Peace broken, or, Blessings become snares and cursings. By reason of man's disobedience and rebellion.

GEN. 3. 19.

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread, till thou returne to the earth.

GOD Almightie, the great and sole Builder of heaven and earth, in those six dayes, in which his goodnesse did first reconcile the odds betweene being and not being, calling the possible world into act, made these, and but these two natures, the neces∣sarie and the voluntarie; to the former, as being voyd of reason, and therefore not capable of any positive Law, he gave no precept, hee set Nature to them a rule, and furnisht them with faculties determined, and (if there be no impediment in second causes) necessitated to such or such actions, tending to such or such ends. To the latter, as be∣ing endowed with freedome, and a power indif∣ferent to both extremes, to doe or not to doe, to doe this or that good or ill, He expressely gave in charge, what (if hee tendered his life) hee should not doe; and therefore hee had no sooner pro∣nounced him Lord of the whole earth, but know∣ing how proper it is for happinesse to forget her

selfe, and how safe for Monarchs to remember, that they are dependantly and subordinately great, in the proper tone of a Law-Giver (Legum enim authoritas ratione suasoria vile est) tels him flatly, Of the fruit of the tree which is in the mid∣dest of the garden, thou shalt not eat: The tree is now forbidden, and that by the Lord and Maker of it: from henceforth for Adam to taste it, shall be disobedience, shall bee intemperance, shall bee injustice; the least of which shall not dwell in Pa∣radise, they make too great a stir in the soule, and are too turbulent to reside in him, whom God created as a Citie at unitie in it selfe, there was no insurrection of the sensitive appetite against the will, no deformitie betweene the will and reason, the intellect directed, the will commanded, the members executed: In a word, there was a neat and harmonious consent of all the faculties with reason, and of reason with God; thus was man at peace with God, and with himselfe. But like as from the quietnesse of the aire the Philosopher suspects an earth-quake, mee thinks the man that had not read this book, should have read so much in the book of Nature, tane so much from poli∣tick rules, as to fore-see a declension of things at perfection, to fear most a rebellion in a State most composed: such was the state of Adam, and with such successe, in the same day were his affections quiet and tumultuous; his will, which that day had well given up her name, revolted from the re∣giment of reason, judge you how voluntarily

fallen, in that she left her leader, and yet her selfe blind. I ask not whence this desertion, who per∣mitting, who instigating? This is enough for me, this will bring me to my text, if I tell how the evill of sin lets in the evill of paine, and that I find in the sacred History, that our first parents did eat, and this probable in the schoole, that they were both created, both stood, and both fell, and both in one day. Let both these two great lights on earth answer to those two in heaven, and then be∣hold the eclipse, that Hesychius Milesius speaks of, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, The Sun was darkened, and the Moone withdrew her light: but happy you superiour lights, whose eclipses are not sins, the defects and anomies of humane actions are scann'd at the bar of justice, and bearing a guilt upon the offendent, will not be expiated but by suffering; for let the man but taste of the pro∣hibited fruit, and he shall heare a voyce from hea∣ven, that voyce which breaketh the Cedars of Libanus, thundring out wrath, and this sad doom, In the sweat of thy face, &c.

The generals in the text are three: first, the suf∣ferer, thou; secondly, his sufferings, to eat his bread in the sweat of his face; thirdly, the terme of his sufferings, till thou returne to the earth.

Since there is so necessary dependancie of mo∣rall acts upon intention, it is a good rule which the Phil••sopher gives in the first of his Rheto∣rick, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, Not to look so much to the letter of the Law, as the mind

of the Law-giver: The expresse prohibition of eating was to one, but intended for all; one man, our first father did eat, and sin; the sin ran downe to his sons, and to the sons of their sons, and to those that did descend from them, to all nations, sexes, conditions, times, and ages of the world, to the man that shall last see the Sun set. In the day that thou shalt eat, thou shalt dye the death, as it sayes more kinds of death than one, so more that should dye than one; and to dust thou shalt returne, was more than a personall sentence, for all men were dead in one, and were gathered to their fathers, as to a living sepulcher, larger, and more common than that which Abraham bought of Ephron the son of Zoar, which was but for him and for his house; so that it seemes to have a great deale of mind that which the Jewes so talk of, that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were buried in the same cave with Adam.

