THE TESTAMENT OF WILLIAM BEL. GENTLEMAN. ●EFT WRITTEN IN HIS OWN HAND. SET OUT ABOVE 33. YEARS AFTER HIS DEATH.  
With annotations at the end, and Sentences, out of the H. Scripture, Fathers, etc.  
By his son FRANCIS BELL, of the Order of Freers Minors, Definitor of the Province of England: Guardian of S. BONAVENTURES College in Douai: and Professor of the sacred Hebrew tongue, in the same.  Electo meo foedus excidi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vulgat. Psalm. 88 Disposui testamentum electis meis. 
Permissu Superiorum.  
AT DOUAI, ●. BALTH●●●● 〈…〉   

TO THE RIGHT WORSHIPFUL MR. EDWARD SHELDON of Beoley, etc.  
SIR.  
Anciently, when after the rihgt of nature, the earth was Common, and all the gods thereof: ●hat a man Can say to his neighbour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hast thou not all the earth before thee? 
Genes. 13.9.  separate thyself from me, if thou go to the lef● hand I will keep the right, i● thou go to the Right hand ● will howld the left. Men gau● in their testaments to they● children only celestial doctrines, that to whom they had given being, they might also give well-being. 
Psalm. 77,  By thee● means we have heard an● known so many things: declared to us by our fathers which in the next generation were not hid from they● children, declaring the praises of our Lord, his virtues, and marvels done by him, ●hat raised up testimony in ●acob: and gave a law to ●sraël▪ how many things did he command our fathers ●o make known to their ●onnes to the end that the ●ext generation might know ●hem, that the children that ●hould arise and be borne of ●hem, might tell them again ●o their children, and all, ●hat they might set their ●ope in God, not forget his works, and search out his ●ommands. Moses. 
Deut. 32.  Remember the days of old think upon every several generation, ask thy father & he will declare, thy elders and they will tell thee. Men gave, I say, from hand to hand the law of God, his fear, & love: with benediction to the keepers, malediction to the breakers of it▪ Commending virtue, condemning vice: foretelling pain and glory the rewards of both. 
Epist. jud. ca 1.14.  Such testament▪ the seaventh man from Adam, 
Gen. 48 49.  Enoch made. Such wa● the Patriarch jacobs' testament disposed to his 12. sons: such also those, of these 12. patriarchs themselves. 
A most ancient Hebrev book, called, the testament of the 12. Patriarches  But of that new & everlasting testament of JESUS-CHRIST the son of God what shall I say? therein is all knowledge of the heavenly kingdom: the eternal beatitude and felicity of man. After this incomparable Testament, in which are all the treasures of the riches and wisdom of God, I may bring in that godly testament of my holy Father S. Francis, which after he was signed with the sacred stigmats of our Saviour JESUS CHRIST, full with fervour, and the holy ghost, near the end of his life, he left to us his children, that more sincerely and catholickly we might keep his Evangelicall rule.  
Divers pious testaments have been by sundry devout persons, at several times ordained: And not among the last do I account this testament of my father, a man known and esteemed of your worship no less than of Mr. Ralph your father of happy memory. It hath been kept in his own manuscript these 44. years and more. By divine providence, it hath at last come to my hands: who having been above 18. years out of my country in foreign lands, neither sought for, nor thought of any such thing (although seeing it now, I remember that in my younger years I have seen it before) when a grave father of our seraphical order venerable for his well spent, years from his infancy till 67. (so ●owld he is at this day) and no ●ess for his profownde judgement and eloquence both in speech and style, lighting ●pon it sent it out of England to me, with no small commendations thereof. His censure animated me to put it in print. And for a patron to whom I might dedicate it I had not fare to seek: your Constant Christianity and professing of the Catholic Religion: who like the great Patriarch Abraham, to follow God, have gone out of land and Country and father's house and friends and kindred, and familiars, or like Saint Peter out of all, doth Challenge so christianlike a testament: especially from me who, as appeareth in the 34. §. of it, am severely charged to be serviceable towards you and yours.  
That service together with myself I offer here to your worship, for us all that have the charge there laid upon us: that we be not challenged with the vile vice of ingratitude: or breach of the dead man's will. myself have had part of my education from Mr. Francis Daniel, my uncle, of whom mention is made in the 32. §. who now liveth not on earth. Of the Throckmartons of Coughton or Fekenhan mentioned in the 33. §. I have yet no knowledge, nor of Sir John Littleton's house, spoken of in the end of the 34. §. I may live to do them service. yourself only remains the man that most extended his goodness towards us in accomplishing this will: in bringing up my brother Edmund together with your own sons to learning to music, & to the university of Oxford, as was required. your sister also the Religious Lady Russell gave education successively to two of my sisters Margarit & Dorothy.  
Receive therefore from me this last will of my father as my first will to serve you, which with my life shall last, and be my last▪ so shall I fulfil that iterated precept of the holy ghost 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 
Proverb. 1.8.   
hear o my son the instruction of thy father.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 
Proverb. 6.20.   
keep o my son the precept of thy father.  God praeserue your worship long to his highest glory, the good of our family, and chief of our seraphical order to which you have always showed a charitable affection: and finally chosen in our Convent at Namur Abraham's double cave for burial to your happily decessed wife and you. From our celle● in S. Bonaventures College in Douai this 7. of januarie▪ 1632.  
Your worships obliged Br. FRANCIS BEL●   

●N THE NAME of God. Amen.  
THE twentith day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand five hundred fourscore and seven: and in the nine and twentith year of the reign of our sove●igne Lady Elizabeth. I William Bell, alias, ●ellne, of Temple-Broughton in the County of Wigorne, Gentleman: being 〈◊〉 good health of body, & of sound & perfect memory, (our Lord be blessed & thanks therefore) calling to my remembrance th●● all flesh is grass, according to the saying of the Prophet Esaia, and borne to di● and that in this decaying age of the wo●● and triumphing time of sin; besides t●● course of nature, many new and dangerous diseases do arise: & many malicious complottes and practices of Satan and 〈◊〉 ministers are taken in hand; whereby our li● is continually endangered and suddenly t●ken away whereof there be infinite natural & some rueful & tragical examples. A● having respect and regard of my frail substance: of my short pilgrimage in th● world, and long account I have to ma●● to my Maker in the world to come. A●● desirous to make known to my postery the state of my soul and body. I do no● declare, ordain, and publish, my will a●● testament: as a farewell to the vain and disembling world: and do thereby give, a●● bequeath, devise, and declare, in manner 〈◊〉 form following.  

§. 1.  
IN PRIMIS. I give, and as a true Christian Catholic man, bequeathe my ●oule into the hands and mercy of Almighty God; by faith confessing and in hope reposing my salvation to be in the only merits death, and Passion of CHRIST JESUS, ●rusting to reign with him in glory, that ●or the redemption of me and all mankind reigned and triumphed over sin, ●eath, and hell itself, in the Altar of the Cross. Whereunto I implore, and beseech ●he assistance by prayer of the blessed and immaculate Virgin MARIE, and of all the ●oly company of heaven, who being now ●n glory, members of the triumphant Church, have in Christ compassion of the members of the militant Church. And I will that my body, when it shall be dissolved into his first substance, be decently ●uried in the parish Church of Handburie, ●r wheresoever else it sh●ll please God to appoint.   

§. 2.  
And, for as much as in this rueful decay ●f the Catholic religion, and in this most ●iurious and troublesome time, I as a true ●hristian, and careful father, have a zealous care to leave to all the world, and especially to my Children, for their imitation, a Confession of my faith.   

§. 3.  
Be it known to them, and to all the world, that I profess, and from my heart protest to live, and die a member of Christ's true Catholic and Apostolic Church out of the unity and fellowship whereof, there never was, nor is, nor can be, salvation, what plausible persuasions or pleasing pretences soever now be, or by the devil's drift may hereafter be devised, to the contrary. In which faith, and unity of which Church, I acknowledge God the Father my Maker, God the Son my Redeemer and God the holy Ghost my Sanctifier three persons, and one very and eternal God.   

§. 4.  
I believe and hold the twelve Articles o● the Christian faith, as the Catholik● Church teacheth them: The Nicen● Creed, and Athanasius Creed. I hold an● acknowledge the ten commandments, a God declared them to Moses, to be th● substance of the Law. I believe there be in Christ's Church, seven Sacraments or fountains of grace whereby the holy Ghost doth by our receiving and use of the same work in our soul's grace, that is to say, Baptism, Confirmation, Matrimony, Confession, Orders, Supper of our Lord, ●nd Extreme Unction, and that to be deprived of the use of these, is an impediment ●nd stopping of God's grace in us; whereof many a Christian soul doth in this time of ●inne feel a rueful loss.   

§. 5.  
I believe that in the Sacrament of the ●ords Supper; otherwise called the Sacrament of the Altar, after the words of Consecration, in the sacrifice of the Mass, done ●y the Priest duly ordained, there remains the very Real presence of Christ's Body, ●nd Blood, without any other substance of creature's, and that all figurative speeches, all spiritual meanings, all glosses of words, all surmises of false spirits, that suppose or teach ●he contrary, are derogatory to the power ●f God and injuriouse to the salvation of ●hristian souls, the words of the Gospel ●ying. Take eat, this is my Body, and ●ke and drink, this is my Blood.   

