the moisture, their stomachs cannot brook the annoyance. They are thirsty, yet cannot tell whether they should die, or drink; die with heat, or cool that heat with blood. How fit is this wages? they made that one element their god, and by the loss of that one element they become miserable men. The fish was no small part of their sustenance: those die with infection, and infect more by being dead. But was this all the similitude? no, they had polluted that river with the blood of infants, and now it appears to them in his color. As if it should say, Am I bloody? thank your own murderous hands that made me thus. It is your sin that hath turned my clear streams into this sanguine hew. The very waters will no longer keep their counsel. Never any man willfully shed blood, but he had enough of it ere his end. If they look upon the waters, they see nothing but blood: when they drink, they taste nothing but blood. They shedded some few streams, but are requited with whole rivers of blood. As if the Divine Justice had said to them, as Tomyris did (afterward) to Cyrus, Sanguinem sitisti, sanguinem bibe; Satiate thyself with blood, thou that so desired'st it. A red River was one plague, but a red sea, the greater. That annoyed, this overwhelmed them: that slew their fishes, this drowned themselves. For a water bloodied with Innocents, to have a river turned into bloody waters, a red sea made redder by the whole host of Egypt; how fit a wages of unrighteousness was this? The corrupted river was both a monument of their former sin, and an image of their f • ture vengeance. God paid them in specie, their own money.

Such another Instance we have in that fat king of Moab, Eglon; whom Eh • d slew. He had made his belly his god, and God sends a message into his belly. I have a message to thee from God. This he thought to have heard with his ears, and he feels it in his guts. A message indeed, but such an one as did neither require nor admit an answer: no reply, but a groan and a gasp; and then everlasting silence. His very soul lay in his entrails, and through that unclean passage she goes out in stench. His sin had pampered those parts, and swelled them to an unwieldy grossness: in those parts his destruction enters to let out life. Many delicate morsels, and choice creatures had been buried in that bulky vault: Ehud’s dagger is a hard and cold bit to close up his stomach. He can never digest this, now he pays for all his gluttony; this was the wages of unrighteousness.

This Lex talionis hath fallen upon the dear Saints of God. Samsons eyes were the first offenders, and they are first pulled out: they betrayed him to lust, and lust betrays them to darkness. In Azzah he was first captivated by a woman, and thither he is led captive in triumph. He that was grown blind in his understanding by doting wantonness, is now doomed to his own perpetual night. Because he trusted his locks in the lap of a whore, he riseth up shorn and weakened. He that was a terror to armies, becomes a scorn to boys. Eli could not have devised a way so much to plague himself and his sons, as by his partiality to their sins. He receives a variety of Judgments, yet everyone a just wages for his faults. First, his sons had despised God, therefore God lightly esteems them. Secondly, old age is commonly choleric, old Eli was indulgent, therefore not an old man shall be left of his house forever. Because he had been faulty in his old age, therefore all his family shall die in their youth. Thirdly, his sons were enemies to God in their profession, therefore he shall see his enemy in the Lord's habitation. Fourthly, because he so mis-favor'd his offending children, as not to punish them, therefore they shall be to consume his eyes, and grieve his heart, even to punish him. Fifthly, because he esteemed their life above his Makers glory, therefore they shall die with dishonor. Sixthly, the Authority which he had abused by connivence, shall be translated to another. Seventhly, because his sons were saucy, and of so wanton an appetite, that they durst take meat from off God's own trencher, therefore the remainder of his household shall come to beggary. Lastly, because he forbore to take vengeance on their iniquity, God shall revenge himself on him and them, and that severely. Consider this, ye fond parents, that prefer the vanities of your children, before the will of your heavenly Father: you cannot devise a speedier way to ruin them. Thus to be kind to them, is to be cruel to yourselves, and them: to make their sins your own. God might have pardoned them, had you not pardoned them: now your indulgence makes way for his vengeance. We read not of any fault Eli had but this; yet which of the notorious offenders was plagued more? A man needs no more to make him and his posterity miserable, than sparing the rod. How just is this, when men will not se • the faults they should, to feel the punishments they would not?

Absalom was fair, and he knew it well enough: the glass and flattery had made him acquainted with his own comliness. His beauty was the matter of his pride, and his hair was no small piece of his beauty. Once every year he used to cut it; not as weary of the length, but of the weight: his pride could have brooked it longer, his neck could not. Now those locks which had been his glory, become his hangman. He had curiously plated those tresses for his ornament, therefore God makes use of them for his halter. The part which man's unrighteousness abuseth to sin, God's justice employs to revenge. When it hath served our turn to offend God, it shall serve his turn to punish us. This latter service makes amends for the former trespass. The disheveld hairs that loosely hung on Absalom's shoulders, shall do him the office to hang him. He came out of his fathers loins, yet turned traitor to him: his hair grew out of his scalp and turns traitor to his own head. When he was thus mounted to his unexpected galhouse, his beast leaves him: it had done him service enough, to bring him to the tree of Justice, and there resigns that unnatural burden. He reared a pillar, and called it by his own name; either because he had no sons, no living images of himself; and so to supply nature, he thought to survive in dead stones. But it had been great pity there should have been any of his breed: he that robbed his father of a son, slew Ammon, and would have robbed himself of a father, his father of a kingdom, deserved to die without issue. Or to preserve the memorial of himself; that the world, when it saw the stately pillar might be occasioned to remember the goodly person of Absalom: as if the generations to come were wronged in losing the mention of Absalom. The world esteemed him highly; and he had an higher opinion of himself; and he was famous, but for infamy: not that arched pile, but a rude heap of stones, cover his carcase. One death is not enough for him; he is hanged, pierced, mangled. He had lifted up himself against his own royal father, therefore was lifted up to a tree of execution. He had pierced his fathers heart with many sorrows, therefore he is pierced with many darts. He had dismembered and divided Israel, therefore he is mangled and torn in pieces. He that cursed his parents, according to the law, was stoned to death: he had done worse, even attempted to kill his father, therefore was buried under an heap of stones. Behold with terror, the just wages of unrighteousness.

How righteous art thou, O God, in thy retaliations! Non invenit guttam, qui non dedit micam. The rich man would not give Lazarus a crumb, Lazarus shall not bring him a drop. Saul slew the Gibeonites: nothing can expiate the blood of these heathen fathers, but the blood of the persecutors children. Because they knew God, and would not glorify him, therefore their foolish heart was darkened. Because their knowledge would not retain God, they shall not retain their knowledge. Men profane God's Name, and he makes their names to stink. Why should they be mentioned with honor, that do not mention their maker but to his dishonor? So we read of Lots wife, Job's wife, the rich man, but no name: as if God had said, let their names be blotted out. Idolaters will set up a false god for the true, therefore the true God gives them over to the false. We forget duly to bless God on the Sabaoth, therefore go unblessed all the week. If mine heart hath been deceived by a woman, then let my wife grind unto another. Few dare take such an oath, or make such a wish. They have polluted the beds of others, therefore their marriage finds pollution. We rob the Ministers, and therefore commonly we are robbed by the Lawyers. Who so stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry himself, but shall not be heard. In vain they cry to us for charity, and for mercy we shall cry in vain to God. The measure we mete to others, is with much equity remeasured to ourselves. In every grievance of your sense, read the characters of the cause. When you receive your wages, consider your work: so you have done, so you are undone. When the dropsy invades the drunkard, it is but his wages. When the pestilence rageth in out streets, blasphemy and execration must confess that they have their due wages. Poverty is the wages of dishonesty. Blasphemers live swearing, and die raving; it is but their wages. These things if we preach, we are hated; if we do not, we shall be condemned: it is a woeful strait, when we must either incur the worlds mal-opinion, or the Lord's malediction. But certainly, if men do these unrighteous works, they must expect this righteous wages.