Now if posteritie dyed with him, then it sin∣ned with him, and then shall suffer and labour with him; Sane hoc iniquum videtur (sayes Bodi∣nus) parentum culpam in liberos derivari: Does not Sylla heare ill for the sonnes of Proscripts? Can a man be guiltie of that which was done be∣fore he was? Ask the Schoole, Is it not the nature of sinne to bee voluntarie? Does it not require knowledge, counsell, consent, election? If not, why then is not the Wolfe called unjust that de∣voures the Lamb? Why is not hee cited to Areo∣pagus as well as Mars? Why doe not Princes

promulgate their Lawes in the Desarts, and com∣pell the affections of the wild Asse to a meane, as well as ours? But 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, Arist. Moral. lib. 3. The Law-giver hath an eye to what is voluntarie and unvolunta∣rie; to the former by the rule of distributive ju∣stice, hee sets out rewards and punishments; to the latter, neither reward nor punishment: How then does God punish the sin of the first man in his posteritie, that personally had done neither good nor ill? How could they conceive, and bring forth sin, who yet themselves were not con∣ceived, or call it a sin; shall it be a mortall sin? 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, Who blames a man for be∣ing borne blind? That does the Judge of the great Court of heaven and earth: and surely the Almightie does not pervert justice, it is not with him as with those Romane Praetors, Jus dicunt, cum iniqua decernunt: For like, as by a politicall union, many families become one body civill, so by participation of the same specificall nature, were all men as one man; and like as the acts of any part of the body, as theft, or murder done by the hand, doe not ascribe it to that part, but as it is moved by that first and universall motive principle, the will; so is not that first sin layd to us, as severall persons, but as persons and indivi∣duals meeting in the same universall nature, total∣ly at once by one man depraved.

It is not, I confesse, the nature of positive Lawes to bind where they are not known or pub∣lisht,

so that if Cain had eaten of the forbidden fruit, Enoch his son had not therefore been borne a sinner; but it pleased God, by a peculiar will, to wrap up all men in one Adam, whose will should be reputed as the will of all to come, whose inno∣cencie should be our innocencie, whose sin our sin, though his repentance not our repentance. Let not dust and ashes wrangle and dispute, how just this is, how much safer is it to rest in his decree, at whose right hand, with the testimony of the Gen∣tiles, we proclaime that justice sits enthroned, and in the infancie of time did sit, when he examined nature in a true balance, and weighed out to all things their being, their properties, their places, their figures, with most exact conformitie to their exemplarie cause.

So then you have seene how many came with∣in the precincts of this prohibition, Thou shalt not eat, so many are guiltie of the breach of it, and so many are sufferers. Now I proceed to the suf∣ferings: Democritus and the Epicure, whether flattering corrupt manners with promise of im∣punitie, or trembling to joyne wrath with omni∣potencie, gave out, that God was not angrie at all, but that he sate in Heaven a Dispenser of good things only: The Poet sang of an age that knew not whether Iove could thunder or no, and wee have heard of an age, when God as yet had not entered into judgement with the sons of men, when death had no more name, than it hath reall nature, when mans labour was his pleasure, his

life contempl••tion, and his dwelling Paradise. But oh 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, The very name of Troy is dolefull, how much more of Paradise, it adds to our misery, since we have lost the thing, to keep the name, which at this day sounds no better, than to the Mariner some unhappy place in the sea, famous of old for the notorious wrack of some goodly vessell.