§. 6.  
I believe that the examination of conscience and Confession of sins to a ghostly father, is a work necessary to salvation, as the Church of God doth require it: and that it is the most comfortable mean to stir up the soul, sunk into sin, unto repentance and amendment, that can be: and that by the often use thereof God's grace doth wonderfully work in our minds, and that by the neglecting of the same Satan worketh his will.   

§. 7.  
I believe that the doctrine of the Catholic Church concerning invocation of saints, prayer for the dead, and holding of the place for purgation of souls dying in the state of grace, and of christian works to be effect of christian faith, is a most sound and wholesome doctrine, and that the new found Doctrine of sole faith is the fine force of Satan to deceive the world.   

§. 8.  
I believe, and firmly avow, that the holy Ghost, since Christ's ascension, hath been and continued with this Catholic and Apostolic Church, teaching her all truth, and so shall continue to the end of the world; and that the gates of Hell shall never prevail against her, according to Christ's promise: And that the pretended reformers of Religion are Devils, transformed into the shape of Angels of light, fallen into the delicacy of worldly men's delights, in this latter age of the world. And that this is true may be proved by a sensible consequent. First of the new pretended reformed Religion there was never, public profession in the Christian world before these forty or fifty year's last passed, or thereabouts; then, it being fifteen hundred years since Christ established his Church, either it is to be confessed, that the Church and Religion that had beginning and continuance from Christ's time until these pretended reformed days, is the true Church, and true Religion, and that the contrary is f●lse, or else, ●hat Christ hath not kept promise when he ascended, saying, that he would send to his disciples the comforter, which should teach them all truth, and continued with them to the end of the world: but to say so were blasphemy, as I trust every Christian heart will affirm. And Christ's Church is no hidden thing, for in the scriptures she is compared to a City set upon an hill, that every one may see; to a Candle set upon a candlestick, to lighten all that come into the house: And a most rueful and lamentable thing, my dear infants, it is, that we should now condemn that Religion which we received first into this Realm, above thirteen hundred years past, and continued in until about fifty years past, and then altered into such a liberty of life, a discharging of the conscience, a carnality of pleasures, a security of salvation, a rash believing of spirits, a condemning of the Fathers, a pride of opinions, a setting up of sects, a pretending of piety, a performing of impiety, a dissolving of obedience, and generally into such a pleasant safety of sinning, as I can not but (in the charity towards all Christians, and especially of you my dear children, that may haply live to see and feel the truth of these things) with an inward sorrow of heart remember.   

§. 9  
For conclusion, I hold and believe all that the Catholic and Apostolic Church holdeth and believeth, in the sum and substance of faith, and in the godly ceremonial rights of teaching thereof, and I protest to hold it, and affirm it in the passage of my soul: And I desire the eternal God for Christ's sake to grant you my children his grace to do the same, without the which you can never possess the joys of heaven. And I beseech you, in the mercies of CHRIST JESUS, and charge you all, as a father, upon my blessing, that with continual prayer you call unto God to direct you this way, to bring you to this faith, and then no doubt but he will also bring you into life everlasting: which CHRIST JESUS grant you, and me, and all people. Amen.   

§. 10.  
And from a resolute heart, and settled Faith, I do now here make protestation, that if hereafter, either by weakness, or debility of body, by means of sickness, or for the shunning of any worldly dangers, losses, or persecutions, whereof no part of the world ever knew half so many and so great as we now do, or for any torment or trouble; whereof there be tragical, and wonderful inventions: or for any carnal affection of wife or children: or by any temptation, subtlety, or shift of the adversary whatsoever, I shall be of any other mind, or my senses abused to offend against this faith, which God for Christ's sake forbid, that then I do now in perfect mind, by the assistance of God his spirit utterly deny, detest, and renounce, the same, as wicked, and do adhere and abide, in life, and in death, to the former declaration of my faith. Which protestation and resolution, I will you my children and all men to witness with me, before God and his Angels in the dreadful judgement. And I beseech our Lord I may then see the same found in you and all other men.   

§. 11.  
Thus having briefly made known unto you the faith and religion wherewith and wherein I mean to pass (by God's grace) out of this world: For as much as I may leave you young and tender, and your ●eere mother and I by country far divi●ed, and yet lastly conjoined by God in ●ariage, whereby you may be ignorant of ●ome things not impertinent for you, in worldly respects, to know: I have thought good, before I dispose of other things, to acquaint you with what you are by me. I may, I hope, commend you by descent of honest parentage, as the world knoweth: whose predecessors have tasted of such infortune as in the world is not strange, and for more. Albeit true generosity consist in virtue, and is lawful for every one to obtain, and not tied to the only descent of flesh and blood: yet are you not ignoble that way. Which I leave you, not by way of a vain vaunt, but rather to excite you thereby to endeavour the obtaining and continuing of true generosity.   

§. 12.  
The first of mine Ancestors by name, within this County of Worcester, was Hugo de Belne, a Gentleman; who, (as by tradition it hath continued in our family) was advanced, as I take it, in the time of Edward the first: for service to him done by the long Bow; being an excellent Archer. 
Et haeredibus masculis as it is said.  This King gave unto the said Hugo d● Belne, and his heirs, the fee-farm of divers lands and teniments in Kingsnorton within the County of Worcester: Whic● fee-farm cometh every year in charge to the Sheriff of Worcestershiere out o● the Exchequour, to this day, under the title De terris & tenimentis quondam Hugonis d● Belne, etc. the lands are called Black greve and Bells, in value better than an hundred marks by year.   

§. 13.  
From him the lands descended, from on● to another of the heir's males, by lineal descent, whereof the Court Rolls of the manors of Bromesgrove, and Kingsnortton, remaining in the steeple at Bromesgrove, can witness and all in the title o● gentility; until the time of my great grandfather, in the days of King Henry the eight, whose name was William Bel, or William de Belne, who marrying to a second wife, the base daughter of Sir Arthoure Plantagener, was, for the maintenance of her dissolute life, forced to sell all his patrimony: part whereof he sold unto Sir Edward Littleton of Staffordshiere, and part to ● ʳ Sheldon of Spettesley, whose heir ●ilipp Sheldon, at this day enjoyeth the ●ne, by means whereof my grandfather ●n Bel, his heir by the first wife, was 〈◊〉 inherited.   

§. 14.  
My father, whose name was also john: in ●s life-time understanding that the lands ●ere entailed to the heir male, with remainder in the Crown, made entry into a message, and lands called Blackgreve, but ●eing not able to proceed in the trial, for ●ant of ability, was forced to give over; ●hich moved him to extend his ability for ●y maintenance in learning, hoping thereby to procure a recovery of our inheritance, for that the common report of him ●as, that the lands were but mortgaged, ●ith condition of redemption at any ●me.   

§. 15.  
At school I continued in the County ●f Warwick until I was 18. years of age. From thence I went to the university of Orford, where, with good allowance of my good father (whose soul our Lo●● bless) I continued 7. years, proceeded bachelor of art, and was fellow of Ball● Celledge there, and being ready to pr●ceede Master of A●te by time of years, was envied by some ungrateful, God forgive them, accused of discontentation Religion, and called to answer the sam● But declining the malice of time, I retire myself by favour of my College with cause allowed for on year. And after returning and finding the malice continuing for the quiet of my conscience I was force to leave my society, and to commit m● self to the favour of God in the world: b● whose direction, and upon earnest reque●● to me made, I came then to a right worth● Magistrate, and worshipful Gentleman Sir john Throkmarton, Knight, chief Iustic● of the Marches of Wales, with whom ● continued in especial good favour, an● credit, and in entertainment as a dear friend of his, by the space of 12. years: i● so great contentation every way, and suc● liking both in mind and body, as, respec●ting the security, I found not else where t● be hoped for, at that time. But perceiving my years increasing and mine hability a● ye● nothing, I was in part persuaded by the ●d Sir john Throkmarton to undertake the ●die of the common laws of the Realm, the Inns of court. Whereupon admitting 〈◊〉 self a Fellow of Clement's Inn, in ●amber and bed with that Worshipful ●entleman Mr. George Shirley, I fell to the ●●die of the Laws. Where finding, upon ●o years experience, that the air of the ettie did utterly overthrew my heath, ●eing never well in health one whole month together, I was forced to return 〈◊〉 to the country: where was willingly af●rced me, by Sir john Littleton knight, the execution of the Office of the clerk of ●he Peace, of the County of Wigorne: ●hich with the good favour of Sir john ●hrokmarton I accepted, and executed with ●uch liking and favour of my country as I ●eaue in modesty to speak off.   

§. 16.  
Shortly after died Sir john Throkmarton: ● man whose virtues and rare gu●fts were worthy a longer time, for one to wise and politic in government, in counsel, so grave and provident; in justice so sound; in ●earning, (f●r one of his calling) so rare; in company, so affable and pleasant; in his disports, so gentlemanlike; so pitiful to th● poor; so plentiful in hospitality; to goo● men such a patron; to offenders such a terror; and generally so complete a man ev●rie way, as lived not his like in Englan● The loss of him, to me a principal friend moved me eftsoons to return to the Inns of Court, determining to have go● through with the study of the Laws: bu● still finding the decay of my health. I wa● eftsoons forced to retire into the country to my house at Templebroughton, whic● Sir john Throkmarton had granted me During mine abode in the Inns of Cou● many crosses and troubles befell me, putting me to long trouble and charges.   