The measure follows; no temporary suffering can be a sufficient wages of sin. Nothing but death can expiate some offenses among men; blood must have blood: but death it self cannot satisfy God. All sin is infinite; not in respect of it self, but of the Majesty which it offends: now an infinite work must have an infinite wages. Through the creatures incapacitie, this cannot be infinite in intension, therefore must be so in duration. The Quantitie of this wages is begun in death, accomplished in torment.

1 In Death. There is but one door to come into the world, a thousand to go forth. Death hath his choice of ways to let out life: and while we are busily watching at one door, he comes in at another. A furious horseman, with a pale and gastly look: Pallida mors; symbolizing that effect which he works both on the living, and on the dead. On the living; I know, that many can talk of death without fear, because they think it out of hearing: they make a league with death; as the frantic merchant alone, would sell this commodity, and buy that, and make matches for hundreds and thousands, when there was nobody by to deal with him. Thus it is reported of an Earl of Kildare, that playing at the boards end, and seeing his warrant of execution brought in; threw his cast, and said; Whatsoever that is, this is for a huddle. Many have feigned to die in jest; but I doubt whether their heart and face were both of one piece. Some call for it, as the poor wearied man in the Fable; but when it comes in good earnest, they have another errand for it, and are not able to look it in the face, with the blood in their cheeks. When it gave Belshazzar that fatal summons, all his Courtiers and Concubines could not cheare his heart, nor all the wine in those holy bowles fetch color into his countenance. How do we see prisoners at the bar even die at the sentence of death, as if they could not live to the execution. Some Stoike would fain set a good face on the matter, and says in a bravado to his neighbors, he fears not death; and all, that the world may witness, he is no coward. So Jezebel painted her face, and affronted Ieh • out of the window: but had that artificial visage been off, a pale cheek would have appeared underneath it. Whatsoever is pretended, there is no unrighteous man but is afraid of this wages.

On the dead; it bereaves the body of blood and color, spoils the complexion, whether it be of art or nature, renders a lifeless and wan carcase, lays it rotting in the moulds, exposeth it a feast for worms, alters the fashion, consumes the beauty, turns the whole proportion into deformed rottenness. There lies the body in blended dust, receiving that insensible wages, which the sin of life earned; till the Archangels trumpet, together with the summons of the Judge, gives it a Surge. Even this is a fearful wages, when it is paid in the proper coin, without the allay of Christ's death to qualify it. As death is the contrary to life, so commonly they that live like Laban, die like Nabal which is but the same word inverted. The very mention of death is irksome to them; as Louis the eleventh straitly charged his servants, when they saw him sick, not to dare once so much as name that bitter and unwelcome word, Death. Thus like insensate stories, they sink down to their Center, and rather choose to feel what they fear, than labor to avoid what they must feel. So cowards wink and fight; yea, they wink and suffer, and fight not: a dismal wages!

2 Hell, and that in the worst sense; not the grave of the body, but of the soul. There is Hell ration meriti, a sinful life: and Hell ration poena, the horror of conscience: and Hell ration loci, which is Hell it self, the local prison of the damned, as Heaven is the triumphant Mansion of the blessed. This is the full wages of unrighteousness, into which the desperate madness of ungodly men doth chop blindfold. There be some, that thank philosophy and their own reasons, they fear no such fable, as Hell. Socrates and Plato were great philosophers, yet they believed a hell, and hissed the contrary opinions as bellarine, out of their Schools. Yea, the very Savages and Infidels confess it: the instinct of nature, and a divine impression, extorts from them this acknowledgement; that souls live after their bodies, either in bliss or pain. What are they but Monsters, that seek to obliterate these indelible characters, and so dance hoodwink'd into perdition? O were it allowed to the desperate Ruffians of our days, that swear and curse, as if heaven were deaf to their noise, or as if they would make it deaf by their noise, to have but a sight of hell: how would it charm their mouths, appall their spirits, strike fear and astonishment into their hearts! The Church and they would be better acquainted, which are now perpetual strangers. Superstitious recusants, irreligious profaners of the Sabbath, that never serve God but once a year: their bed or their boat or the Tavern is all their Temple, except we see their faces at Easter: would they do thus if they understood this wages? No, could we foresee death and hell in their proper shapes, we would fore-appoint ourselves, not to avoid the first death which we cannot; but to escape the second, which we may, through repentance and faith, &c.

The devils besought Christ, that he would not cast them into the Deepe. What is this Deepe, but Hell? First, for the utter separation from the face of God, never to see his favorable countenance: then for the impossibilities of passage to the Region of rest and glory. The very devils fear this deep: they feel themselves bound in chains, and reserved to this torment; expecting a further degree of vengeance. They know this to be the wages of unrighteousness: now the wages is not paid till the work be done. Still they are tempting men unto sin, and still they sin in that temptation: the mis-leaders into evil sin more than the actors: therefore the full measure of their damnation remains to the upshot of their wickedness: the day of Judgment shall confine them to the deep forever. This day, this deep, they tremble at: yet sottish men sleight it. Were their understandings sensible of that burning Lake, where soul and body must be crowded into a firy dungeon, with torments intolerable and interminable, which can neither be endured nor avoided; durst they so boldly rush into sin? who will thrust his hand into a firy crucible, to fetch out the gold? Can the metal recompense the burning? We durst not continue our licentious and willful sins, if we did truly believe the horror of those infernal and eternal flames.

Believe there is a hell! who does not? yes, very many that say they do: it is hard for men to believe their own unbelief. They that be most dangerously sick, are least sensible of their own sickness. We their Physicians perceive it, and tell them of it, and they hate us for it. But as when the Seminary in Lancashire lost his Glove, riding in his disguise, and one that found it, rode apace after him to restore it: he mistrusting him for a Pursuivant by his speed (but most pursued by a guilty conscience) quits his horse, leaps over a hedge, plungeth into an unseen marle-pit behind it, and was drowned. So men fly us that mean them no harm, and rather hazard themselves into destruction, than suffer the Word of Exhortation. I know that love should win us to goodness, rather than fear: yet fear is often the door that lets in Love, as Love casteth fear o • t of the door. Even the fear of hell hath made way for the Love of Christ, and the Love of Christ hath taken away the fear of hell. There is a story of one that gave a young Gallant a curious Ring, with a Deaths head in it; upon this condition, that for a certain time, he should spend one hour every day in looking and thinking on it. He took the Ring in wantonness, but performing the condition with diligence, it wrought a wonder on him: and of a desperate Ruffian, he became a conscionable Christian. Imagine this discourse a Ring the wages of unrighteousness a Deaths head; yea more, a map of hell, an Emblem of destruction: spend but one half hour fixedly every day on these meditations, and (I doubt not) by God's Grace thou shalt find such an alteration in thy heart and life; that there shall be gladness in the Church, peace in thy own Conscience, and joy before the Angels in Heaven for thy Conversion.

