London LOOK back, AT THAT YEAR OF YEARS 1625. AND LOOK FORWARD, UPON THIS YEAR, 1630. Written, not to Terrify, But to Comfort. LONDON Printed by A. M. and are to be sold by Ed. Blackmoore at the Angel in Paul's Churchyard, 1630. London Look Back. TO look back at Ills, begets a Thankfulness t● have escaped them: So the Children of Israel having d●y foot passed through the red Sea▪ looked back, with a double joy; To see themselves on Shore, & their enemies Drovvned To Look Back, at our sins, begets a Repentance: Repentance is the Mother of Amendment: and Amendment leads us by the hand to Heaven: So that if we look not Back, there's no going forward in that journey to jerusalem. To look Back at an enemy, from whom we fly; Calls up Hope, and Fear; Hope to outrun him, Fear to be overtaken: Hope to fight with him again, Fear never to fight more. To look back, strengthens wisdom, to look forward, arms Providence: and lendes eyes to Prevention. What Mariner having gotten safely by a Rock, but with a lively spirit looks back, and praiseth Heaven, for Styling by such a danger? What General, but at the end of a Battle, looks back, on his slaughtered Soldiers with sorrow: and on his living Regiments, with Gladness; What a Glory is it, to repeat the story of the fight? How such a Captain cut a brave way to Victory with his Sword? How another brake through the Battalia's, like the God of War. Look back therefore (o LONDON) at Time, and bid him turn over his Chronicles, and show thee, that Year of Years 1625 For, The year ●625. if ever there was in England, a year, great with Child of wonder, that very year was then delivered of that Prodigious Birth. It was a year Fatal to all our Kingdoms; For▪ the Courts of our Kings, Fatal to our Kingdom. were forced to fly from place to place for safety▪ and yet the pursuing enemy, D●ath, traced them and overtook them by the pri●ts of th●ir feet. It was fatal (O thou Empress of Cittiees, fa●re Troynovant) to t●ce; For (blood shed excepted) thou with jerusalem, To the City. didst feel as g●ue● us a Desolation: eating up, with Mariam, thine own children, with Samaria thou wert besieged, 〈◊〉 go not (like Samaria) with Benha●ad King of the Aramites, ● King's. 20 ●. and ●2. Kings more with him: But with a far more cruel enemy, (the Pestilence,) and an infinite Army of Sins, which to this very day, fight against thee. A more terrible Tyrant, than Benhadad (and that is Death) said then to thee, as h●e di● to Samaria; Thy Gold and thy Silver are mine, 1 Kings 20 5. thy Women 〈◊〉 and thy fair Children are mine. O how much of the one was then buried in Earth, and what excellent Pieces of the other lay then deflowered in Graves▪ joh. 6.20. With jerico, the wades of thy Glory (O London) were broken down▪ for thy Princes took from th●e the Honour of their Chariots t●e Diuin●● the harmony of their Eloquence; London▪ general Misery. Thy Magistrates, the splend●r ●f their Authority; Thy Merchants the Renown of Commerce: Thy Physicians gave thee over; Thy Soldiers 〈◊〉 Cowards left t●ee in the open field: Thy ol● M●n went away, and thy youngmen fled before thee in the 〈◊〉 of their Marrow. Reader, to Feast thee with more v●riety, cast 〈◊〉 eye on these following verses, in which is set down a 〈◊〉 full, and more lively Description of that Lamentable Time. This was that year of wonder, when this Land, Was Ploughed up into Graves, and graves did stand From morn, till next morn, gaping still for more. The Bells (like our loud sins) ne'er giving over. Then, life looked pale, and sicklier than the Moon, Whole Household's, well ●'th morn, lying dead at Noon. Then sickness was of her own face affrayle, And frighting all yet was herself dismayed: LONDON was great with child, and with a fright She fell in labour— But O piteous sight! All in her Childbed Room did nought but mourn, For, those who were delivered were stillborn. The City fled the 〈◊〉, for those Bells Which called the Church man, rung his neighbour's knells: The City fled the City, a●d in fear, That enemy shu●●'d who me● her every where. The City so much of her Bo●y lost, Th●● she appeared 〈…〉 Ghost: Paul's Organs (th●n) 〈…〉, to