§. 17.  
In this time I resolved to marry: wherein commending my hap to the good direction of God, he so guided me, as I became acquainted with the Worshipful Gentlewoman your grandmother Daniel, who for her virtue, piety, and liberal housekeeping, was not then in many places matchable. Among her daughters I made choice of your mother for a wife, and she, with the good liking of her friends, content to become mine, wherein I can not account my ●fe so happy with the best fortune of the ●orld, as in having her to me a wife, and 〈◊〉 you a mother. A woman I assure you ewards God so religious, in love and ●fection towards me so liberal, in faith ●●d vowed chastity so sound and inviolate, in patience so perfect, in obedience 〈◊〉 humble and ready, in housewifely care, ●nd discreet government of her house●ould, so wise and provident, to you, ●y children, so loving and naturally affected, to all my friends so kind and ●entle, and generally towards all so mo●est and courtesou, as her match is not ●asily found: And therefore both you and 〈◊〉 own much to God in such a blessing: which for my part, as I am resolved to be thankful for whilst I live, so I ●equire you, my children all, that you do the like. And if it shall please God she do survive me in this world, I require and charge you upon my blessing, and upon all the duty that by the laws of God or nature you own me, that during your life you love, honour, and obey her, in word and deed, that you cherish and comfort her, that you be serviceable and dutiefull unto her: that you never murmur, n● grudge against her, that by any means yo● provoke her not to anger, or displeasure that for any vain pleasure you never do● nor consent to the thing that may offend her, that you be ever ready to relieve he● in all distresses, with all the ability of you bodies, and with all that God shall giu● you in this world, that you continually pray for her and me, and in so doing▪ be right well assured, that Almighty God will bless you, he will multiply and increase you, and you shall see in this you● posterity blessed upon the earth, and all tha● you take in hand shall prosper, and go well with you; yea, the dew of heaven wil● fructify all that you shall have; God hat● so promised, who will never fail you i● you fail not yourselves. Remember it is he that in the commandment hath promised long life to them that honour their parents: The wise man hath said, that the father's blessing buildeth up the roof of the house, but the mother's curse rooteth up the foundation. Behold all the histories, both divine and profane, from the creation of the world to this day: and you shall never find but the obedient child was favoured of God and man: and contrariwise, the disobedient was hated, and never failed of his just punishment in this world, either in himself, ●r in his succession.   

§. 18.  
And to the intent you may the better perform this, and all other good actions ●ou take in hand, for as much as nothing ●s, nor can possibly be profitable unto man ●n this world, without the grace of God, ●nd assistance of his holy spirit, and that he ●s our God, and we his creatures, and the work of his will: who hath commanded ●o knock and it shall be opened unto us, ●o seek and we shall find, and to ask, ●nd we shall have, I now most instantly, ●nd before all things, require and charge ●ou, that with continual prayer you call ●pon God that he may endue you with his ●race, that he will in this time of the Pro●inciall darkness of England, wherein ●ou are borne, open unto you the knowledge and light of the true Catholic and apostolic Faith, that he will confirm ●nd fasten you therein, that you never warn from the same, nor stagger to your ●ues end. What greater joy or comfort can ●ny worldly man have, then if he were in ●ant or necessity of any thing, to have his Prince, or some great man that were of ability and power, to say unto him: ask me a● lordship, a farm, an office, or great store o● treasure and thou shalt have it, and might thereupon in deed have it; were not such an one that would lose all this for want o● ask worthy to want and abide in mos● miserable beggary? it cannot be denye● but he were. And then, what an injuri● were it to yourselves, and what an ingratitude to so merciful a God, that hat● heaven and earth and all the rich conten● thereof to dispose of at his pleasure, an● that so freely and willingly offereth to the● that seek, ask, and knock, not to pray t● him in our necessities, and for our relief who can have nothing in this world but o● his free mercy. The minds of worldly men are mutable, who oftentimes promis● and pay not, though we never so much entreat them: but God is so just as he will no● alonely perform all promise, but give wit● increase of measure and in abundance: fo● a full demonstration whereof, look, amon● many, unto the Prophet David, who in a his distresses, persecutions, adversities, an● crosses, ever humbled himself to God b● prayer, and was heard and delivered.   

§. 19  
This prayer of yours must have faith and trust in God, charity and the fervency of zeal, such as was in the Prophet when he said. Exaudi me Domine quoniam clamavi ad te, and again. Dominus mihi adjutor, non timebo quid faciat mihi homo. Dominus protector vitae meae, à quo formidabo? and infinite other places, whereby he ever obtained of God comforr, and deliverance.  
You are, my children, as David said of himself: In te proiectus sum ex utero: So from your mother's womb were you cast upon God, where our Lord grant that you may fasten yourselves forever.   

§. 20.  
Of the effect of prayer, and the most sweet comforts thereof, no man can speak more effectually than I your father, and herein I protest before the sacred Majesty of Almighty God, to whom I must yield account of all my words, deeds, and thoughts, that I will speak no more than truth: That from the time of my infancy, wherein I was taught to pray, to this present day, as I have many and sundry times in my life felt sickness, need of many worldly things, sorrows, loss of friends, false accusations, the sting of envy, as a matter that did ever oppress me, close imprisonment in an innocent cause, household troubles, false friends, and infinite others, and above all, the lack of the highest mysteries, and sweetest comforts to both soul and body: so ever in all my necessities repairing unto God by prayer, I have ever found relief, comfort, and deliverance thereby. Whereof no creature under heaven could show you more rare and notable examples than I; which in this place I omit. Only crying unto you from my whole heart, to be earnest, zealous, & perseverant in prayer, and if you had nothing in the world to relieve you, yea, all the world opposed against you, yet shall you prevail and receive the blessing from God by faithful prayer.   

§. 21.  
Hitherto having made known unto you the Confession of my faith, my worldly course, and my counsels in the same: I am now to make my purposed legacies, and bequests among you: wherein I first give, & commend you all to the merciful care and protection of God the Father, God the Son, and God the holy Ghost, & to the assistant prayers of all the blessed company of heaven: beseeching CHRIST JESUS, that bought us all with his precious blood, to bless you, save you, & make you heirs of his Kingdom, And I desire Almighty God so to dispose of you in your several callings, in this world, as may be most to his glory, and your own soul's health, and that it may please him to pour down the dew of heaven upon you, bless you, increase you, and all your labours, and all things that you shall take in hand, and evermore deliver you from the power and evil purposes of your enemies. Amen.   

§. 22.  
Concerning my worldly goods, as I received nothing in this world from my parents but mine education, to them (considering the course of my life) both careful and costly, so having not much, in respect of the time (an enemy to the thrift of a distressed conscience) I can not much bestow, and yet, (blessed be God for his increase) shall leave you something.   

§. 23.  
The worldly goods I have, I give, and bequeathe to Dorothy my dear & loving wife: therewith charging and requiring her, in the faith she beareth me, and in the love she beareth my children, to see them virtuously brought up, and instructed in learning, the more readily to prepare them to the service, of God, and true knowledge of him.   

§. 24.  
The chiefest thing I do desire therein, is, to have Edmund and William trained in school to learning, as their capacities will admit, and so to go to the university of Oxford, if by any means they may obtain that preferment: and there to Balliol College, of which house I was fellow, and where Doctor Bel founded two scholarships for Worcestershiere men: or else whereas it may be obtained.   

§. 25.  
After they are entered in their learning, and are 7. or 8. years of age, I would they should be taught plainesong, and pricksong skilfully, and to play upon the lute, and virginales: a shill not alonely comfortable in itself to the haver, but a very good mean of preferment, or a grateful entertainment with the best, and to such of them as shall best affect the same, I bequeathe my best lute, sythorne, and gittorne. Item, if either Edmund or William shall be enabled, and have a desire to study the common laws of the Realm, which I greatly desire, then to him so affected, and enabled, and doing the same, I give and bequeathe all my law-bookes, which I wish should be duly preserved together for that purpose.   

§. 26.  
Item if Francis my son do hereafter recover speech, than I will that he be, according to his birthright, mine heir, and to have all my lands, tenements, and hereditaments, to him and his heir's males for ever, and not otherwise: yielding & paying to my son Edmund out of the same, after my said son Edmund shall accomplish the age of 21. year's *** by year, during his natural life, at two terms in every year, that is to say, at the feast of S. Michael the Archangel and the Annunciation of our blessed Lady the virgin by equal portions. But if Francis my son do not recover speech and good discretion, than I do now give and bequeathe to Edmund my son to be mine heir, and he to have all my manor of Templebroughton and lands, tenements, and hereditaments, to him and to the heir's males of his body lawfully begotten, and not otherwise.   

§. 27.  
Item I give and bequeathe to Marguerite my daughter, to her preferment in marriage, when she shall accomplish the age of 18. years *** and if I have no issue male, than I give unto the said Marguerite all my lands, tenements, and hereditaments, to have to the said Marguerite and her heirs for ever.   