As they that count it pleasure to riot in the day time.] There is no greater danger in the world, than to live in the danger of the world. This is a care that troubles but few: how to get it, not how to use it, is the common study: Many waking hours are spent on the bed, how to be rich, how to be glorious, not how to be good. God hath written divers books of holy instructions, and they are able to make a man wise to Salvation: these contain Rules how to be holy and happy, not how to be wanton and wealthy. Solomon had his Ethickes, his Politickes, his Oeconomickes; for the government of Behaviour, of Commonwealth, of Family: not one book of secular mysteries, though his wisdom were incomparable even in that kind also. Not a leaf in the sacred volume, but hath matter against a voluptuous life, none for it. To please flesh and blood is the doctrine of the devil; this, man hath learned by nature; he is borne with this knowledge: and the whole contents of the Scripture is by the Law to forbid it, by the Gospel to mortify it. Certainly, if it had been good to live in sensual pleasure, among so many Divine Rules, some direction would have guided us to this. But all that God says about it, is to forbid it, to threaten it, to condemn it, to cast it into hell. Indeed he neither condemns our affections, nor these objects, asunder; but their composition, as they are married together. A man may covet (so as it be) the best gifts: Desire more Grace, seek more, never think you have enough: be still poor that you may be rich, rich that you may be full, full that you may be glorious. You may desire worldly things long enough without finding any content; but covet after righteousness, and you shall be satisfied. Be merry, pleasant, rejoice, but in the Lord: Christianity does not take away our joy, but gives it. It is the Ram that dies, Isaac (our laughter ) escapes. Be ambitious of favor, of honor, of a kingdom: but of God's favor, of the honor of Saints, of the Kingdom of Heaven. But to take pleasure in riot, as if a man's heaven lay in his guts, and Paradise were nothing but the delight of his sense; this is that brutish opinion, the faith of Epicures, which sends many with that rich Churl, from their delicate tables to eternal flames.

To riot is belluine; there is their Sensuality: In the day time, is desperate, for that is a work of the night; there is their Impudence: To count this a pleasure, (many have been over-taken with intemperance, but it was their sorrow and vexation, to these it is a pleasure) there is their Voluptuousness: They think it so, they do but think it so, they shall not so find it; there is their Sottishnesse. Their wickedness appears here like a Conjuration. First, the spirit raised is riot. Secondly, the circle wherein it is raised, is the day time. Thirdly, the sorceresse that raiseth it, is Pleasure. Fourthly, the charm or illusion is conceit; They think or count it a pleasure, &c.

Riot] This is the spirit: the grossest devil of all is the eating devil: surfeiting guts turn men into beasts. We borrow pride from the Lion, covetousness from the Hedgehog, envy from the Dog, wrath from the Bear, gurmandise from the Wolf, sloth from the Ass, riot and sensuality from the Hog: such be called Boarish men. God sent them into the world men, and they come forth beasts. Only the beasts are in better case; because they want the reason of Election, and shall receive no sentence of condemnation. Drunkenness is so apt to misdemeanors, that even against the violence of men not drunk, there lies an Action called a Riot.

There is Riot in many things: First, Riot in drink, when men drink in measures, without measure. We may change the verse; Non habet ulterius quod nostri • potibus addet Posteritas. Peace hath made many countries sick of a surfeit, but (were the Assizes come) God would find this whole Land guilty of a Riot. Crates threw his money into the sea, resolving to drown it, lest it should drown him: the drunkard casts his money into a deluge of drink, both drowning it, and himself with it. Herein the Miser and the Rioter are opposites; the one so loves money that he will not afford himself good drink, the other so loves good drink that he scorns money. Cornua Bacchus habet, the riotous must be quarrellous; therefore some quarrels are called riots. When the iron is hot, the Smith can fashion it to his pleasure: Wine tempers the heart like wax for the devils impression. Secondly, there is riot in meats, Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die, saith the Epicure: one would think it should rather be, Let us fast and pray, for tomorrow we shall die. The poor man's labor is to get him meat for his stomach; the riotous only care to get a stomach for their meat. Their whole vicissitude of studies is but meat for the belly, and the belly for meat; as Brewers provide barrels for their drink, and drink for their barrels. What wonder is it, if they in hell be most tormented in their tongues, that have most offended in their tastes?

Riot is of a great latitude; to abuse any riches of Nature to wantonness, is riot. So a man may riot in apparel: divers men are in all other things miserable. Yet prodigal in their clothes; and these shall be indicted of a Riot. The Daw values himself by his cockscombe, the fool by his guarded coat; and these take state upon them according to their garments; and after a little custom, persuade themselves that they are such in deed. The case of an instrument keeps it from soil, the cover of a glass from dust: but gorgeous attire can neither prevent age, for they soon wax old themselves; nor save from soil, for sin bred them, and they breed sin. Pagans over-gild their blocks, that they may be worshipped; and men garnish their bodies for the same purpose. The dress of proud women is but Democritus his brazen shield set up against the Sun, to amaze the eyes that behold it; but bavins to the furnace of lasciviousness: in their best interpretation, they are but bushes which should signify beauty to sell: for why is a sign hung out, but to invite men to buy? As in Italy, the beasts that are to be sold, are decked with blossoms and garlands. But that which is worse; the plaistering of their faces, ensparkling their eyes with spiritualized distillations, touching their lips with aurum potabile, filling up frets with fresh colors, as men keep roses all winter in covered vaults; this is horrible riot. It seems they think God was a bungler, not his crafts-master, and that they are able to correct and mend his workmanship. But do they not lay on their colors so thick, that they size into their souls? Does not a p • acke soul often dwell under a white roof? Mee thinks they should be jealous, lest the devil should come to them in the disguise of a Tailor, Tirewoman, or Complexion-seller.

There is Riot in play, where the greatest winner is it danger to lose the ga •• e. The Romans built a Temple to ill Fortune in exquiliis, on a mountain hard by, that it should not plague them at cards and dice. God made no man for play, but all for work: they that play when they should work, shall work when they might have rested. Not seldom doth Riot break forth into wantonness and carnal delights; a sin so trite and customary that it serves the City for an afternoons recreation. Common strumpets are said to have no common Patrons: and if lesser magistrates put them in hold, they have greater persons to fetch them out. Either authority is connivent, and will not see the faults; or corrupt, and loves to feel bribes; or which is worse, doth not punish the sinner, that they may sin with her; which of all bribes is the basest. There is Riot in any excessive delicacy; so the word here used is Deliciis frui, not uti: a sin hard to describe, because it hath so many shapes. In women it reigns most, because they have least to do. They must have delicate houses, rubbed and glaz'd, as if like Abraham, they were to entertain Angels; whereas too often, it is but for their wanton lovers. The floors are so glistering, as if they would walk upon looking glasses. They have delicate paces, going on the earth as if they went upon snakes, and feared to tread hard lest they should turn again. This is truly to riot by a delicious life; when everything about them is so resplendent and contentful, that they have no mind to go to heaven. This is to fortify themselves, not against mortality, but against the thought of mortality; to quintessence a heaven out of earth, yea to exchange a true heaven for a counterfeit. How many souls have these artificial paradises beguiled? Through a hell upon earth God brings many to heaven, and through a heaven upon earth many bring themselves to hell. In the forenoon Riot is merry, in the afternoon drunk, at night it goes to bed stark mad, but in the morning it riseth sober, in everlasting sorrow; that is the farewell of it.