Well, wee are now unparadised, turned out of our pleasant walks, and must fall to our work, we must eat our bread in the sweat of our face, this is our sentence, wherein consider, first the act, eating of bread; secondly, the qualification of this act, in sweat of thy face. Man in his innocencie had not a body intrinsecally immortall, but a naturall and elementary body, composed of the same prin∣ciples with ours, and using for the reparation of nature food, though not using the very same with us; hee was to eat, though not to eat in sweat: And though he was not (as Suarez sayes) in a lite∣rall sense to eat bread, by reason of the toyle in tillage, in sowing, in reaping, in grinding, yet was hee, as the word is meant in my text, to eat bread, it being taken here for all manner of suste∣nance: and here I cannot passe by that ridiculous conceit of some Rabbins, who from this very word bread, doe gather that God condemned all men to jog after the plow, a thing which could not stand either with the nature of man, or with the wisdome of God.

I declare it thus: The light of nature, a beame

of that intelligible and eternall Son, was not set out by the fall of man, this lighted men out of caves and rocks into societies oeconomicall and politicall: Politicall have for their end 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, selfe-sufficiencie, never to bee found, if all men were plow-men: the multitude of our defects must be supplyed by the multitude and varietie of Arts and Artificials; since then God gave man a naturall appetite of a civill and sociable life, which appetite being naturall, is not in vaine, nor yet was lost by sin; for Cain, an hainous sinner, built the first Citie, it had not so well suted either with the nature of man, or with the wisdome and goodnesse of God, to have adjudged all men to that one condition of life; besides, what had be∣come of Sciences, liberall Arts? Had not been mechanicall, rude, and inchoate manners as court∣ly as old Evander found them among the wild Aborigines, the whole world had been benighted, darknesse had beene on the face of the earth, Ae∣gyptian darknesse, and yet not felt, and God him∣selfe had scarce found an unblemishable Levite to serve at his Altar, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, sayes the 7. of the Politicks, The Plow-man is no fit Priest.

Thus much of the act: I now come to the qua∣lification of the act, In the sweat of the face: To sweat is proper to the body, yet may be translated to the soule, neither is it a bold metaphore, Tully hath it de Oratore, Commentatio & stylus ille tuus multisudoris est: so that Archimedes sitting still in his study, did sweat as well as Marcellus his

Souldiers, then in the middest of Athens, neither does the word face restraine the sense to bodily exercise, since it is so frequent by metaphore, to attribute to things incorporeall, things proper to corporeall, thus does Aristotle call the understan∣ding, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, and David prayes, Turne away thy face from my sins, O God, when as God hath neither figure nor face.

Thus much de signo, the word, or the name; now de signato, or the thing signified: Man is a continuall Actour, the Sun riseth and sets upon his action; waking, he moves, heares, discourses, and when his externall senses are lockt up, his ve∣getative facultie is at work, and his fansie dreams; the whole man here never rests, nay, let it seeme a paradox, I am sure it is true, there is no rest in Heaven. The grand Stoick denied motion, I deny rest. But yet take this distinction, Rest is either a meere cessation from action, a simple not opera∣tion, or a cessation from some action that wea∣ried the Agent: there is a great deale of diffe∣rence betweene these two. In the former sense God rested the seventh day, from production of new species: In the latter it was not possible for him to rest. In the former, man in all his facul∣ties, all at once, is never at rest: In the latter, hee is in the time of sleep, in this sense our God wils neither perpetuall labour nor rest, it was his pro∣vidence that the Heavens should move, that di∣vers parts of the earth might be disposed by the influence of divers stars; upon this motion fol∣lowes

a necessarie vicissitude of day and night, up∣on that a vicissitude of rest and labour: these two God hath wisely knit together, intending the one for the laxation, yet continuance of the o∣ther, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, The finall cause of rest is labour: Arist. Ethic. 10. Now penall la∣bour, there is a continuall succession of these two, the end of the one is the beginning of the other; the one is from justice, the other from mercie: Now let Anaxagoras look up, and see whether heaven be, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, all of stone.

To be, is good; but to be doing, is the good and end of being: wee perfect our selves by acti∣on; for the defects of nature are supplyed by ha∣bits, and habits acquired by actions, which so long as they are simply voluntarie, are pleasant, once forced become tedious; so much as they have of constraint, so much of griefe, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, Rhet. Arist. 1. Violence is beside nature, and therefore hath griefe annexed to it.