§. 28.  
Item, albeit I have formerly given all my goods and chattels to Dorothy my wife, yet is there in the same gift an employed trust which she hath promised me, and which I do most certainly assure myself she will never break nor violate towards me and those that are hers and mine.   

§. 29.  
Item, I would that every one of my children should have a ring of fine gold weighing 3, l wherein should be written this sentence well enamelled: jacta super Dominum curam tuam & ipse te enutriet. Which may be engraven in two rounds, because it is too much for one, and these rings to be made presently after my decease, and to be delivered them at 18. years of age. Which rings I charge them on my blessing, never to departed withal to their dying day. And which of them soever wilfully breaketh this charge, it will go worse with him, be he well assured.   

§. 30.  
Item if my wife be now with child, such care as I have had of my other children, I would should be had of it, be it man or woman, which care I must commend to my dear wife: and she with that God hath lent us, to provide for it, and the rest, as God shall enable us, and my will is, and I do give to Dorothy my wife, the issues, and profits of all my lands, teniments, and hereditaments, till my sons come to 18. years of age, & then so to allow Edmund *** yearly during her life and she to have the rest of the profits of my lands during her life.   

§. 31.  
Item I would that Marguerite my daughter should, so soon as thee is able to go to school, and be applied in her book, and with her neelde, so fare forth as she shall be of capacity, and if it may be, that she be also taught her pricksong, and plainesong, and to play on the virginals, and if we cannot prefer her farther, this will be (with God's grace to guide the same) a competent preferment in the world. Item I will that Dorothy my wife shall fully possess my goods to the use of my children: as I am assured she will do no less then if she were my sole Executrix, but Executors or Executrix, I will (for some private respects) make none: and so to do concerning my will, so fare forth as she shall be able, to execute the same, in all points, according to the conference, and promise between us made and agreed, and that do assure myself she will do. Notwithstanding, for as much as we are all mortal, my will is, that if Dorothy my wife do die before she perform my will, and deliver my children their portions, or for any other respect do refuse to do the same, than I do constitute and appoint all my children jointly to be my Executors, and they to do the same, as by the sound advice of their friends (whereunto I ever advise them to give ear) they shall be directed.   

§. 32.  
Item, I will that William my third son▪ shall have *** by year, paid him during his life, after he cometh to 21. year's o● age, by Edmund. Item, for as much as th● greatest peril of infants is in their education, if the same be not wisely governed and provided for, if God call me away leaving my Children young and tender; and that if God continue their mother, they shall ever be assured of an especial comfort by her, so fare forth as she shall be able: yet for as much as many accidents in the world may hinder her good endeavour, I do instantly desire my very especial good mother M. rs Marguerite Daniel, and my good brethren Mr. john Daniel Esquire, and Mr. Francis Daniel, the Right Worshipful my very good friend, Mr. Ralphe Sheldon, and all the friends I have in alliance to me by my wife, and in consanguinity to my children, that they will assist my wife in the care and regard of her children, and for their education in virtue and learning; wherein they shall do a work of merit, and worthy their profession towards God, and affection to me.   

§. 33.  
Item, in respect of the great favours I have found, and the many obligations of friendship wherein I am bound to be grateful: I do now commend to my children, and their posterity: that they ever show themselves inwardly affectionate, and, as may concern them in duty, serviceable, to the Worshipful family of the Throkmartons of Coughton, and among those, in especial to the posterity of my dearest friend Sir john Throkmarton of Fekenham, whereof there is in the eldest line but only one young Gentleman, john Throkmarton, the son of Francis, the son of Sir john: this young john Throkmarton is my Godson: I humbly beseech our Lord to bless him, defend him, and increase and multiply him with his grace, that he may, in the favour of God, repair the ruins and worldly accidents that unfortunately and ......... fell on his father and grandfather. Whose rare and wonderful gifts both of body and mind God grant may, in dutiful obedience to his Prince, descend upon him, and he use them to his glory.   

§. 34.  
☞ In most ample merit, and for greatest favour, I require, and charge all my children, with all that ever they shall be able, in body and mind, to be grateful, serviceable, and loving, to the right Worshipful Mr. Ralphe Sheldon of Beoley, Esquire, and to all that family, by whose great and inward affection borne me, after the decease of Sir john Throkmarton, I was not alonely comforted and favoured, but relieved and helped with all that I have in effect, as my wife by particularity of knowledge can well witness. They are a fortunate family, and have relieved and bred up more men of account, than all the gentlemen of Worcestershiere. And I would that all mine should serve and follow them, before any other family whatsoever. With these I require them, to be both grateful, and dutiful, to Sir john Littleton, Knight, and that house, of whose good favour I did also taste.   

§. 35.  
And now to bid farewell, and conclude with mine advice, to you my children, after you have resolved, and indeed become the servants of God, and ever to use prayer, as the means to make God mindful and careful of you. Resolve with yourselves to use truth, in word and deed, never to lie, nor dissemble with any man, for any cause: for albeit the same be counted now (the more is the pity) with many , but a worldly policy, yet assure yourselves, that those subtle shifts have in conclusion a shameful detection: and leave behind them a star of discredit, that will not be blotted out, seek to please good men, and pray for the evil.   

§. 36.  
Delight not in ribawdrie, scurrility, nor unclean communication, for such stuff as men utter with a pleasing tongue, wise men will judge there is store thereof in the heart.   

§. 37.  
Among all the virtues, make choice of humility, and abandon pride, for it is such a horse as will sure give his master a fall, sit he never so fast: you shall find more men exalted from mean estate by being humble, courtesou, and affable to all, than by any other worldly occasion.   

§. 38.  
Entertain all men with gentle speeches, and be not dainty to put off your caps to the poorest creature: for, let me your father be believed, that there is nothing that winneth the hearts of so many with so little cost.   

§. 39  
Accompany yourselves with the best, with all humility, and ever desire to be among wise men; with them rather the meanest, then to be Captain of an unruly rabbell of Roisters, for with whom men flock most, of such shall they be judged to be.   

§. 40.  
Be not rash, and hasty in judgement of ●ny thing: nor prone to anger, for the one ●s a short madness and the other the mo●her of error.   

§. 41.  
Use few words, and those with discretion, especially among your betters: where ●t is ever more seemly to be a hearer then speaker, without you be required.   

§. 42.  
Be not curious meddlers with other men's matters: nor busy lookers into other men's ●ues; but amend your own, and pray for ●hem that do amiss.   

§. 43.  
Be secret and silent in all things committed to your credit, for the blab is not liked, ●●ough he have never so many other ornaments.   

§. 44.  
Above all other things, in worldly respects, I warn you my children not to meddle with matters of estate; but to look to your calling, live in obedience, and leave Kings, and their causes to God: for the busy intermeddling with God's counsel (which I take the affairs of Princes to be) hath destroyed more rare overreaching wits, than any one thing else.   

§. 45.  
Use temperance in diet, and beware of drunkenness, for besides that it is a thing displeasant unto God, no man will trust the Drunkard.   

§. 46.  
Beware of sudden passion, either i● disport, or otherwise, for the rash ma● never wanteth woe: and no man will willingly have friendship, with such an one.   

§. 47.  
Be constant, and resolute, in all honest offices; and fast in friendship, for a turner with the wind is worthy the reward of a weathercock, and that is, still to be fed with the wind.   

§. 48.  
Use patience, and in any wise forbear revenge, as a property peculiar unto God: for I can by experience assure you, that to be patiented, and pray for them that offend you, will kill more enemies, and win more friends, than the sword, had you the power of a Prince.   

§. 49.  
Be not too liberal in expenses, but learn to use frugality, proportionating your charge, according to your store.   

§. 50.  
Be not overhastie to believe the fair words of every seeming friend, & trust not without trial. Be thankful for every courtesy, and requite it as you may; but let time breed the friends you commit secrets unto. Quia defecit veritas à filijs hominum.   

§. 51.  
Let the familiarity you have with your Superiors, if they thereunto admit you, be ever with due reverence, and not saucy: for though lion's play, yet have they long nails, to scratch at their pleasure.   

§. 52.  
Be ready to relieve all that are distressed, as it shall fall to your ability, for he shall never want a friend that hath been a friend.   

§. 53.  
Have charity with all men, and pity the poor, forward their suits, and relieve them for you may be assured that God will give an abundant blessing therefore.  
Quod tacitum velis nemini dixeris.   

§. 54.  
Embrace chastity, as a sweet ornament of the soul, and beware of the allurements of the harlot: for they destroy the body here, and after draw soul and body into hell.   

§. 55.  
Beware of suertieship, as a means of the undoing of many: neither be busy borrowers above ability to pay, which will either with the canker of usury consume your substance, to the very synders of beggary: or drive you into exile, from country to country, or leave you consuming in prison.   

§. 56.  
Apply yourselves in company to a modest mirth, agreeable to the delights of such as you are with: for sir Sulen, and sir Solemn, are seldom welcome to any place.   

§. 57  
One thing is my meaning, and full purpose, and I charge and adjure you, Edmond, and William; to perform it. That albeit I have made a grant to each of you by lease of my lands in possession, yet I require you before the majesty of God, that you never presume to take one foot thereof from your mother, so long as she liveth, nor to trouble her in the occupation thereof, otherwise than she shall freely give you; as before I have appointed: and if you do, look for a sharp revenge at the hands of almighty God, who will severely punish contempt to parents, and breach of the dead man's will.    