In the day time;] This is the Circle: whether we read it, Per diem, Ad diem, or In diem: here be three readings, and three senses. Per diem, that is continually, day by day. Day and night is often taken for Indesinenter; now the day includes the night: when we beg Panem quotidianum, our daily bread, we desire provision both for day and night. It was a foolish superstition of them that refused the Paternoster going to bed, because they thought it absurd to say, Give us this day, when as it was night. Come, we will fill ourselves with strong drink, and tomorrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant. It is never night with them while the drink lasts, or their eyes can wake to guide the pot to their mouths. There is great difference betwixt infirmity and vice: the former is but an ague, neither mortal nor perpetual: the other a dropsy, that drinks till it rots, and rots till it dies. There be sins in the righteous, there is nothing but sin in the riotous. If Xantippes scolding so troubled Alcibiades, that heard her but seldom; what an affliction was it to Socrates, her husband, that must bide by it day and night? when a Citizen complained what a pitiful journey he had in a moorish fen-country; a country man replied, God help them that dwell there, as I do. A traveler often drinks that liquor with offense to him, which his host guzzles with pleasure. This made the Friar, that had drenched himself for experience, to impose it as a sore penance on them that had confessed that sin, Go and be drunk again. Custom makes that a pleasure, which is a torment: many do that in a day, for which they weep all their life.

Or Ad Diem; and this is indeed the term of all sinful pleasure; it is but a flash, a puff, and it vanisheth. It is expected with desire, with delight entertained, and departs with discontent. Like some spritely music, that advanceth a man's mind while it sounds, and leaves him more melancholy when it is done. A countryman observing the preparation for a great triumph, among many other questions, about the labor, the cost, the study; demands how long it should last: he was answered, for an hour: but he replied, then the leasse is very dear. Could they drink with Cleopatra, the riches of Egypt at a draught, yet it is but a draught, and quickly down the throat. Turn but the candle, and Quod me alit, me extinguet; that which keeps me in, puts me out.

In diem, so the word properly imports: this is impudent. They that sleep, sleep in the night; and they that be drunken, are drunken in the night. And male agens odit licem. But alas, that is cowardly sin with them, that is ashamed to show the face. They dare the day to witness their ungodliness, and do their villainies, as the Pharisees gave their alms, and said their prayers, to be seen of men. As if they were ambitious to be like God, to whom the day and the night is all one. The Apostle intends it, not as a qualification of their naughtiness, but for a more full expression: In the day time, when others are at their labors, they then roar with riot. The day is made for work, the night for sleep: our lawful work in the day, is God's service; our natural sleep in the night is our own indulgence: he that steals an hour from his sleep, robs but himself: he that trespasseth upon the day, injures God. If you say, rest enables us for work, yet work is the end, and the end is more noble than the means.

Again, all sin is the work of darkness, therefore most proper for the time of darkness: the riot that is bad at any time, is worse in the daytime. In the night it only makes the devil sport; none but fiends are spectators at that interlude: sin is then but like a poor watchman in his night-gown. In the day it ruffles it like a swasher, marches with drumme and fife, and bids defiance to authority. So it offends the good, enrageth the bad, and infects the indifferent: and that which might have escaped with forty stripes for the mere evil, shall have an hundred for the example. Sin at first was a single woman, and kept home; but rambling one day abroad, the devil got her with child, and she was delivered of two bastards, Temptation and Example. Ever since she cannot stir out of doors, but these Impes haunt her: when she would delight her self, either Temptation gets some to sin with her, or Example teaches some to sin after her.

Lastly, day-sins are done with less shame, therefore more impious. Many that care not for honesty, yet stand upon their credit, and would not be detected of that they love to commit. But they are frontlesse Zimri's, that bring whores to their tents in the face of all Israel. Noah was uncovered, but in the midst of his own Tent: sin is bad enough, though no eye see it: and unknown sins are attended with known punishments: secret faults have their secret guilt and shame. But four eyes saw the adultery, ten thousand millions shall see the torment. But that man is past all goodness, that is past shame. Sin bred shame, yet the mother is often curbed by the daughter: she dares not play her pranks so boldly while shame is by. Sin would kill all the agents of goodness in us, but that shame hinders her. Shame holds them in, though sin holds them under. There is some fear to offend, some knowledge of good and evil, some remorse, some conscience, while shame lasts. But if shame once departs, knowledge goes, and fear goes, and remorse goes, and conscience goes; none will tarry behind shame. Alas, for our age, to bear the date of such impiety; that it should be said, In such a year, when yet there was no plague, Shame died. Honesty died long since, and was buried in the Suburbs: Charity lived not long after, and was buried in the City: Plain-dealing died then too, and was buried in the Country: and now Shame is dead also: the Sepulchers of Suburbs, City, and Country, being taken up by Honesty, Charity, Plain-dealing; what room is left for Shame's grave, except the waters? And it is thought, that amongst the Watermen she first caught her death. If any man can find a place to bury her, I will bestow a sory Epitaph upon her:

In the day time.] Perh • ps they slept a-nights; and followed the business so close by day, that they dispatched it before night. Or it may be, they would husband their bodies, that they might hold out: for riot is a soaker, and it would drench them to follow it day and night too. Sin is the greatest folly in the world, and yet there must be some art and cunning to maintain it. The house that grows sear, needs supporters. But now have we none worse than these? The day contented them to riot in; day and night too is too little for some. Often do they curse the clock for haste, never blame themselves for lingering in riot. Revell they never so long, their last dance is loath to depart. They are angry, that they cannot with Joshua, make the Sun stand still, or keep the Moon from going down, not till they confound the Amorites, but till their Amorites work their confusion. They wish that the day might be corrupted, and that the night would take bribes. There be some feasts, where the guests think they are slighted, if they be not sent away drunk: and Time is no pleasing Host to these if he will not allow them to surfeit.

But the night, the night is the guilty time: it would be a long Assizes, only to take the confession and indictment of Candle-light. This would tell of doors ready to let in the adulterer, of thieves watching to break into houses, of Fauxes with their dark lanthornes ready to blow up States; of Unthrifts revelling and drinking, till their monies and their wits be both spent together; of age-decayed dames baking on their colors, and spending many pounds of candles in pinning and trimming their dresses, that will not bestow one minutes light in reading any good book: Murder, treachery, conspiracy, felony now follow their business very close: many Owls that cannot endure the light, now flutter abroad, and keep a howting and rowting in the dark. Those dare now frequent Taverns and Brothels, quarrel in the streets, rage and domineer, who would appear contemptible in the day. The Sun, that eye of Heaven, does scarce see so much villainy, as Candle-light. Wittily conceited was that Italian, who wrought the supplication to Candle-light, desiring her to disclose to him the rare secrets which she saw in her Empery. The day would scarce believe what deeds are done by night.