These painfull actions which my text cals for, are of the same nature with those that Aristotle cals 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, partly voluntary, partly violent; for as the poore man parts with his purse to a thiefe, yet would not doe it, but to save his life, setting the lesse evill in the place of good; so wee spend our spirits in some actions, not because they are plea∣sing to the will, but because they are necessarie, partly to satisfie the Law, partly for the attai∣ning, partly for the ornament, partly for the maintenance of happinesse; supposing then that

we efficaciously will this end, or happinesse; wee necessarily will these penall actions, as meanes to the end, no other way to be purchased. For our condition is not like that of the Lillies, which are cloathed and spin not; nor that of the little Lambs, whom their mothers bring forth in the mountaines, wrapt in naturall rags against the in∣juries of the aire; neither is it with us, as they say it was with Mercury, who was borne in the mor∣ning, found playing on the lute at noone, and dri∣ving of oxen at night: wee are first infants, then boyes, then youths; how many are the wants of these ages? and when wee come to be men, wee espy more, and are faine to double our paines, the more our knowledge is, the more intense are our desires, and our desires employ our members; the vast capacitie of our soules, and our large wills adde much to our travaile; the appetite of bruits is terminated here below, our ranges about the earth, the sea, the aire, attempts heaven with waxen wings, mounts up to Angels, to God him∣selfe, and rests not there; which very unrestinesse, though it be full of anxietie (Non enim est absque dolore quòd aliquis perfectionem appetat: Aquin. Comment. on Ethic.) seeme to me wonderfully to exalt man above other creatures, that whereas they al disport themselves in some slender rivulets of good, onely man looks to that boundlesse and bottomlesse deep, the Deitie of his Maker, not to be sounded, not to be compast.

You have heard the sentence that God hath past

on the sons of men, and that an heavie sentence, yet me thinks easier than if he had condemned us to doe nothing, this 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, this 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, as Aristotle termes it, contradicts not only the nature of the soule, whose verie being is to be, and whose well being is to be well doing, but also the whole nature of things: Could a man stand in Delph, which Cosmographers call Vmbilicum terrae, the very navell of the earth, and turne his eyes to all positions of place, to the right hand, to the left, behind, before, above, and beneath, hee should find them all meet, and conspire to smother, or ex∣pose this spurious or supposititious brat, and shall man father it, and harbour it in his bosome?

Goe to the little Bees, thou sluggard, Pullos vel triduanos ad pensam vocant, they set their little ones their task at three dayes old; nec insenectute in fucos degenerant, neither turne they Drones in their old ages. Next turne to the Ant, and see her wayes, what are those wayes? Ask the naturall Historian, Etiam per saxa & silices vestigia vi∣deas & semitas, Thou mayest find her steps and paths upon the hardest flints: So often does that little, yet exemplary creature, trudge this way and that way, backward and forward, to store her earthy granarie, and keep off a winter fa∣mine.

Now if there be any to whom God hath dealt so liberall a portion of these temporall goods, as that they need not labour to prevent either want or cold, or famine, even to these also do I preach,

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eate thy bread: they that sit on high, so high, that the poor be∣low seeme 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, no bigger than Ants, sayes Lucian, are not alway to sit still, qualitie and con∣dition exempt not from labour, but from the manner of labour; and therefore does Solomon set the Spider, that embleme of industrie, in that she spins her Web out of her owne bowells, to spin even in the Courts of Princes, though she has beene often swept out for her labour. Why now should the sluggard yet fold his armes? why should he for fortie, fiftie, sixtie yeares rest those bones to whom nature owes so long a rest? surely his soule is crept into his bodie to the same end that Epimenides did into his Den, to sleepe out sixty yeares: he forgets how long a rest he is like to take in the grave, hee and all the travellers of the earth; let the poore labouring man, he that grinds in the Mill, the hireling, whose paines are trebled by the sins of great ones, solace him∣selfe with this, that this day shall end in a night, not like the nights of the yeare, which after a few houres give place to the day: nor like that in Ogy∣ges his time, famous for nine monthes, but lon∣ger and more shadie: where Abel has slept al∣most from the foundation of the world, where Israel makes not, nor Aegyptian Pharaohs tire the people with building Pyramids, where silent Na∣tions sleep in beds of Clay, and shall not rise, nor wake, nor rub their eyes, till the Trumpet shall sound in their eares, and heaven and earth infla∣med,