HERE FOLLOW certain fragments of the same Testament, that were left written in the same copy, but out of their order.  
ITem, I do give to William Turner my black silk rash doublet, a coat and cloak.  
Item, to the intent my wife may make William Turner beholding to her: I require her to bestow on him, as it may appear I did love him as a friend.  
Item, I do give to Arthur my son my gaffell bow, my best lute, and gittern: and my will is, that every of my four children shall have a joined bedstead, with a featherbed, and the furniture: and look what portion I did assign unto Francis, whose soul God pardon. I would should be assigned between William and Arthur, and to Marguerite my best virginals.  
Item, to every of my children a silver cup, and two silver spoons: the choice, as they are in age.  
Item, to whom so ever my lands descend, I will he or she to have my greatest clock.  
Item, I give to William my son, my guilded watch, which cost 3. pounds twelve shillings: which I commonly carry about me: it was made the same year that William was borne 1589. which year is graven by the name of the maker, on the watch: by the fly: and my gold ring with a crapon stone.  
Item, I give to Edmond my son, my round guilded watch, which is the larger of the two: and my ring of gold with the red sealing stone but I will my wife shall have the use of my round watch during her life.  
Item, I give to every child two old starre-Riolles.  
Item, I do give to Edmund my son my crossbow, handgunne, and short dag.  
Item, I give to William my son my stone bow and my longer dag.   