I conclude; both day and night let us banish intemperance out of our coasts: it will beg for some indulgence, but let a shameless beggar have a strong denial. If we will not grant it the day, it will crave but the night: sin hath no right to a moment of time, therefore will take any: but when thou hast once allowed it a part, it will proudly challenge all. He that shall duly consider his sins, will find that he hath time little enough for repentance, none to spare for intemperance. Instead of rioting ourselves, we have cause to mourn for the riot of others. But alas, all mortification is censured by the name of superstition, and he that forbears excess, is held an irregular melancholy person. The most men's sorrows are like the mournings of an heir, who then smiles in his heart, when his eyes let fall forced tears. We may say of this kind of evil, as Christ said of that kind of devil, it will not out with Prayer alone, but with fasting and prayer. It is not only human, but heavenly policy, to weaken our enemy before we fight with him. The lust that is fed with riot, will be too strong for us. Inveterate wounds or ulcers must have corrosives to eat out the dead flesh, ere they can be cured. We are ordained for holiness, not for licentiousness: the jollity of this world is so far from saving us, that it keeps us from being saved. O let not all the showers of Sermons fall like rain in the horse-fair, or high-ways, to breed nothing but mire and puddles; hear not to become worse. But judge every hour worthy thy sorrow, which thou hast mis-spent in vanity: fly the sins against which I have spoken, and I have spoken.

They count it a pleasure to riot.] Pleasure is the Sorceresse that raiseth up the spirit of riot: that special harlot of hell, which the devil hath dressed up to tempt the sons of men. She hath a melodious tongue, to enchant: a face of artificial beauty, to allure: eyes that roll with invitations, to bewitch; arms of wanton provocations, to embrace. She courts all men in the language of Absalom, but her heart is full of treason; and her project is to deceive them of the Kingdom of Heaven. Pro Ration voluntas, is the Usurpers tyranny: and Pro Religion voluptas, is the Epicures Divinity; whose belly is their god. Pleasure guides them in all their actions and courses: demand of a voluptuous man the reason of his doings, he will answer, It is my pleasure. Two questions would here be examined, for direction of our minds about Pleasure.

1 Whether a man may take any pleasure in this world or no? Yes certainly; one special use of wisdom stands in tempering our pleasures; to be delighted is not evil, but to be delighted in evil. As Paul says, Be angry, and sin not, so Be merry and sin not. Why hath God given man such choice of earthly commodities, but for his use? The whole world is a well-furnished table; if we shall willfully fast, we shall be held for sullen guests. Some to avoid the danger of Pleasure, have run from the world, changing popular cities for solitary mountains, and the society of men for beasts. As if the world were not in the desert, or the desert not in the world: as if an Hermitage could hide a man from the devil, or he could not be tempted while he was alone, or an estuant desire could not be in a neglected body. Did not Jerome find Rome in his heart, when nothing but rocks and bushes were in his eye? Do we not naturally more affect those delights which are restrained? Is not solitariness a main help to the speed of a temptation?

There is certainly a nearer and a fairer way than this. The wise man will be an Hermit at home, and seeks rather to turn the world out of himself, than to turn himself out of the world. He can distinguish between the love of pleasure, and the use of pleasure; and while others serve delight, he teacheth delight to serve him. If we see vanity, must we needs dote upon it? Our Savior saw the glory of earthly kingdoms, yet despised it. The Angels see the affairs and proceedings of us mortals, but as strangers. Lot reaped profit from the goodly meadows of Sodom, he meddled not with their sins. Moses was in the Court of Pharaoh; the confluence of all pleasures, yet his heart was suffering with his afflicted country-men. Elisha saw the secrets of the Syrian State, but as an enemy. David is in the Court of Gath, but as his refuge; he was no friend to the Philistines. The world looked upon Abraham, Job, and many other Saints, and they contemned it: and cannot we look upon it, but presently we are bewitched with it? Can we not warm us at the Sun, but we must make an idol of it? Must we needs either hide our faces, or bow our knees? Either renounce all pleasure, or be the slaves of pleasure? what extremes are these, we may be merry, without being mad: let these contentments go and come like strangers: true pleasures be ours, if we be Christ's.

2 How may a Christian take pleasure in the world? By having respect to three things; An liceat, an expediat, an deceat. The pleasure must be lawful, there can be no safety in a sinful delight? That which is absolutely evil, can by no circumstance be made good. Poison may be qualified, and become medicinal: there is use to be made of an enemy: sickness may turn to our better health; and death it self to the faithful is but a door to life: but sin can never be made good. Pleasure therefore first must have the warrant, that it be without sin: then the measure, that it be without excess. If the cup be evil, we may not taste it: though good, yet not carouse it. Reason forbids us both to touch known poison, and to be drunk with wholesome wine. Pleasure is like sauce to our meat; we must not be too saucy. A little honey is sweet, much fulsome. Non nascimur ad ludum. Nor is the lawfulness only observable, but the convenience: a man may wear good clothes unhandsomely. The stuff may be good, yet while the fashion of the garment does not become him, it appears ridiculous. The place, the occasion, the company, the opportunity, all must be fit. The house of mourning is not for mirth; soon did Christ turn the Musicians out of doors. In the time of visitation, while the plague or famine lies sore upon our neighbors, shall we give ourselves to sport and jovisance? Isaiah. 22.12, 13. Let us be sure that our delights exclude not the presence of God. (We love the medicine, not for it own sake, but for the health it brings us. The Angels are sent about God's messages to this earth; yet they are never out of their heaven, never without the vision of blessedness. We may be merry, though God be by; we may please ourselves, so long as we displease not him. He that desires pleasure for it self, and is taken up with the sweetness of it, is already drunk. Whereas he that rests not in it, but looks through it to the Giver, referring all to the highest good, is safe, and as far from sin, as from sorrow. It is not the use, but affectation of pleasure that offends; therefore all the danger or safety is from within. The body may be a Recluse, and the heart a wanderer. I have observed some to look carelessly and strangely on such objects as transport others; and answer questions far from the purpose; it seems they did mind some other thing: it is happy for a man not to mind the world. We eat and recreate, not because we would, but because we must; and when we are best pleased, let us be most suspicious. Let us use pleasure in God, from God, to God: in God, lawfully: from God, thankfully: to God, that is, to his Glory.

These be the two Quaere's, now there be also two Quare's; why should me, why should Christian men riot in pleasures?

1 Why should reasonable men delight in riot? It makes them the worse, the unhealthfuller, the poorer, none the better. It is every way expensive, and cannot quit the cost. First, to the estate, voluptuousness is a waster: that merchant is likelier to grow rich, that turns his gallerie into a warehouse, than he that turns his warehouse into a gallerie. Honestum, Vtile, and Iucundum, keeping house together, Honestum was to govern all, Vtile to provide for all, and Iucundum to dress or prepare all. They had a great household, yet maintained their charge, relieved the poor, and laid up somewhat for their posterity. All things went sweetly on, while Cheerefulnesse was the Cook, Thriftinesse the Cater, and Honesty the Steward. If any of the family were disordered, Honesty reformed them: if any lavish and unthrifty, Frugality recovered them: if any melancholy, Iucundum revived and cheered them. But after a while, this Iucundum getting a little head, begins to exceed in mirth, and falls out with Vtile 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.

LOng and late I am got out of that troublesome Labyrinth: and now like a traveler that hath spent some time in a bad country, where the conditions of the people displease him, he embarques himself, and ho • seth sails for another coast, hoping to speed better: and yet alas, finds his progress from bad to worse. So where am I now landed? Is the climate more temperate, are the Inhabitants more civil, am I contented in my change? No, I have left the Sybarites, and lighted upon the Cannibals; I am come (with Lot ) from Egypt unto Sodom: from a knot of loose companions, to a rabble of adulterers. Before I found a land of deceivers, now I am fallen upon a land of adulterers: thus is the matter well mended: The sixth Commandment forbids to kill; the seventh, to commit adultery; the eight, to steal: a man's life is more precious than his wife, his wife than his goods. So the Apostles argument riseth à minore ad majus: before they did but cozen men of their purses, now of their Spouses.