shall light them new start up to Christs Tri∣bunall.

Thus much of our sufferings: the terme of suf∣fering followes in these words, Till thou returne to the earth: where you may take notice of foure things: the first implyed our comming from the earth: the second exprest our returne to the earth: First, as the end of evills: Secondly as it selfe an evill. First of the part implyed, our com∣ming from the earth. Luc. Iun. Brutus consulting with the Oracle, who should be Consull, received this answer, That he should be Consull that first kis∣sed his mother, he by and by fell on his face, kis∣sed the earth, returned home, and was created Consull, Romes first Consull: beside the faith of the Historie, that man is of the earth, witnesse the like qualities of his nutriment, his sinking in the water, melancholy, his compact flesh, the drynesse of his bones, the constancy of his figure, and that which is not of least moment, the base worldling, that has fixt his eyes on the earth, and by his life-preaching Gentilisme, does sacri∣fice at Vesta's Altars, and calls her the mother of gods and men; it may be Lucretius read his Pe∣digree, where hee tells of men, whom the earth after certaine conversions of the heaven growne big, brought forth and nursed with her owne milke: But let the Poet dreame of prodigious birthes, we know that God made man of the earth, I doe not say as some did, fetcht from the foure extremities of the earth, to shew that his Domi∣nion,

and the world had the same bounds, but of earth: First, that wee might the more joy in our Ascension to heaven, and glorifie our Maker, for raising our heavie bodies to so high a place above the Ayre, above the Fire, above the Moon, and though Leucippus taught 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, that the Orb of the Sunne was the supreame Orb, above the Sunne, above all the Starres, ex∣cept those that praysed him in the morning. Iob. 38. The blessed Angels, whose early harmo∣ny eccho'd to the harmony of the new borne world.

Secondly, of earth, that we might have from whence to raise our soules: but not why to raise our Crests, that great ones might not look too big on the poore, but resemble in this that glori∣ous Planet, the bright eye of the World, the Sun: the higher it is, the lesse it looks, that they might consider, the humble shrub lives in Mount Leba∣non, as well as the stately Cedar, and many times lives longer, alway safer: that 'tis somecimes in States as in nature, that gives to lighter bodies the higher place; that all faces are drawn in dust, though some in illustrious dust; that very Cyrus, who in his time was writ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, now begs his memorie as Strabo writes, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, O man I am Cyrus, he that stiled him∣selfe great from the Empire of the earth, stood but like the Embleme of inconstancie, with his foot upon a Globe, a slippery Globe, earth upon earth: he and poor Diogenes lived both but for a

time, and both in a time, though not both in a Tub: and Plutarch sayes, they dyed both in one day: Death you see makes no difference, and Christ himselfe seemes to make none: 'tis noted to this purpose, that on the mount there appea∣red with him Moses and Elias, the one in his younger yeares was a mightie man in Aegypt, af∣ter a leader of Gods people: the other, alway poore, cold, and hungrie, cloathed with Goats haire. Away then with that Knave Lisippus, that must needs paint Alexander with a Thunder-bolt in his hand, with Caligula, that set his head on Jupiters shoulders, and with Darius, that by all meanes must bee a god, though but for thirtie dayes: better was that speculation of Philip the Macedonian, who on a time falling, and view∣ing in the dust his length, cryed out, Lord what a little portion of earth is not content with the whole earth: he well took notice, that as he had falne on the earth, so hee came from the earth: which is my first part; and should returne to the earth, which is my second.

〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, Rhet. 2. Arist. who knowes not that he shall dye? to consult about an escape were 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, seri∣ously to deliberate what course a man might take, that the Sun should not rise or set. I have read of Temples dedicated to Feares, but that no peo∣ple did ever consecrate a Priest or Temple to death, as being well knowne to bee inexorable; who have not heard of the gates of Death? who

knowes not that they lye open, and that for him? yet because Evills that may bee farre off doe not much affect: and wee while the bloud runs hot in our veines put farre from us, that frozen and be∣numbed age, as if eternall Hebe or Youth fild our Cups, as Poets say shee does their Joves: it will not be out of place or time, in the middle of Sum∣mer to admonish of Winter; 'twas the Devills policy in old time, to have the dead buried with∣out the Walls, out of sight, that the living might not lay it to heart: he that steeres well, must sit at the end of his Boat: and 'tis the good Poli∣tician, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, when danger is farre off, then to suppse it neare: in this respect it cannot bee out of season: this is my second part, our returne to the earth.

The whole man came not from earth, and therefore cannot returne to the earth: the soule shall goe to places deputed to her, the body to the earth, one and the same our Mother, our Nurse, our House, our Tombe; that these two should part, proceeds from causes Morall, and Naturall; the Morall cause is sinne, that made a separation of God from the soule, then follow∣ed a separation of the soule from the body: for God made not Death, neither taketh the Pot∣ter pleasure in bruising an earthen Pitcher: two things (I may safely say) cannot God make, a God and Sin; of these (take the word properly, he has no Idea.)

The Naturall causes of Death are either

externall or internall; externall, O that I could number them! I should then learne to number my dayes: the internall cause is the mutuall con∣flict of contrarie qualities: the brain being cold, the Stomack, and the Liver hot, the Bones drie, and the Reines moyst: the soule comes from the Father of Spirits, it selfe a Spirit; into a body whose principles exercise naturall and irreconcile∣able enmitie: me thinks at her first entrance in∣to an house so divided against it selfe, she should looke about her like that fellow in Libanius, that comming home, and finding painted on his Wall two ready and instructed Armies, cries out, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉; who has made my house a Military Campe? The members of every mans body are at continuall Warre; wee may bee at peace with forraine enemies, our domestick are alway in armes: 'Tis false that So∣linus writes of a people in Iurie, that are so e∣qually mixt, their temper so arithmeticall, with∣out excesse, defect, or jarre, ut aeterna gens sit ces∣santibus puer periis, that there is alway the same number of people, and yet no children borne: Who shall make me believe that Iurie, or any part of Jurie is exempted from death, since life it selfe, our Lord and Saviour Jesus did dye in Jurie? Death erects her Trophies as well in Iu∣rie as Greece, and in Greece as Scythia; her victo∣ries are here above, her Captives lie below; God made the face of the earth to bee inhabited, sin and death the bowells: this is the place of them

that live, that of them that have lived. Thus is the earth the common receptacle of the living and of ••he dead: other Elements serve us in our life, her service continues after death, when our funerall fires have turn'd us to ashes, when the Aire our Breath hath left us, and the water belcht us up, shee is to our tossed bodies a shore, to our bodies turn'd to ashes an Urne, to our bo∣dies out of breath a place of Repose, a Seat to rest in.

Thus much of my second part, our returne to the earth: I now come to our returne as the end of evills. Hercules his Pillars were the terme of his Travailes, the terme of his life was the terme of his labours; Life and Labour goe hand in hand, death and rest: hence some did conclude it the prime good not to be borne, the next to dye speedily: Plinie thought so well of death, that he conceived no other end of venemous Herbes, than to rid men out of life, siquando taedio esset, when it grew wearisome. But seek not, said So∣lomon, death in the errour of your lives; Death is not to bee hastened, and need not bee feared: never did Pinace arrive at the blessed Islands, that first passed not through the straights of Death; God and Nature have set them between us and home.