ANNOTATIONS UPON the precedent Testament. And first of the reason of them.  
SEeing the Author to call the Sacrament of Penance, by the name of Confession, and the Sacrament of our Saviour JESUS CHRIST'S Body and Blood, the Lords Supper: and fearing the weak might take occasion of offence where none was justly given: I undertook to note those places, and all others, if any of like sort were found different from the usual manner of speaking in these times; yet not so as I would make any great treatise, or discuss matters in controversy, so much handled and rehandled now a days: but only with reason to show, by the practice of good men, that in such use of speech there is no other thing than may well become a Christian man.  
This I thought to have done by way of marginal notes, but perceiving it increase to more than could with conveniency enter in the margins, I dilated myself and adjoined it to the end of the Testament, adding withal, some sentences of the saints, and renowned men, upon several passages thereof applied.  
THE TESTAMENT.] The original had no title prefixed, but thus I thought good to style it, rather than to call it a last will, or codicil, or donation for cause of death, etc. Because although, generally speaking, a last will do comprehend a Testament, yet every last will is not a Testament: in a codicil there cannot be given inheritance. c. de codicil. in l. si idem. And donation for cause of death, is but as it were a last will.  
A Testament, speaking properly, doth not comprehend every last will, for a Testament is the just sentence of our will, concerning that which one will have to be done after his death, with institution of an heir, l. iuncta glossa. ff. e. therefore without institution of an heir there is no Testament. insti. de leg. in §. ante haeredis. And consequently a Testament comprehendeth not a codicil.  
This, whether we respect the spiritual doctrines, or temporal distributions, may have the name of a Testament, of the first all, of the latter each one respectively are instituted heirs: the Author, with full ●ower of testation: for every man may ●ake a Testament that is not specially prohibited. no. glow. & Bart. in l. si quaeramus. ff. e. & ●e. in ti. de instru. edic. in §. compendiose.  
Faculty of making Testaments is a ●hing graciously granted men: be ause ●he testator disposeth of that time, wherein ●e is not to be Lord of any thing, for a Testament is confirmed in death.  in c. ●um Marthae. de cele. miss. That is, after his death when he ceaseth to be Lord or have ●ny dominion. Whence, although the disposition be made when he is Lord and at ●u●h time as he is able, yet the effect is bestowed at such time as he is unable: which of mere right, or law, should not be ●a●full. l. quod sponsae. c. de dona. ante ●nup.  
Testamentum, according to the etymology of the word is testatio mentis, a testification or witnessing of a man's mind. the Hebrews call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, a compact, or covenant between the dead and the living, which as the dead cannot, so the living may not change. Paul ad Heb. 9.16. Where there is a Testament of necessity the death of the testator must come in; for a Testament is confirmed in the dead, otherwise it is of no force, while he liveth that made the Testament. God Almighty in the death of CHRIST JESUS disposed t● new Testament to his elected, the sonn● of adoption,  
Aug. Epist. ad Gal. circa medium exposed lib. 1. Tom. 4. A humane Testament is muc● more infirm than the divine, and yet th● confirmed Testament of a man, none da● make void, nor ordain any thing a ne● upon it: for when the testator changeth h● Testament, he changeth an unconfirmed Testament, because it is confirmed by th● testatours death. And look of what value is the death of the testator to confirms his Testament, because he can now n● more change his counsel: of the same value is the incommutabilitie of God's promise t● confirm the inheritance of Abraham, whose faith is reputed for justice.  
The Author of this Testament confirmed the same in his death 11. years after the making of it, dying in the same profession of the Christian faith, with all the rites of the holy Catholic Church: leaving the Testament whole and entire in all, except the disposition of his goods; which by reason of the death of some, and birth of other children, increase of his goods and other occurrences, he left crossed in some places▪ and in others unperfect; all which places ●o● noted in the margin with semicircles, 〈◊〉 with asteriscs, or interpunctions in the addle of the line.  
IN THE NAME OF GOD] A Christian ●me of beginning, not only Testaments, ●t every good work: and with great ●son doth he call upon God in all his ●rks that cannot be, much less work of himself: man that is by the will of God ●st do all things in the name of God.  
Enosch the son of Seth, 
Gen. 4.26.  the son of A●n, being borne, then was the name of our ●ord first begun to be invocated, that is, ●th more express form of words, and ●es then before.  
Every one that invocateth the name of ●r Lord shall be safe: 
joël. 3.5. vulgata▪ 2. 32.  not that every one ●at sayeth Lord, Lord, shall go to heaven: ●t that there is no salvation for any, upon ●hom the name of the true God is not invocated.  
Hieremias 14.9. And thou Lord art most ●ward to us: and thy name is invocated of 〈◊〉, forsake us not.  
1. Reg. 18. vulgat. 3. Reg. All nations do ●vocate the names of their Gods.  
Elias. Ye shall call upon the names of our gods, and I will invocate in the name ●f the Lord.  
Coloss. 3.17. All things whatsoever ye do in word or work, do all in the name of o● Lord JESUS CHRIST.  
Psalm. 123, Our aid is in the name 〈◊〉 the Lord that made the heaven and earth When others have confidence, some i● their chariots, and others in their horses, 〈◊〉 will invocate the name of the Lord o● God. Psalm. 19  
judic. 11. Invocate the gods that ye hat● chosen. jonas 1. Arise & invocate thy God▪  
Many invocate not but in swearing, cursing; or blaspheming, contrary to th● Exod. 20. Thou shalt not assume the nam● of thy God in vain; and Levit. 19 Tho● shalt not perjure the name of God. Tho● shalt not pollute the name of God.  
Esaia 4. Let only thy name be invocate of us, etc. To those that invocate him, o● Lord is of much mercy. Psalm. 85. To a● that invocate him in verity. And therefore is always adjoined Amen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] Verity, particle of one assenting, and yielding trust, as if it were said, let it be firm, be ratified, be it truly so, be it done indeed truly, certainly, in very deed, constantly which if it be redoubled becometh superlative after the use of the Hebrew tongue, Amen, Amen, most truly, most certainly.  
Esaias 65.16. He that blesseth himse● earth, shall bless himself in God Amen. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Who is this God Amen, demandeth Rabbi Racanat upon the 15. of ●odus. Whereto the Cabalists answer by ●e rule of Notariacon, where a letter stands for a word. א For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Adonai. Our ●ord. ם. For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Melech. A King. ●. For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Neeman. Faithful, true: Which is no ●hit dissonant from the faith and confidence's which he that prayeth aught to have, ●ut rather much confirmeth it, when at the ●nd of every prayer he addeth Amen, that 〈◊〉 Dominus, Rex, Fidelis: Our Lord is a faithful King: Our Lord is Potent and of good will to grant us our Petitions made in his ●ame.  
Greg. Nazianz. in Apologetica. The best order of every word or work, is, that we ●ake our beginning from God and refer the consummation thereof unto him again.  
OUR SOVEREIGN LADY ELIZABETH] She was proclaimed Queen the 17. of November 1558. the same day that Queen Marie died.  
TEMPLE BROUGHT ON] This Manor belonged in former times to the order of the Templars.  
HEALTH OF BODY: AND OF SOUND AND PERFECT MEMORY.] The first is necessary, in as much as it conduceth to the latter, which is absolutely necessary. For whatsoever is by a man done without it, although it be the action of a man (as the action of a brute beast is the action of a brute beast) yet is it not a humane action. Which proceedeth from a deliberate will, having free faculty to work, or not to work, and also sufficient light in the understanding to consult and deliberate upon the things that are to be done, and to discern between moral good and evil. Which actions alone, and no others, do merit or demerit, serve to the end of a man, and bear away reward. Want of health, and old age, do oftentimes diminish, & oftentimes quite abolish the necessary use of reason in a man at that time when most of all he should have it: at his end, when he is to dispose of his house, his earthly in habitation, & leave the same, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. 
Ecclesiastes. 〈◊〉.  Remember thy creator in the days of thy elections: before the evil days do come, and the years lay hold on thee of which thou mayest say I have no will in them. The days of elections, the vulgate calleth the days of youth, as wherein a man hath most vigour to extend his hand to fire or water and choose good or evil; and the days in which we have no will, is the time of dotage when a man's actions are scarcely humane, or the days of infirmity & sickness which the vulgate calleth the days that please us not.  
Greater madness can not be, then to defer the thing that most concerneth, and that of necessity we must do, until such time as we be most unable to do it: as if a man that were to carry an hundred weight, should let it alone when he were strong, with purpose to bear it when he were fainting through feebleness: yet such is the want of reason in many men as they defer and put off, not only the disposing of worldly goods, but even the profession of their faith, or conversion to God by penance & good life, until they be hardly able to exercise any act of life.  
Let us not, saith S. Augustine, 
Aug. 1. de salutarib. documenti● cap. 39 Tom. 4.  so secure ourselves of God's mercy, as to heap sin upon sin, nor say, while we be in the vigour of our age, let us exercise our concupiscences, and at last in old age we will do penance for our evils, because our Lord is pious, and merciful, and will no more remember our crimes. Let us not, I beseech you, think so; for, thus to think is folly in the highest degree, being it is impious for any man to will to have such licence from God, whereof the very beginning, is, to separate us from God: therefore, I say, let us not think of such things, being we know not what day we are to die: for no man living knoweth the day of his departure. All die not in old age, but in divers ages they depart out of this world; and in what acts soever a man is found, in the same shall he be judged, when the soul goeth out of the body: for the Psalmist saith, no man shall confess thee in hell. Let us therefore make haste to be converted to penance, etc.  
Come hither mad man; the disposing of soul and body which thou hast at thine own will, is it a work to be done in time of sickness, which time yet thou art not sure to have, or in old age, of which thou hast as little certainty, or rather a work that requireth health, and strength of body, with perfect use of all the powers of thy soul? Age and sickness, thou sayest, will force a man, to look about him. How Alas, shall then that habit come upon thee of which there hath been no precedent, act? thou art habituated in deferring, and that habit will still follow thee: thou wilt yet defer, and if for ever thou couldst defer, for ever thou wouldst not serve God: of whom it is yet doubtful whether he will accept of this thy last will, which was, never to give God but ●he last, and that is now rather necessity ●hen will, and in it thou seekest not God, ●ut thyself, because thou fearest to be ●ost for ever. 
Seneca in Agamennone. Seneca epist. 32 Bernardus sermo. 10▪ in psal. qui habitat. Aug. epist. 13●  How miserable a thing it is not to know to die! how goodly a ●hing it is before death to consummate life, ●nd then secure to expect the rest of our ●ime! Being in agony thou wilt do, as commonly the afflicted use, repute it the ●ighest felicity to be exempted from those molestations, and judge it the greatest beatitude to want that misery; whereas that temporal molestation ought rather ●o admonish us how we should think of that life, wherein we may live without any labour: escaping, not the turmoiling anguish of a little time, but ●he horrible pains of everlasting fire: for, if we now deal with so much care, ●o great intention, and such labour, ●hat we fall into no transitory vexation; how much more solicitous should we be to avoid everlasting miseries? And if death that finisheth temporal ●abour be so feared, how is that to ●e feared that casteth us into never●nding sorrows; and if the foul and ●hort delights of this life be so lo●ed; how much more vehemently are the pure and infinite joys of the world to come, to be sought after? then in the time of youth and health, and not of crazy old age. Sickness coming on, a ma● seeketh only how to get ease, which had, he is then as fare to seek as before, in tha● conversion which before he pretended. While we have time, saith the Apostle, le● us do good, he that deferreth, sinneth ever, in as much as if he should never leave to live, he would never leave to sin, and perchance that is the sin to death, whero● S. john. 
Epist. 1. c. 5. Tom. 3. cap. 71.  I say not that any man pray for such an one. Among the sentences of S. Augustin● is this: The remedies of conversion to God are not with any delays to be deferred, le● the time of correction perish by our sloth for he that to the penitent hath promise● indulgence, hath not to the dissembler promised to morrow's day. Life is not muc● worth, 
Aug. de Temp. Serm. 120.  if a man live to no other end, bu● that in the few years of this life, whic● with a short end is to be cut off, he heap up to himself eternal pains to last without end. But lest any one become too secure or wax remiss by the felicity of such new● credulity, lest perchance any one do say in his heart, let not my guilty conscience s● fare gripe and trouble me, nor my culpabl● life so fare contristate me, I see in a moment, ● see in a small space of time the good thiefs ●rimes forgiven him, etc. First in that chief is to be considered, not only the compendiousness of his credulity, but his devotion, but the occasion of that time wherein those things were done, in which ●ven the perfection of the just is said to have been shaken. Then show me first the thiefs faith, and after promise thyself the thiefs beatitude; the devil casteth in security that he may draw on perdition. It cannot be numbered how many this shadow of vain hope hath deceived. Let, I beseech you, the innumerable company of people, under colour of such security taken out of this life, void of all good, full of all evil, deter us from this persuasion. By daily fearing the uncertainty of our passage and departure hence, which even now are unlooked for, and yet at hand, and are to want all remedy for ever, the day must be prevented which is wont to prevent us. He seduceth himself and playeth with his death that thinketh thus, the indulgence of the last hour may help me; security promised at the last day is most perilous. Then again, it is a most foolish thing to commit unto the unprofitable extremity of the now faliing life, that cause which treateth of eternal necessities. It is odious before God, when a man sinneth more freely through confidence of penance that he will do in old age. Believe me, my dearest, it is a difficult thing for crafty dissimulation of ordering a man's end, to be found worthy to obtain pardon: with that interpreter of the heart, there wil● be admitted no art to salvation. But that blessed thief of whom we have spoken, did neither wittingly defer the time of his salvation, nor with unlucky fraud put the remedies of his state in the last moments, nor reserve the hope of his redemption, to the last of desperation; Before that time he neither knew Christ nor Religion; which if he had known he had been perchance amongst the Apostles, not the last in the number who became the first in the kingdom. In this therefore he pleased God at the last, because to the obtaining of the faith, that was not the last hour, but the first. Necessary therefore it is that by daily acts a man provide for himself, and procure his consummation, it is necessary that all our life be such in conversation, as we may deserve to be free in the end. Thincking incessantly upon the day of our passage, and the time of judgement.  
Admit thou hast at last both health and memory, thou art not sure the grace shall then be offered, which often offered thou hast refused. Thou that despisest, 
Isaia▪ 33. Eccles. 7.40.  shalt thou not also be despised? Remember in all thy words, thy last things and thou wilt not sin for ever. 
Hieron. Epist. ad Paulin. in fine. tom. 3. Aug. serm. 10 de Sanctis. tom. 1●.  He will contemn all things with ease that always thinketh how he is to die.  
If men would always bear their day of death in mind, they would restrain the same from all covetousness or malice. But that which wholesomely now they will not think upon, necessarily hereafter, & without all remedy they shall sustain: For the last day will come upon them, the day of judgement will come, when neither it shall be lawful for them to do penance, nor can they by good works redeem themselves from everlasting death: then with such deep thought the sinner is strooken, as dying he forgets himself, who whilst he lived did forget his God.  
They that were hired to the vineyard, 
Aug. de verb. Domini serm. 59 tom. 10.  when the father of the family went out and hired; for examples sake, those that he found the third hour; did they say unto him, expect, we will not go thither till the sixth, or those that he found the sixth hour, did they say, we will not go till the ninth; or those that he found the ninth hour, did they say, we will not go till the eleventh? for he will give all alike and wherefore shall we weary ourselves more than the rest? What he is to give, and what he will do, is in his own power, the counsel is to himself, do thou come when thou art called: for equal reward is promised to all, but about the hour of working there is a great question: for if they, for example's sake, that were called at the sixth hour constitute in that age of body when the youthful years are fervent, as at the sixth hour it is hot; if those young men called should say, expect for we have heard in the Gospel that all shall receive one reward, we will come at eleven, when we be old, being to receive alike wherefore shall we labour? it would be answered them and said; wilt thou not labour that knowest not whether thou shalt live to be old? thou art called at the sixth hour; come, the father of the family indeed hath promised thee thy penny if thou come, even at eleven; but whether thou shalt live till the seventh hour no body hath promised thee. I do not say till the eleventh, but till the seventh. Wherefore then dost thou put off, and defer him that calleth thee being certain of thy wages and uncertain of the day? Look ●o it, lest perhaps what by promise he is to give thee, thou by deferring take from thyself.  
If a man do penance when he hath power to sin, and while he liveth, correct his life from all crime; there is no doubt but that dying he passeth unto everlasting rest. But he that living wickedly do●h penance only in peril of death; as his damnation is uncertain, so is his remission doubtful. He therefore that in death desireth to be certain of indulgence, let him do penance while he is sound, let him sound, and in health, bewail his passed heinous facts. Isidorus lib. 2. de summo bono. cap. 13.  
If any one being now in the last extremity of sickness will and doth accept of penance: and immediately is reconciled, and depart●th hence; I confess to you, we deny him not what he asketh, but we presume not that he departeth hence well. I do not presume, I deceive you not, I do not presume. The faithful living well, departeth hence secure, he that was baptised but an hour before, departeth hence secure: he that doth penance and is reconciled while he is in health, and after liveth well, departeth hence secure: he that doth penance at the last and is reconciled, whether he depart hence secure, I am not secure. Aug. lib. 50. hom. 41.  
In vain doth he pour out his prayers before the tribunal of Christ, who neglecteth the time of penance given him. Aug. serm. 71. ad fratres in eremo.  
Integrity of the mind, and not health of body, is required in the testator, at that time when he maketh his testament. Digest. lib. 28. tit. 1.  