Having eyes full of adultery.] The Theame riseth in full strength to the condemnation of Adultery. For the particulars, we may compare them to a Hun • ing: these graceless deceivers being granted the Huntsmen, we have three occurrences. First, The hounds be their eyes. Secondly, the beast they hunt after, is the whore; for so is the word originally, the adulteress. Thirdly, the game is pursued, the dogs are at full cry; their eyes be full of adultery. Before I uncouple the hounds, or examine the particulars, let me say something to the matter in general. And that not much, because I have formerly handled this argument. It is a conquering sin, a coozening sin, a commanding sin, and a condemning sin.

1 It is a conquering sin, for it hath overcome the strongest. Some man perhaps says presently, why then hath it not overcome me? nay rather, why should it therefore overcome thee? even their falls should teach thee to stand Bathsheba was no sooner washed from her uncleanness, but she goes into a forbidden bed: she was never so foul, as when she was newly washed: yea, if she had not been washed, she had been clean: the worst foulness of the body is cleanliness to the best of sin. We read not of any fault of Bathsheba's either before or after, but that she was a good woman; yet she was a woman: the importunity of a king, and infirmity of sex, may plead for her. But what can be said for that Prophetike King, and royal Prophet? God hath not left it a blank, but a blemish in king David's Chronicle; that every passenger may shun that rock, and steer his course another way. Otherwise what hope hast thou but to be drowned, when God's own favourite so narrowly escaped? Did not his holy profession teach him to abhor such a sin more than death? Did not his justice punish this sin in others with no less than death? Did not his place require him to protect the chastity of his subjects? Did not the countenance of his Majesty embolden the others dishonesty? A princely tempter is like to prevail. Great persons should make their commands conscionable, their demands reasonable; for they sin by authority, that are solicited by the mighty. Thus deeply might we accuse him, but that he did more deeply accuse himself. Be there any profane eyes that look upon this woeful example with content, as their pattern, or their excuse for adultery? (As some think of Cha • s, that he meant to take advantage of his fathers nakedness, thereby to excuse himself for his continual drunkennsse.) O those be dissolute eyes, and such as shall one day see David in joy, and themselves in torment. Good eyes behold it with fears and tears, as the woeful spectacle of human frailty. God notes it, and we repeat it, in terrorem, for a terror. What a powerful sin is that, which could overcome a David? If any man could have beaten Samson, how terrible would he have been to the world? One Joseph shunned his tempting mistress, now he is a rare man that hath not his mistress. If thou be that Joseph, I will apply to thee that Text of Solomon, One man have I found among a thousand; but a woman among all those have I not found. Inveni ex tot millibus unum, but not ex tot millibus unam. But if thou hast not been an innocent Joseph, yet now at least become a penitent David.

2 It is a coozening sin; for instead of repentance, it works the adulterer to labor a concealment. His study is not how to abandon the lewdness, but how to hide it from notice. He fears shame, not sin; the Commissary, not God; the Churchwardens more than the Angels; and the Apparitour worse than the devil. He seeks a rag to cover his sin, rather than a plaster to heal it. Bathsheba conceives a child in sin, and withal conceives a trouble how to hide the shame. He that did the fact, must cover it. Marriage is a common recompense, and shelter for fornication: but adultery always breaks out like a desperate plague, that knows no cure. Therefore it makes the offenders such hypocrites, that they rather seek to conceal their wickedness from the eyes of men, than to pull the sting of sin out of their own consciences. As there be some acts wherein the hypocrite appears a Saint? so there be some, wherein the greatest mortal Saint may be an Hypocrite. Compunction and tenderness is turned into circumspection and care of secrecy; not quam caste, sed quam cante. Instead of clearing their sin, they labor to cloke it: and spend those thoughts in concealing it, which they should have bestowed in preventing it before, or in repenting it afterward. As if a Client should be tedious and curious in making his cause good to his neighbor, and never think of a Lawyer to plead it for him. Sinners endeavor to make all fair with the world, and forget their Advocate, Christ. Not unlike the soldier, that was very diligent in scouring his musket, preparing his match, practicing his postures, and fitting his furniture: and when he came into the field, had forgot his powder. Their thoughts are so taken up with the sweetness of fruition, and policy of contriving, that they quite forget the main, which is repentance.

3 It is a commanding sin; no iniquity that stands in the way, must be refused, if adultery be once admitted. All the witnesses must be corrupted, yea and allowed to take their own pleasure the same or any other way; the bawd or pandar must not ask a reward, and have a repulse. Other maids stand in fear of their mistresses, but here the mistress stands in fear of her conscious maid! The servants lips must be locked up with a golden key: if those setters once quest, the game is marred. The husband must be watched, dishonored, impoverished, yea perhaps butchered: for if blood stands in the way of lust, it is not spared. There are no conditions so hard, to which the adulterer must not subscribe. David hath abused Bathsheba, the Hittite (her husband) is sent for from the wars; and after some needless and far-fetched questions, receives a royal present, and so is dismissed home, to cloke another's sin. That train will not take, the good soldier is so used to his field-bed, that he rather chooseth a stony pillow under the canopie of heaven, than the delicate chamber of his wife, whom he thought as honest, as he knew fair. David's wanton heart does not yet melt, by comparing his servants chaste resolution, with his own light incontinence; but he tries another trick. He that cannot be stirred with words, shall be heat with wine: this fire (he presumes) will send him home to his remedy. Here is a new plot, with a new sin; but it does not take. Drunkenness hath made many adulterers, yet shall it not move Uriah to lawful pleasures. What then? there must be another project. Where, O where will this mischief end? Adultery cannot be hidden without murder, murder shall be employed to hide adultery. The fact which wine cannot conceal, the sword shall. What a brood of sins hath the devil hatched out of this one egg of adultery? Uriah shall bear his own mittimus to Joab, and be the messenger of his own death, Joab must be a traitor to his friend, the Host of God must shamefully turn their backs upon their enemies, much blood of Israel must be spilled, many a good soldier cast away, that murder must be seconded with dissimulation; and all this to hide one adultery. Who knows how far he shall fall, that hath once fallen thus far? Let him not flatter himself, This sin and no more: for when Satan hath him at that advantage, he will command him further service. O how happy is it for us never to begin the evil, whereof we know not when we shall make an end! Now the preventing grace of God keep us from the sin, that we be never delivered over to the shame.

