Miscellanea spiritualia: or, Devout essaies: composed by the Honourable Walter Montagu Esq.

§. VIII.

The final and most solid assignment of con∣fort for this condition.

NOw then to sum up the true account of all my propo∣sitions, I do not pretend they should amount to so much as the Stoicks have vainly reckoned upon their precepts; I do not promise the minde such an apathy or insensibleness of all distresses and afflictions, as those Rational Charl••tans have undertook; this deading and stark calming of all passion, is rather a dream of Phi∣losophy, then the rest of a Christian; and of that fan∣cied slumber of theirs, we may say with the Psalmist, of these mens fancied riches, They have slept their sleep, and have found nothing; a Christian must not affect to say, I have slept a good sleep, but I have fought a good fight, and

my Crown hangs where I must take it away by violence, it will not fall upon my head while that lieth upon the pillows of my sensitive appetites; they therefore who are the best studied in the precepts of Reason, or the power of Grace, must expect to meet with some dark obscure parenthesis's in their Solitude, which at sometimes they cannot understand, and the more contestingly they set their Reason to explain them, the more intricate they, perhaps, will finde them at that conjuncture; for there are some inter∣vals of wearisomness and disfavor in our Spirits, which no Reason can clear to us, though it may be they have a coherence with the whole contexture of our peace, as being interposed by God, to introduce patience and resignation, by these intervening trials of our temper; and likely the thoughts we have in temptations to frowardness, are the copies of our minde, upon which God judgeth their profi∣ciency in the school of patience, which he hath put them to: There are diverse forms in prisons, to which God pre∣ferreth our mindes by degrees, and the highest seemeth to be, the remaining humbly patient in a destitution of all sensible consolation from the Spirit of God, to which we rise not but after some experiments of such desolations; so that the best advice to this case, is in our propensions to frowardness and petulancy, to conclude, That we are then set to bring in those exercises of vertue, that must prefer us to a higher form; all the Saints have passed by this exam••n, insomuch as David saith in this case, My * 1.1 soul refused to be conforted, I was mindfull of God, and was delighted: here you see the storm, and the passing of it over, by remembring the qualities of such blasts and stresses of temptations.

He is then the best scholler, that studieth the least by his own arguings, to clear to himself these obscure interjections of displicence and ill humor, and cieling up his thoughts; flieth directly to the top of the Cross, resting there, with the Man of sorrow; where his

minde, finding (My God, why hast thou forsaken me?) may easily be answered in all her own perplexities and desola∣tions; and in stead of fearing her self to be forsaken, may suppose she is following of Christ in this anxiety, to which he was voluntarily subjected, to solace by his Society our Nature in this infirmity, whereunto that is necessarily ex∣posed; so as in these disquiets, when the book of our Spirits seemeth closed up to us, and we are ready to weep for our not being worthy to open it, we may suppose our good An∣gel doing the office of the Elder to St. John, bidding us not * 1.2 to be dismaid, for the man of sorrow hath opened all these sealed anguishes, by his taking the same impression upon his Spirit; and indeed, when our mindes are well died in the blood of the Lamb, these aspersions of disquiets do not at all stain our Soul, though there may seem some refractariness in our Spirits, in these overcast intervals; But to secure us from incurring any irregularity by this Spiritual Contention in the Temple of the Holy Ghost, the safest way is, not to seek a defence by the power of our Reason, but to yield up our Spirits to suffer under this indisposition, as long as it shall please the Holy Spirit to remain withdrawn, even within our own Spirit, beyond our discernment; and many times in this ari••ity of our Devotion, when our hearts are, as I may say, parched and cracked in this drought of Divine Refreshment (if our wills are faithfully resigned to this ex∣ercitation of our Faith) every such crack or overture in our hearts, caused by the shutting up of Heaven, proveth a mouth opened, and calling for that holy dew which never fails to be showered down in due season, upon such necessi∣tous fidelities; insomuch as this aridity and desolation in∣terposed for some time, doth often prove more fruitful then a common kindely season of repose and acquiescence.

I desire therefore to recommend specially this Advice (to this state of Solitude, which is very liable to these obscure interjections) not to expect peace of minde onely from what we do sensibly receive from God, but also from what

we do sensibly give unto him; for in this our commerce with Heaven, there is this Supernatural way of Traffique, we do not onel•• pay God with his own gifts, but we may give him even what we want, and do not receive from him; that is, we may present him with our privation of his sensi∣ble Graces, by our acceptance of this poverty and destitu∣tion; And this offering of our emptiness, is no less pro∣pitiatory, then the first fruits of our Spiritual abundances.

This Advertisement I conceive very pertinent to my de∣sign, of furnishing my fellow Soldiers with the armor of * 1.3 God, that they may resist in the evil day, and in all things stand perfect; for it may be properly said of their condition, that they are to wrastle not onely against flesh and blood, but against the Rulers of the darkness of this world, the Flesh shooting all her sharpest darts in the privation of Liberty, and the Spirit his▪ in the destitution of the most humane sympathy of Conversation: This resignation then which I have pro∣posed, includeth a disswasion of any anxious solicitude, concerning the cause of our sufferance; for the ranging of our thoughts to spring second causes, may keep us too much upon the scent of the earth, the Apostle's advice is properer * 1.4 in this case, Seek upward, and not upon the earth, which was the first point from whence this circle of my discourse did set forth; and to allay this feaverish disquiet in our Patient, I may fitly apply this Opia••e of the Apostle, If you are dead to * 1.5 the elements of this world, why do you yet decree as living in the world? This perplexing your selves with the thoughts of the world, is to lose the benefit of this your civil death, where∣by you may rest from the labors of the living. This you may rest upon in general, That in this life there is no sort of Suffering, but may be converted into Sanctification: If you lie under a just sentence, you may, by an humble conformity to Gods Justice, make it a release of a greater penalty, then you feel in all your deprivements: If you suffer injuriously for your engagement in a righteous Cause, your Consola∣tion is so much supposed, as you have a command to rejoyce * 1.6

in 〈…〉〈…〉tion, in view of the glory of your reward▪ And if every imprisoned Christian may be said to be a rough draught of Christ (since he avoweth his personation in them) they who suffer for the Defence of Justice and Vertue, may be said to be Christs Images, coloured and more exactly finished; wherefore such may expect to be readily received, with, I know you easily, your scars and wounds which you bring with you, coming out of my service, have finished the figure of my similitude: And we may resolve, That such Champions shall be set near Christ, where the number of their wounds shall be so many marks of their Consanguinity with the bleeding Lamb, and the weight of their Chains shall be the estimate of their Crowns.

All sorts of Christians then may fill their several measures of Confort out of this Fountain of Christian Doctrine, that all they, who do not directly suffer for Christ, may yet suffer as Christians, and so attain the reward of a Prophet: I will then close up my Present to them with this Seal of the Bands of our fellow-Prisoner and Master Doctor, Let us for∣get * 1.7 th••se things which are behinde, and reaching forth 〈◊〉〈◊〉 th••se things which are before, press forward to the mark for the pri•••• of the high calling of God in Christ: Let as many therefore 〈◊〉〈◊〉 be perfect, be thus minded; and those who are otherwise, I beseech God to reveal this unto them.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Psalm 76. 4.
• * 1.2

  Apoc. 5.
• * 1.3

  Ephes. 6.
• * 1.4

  Col. 2. 20.
• * 1.5

  Col. 3.
• * 1.6

  Matth. 5.
• * 1.7

  Phil. 3. 13.