Gen. 47 ●.  SHORT PILGRIMAGE] jacob said to Pharaoh, The days of the years of my Pilgrimage, are 130. years: short and bad have the days of the years of my life been, and they have not reached to the days of the the years of my ancestors lives, in the days of their Pilgrimages.  
By way of malediction was man's life first cut from the ordinary length of 500 or in some 900. and stinted to 120. Gen. 6.3.  

Psal. 89  The days of our years in themselves are 70. years: And if in able men they be 80. years: what is above that is labour and grief.  

Psal. 38  Behold thou hast set my days measurable: how short is our life that is to be measured, not the days of it only, but the hours, but the moments: not by the divine, or Angelical science alone, but by every man that hath but a little tasted of Arithmetic?  
Well may his days be measured, whose very substance is as nothing in the sight of God.  
LONG ACCOUNT] Long and strict, 
Mat. 12.36.  when of every idle word which men have spoken, they shall render an account thereof in the day of judgement.  
Every one of us shall render to God an account for himself. 
Rom. 14 12.   
§. 1. Pag. 17. A TRUE CHRISTIAN CATHOLIC MAN] By this title did S. Augustine style himself: Sed de me quid dicam, 
Lib. de utilitate credendi.  qui iam Catholicus Christianus eram? But of myself what shall I say who was now a Catholic Christian?  
The name of Christian was given to the Disciples first at Antioch in the very beginning of the Apostles preaching of Christ's Gospel. 
Act. 11.26.   
The Apostles themselves in their symbol called the Church Catholic, and the members thereof catholics.  
As many as being baptised have put on Christ are called Christians; this the use of the name hath obtained; although with some nations he is not holden, in common understanding, for a true Christian that is not also a Catholic, and the one name comprehendeth as much as the other, and they be convertible.  
Besides these so ancient names whereby ever since Christ's time those of the true Religion have been known, whosoever bringeth in another, doth injury to the catholic cause, which the Heretics of our times have laboured much in, to have us called Roman Catholics, that consequently themselves might also be called catholics of other particular Churches, suppose, of Amstelrodam, Geneva, or the like. This they do pricked on by the sting of envy seeing us alone to bear away from them that most ancient and glorious name: while they thereby shut out of the whole, must of necessity remain sects, and by one name, whatsoever they be, be called Heretics. This fraud, and the poison of their malicious intention some Catholics not perceiving, take upon them the addition of Roman: Which although it be good in itself because the Roman Church is the Catholic Church, yet more glorious it were for us, and more confusion to our adversaries to stand fast to that our first name of Catholic which we have prescribed from them and never suffered to go out of our hands.  

Aug. de vera Religione, Tom. 1.  Taking Catholic in the true sense, it signifieth a man that professeth the only true Religion wherein one God is worshipped and with most purified piety known, and acknowledged for the beginning of all nature, by whom all the universe is both begun, and perfected, and contained, in the one, only, and universal Church which is called Catholic, and not tied to one place, but diffused into all places and all times.  
We, Saith S. Augustine, 
Aug. de vera Religione, c. 7.  must hold the Christian Religion, and the communication of that Church, which is Catholic, & called Catholic, not only of those that are her own, but also of all her enemies. For whether they will or Noah, the very Heretics themselves, and nourtured in schisms, when they speak not with their own compagnions', but with strangers, they call Catholic, nothing else but Catholic, for otherwise they can not be understood, unless they discern her by this name, by which she is called of all the universal world.  
Of universal Saith S. Augustine, 
Aug. contra litteras Petiliani. c. 38 Tom. 7. Act. 1.  Catholic took the name: our Lord himself saying: It is not for you to know the times which my Father hath kept in his own power: but you shall receive the virtue of the holy Ghost coming upon you, and ye shall be witnesses for me in Jerusalem, & all judea, & Samaria and through all the earth. Behold from whence Catholic is called.  
A Christian I am, and a Catholic I am of the same Christian faith that the Disciples were at Antioch and the same Catholic faith that was founded upon saint Peter and continueth in his successors the vicar's of Christ at Rome: which is to be a Christian Catholic man simply, and absolutely. He that calleth himself a Roman Catholic doth like him that calleth a man a risible reasonable man, giving no more distinction in the last then at the first: for all that they will have a Roman Catholic to signify, is but the same that is signified by a Catholic.  
A Roman Catholic, soundeth in some sense as if one should say a particular universal. Augustine. 
Aug. contra Gaudent. lib. 5. tom. 7.  Mark a little what Church Cyptian called Catholic when he defended the unity thereof, the Church, saith he, spread through with the light of our Lord streacheth out her beams through the whole world. Yet it is one light which is every where diffused, and the unity of the body is not separated. She extendeth her branches over the universal earth with copious plenty: her large spread streams more broad she layeth forth: yet the head is one and the origin one: and one mother copious in successions of fecundity ...... if yours be ●he Catholic Church show her stretching ●er beams over the whole world: Show ●hat she extends her branches with co●ious fertility over the universal earth: For hence is Catholic of the Greek ●ord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 named. and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 holon in Greek maketh in English the whole, or ●niversall, so that through the whole, or according to the whole is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Catholon, from whence Catholic ●s called.  
To be a Christian is glorious, and may suffice us in as much as he that is a good Christian must necessarily be a good Catholic, for he is a Christian that being baptised professeth the whole doctrine of JESUS CHRIST in his Church, and the same is also a Catholic, which name was given to distinguish between some and others of the baptised that not professing the whole doctrine, of Christ did stick to parts and making a doctrine of their own, leaving the whole, are therefore Heretics: which only name is condistinguisht against Catholics, that whosoever is not a Catholic is by the same an Heretic: and not a Luther's Catholic as, the Germans call it, nor a Calvins' Catholic, nor no Catholic: for no other sort of Catholic is there, or can b● then a Christian Catholic, S. Peter Ma●men died a Martyr at Damascus about th● year of our Lord 742. Slain by the Arabians, for saying: Every one that embrace● not the Christian Catholic faith, is da●ned, like as Mahomet your false proph● is. Mart. Rom. 9 Kal. Mart. Theophan. in hi● Miscell. lib. 22. Anno 2. Constant. 6. Imp.  

Aug. l. 1 Quaest. ex Mat.  Good Catholics and evil Catholic S. Augustin admitteth. Calling those evi● Catholics, who, although they beleeu● those things to be true which appertains to the true doctrine of faith; and if the● be any thing that they do not know the● think it is to be sought out, and without breach of piety do discuss it, without any prejudice to the truth itself, and in a● much as they can, do love and honour those that ar● good, and whom they thinks to be good; yet they live wickedly and full of heinous crimes, otherways then the● believe that they ought to live. And good Catholics are those which follow both entire faith and good manners.  

Aug de Civitate Dei. l. 10 c. 32.  What is the universal way, but tha● which every nation hath, not proper only to itself: but is given from God, that i● may be common to the university, of nations, to all people: this is our piety, which therefore is called Catholic, because it is not delivered to any certain people, as to the jews, but to all humane kind, and excludeth not any one; by this all may be saved, and without it none; and in this every nation hath not his own religion, like as with the Gentiles; for with the Romans other Gods were, and worshipped after another manner then with the Greeks'; others with them then with the French, Spanish, Scythians, Indians, Persians: all nations that have professed Christ do worship the same God, and with the same kind of sacrifice; and Augustine 
Aug. Breviculi count.  calleth the Church Catholic not alone for the plenitude of sacraments therein, but also for the university of nations, and people that therein communicate.  
S. Athanasius, 
Luc. Act. 11.26. Mart. Rom. 8. Kal. mart.  in his dispute against Arrius, giveth the reason of the Disciples being called Christians, thus: All that believed in our Lord JESUS CHRIST, were not called Christians, but only Disciples: And because there arose many Authors of new opinions, contrary to the Apostolical doctrine, they called all their followers Disciples; and there was no difference in name between true and false Disciples, whether they were Christ's, or Dosithees, or the followers of one judas, or of john, that confessed themselves, as it were, of Christ's Church, but all were called by that one name of Disciples. Then the Apostles coming together (as by S. Luke's narration the Acts bear witness) called all the Disciples by one name Christians, differencing them from the common name of Disciples; and that the saying of the divine Oracle pronounced by Isaias 62.2. might be accomplished, which hath; And thou shalt be called by a new name which the mouth of our Lord shall declare, etc.  

Epipha. haeret. 27.  Not long after the Heretics had emulation to this name, and the Carpocratians first usurped it, whom others followed, reproaching so great a name with false doctrine, & evil manners, as now they would do with the name of Catholic.  