4 It is a condemning sin, and carries the own sentence about it. It must needs abandon all love of God, for that and the love of a whore cannot stand together. There be three sorts of love; the first is ever good, the second is ever bad; the last is good naturally, accidentally evil. First, the love of God is ever good nor is it possible to sin in the excess: Modus sine modo; there be no limits or boundaries set to this love. Secondly, the love of any sin, as of whoredom, is always bad. Thirdly, the love of sustenance, recreation, &c. (as they say of Mercury, that joined with a good Planet it is auspicious, noxious with a bad one) is good by nature, bad by intemperance. This love by the love of God is stinted, that it may satisfy necessity, not curiosity. A proud stomach that quickens it self by artificial receipts, it will not endure, but confines it to mediocrity. But unlawful love is allowed no mediocrity: a man must not be an adulterer by measure. The fear of God is clean: that and foul thoughts will no more stand together than the Ark and Dagon: if the Ark be there, Dagon must down: Dagon may stand when the Ark is gone. No idol must be in the Temple of God, but of all idols not Baal-Peor. As malice is damnable, because it is so diametrally repugnant to God who is love: so God is also Purity, and therefore nothing more directly contrary to him than uncleanness. There is no adulterer but will say, yea and (not stick to) swear, that he loves God: yet if he have but a crown in his purse, his harlot shall sooner have half of it, than he will lend God one sixpence: this the poor find too true. Perhaps after the cooling of his heat, loss of spirits, and abatement of courage, he may be a little sorry: but it is like a cold thaw at noon, that is congealed worse at night. Though it takes away present strength, yet it leaves a desire: whereas grace takes away desire, though it leave strength. It is like fire, that purgeth out the filth of uncleanness: like the Sun, that deads these embers by his greater force, like pure water put into a vessel, that thrusts out the stinking air whereof it was full before. Love God therefore, know him that you may love him, read that you may know him, pray that you may do all. Augustine, the famous Doctor, was upon terms of rendering himself a Christian; only this troubled him, that he must leave his fornication. As he sat in a garden, he heard a voice, saying, Tolle, lege, take the Book and read: and at the first opening of it, he was presented with that Text; Let us walk honestly as in the day time, &c. This was enough: it wrought his heart to piety; whosoevers the voice was, the conversion was the work of God.

Having eyes full of Adultery.] Their eyes be the Beagles that hunt after this game; where we have five observations:

1 There is no sense which is not at the Hearts command; but the principality of those servants is varied according to the disposition of their mistress. If the Heart be gracious, the care hath the superiority; if vicious, the eye. Faith comes by hearing, to make the soul good: faith is confirmed by hearing, to make the soul better. Lust comes in by Seeing, to corrupt the heart, and make it evil: lust is inflamed by Seeing, to make it worse. Nisi Deus prius fuerit in aure, non erit in cord: unless God come in by the ear, you shall not find him in the heart. So non nisi per oculum meretrix se ingerit in animum; the harlot takes the heart by the eye. The blind is in better case than the deaf: for the former hath but lost the sense that might undo him, the other hath lost the sense that should save him. In the market a man's eyes do him more service than his ears: in the Church, no matter though his eyes be shut, so his ears be open. Mine ears thou hast opened, saith David, not mine eyes, yea he prays rather for their shutting, Turn away mine eyes from vanity. In the Temple, a running or roving eye is a dangerous thief to st • ale away the soul. The Popish service was only invented to take the eye: the deaf man may be one of their best catholics: there is nothing to do for his ears, unless he can understand Latin, or have some skill in music to distinguish of the organs. All is a pageant for the eye, as Saint Paul hath fitted it with a word, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Eye-service; which brings so many fools into their Paradise. This makes it perilous to see their histrionical Idolatries, because the soul is surprised by the eye.

If any object, that Paul was present at the Pagan devotions. But non omnes Paul's sumus, we have not all Paul's constancy: yea rather, Quot sunt Petri? How many are guilty of Peters flexiblenesse! But Truth is then too cruel, to forbid our bodily presence at superstitious services, for the preservation of our lives and liberties? Nay, rather admire the bounty of this mistress: you aim at the company of men, she tells you of a society with Angels: you think of your rotten tenements, she wisheth you eternal mansions: you would be content with under-offices, she offers you dominion over cities: you plead for Provinces, she for kingdoms: you are indulgent to a life that leads unto death, she counsels you rather to accept of a death that leads unto life. We read not, By Seeing you shall be saved, but by Hearing.

2 The eye is of all senses the quickest of apprehension; a port to land the commodities of hell, before the soul have warning. It goes out for prey, and brings it home in an instant. If that of Plato had been true philosophy, that visus fit extramittendo, by darting out the visive faculties to the object; there had been hope of better safety. But Seeing exerciseth it self intramittendo, by bringing the object home, according to Aristotle, and thus is the baneful impression made. That is a rare eye, like a pure beam of the Sun, that can mingle it self wi • h sordid corruptions, and receive no taintment. It is sensus perspicacissimus, it can see the sky and stars so remote. Efficac • ssimus, no sense so firmly imprinteth forms in the imagination: what it sees once intentively, it sees many days after. Certissi mus, vidi, I saw it; an evident testimony. One eye-witness is better than ten ear-witnesses. No sense is so ranging, now it is on the earth, in a moment at the Moon. Therefore the suddenness of the last Judgment is compared to the twinkling of an eye. None hath such variety of objects, and continual business: none is so often put in action, none is so quick of motion; indeed none so serviceable to reason: well guided, none so commodious, and none so pernicious, if corrupted.

The visible instruction is most potent: young king Philip, being but carried in his Cradle to the wars, did greatly animate the soldiers. The visible temptation is most prevalent: so beasts, in the presence of their sensual objects, are scarce restrained. Imagination in absence represents the pleasure a-far off, and not prepared: before the eye, it enrageth the desire, and nothing wants but execution. Therefore the way to root a bad impression out of the heart, is to remove the object from the eye: out of sight, out of mind. We think on absent things with colder affections. Indeed well-grounded love is more constant, and lovers have a secret Cabinet in their memories, whereby they confer: yet unless the intercourse of Messengers, letters, tokens, revive the affections, even their thoughts will grow remiss. How easily then may loose love, which hath no other nerves but blood and sense, be dissolved by a separation? Many a bitten lover says of his harlot, would I had never seen her face: but he says not, I will never more see her face. He vainly wisheth what cannot be, and yet does not conscionably resolve what may be.

3 The eye is the Pandar of a lustful heart; the window that lets in the infection, the first betrayor of the Fort. To say nothing of the Sons of God, allured to the daughters of men, by their eyes: nor of Potiphar's wife, that by a cast of her eye drew Joseph into her heart, and would have drawn him into her bed; uritque videndo femina: nor of David, the glance of whose wanton eye wrought so many mischiefs. Ahab's eye was sick of Naboth's vineyard, his heart was drunk with the grapes whereof he never tasted. Adultery sets her chair in the eye: they say, the Masters eye feeds the beast; but here the beasts eye feeds the master. In the eye it self there is no such virtue; yet the masters eye is said to govern the family. They write of some marine Cr • atures, that they engender by their eye. Here it is too true; the eye doth engender lust, lust adultery, and adultery (if nothing else) engenders vengeance. Let her not take thee with her eye-lids: Oculi sunt in amore duces. Upon this ground it seems Zeleucus imposed that law on the Locrenses, that the adulterers eyes should be pulled out: sin entered at those casements, therefore he would stop up the windows; and when the steed was stolen, shut up the stable door. Pliny writes of a chalky brimstone, that draws to it self distant fire: the wanton eye attracts this adulterous fire to the heart. The eye doth (as it were) specificate the object: the blind man in his lust desires a woman: the libidinous desires this or that woman, making his choice by his eye. All shapes, all colors are alike to darkness: no sense can distinguish betwixt foul and fair, but the eye. Dinah was a maid, and went to see Virgins of her own sex: her eye was chaste, though idle: but Shechems eye was both idle and unchaste. That great Soldier called the Persian maids, Dolores oculorum: therefore the same Alexander refused so much as to see Darius his wife, a lady of incomparable beauty; fearing lest he that had conquered the husband, should be overcome by the wife. What abundance of offices doth the eye bear in this little family of man? First, it is the bodies Watchman, and guides the hand to defend it. Secondly, it is the understandings Informer, whereupon she determines of substances true or false. Thirdly, the stomachs Taster; for if the eye do not like the morsel; that refuseth it. Fourthly, the affections Purveyor, to bring in their desires; Vbi amor, ibi oculus. Fifthly, the hearts Messenger, that runs on her errand almost as quick as thought. Sixthly, the fancies Intelligencer; the painter must see, before he can counterfeit. Lastly, a Scout to the whole Soul, and a Sentinel to the whole body; and corrupted, a traitor to them both.