call This day a Qui 〈…〉 Who yesterday sat 〈…〉 me To morning 〈◊〉, yet ●re they got home, Had Token's 〈◊〉 th●m 〈◊〉 they should no more Hear A●th●●s there They we●e to go before Him, to whose 〈…〉 Anthems were all sung, To instruments, which whereby Angels strung. By this little Picture you may guess, if that year of 1625. was not one of the world's Climacterical years: If it be not (to this day) more remarkable, than any ot●er year in the memory of man, look back but on such Calendars, as your observations may set down, and then be your own judges. Fi●st, 〈◊〉 (in your looking back) remember those faint and purgative Fl●xes, which then were the V●nt-currers, making way for other Diseases which immediately broke in upon us: How many Families f●ll by that Consumption! How many househol 〈…〉 carry away? 〈◊〉 one 〈◊〉 in a Thousand 〈◊〉 it? Or if happily they get out of his fingers, did not a spotte●● Fever then presently print her Nails upon their flesh? How many Bodies were by this Purveyor of Death, marked for Funerals! Our Doctors give that young Sickness then as they do this, now Reigning a fine gentleman like name, the sp●tted Fever, as if it had been Errand, the s●o●t●d Fever, as if it h●d been a Beautiful fair ski●d Sickness, and those Spotes, the fr●ckels in the face of it. But how many did this spotted Leopard set upon, and tear in pieces! The spotted Fever. The Physicians were modest, and gave it a pretty harmless Name, (the spotted Fever) but woeful experience made us confess, A kin man to the Plague. it was the direct Plague▪ or Couz●n-germane to it: The spotted Fever served but as a Byname: The spots were the signs that hung at the Doors, but the Pestilence dwelled within. Again look back upon that Moon, and that officious Star, The Moon and her Wa●ting-ma●de.. waiting so close upon her, and read in both th●ir faces, w●at followed after. Again look bac●e, at the sudden, and unexpected death of K james: The Death of K. I. He lead the way, and Millio●s of Subjects followed after him; He died of a Burning Fever but that burning went cold to a great ●any Hearts in Christendom, and it ●●uck cold to us in England. 〈◊〉 breathe of 〈…〉 glittering of Bonfires, and 〈…〉 People hea●ed us again, with the happy N●w●s of a Glorious Sun ris●n And that Sun was the Great Charlema●ne, our now present Sovereign. The Death 〈…〉 Again look back upon 〈◊〉 ●aths of our N●bility: Dukes, Earls, and Lords, being at that time snatched from us. The 〈…〉 grave. Again look back, on the heaps of English, th●n swallowed in the sea, & eaten up in the Low-Countries. Rekcon our Losses of Men abroad, and at that time, the ruin of Men, Women, and children at home. All this Remembrances being thus added up together, point if you can (through all the Reigns of our Kings) to any one year so full of wonderful mutati●n●! Such Shifting of the Winds from fair to foul, and from foul to fair weather. Such Eclipses, and such affrighting Changes▪ and then my Pen shall be silenced, But of all the changes happening that year, the greatest is not yet mentioned: When our Sins were in a full Sea, God called in the waters of our punishment, The great Change. and on a sudden our miseries ebbed: When the Pestilence struck 5000. and odd in a Week into the Grave; an Angel came, and held the Sword from striking: So that the waves or Death fell in a short time, as fast as before they swelled up, to our confusion: Mercy stood at the Church doors, and suffered but a few Coffins to come in: And this was the most wonderful change of all the rest. This was a Change, Crosses 〈…〉. worthy to be set over every door in Letters of Gold, as before Red▪ painted Crosses stood there, turning Citizens to runnawayes. But a white ●lagge was held out in sign of Truce; A pardon was promised, and it came to the great Comfort of all our Nation. A 〈◊〉 When more than threescore thousand were ●owen down by the byeth of time: Death's harvest towards the end of that year was all most all in. Look back (O LONDON) at these, and on thy knees, sing Hymns to heaven to thy th●n deliverance. 