There is a place, sayes Iob, meaning the grave, where there is no order; and yet this for our comfort, there is no tumultuous confusion, for Pompey and Caesar are ••t peace, the Senate and

the people, nay Rome and Carthage: Fortune there rules no Orbe, anger and revenge lye chai∣ned up, and they that divide the Empire of our living world, pride, ambition, injustice, fraud, co∣vetousnesse, oppression, have not so much as one little Province: 'Twas well done of Nature, that condemned us not to any long stay here, that cuts off our sins with our thred, and our paines with our lives, for did not men weep oftner be∣fore the floud than after? and did not old Pri∣amus shed more teares than young Troilus? to all that float upon the troubled waves of this world, there is one common and universall Haven, the haven of death, and yet even there in the very haven doe all men suffer ship wrack, which casts me on my fourth and last part, the discourse on death, as death is an evill.

Sin, and the punishment of sin, are members adequally dividing humane evils; the former pre∣supposed no evill or privation, it presupposed im∣perfection in him that sinned, as mutabilitie of will, which is no evill or privation; for it is uni∣versally & actually in all individuals; but no priva∣tion is actually affirmed of the whole species: the later presupposed evill, an inordination in free a∣ctions or omissions, called Malum culpae, which in Gods justice is payed with that other, called Ma∣lum poenae, the evill of punishment, to which mem∣ber I reduce the hate of Nature, the last enemy, the last of evils, Death; but not the least.

Can that be the least of evils, which is so abhor∣red

of all those appetites which God hath printed in the soule, to wit, the naturall, animall, and ra∣tionall? Does not the nutritive facultie earnestly labour to maintaine us in being, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, sayes Aristotle, Mor. 1. even when wee are asleep? Does not the irascible defend our being, and the concupiscible, together with the generative pro∣pagate it? Does not that universall facultie (as Suarez cals it) the will, love and desire, the being and well being of all inferiour parts? Shew mee but any thing of the most obscure being, that de∣sires not to maintaine that being, and I shall the sooner with the Egyptians believe two Gods that made the nature of things, the one good, the o∣ther bad. Stay then, take notice, see and be ama∣zed too, to see by what strange wayes and win∣dings the derived rivers become tributarie to the sea, all things flow from the deep of divine good∣nesse, see how hee fetches them back againe, hee hath made them all, at least by some analogie, to love him in that they love themselves; for they are drops of the bucket, and so much as they love themselves, which are by participation, so much they must needs love him, which is of himselfe; they cannot love to bee, but they must love him who swallowes up in his infinitenesse of being, all being, whose nature and essence it is to be, let me tell you of a paradox, if there bee any in afflicted Jobs case, that weep that they died not from the womb, that blesse the barren mother, and the paps that never gave suck, even these, the damned spi∣rits

and unhappie soules, out of a meere love to their being, desire not to be: such is our love to our being, and God himselfe glories to say of himselfe, I am, and yet this our being does death, as far as it can, destroy.

Againe, can that bee the least of evils, which drownes in teares the eyes of widdowes and or∣phans? that leaves the streets as a green field, and changes the palaces of Princes into lodges of Bars and Owles, that had not God for a father, nor Na∣ture for a mother, till she was adulterate? that is ushered in by a thousand evils, the sword, pesti∣lence and famine, excesse in labour, excesse in plea∣sure, lingring; griefe, and sudden mirth, with a thousand more.

Now that death is a passage from these to a more blessed mansion, from these cloudy regions to those enlightned by the Lord God, it is no thank to death, death is still the ruine of Nature, the demolisher of Gods Worke, this is the good∣nesse and power of God, who will raise us againe out of the dust, and the dark grave, and then will blesse us, and shew us the light of his countenance, and say in the end of the world as hee said in the beginning, let there be light, and there shall bee light; a light that no Cloud from thenceforth shall dim, that shall never set: to which light hee lighten us, who lighteth every man; nay who is that very light, and for Iesus Christ his sake, our onely Lord and Saviour.

Amen.

FINIS.