4 Satan's first project is to take the eye: if that be once his friend, he hopes well of all the rest. Indeed, if the door stand open to the thief, what safety can be in the house? The devil took Christ into an exceeding high mountain, and shown him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them. Why so high, bu • for prospect? If all this glory were only represented to his imagination, a valley would have served: if only to the sense, no hill were high enough. Circular bodies, though small, cannot be seen at once. This show was made to both: the kingdoms about Judea, to his eye, the glory of them to his imagination. A cunning devil in all: he meant that this glory should tempt the eye, the eye the fancy, and the fancy should tempt the will. If that sense be viciously employed, remember the devil is there. How many thousand souls have died of the wound in the eye? If sin be not let in at that window, nor the door of the ear, it can find no way into the heart. Mors per fenestras: when a man opens his eye lustfully, he cannot think what a train of sins will crowd in upon him. Had Satan come to David in the most lovely form of Bathsheba her self, and at the first in direct terms told him, he should enjoy her if he would murder her husband: without question, he would have spit scorn on that face, on which he so much doated. Now from the glance of his eye arose all that succession of mischiefs. He sins; and no less sin would serve his turn than adultery; and that is not enough, without the addition of blood. Yea, he is not only a sinner, but a Tempter: he solicits Bathsheba to offend God, to break her faith, to dishonor her husband, to dishonest her body, to wound her soul, to put an asp to the breast of her conscience: and all this begun with a look. The man that was so heart-smitten for cutting off a piece of his masters garment, is now lavish of a noble servants blood. Yea, because that worthy commander cannot fall alone, he grudgeth not the blood of his innocent people to accompany him. Could he have expiated that sin with his own blood, it had been but well spent; but to cover it with the blood of his faithful soldiers, was a crime above astonishment. How did the Spirit of God retire at a wanton look! O the deep fetches of sin: Satan were not that old Serpent, if he had lost his windings: his craft is of as long standing, as his malice. That sin at the first presentment would affright a man, which he juggles on by degrees. When the Prophet told Hazael of the horrible mischief he should do to Israel, he replied, Am I a dog, that I should do this? Not yet: but in time the devil will skrew him up to it. He that willingly runs into a known wickedness, knows not where he shall stop. Set a man on the top of some high tower, and bid him leap down, he finds horror in the precipice. Yet you may persuade him to go down by the stairs to the very bottom. If we do not prevent this assault in our eyes, we shall too late complain of the horror and anguish of it in our hearts.

5 Where be the eyes that have not been faulty? If the eyes have sinned, why should not the eyes be punished? Punished they must be, with rottenness in th • dust, with horrid and astonishing visions in hell, if some former penalty be not set on them here. The rich man in hell saw Lazarus in Abraham's bosom: that sight was his torment. How must the eyes be corrected for this wantonness? By tasking them unto tears: for ranging eyes, we must get mourning eyes: for eyes lifted up with pride, eyes dejected with shame and sorrow: for eyes full of incontinence, eyes full of repentance. How else shall we dare to lift up those eyes to heaven, which have been the brokers of hell, polluted with the aspersions of lust? O let those eyes, that have been the cisterns of corruption, become the fountains of compunction. Mary Magdalens eyes had offended, her eyes shall pay for it. She had been a notorious strumpet, a woman of a mercenary condition: if her eyes had not invited her to love others, yet they had bewitched others to dote on her. Loe, she would not look on that world, but through a shower of tears, which she had so enamored with her wanton looks. These organs have made our bodies stinking lepers, let them be turned into a Jordan or Siloam to cure our leprosies.

We magnify some waters distilled out of herbs and flowers, because they are good to heal sore eyes: but there is no water so virtual to cure the lust of the eyes, as the penitent water, which the Limbecke of sorrow draws from those eyes. Some of the Ancients have thought, that God did endue us with this dew of tears for no other end, but to wash away our sins. Because when we weep for any losses or crosses, we do not lessen our grief, but increase it: but when we weep for our sins, we do not increase them, but take them quite away. No tears can raise my friend up from the grave, they may raise my soul from the death of sin. From the bitter flowers of wormwood, the heat of fire distilleth sweet and wholesome water: the Grace of God's Spirit, from the bitter remembrance of our sins, distilleth tears able to comfort our souls. When we are thirsty, we run to the well: when our houses be on fire, we run to the river: the sight of our eyes hath procured both these mischiefs to our hearts: the tears of our eyes must help them; they are able both to lay our thirst, and cool our lust. This is not an eye full of adultery, but full of grief for adultery: such an eye shall look upon thy harlot with indignation and detestation: that in those tears she shall read at once thy present sorrow, and her former sin. A graceless woman that had long ensnared a young man who was now converted, salutes him in the old familiarity as he goes by: he regards her not: she replies, Ego sum, It is I: he answers, At ego non sum ego, I am not as I was, I was not as I am. Blessed souls that have got the mastery of their own eyes.

Adultery;] this is the game, the beast they hunt: where I observe three gradations:

1 The main attractive of the eye is Beauty: and of this the fancy is informed by the eye: yet being so informed, then the eye is ruled by the fancy; and as that imagines her, so the eye sees her. Beauty is the glory of Nature, a glimpse of the soul, a beam of the Makers brightness: so ravishing the heart, that it is more present with the body it loveth, than in the body where it liveth. Yet as the meat which pleaseth the taste, is but a mixture of well-compounded materials: the music that delights our ear, is but a harmony of proportionable voices or instruments: so the beauty which so takes the eye, is but a just correspondence of the parts and colors of visible bodies. Why should not that spiritual beauty be far dearer to us, which is the image of God; the elements or lineaments whereof be righteousness and holiness? The bodies beauty is but superficial, skin-deep, hiding that within which we cannot look upon without horror. Spiritual beauty is like a diamond, fair to the center. Time will plow furrows on the fairest face, and fill it with wrinkles: but the wrinkles of a beauteous soul are done away with time: the older, the fairer. Many a woman's beauty hath been her ruin: but blessing never forsook a beautiful soul. When thou comest near to a fair face, thou becomest never the fairer for it; nay, thou appearest the fouler by being near it. But a virtuous soul by a kind of exemplary influence, diffuseth into thee some ornaments; and is indeed, as they talk of that imaginary Stone, by the touch of that pure metal, so diffusive of goodness; that thou shalt be the better for it. No miseries can blemish this beauty;