'tis strange to observe, ●para that if a Bell be heard to Ring out, and that 'tis voiced in such a Parish within the walls of LONDON, a many is dead of the 〈◊〉, O what talk it breeds▪ If the next 〈…〉 two, than the Report sticks cold to the 〈…〉 Cit●●. But if (as now) it rises to 〈…〉 the Head, and thousands fearfully suspect, they 〈◊〉 be undone. And is there not great ●eaven for ●t is, think you? Yes there is. For all other Infirmities, and maladies of the Bo●y, go simply in their own Habit, and live wheresoever, they are 〈…〉, under their proper and known Names 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 passes only by the name of the 〈…〉 an Ague, the Pox Fistula, etc. 〈…〉 so 〈◊〉 with 〈◊〉 that they 〈◊〉 and King out, sometimes▪ night and d●y,) that sudden destroyer of Mankind: 〈…〉 Enemy. that Nimble executioner of the Divine justice: (The Plague or Pestilence) hath for the singularity of the Terrors waiting upon it, 〈◊〉 title; THE SICKNESS. It hath a Pre-eminence about all others: And none being able to match it, for Violence, Strength, Incertainty, Subtlety, Catching, Universality, and Desolation, it is called the Sickness. The 〈…〉 the 〈◊〉. As if it were, the only Sickness▪ or the Sickness of Sicknesses, as it is indeed. But, for all this Tyrants Raging and Raving up and down this City; after punishment: Mercy as you heard b●fore, came down: when the deluge was p●st, a Rainbow was seen: Martyrdom went before, and Glory with a Crown of Stars immediately followed. To die is held fearful: and the Grave hath many formidable shapes. Men alive in grave. A Prisoner being dragged to a jail, out of which he can never be delivered, may truly call his Chamber, his Living Grave, where his own sorrows and the cruelty of creditors, bury him. They, who with fearful labour, maintain life by digging underground, go daily to their Grave; So do all Traitors that lay trains to Blow up their K. and Countre●: So do all those whose black consciences pr●ck them on to dige Pitts for others, into which they fall then solues. But to open a grave as it is indeed, the grave is our last Inn, A grave Opened. and a poor wooden Coffin our fairest Lodging Room. No: the Grave is not our Inn, (where we may lie to Night and be gone to Morrow) but it is our standing House, it is a perpetuity, our Inheritance for ever: A piece of ground (with a little garden in it, five or six foot long, full of flowers and herbs, purchased for v● and our posterity, at the dearest Income in the world the loss of Life. The World is our common Inn, The World a fair Inn, but i'll Lodging in it. in which we have no certain abiding: It stands in the Roadway for all passengers; And whither we be upon speed, or go slowly on foot, sure we are that all our journeys are to the land of death, and that's the Grave. A sick-man's bed is the gate or first yard to this Inn, A Chamberline for all Travellers. where death at our first arrival stands like the Chamberlain to bid you welcome, and is so bold, as to ask if you will alight, and he will show you a Lodging. In this great year of contagion, (I mean 1625.) when the Bell man of the City (Sickness) beat at every door, there was one who whilst he lay in his grave (his deathbed as he accounted it:) yet afterwards he Recovered, reported to his friends he beheld strange apparitions. He saw a purchased Sessions; The judge was terrible: In his hand, A man i● his Grave ●ees strange sights. Lightning in his voice, Thunder: After thousands were cast, and condemned to dye, (said this sick man) I saw myself a Prisoner, and called to the Bar: The judge looking sternly upon me, was angry: A sick-man's Sessions. my offences (being read to me) were heavy, my accusers many; what could I do but plead guilty! And falling on my knees, with hands held up, cry for mercy. Tears, sighs, and anguishs of soul, speaking hard for me, the judge melted in compassion, signed a reprieve, saved me from death, The best, judge in England. and set me free. O in what a pitiful state had I been else! for my conscience arraigned me, my own tongue accused me, my own guilt condemned me: Yet the mercy of the judge saved me. In this grave I lay, my memory being dead, my Senses buried, my Spirits covered with Earthly weaknesses, and all the faculties of my soul, When men is weakest, God is strongest. cold as the clay into which I was to be turned. Yet lo! I was called out of this Grave; I quickened and revived: Seeing than that albeit death was about to thrust me down with one hand, yet life gentley plucked me up by the other, what did I but look back● at the Horror which had beset me round! I did not only look back but I looked forward at the Happiness coming toward me, which with spread arms I embraced: neither did I only look forward, but I looked upward to heaven. A due de●t must be paid. Had I not reason to pay my heavenly Ph●sitian with an humble & hearty Thanksgiving! I did so. Have I not reason to put all others, (that either t● is year or in any year to come, shall be called to the same judgment-seat) in mind of their deliverance! We, being (at least we ought to be) Christ's followers, use as he did to give thanks before we break our Bread: and when we are satisfied, he is not satisfied, unless we pay him, thanks again, thanks! that's all: Poor is that good turn which is not worth godamercy: That benefit withers, which is not warmed by the breath of the Receiver. Here, leave we our sick-man, well recovered, and singing holy Ditties for his restoring: Let us now again look back, and steadfastly fix our Eyes, upon the terrible face of that former wonderful year. How many in that swallowing Sea of contagion, were struck with dreadful Calentures, and Madness of the Brains! Raving, Raging and Railing: yea cursing God to his face! And who had greater cause to Register up his mercy, in fetching them out of such a hell, than they? job. 3.3 How many did then, with job (through the anguish of their Soars) wish that the day might perish in which they were borne! Yet some at the same time being recovered did not only not send up prayers and prailes for their safety, but having tasted of the f●ll Cup of God's mercy, they again did tempt, his justice.. If Drunkards before their Sickness, they were ten times worse, after they were well. They were not good, for joy they grew unto strength, but being perfectly healthful, were mad in their hearts that their purses were too weak to maintain them in their old Riots. Old s●r●s ill cured, break out again. What would not such have ventured upon, but that poverty gave them Lame hands. These People had a mind to Cheat God by thinking they owed him nothing: Many men dea●, few amended. But God stopped them in their Carrecre; for seeing no amendment in them, after they had been smitten down once or twice, at the third blow he struck them into Earth. To close up this sad Feast, to which none but Worms were invited: let us look only once more back, at this, all-Conquerin● year, 1625. And remember that Preaching in many Churches, was in the heat of the Battles, forced to fly: Law, was at a Nonplus. Traffic cast overboard, Trading in the City lay Bed-ridde, and in the Country ●orely shaken with an Ague. Remember O you Citizens, that our Schools then locked out Learning, (a wound to your children;) that your Servants got little (a Bruise to your Family!) that yourselves spent much, and many of your Stocks were almost wasted to nothing: (a Maim to the City) But then afterwards on the sudden, to see all this dis●oynted Buildings, put orderly into frame again! was there not great reason to rejoice? When that mighty number of 5000. and odd, The ●um●er that died in 1625. in LONDON, and round about were carried on men's shoulders to their last Home, what Glory is due to the Divine mercy! That we (who now walk up and down the Streets,) Live! Nay, not only live in Health but live! having been laid in deaths Lap, full of Sores, of Fevers, of Frenzes, yet are now healed in body and cured ●n mind. Had every Man, and Woman, as many voices as Birds have notes: All of them ought to be singing from Morn to Night, Praises, Hymns, and Honours to this almighty johovah. Are you not wearied, thus long with looking back, turn your Heads therefore round, and now look forward▪ Look not (as all this while you have done) through perspective-glasses, to make objects afar off, appear as if they were near you, but look with full eyes, at those presentations, which are directly now before you. Look forward as the Men of Genazaret did, who bringing all the sick in the Country to Christ, besought him, that they might touch the Hem of his Garment only. Luk. 7.30. Look forward, as the Cananitish Woman did who cried aloud to Christ, saying: Have mercy on me O Lord, thou Son of David; My daughter is miserably vexed with a Devil. Christ said nothing at first: He put her by once or twice, but see how the Key of importunity, can open the very gates of Heaven! Her incessant entreaties, won●e him at length to say, ● woman, great is thy faith, be it to thee as thou desirest, and her Daughter was made whole at that hour. Math. 25.4. Look forward as the five wise Virgins did, to fill your Lamps with Oil, and expect the coming of the Bridegroom. When open war is denounced against a Nation, they (albeit before they slept in security, and lay drowned in sensual streams) yet then awaken, they start up, and look forward for their armour, lest the enemy should come upon them unprovided. To look forward is to see where the fire is given to the Cannon, and so that weak part, which lies subject to battery, is fortified for resistance. Look forward therefore now; For now the Drum of Death is beating up: the cannon of the Pestilence does not yet discharge, but the small shot plays night and day, upon the suburbs: And hath sent seven bullets singing into the City. The arrows fly over our heads and hit so●e, though they as yet miss us; But none knows how soon the strong Archer, may draw his Bow, and clea●e our very hearts▪ Look forward howsoever, and look up with open eyes, under your shields to receive them as they come flying, lest they pierce you quit through, & nail you to destruction. This World is a School, we are God's Scholars; Our Schoolmaster has taken up (this year) as yet, but the twig of a Rod, A wicked ●c●o le, but the best Scholars. in comparison of that bundle of Rods he used in that year 1625. He shakes the twig at us, and a few (of the lower forms in the School) feel the smart, but the head Scholars that sit in the higher forms, do not as yet so much as tremble. Many are preparing to break up School and steal into the Country: But take heed, and look forward on the Book, which your Schoolmaster sets you to read: To truants. For if he finds you not perfect in your Lessons; He is binding the Rod in his hand, harder and harder, and be sure (when he strikes) to be paid sound. The Bell tolles in a few places, but hearts ache in many. Is Sickness come to thy door! Hath it knocked there? And is it entered? There are many good Books set forth, to drive back Infection, or if it cannot be driven away, Love's thy Physician. instructions are given how to welcome it. Make much of thy Physician: let not an Empiric or Mounti-bancking Quacksalver peep in at thy window, but set thy Gates wide open to entertain thy learned Physician: Honour him, make much of him Such a Physician is God's second, and in a duel or single fight (of this nature) will stand bravely to thee. A good Physician, comes to thee in the shape of an Angel, and therefore let him boldly take thee by the hand, for he has been in God's garden, gathering herbs: and sovereign roots to cure thee; A good Physician deals in simples, and will be simply honest with thee in thy preservation. I never sat with Aesculapius at the Table; I scarce know what a Salu●tory-box means: yet● without ask leave of the learned College, to hang out my bill or begging licence at Surgeon's hall, to seal aprobasum est upon my Unguents and Plasters. I will adventure to Minister Physic, and Salves to any one, that in this time, is troubled with the Sickness: and my Patien●s in the end, shall confess: That Galen Hippocrates, Paracelsus, nor all t●e great Masters, of those Arts, did never lay down sounder prescriptions. And here come my Medicines marching in. Art thou (in this visitation stricken with Carbu●cles, blains, and Blisters, Is thy body spotte● all over? Art thou sure death bids: he come away, by some Tokens which he hath sent thee? Be runde by me, and take this receipt; Trust to it, for it cuied a King of Israel. Cry out with David, O Lord! Chastise me not in thy wrath▪ King David's Physic. for thine Arrows have lighted upon me: There is nothing sound in my flesh because of thine anger: neither is there rest in my bones because of my sins. My wounds are putrified; my Reynes full of burning: I am weakened and sore broken. My heart panteth: my strength faileth me: And the light of mine eyes (even they) are not mine own: my Lovers and my friends stand aside from my Plague, and my Kinsmen stand afar off: Yet continue thou with the holy singer, and conclude thus, O Lord, hast to help me. How like you, this Medicine? Is it of such virtue, that albeit, thou art sick to thy Death: It will by degrees take away all thy Torments. A julep. This second is a lulep to sweeten the mouth of thy Stomach, after the bitterness of thy sickness: ●or, when by an Armipotent hand, thou art lifted out of thy deathbed; when the Bell hath ceased rolling for thee, and thy Womer-sle●pers leave gaping for thy Linen, thy goods, and thy money: And are mad they are not likely to Rifle thy House: when thou hast an appetite to eat, and that thy feet are able to walk upon that Earth, which was hungry to d●noure thy whole bdoy; Then fall thou upon that Earth, and Magnify God. Then say, though thy sins in thy sickness made thy conscience shev a face to thee as black as Hell, yet seek thou to it, and tell it, that this Recovery with new repentance (continued) sh●ll make it like the wings of a Dove, covered with Silver: and whose Feathers are like the yellow Gold; David's Song set to our tune. Say to thy Soul, it shall be as white as the Snow in Zumon, and confess that God's Mercy is like the mountain of Bashan: Say to thy Health, that the Chariots which God sent to guard it were twenty thousand Angels, Read 67. amongst whom, the Lord was as in the Sanctuary of Sinai. Nay, albeit Death should lay his Mouth to thine Ear, and bid thee put thy House in order: For, thou shall Die; Yet, an Isaiah (some good Man's prayer●) or thine own, 2 Kings 20.1. may be heard, and God may Ad●e to thy days fifteen years more, as he did to Hezekiah, upon his Repentance. Repentance is a Silver Bell, Good Men sick and sounds sweetly in the Ear of Heaven. It is a Diamond shining and sparkling in the dark, to enlighten all our miseries. It is a 〈◊〉 for every wound: It is a golden ladder by whose st●pp●s we climb to immortality. It is a Chain of Orient Pearl, tying up Gods hands that he shall not strike us: Repentance smelleth sweeter than the Ointment which the Woman Anointed Christ's feet▪ Luke 7 38. when she wiped them with her Hair. Repentance wins the King of Heaven, to smile upon us as if we were his favourites: and to say thus. If thou still art ascending, Great 〈…〉. and getting up this hill of Repentance, blessed shalt thou be in the City, and blessed in the field; Blessed be the fruit of thy Body, and the fruit of thy Ground, and the fruit of thy Ca●tle, the increase of thy King, and the 〈◊〉 of thy sheep: Blessed shall be the Basket, and thy Dough: Deut. 25 Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed also when thou goest out. Thy Land-soldiers (O England!) Shall not stand in fear ●or thy Royal Navy, for thine enemies that rise against thee, shall fall before thy face: They shall come out against thee one way, and fly before thee seven ways. His word (that speaks this) may be taken better than any Kings in the world: And therefore, hold out both thy hands under, this Tree of Blessings. and catch the golden apples when so freely they are taken down into thy lap. But, if thou trample these gifts under thy feet, and spurnest at God's favour bestowed upon thee, Bad service▪ bad wages. in thy Health, in the midst of a hot sickness. If the Tolling of Bells cannot awaken you, nor the opening of graves affright you▪ If Billmen standing at other men's doors, cannot put you in mind, that the same guard, may lock up yours, and the same red Crosses be stuck in your Banners,: If to be shut up close for a Month, seem but a short Saeve in a Tragedy, and not cared for, when 'tis Acted; Then hear (O England and thou her eldest Daughter, so admired amongst Nations for thy Beauty.) Hear what New Quiners of Punishments will be opened; For, these are the Arrows which God himself says he will draw out at rebellious Kingdoms: A Pestilence cleaving fast, Consumptions, fevers, burning Agues; The Sword, Blasting new-Dewes, Heaven shall be turned to brasle, and Earth to Iron: Or Houses to have others dwell in them, our Vineyards, to have others ●ast them, our Oxen to be slain, yet we not eat them, our Sheep to be slaughtered, and to feed our enemies. These, and hideons squ●ldrons beside are threatened to be sent out against disobedient people: What Physicians, Doctors, Surgeons, or Apothecaries, have we to defend us in so dreadful a War? None, not any. If therefore with Naaman, thou wouldst be cleansed from Leprosy, 2 Kings. 5.14. thou must obey Elisha, and wash thyself seven times in jordan: Wee●e seven times a day▪ Nay, seven times an hour for thy sins. Whosoever with Ahaziah, (the King of Samaria) falleth sick, and sendeth for recovery of Baal-Zebub, (the god of Ekron) and not to the true God indeed, 2 Kings 7. ● he shall not come from his bed, but die the Death. For, 2 Kings ●. 5. we sink to the Bottom of the waters, as the Carpenter's Axe did: But, though never so Iron-hearted, the voice of an Elisha, (the fervency of prayer and praising God) can fetch us from the bottom of Hell: And by contrition make us swim on the top of the waters of Life. Now, albeit at the first crying to God, nay, the Second, God lou●● an earned Sui●e●. Third, Fourth, or twentieth time, he will not hear thee; But that thy sighs are neglected: Thy tears unpitied: Thy sores nor repent: Thy hunger not satisfied; Thy poverty not relieved. Yet give thou not over: stand at the gate of God's mercy still; Beg still: 1 Sam. 1. ●● Knock still, and knock hard▪ For, 〈◊〉 was barren, yet being an importunate suitor, her petition was heard, and signed. She was fruitful, and had three Sons, and two Daughters. So, albeit we be barren in Repentance, in Thanksgiving, in Charity, in Patience, in Goodness: Yet if unfeignedly we pray to Heaven, we shall be fruitful: And these five shall be our Sons and Daughters. By this means our Ma●● shall change her Name again to Naomi, Ruth. ●. 2●▪ and our bitterness, be turned into sweetness. Art thou sick! Thy best and only Doctor dwells above: Hast thou been sick! Art thou amended! Fill Heaven and Earth, full of Songs to thy Eternal Physician, who takes nothing of thee, for any Eloctu●ri●s he gives thee, His Pills are bitter, but wholesome, and of wondrous operation: And so much the better, because what he gives, comes gratis? Art thou recovered? Hast thou plucked thy foot out of the grave, Syrack. 30●. 14. when it was stepping in? Then with the Son of Syrach, acknowledge, that a Beggar in health is better than a diseased Monarch, Health and Strength, are fairer than gold, and a sound body is an infinite Treasure. So that, if thou dost not open thy Lips, to Magnify him, that hath snatched thee out of the laws of destruction, His blessings are to thee, as messes of meat set upon the grave. I must yet once more wish thee (O Troy novans) to cast thine eyes about thee: Look forward on thy sad Neighbour (distressed Cambriage,) Sickness shakes her, her glorious Buildings are emptied, her Colleges shut up, her Lourned Sons forsake her, her Tradesmen cry out for succour. Want walks up and down her streets, a few Rich, a many Poor; But the hands of the one cannot feed, not fill the mouths of the other. To thee therefore (O thou Nourishing mother of all the Cities in England) to thee (albeit thou art in some Sorrow thyself) does this afflicted Nurse of Scholars come; What tree hath Branches broad enough to shelter her from storms but thine? Where is a Sun to warm her frozen Limbs if it moves not in thy Zodiac? Thou (O Queen of Cities) art Royal in thy gifts; Charity sits in thy Gates, and compassion waits upon thee in thy Chamber; So that with Dido, thou often sayeth. Non ignara mali, Miseris succurrere disco. My miseries to myself being known, Makes me count others wants, mine own. FINIS.