Rom. 10.  Pag. 17. §. 1. lin. 4. BY FAITH CONFESSING] With the heart we believe, to justice, & with mouth Confession is made to salvation. Faith in the heart, confession in the mouth. This is the word of faith which we preach (saith the Apostle) that if thou confess our Lord JESUS in thy mouth, and believe in thy heart that God hath raised him from death, 
Aug. de fide ad Petrum, Tom. 3.  thou shalt be safe. S. Augustin to Peter the Deacon. I am glad indeed that thou hast so much solicitude for the keeping of the true faith, without any vice of perfidiousness without which faith no conversion can profit, nor yet be at all: for the Apostolical authority saith; that without faith it is impossible to please God: because faith is the foundation of all good things: faith is the beginning of humane salvation; without this faith no man can come to the number of the Sons of God: because without it neither in this world doth any one obtain the grace of justification, nor in the world to come shall he possess life everlasting. And if any one do not walk here by faith, he shall not come to the vision. Without faith all man's labour is in vain, for such it is, as without the true faith whosoever will please God by contempt of the world: as if one bending toward the country in which he knoweth he shall live blessedly, should leave the right way and improvidently follow error, by which he cannot come to the blessed City, but fall into precipice, where will be no joy given to him that cometh, but destruction brought in to him that falleth.  
IN HOPE REPOSING MY SALVATION] A right order first to believe and confess, then to hope. I have believed and therefore have I spoken, and am over much humbled; saith the Psalmist, as it were betwixt hope and fear.  
Augustin. Encheridion ad Laurentium. Tom. 3. What can be hoped for which is not believed: and yet something may be believed which is not hoped for. As, which of the faithful believeth not the pains of the damned, and yet he doth not hope for them? and whosoever believeth that they be now at hand, hanging over his head, and with a flying motion of his mind doth abhor them, is better said to fear then to hope. Which Lucan distinguishing, hath set down thus: Let him that feareth hope. Faith is both of evil things and good: for both good and evil things are believed and that with good, and not with evil faith. Faith is also of things past, and present, and to come, for we believe that Christ died, which now is passed: We believe that he sitteth at the right hand of the Father, which now is: We believe that he shall come to judge, which is to be. Faith is also of a man's own things, and of other men's, for every man believeth of himself that he had a beginning, and that he was not ever, and such other things: nor only of other men but also of the Angels we believe many things that appertain to Religion. But hope is only of good things, and those to come, and belonging to him that is said to hope for them. All which being so, for these causes faith is to be distinguished from hope, as well in reasonable difference as in the name. For in that belongeth to the not seeing either those things that are believed or hoped for, it is common to faith and hope. In the Epistle to the Hebrews, the testimony whereof the illustrious defenders of the Catholic rule have used; faith is said to be a convincing of those things which are not seen. Although when any one saith himself to have believed, not words, nor witnesses, nor any arguments, but the evidence of the present things, that is, to have given credit to them, it seemeth not so absurd, that he might rightly be reprehended in word, and it should be said unto him, thou hast seen and therefore thou hast not believed; whence it may be thought not to be consequent that whatsoever thing is believed must not be seen, but better we call that faith which is taught by the divine word, of those things, to wit which are not seen.  
And of hope the Apostle saith, hope which is seen is not hope; for that which one seethe, what doth he hope for? but if we hope for the things that we see not, we expect with patience. When therefore future good things be believed of us, they are no other thing then hoped for.  
Now what shall I say of love without the which faith profiteth nothing? and hope without love cannot be: To conclude, as S. james saith, the divelles believe and tremble, and yet they do not hope, or love, but rather that which believing we hope for and love, they fear shall come upon them. Wherefore the Apostle Paul approoveth & commendeth the faith which worketh by love, which verily cannot be without hope, nor hope without love, nor both without faith.  
D. Thom. 2.2. quaest. 17. Eternal beatitude is the proper object of hope. For we may not hope for less of God than himself, in enjoying of whom consisteth life everlasting. And supposing our union to our neighbour by love, a man may by the virtue of Theological hope, hope for beatitude for him as well as for himself: 
Psalm. 145. Hierem. 17.5.  but to confide in Princes or the sons of men, concerning salvation, or to set our hope in man, the holy Ghost forbiddeth and gives a curse to him that doth it. That faith being old will I keep in which a child I was borne. Hieronymus ad Pammachium & Oceanum, paulo ante finem. Tom. 2. Now doth faith swim in many men's lips, when in their heart there is either none at all, or that that is doth vehemently languish. For who doth not profess that which we read in the Deuteronomie. Hear Israel, 
Deut. 6. & 10.  thy Lord thy God is one Lord? And, thou shalt adore thy God and serve him alone? Who doth not daily recite with mouth, I believe in God the father Almighty? notwithstanding he believeth not in God, that doth not place in him alone all the trust of his felicity: neither hath he one God and Lord that by harlottrie, by riot, and avarice, doth the commands of Satan: nor doth he serve him alone, that serveth his belly, that is given to this world which is set all upon wickedness. The heathens think there be many Gods, and dost thou seem to thyself a perfect Christian, because thou art persuaded that there is but one God? What great matter dost thou? the jews do the same, who daily blaspheme the Son of God in their Synagogues; the same do the devils believe and tremble at it. If truly thou believest in God believe him to be just and true. Just in rewarding the good, and punishing the evil: true in his promises: believe that there is no hope of salvation but only in his Son whom he delivered to the cross for all of us, and to death, believe that no evil can fall to them that deliver themselves wholly over unto his will; and do persever in the same, this is to believe in God the Father, this is to believe in his Son, this is to believe in the holy Ghost. Cyprian. de duplici martyrio longe ante finem. Tomo 4. Unexercised faith soon languisheth, and idle is tempted with frequent discommodities: the crafty enemy breaks in upon remiss sentinels: but extern fraud instructs the man that's exercised in war and bears him gloriously to the palm of victory. Peace therefore to the faithful is matter of corruption. Ambros. serm. 11. in Psal. 118. longius ante finem. Tom. 4.  

Psalm. 141.  I have cried to thee O Lord, I have said thou art my hope, my portion in the land of the living.  

Psal. 26  Abide our Lord, deal manfully, and thy heart shall be comforted, and sustain our Lord. Because the world, what it promiseth seemeth here to give in the land of the dying; and our Lord, what he promiseth is to give in the land of the living, many are weary of expecting the true joy and are not ashamed to love the deceitful; of such the Scripture saith. 
Eccle. 2  Woe to them that have lost their patiented sustaining, and diverted into wicked ways. Aug. de verbis Apost. serm. 25. Tom. 10.  
Spe salvi facti sumus. Spes non confundit. by hope we are saved, hope confoundeth not. How hope should be without faith I do not find, for no man hopeth that he can attain that which he doth not believe to be. It behooveth therefore that all three be in the mind, faith, hope, and charity: that both a man believe the things be true to which he is called, and hope that he may attain to them, and that he love them. Aug. lib. 21. sententiarum, sent. 8.  
One hope is of the eternal rewards, another of comfort in the humility of tribulation. Aug. enarr. in Psalm. 118. super, Memor esto verbi tui servo tuo in quo mihi spem dedisti. Tomo 8.  
Because the man that is converted to God hath his delight changed; the things that he delights in are also changed, and not taken quite away; for all our delights in this life, are not yet in deed: but the hope itself is so certain as it is to be preferred before all the delights of this world. Aug. enarr. in Psalm. 74. Tomo 8.  
Pag. 17. §. 1. lin. 5. IN THE ONLY MERITS] All our merits are founded in the merits of Christ's incarnation, life, and passion: which ground work taken away, no man hath, or ever had, or could have since Adam any merits towards life everlasting, which by his demerits he lost and merited damnation. 
Aug. Confess. cap, 13. tom. 1. Et de Trinit. l. 13. c. 10. tom. 8.  Whosoever reckoneth up his merits to thee, what doth he but reckon up thy free gifts.  
What was so necessary to erect our hope, and deliver mortal minds, dejected with the very condition of mortality, from despairing of immortality, as that it should be demonstrated unto us how much God weighed us and how much he loved us? And what token of this more manifest and more excellent, then that the Son of God, immutably good, remaining in himself what he was, and taking of us, and for us, what he was not, without detriment of his soul's nature, vouchsafing to enter into our fellowship, first without any evil merit of his own, he would bear our evils: and so now believing how much God loveth us, and hoping for that which before we despaired of, with bounty no way due, he would bestow his gifts upon us without any good merits of ours, yea, with many precedent evil merits; for even those things that are called our merits, are his gifts: for that faith may work by love, the charity of God is diffused in our hearts by the holy Ghost given us. Aug. enarr. in Psalm. 144. tom. 8. Gratia salvi facti estis. Where thou hearest grace, understand gratis, if therefore gratis, than thou hast brought nothing, thou hast merited nothing: For if any thing be rendered for merits, it is wages and not grace: by grace, saith he, you are saved through faith. Expound that more clearly for the arrogant, for those that please themselves, for those that are ignorant of God's justice and will constitute their own. And this self same thing more openly. And this, quoth he, that you are made safe by grace is not of yourselves, but the gift of God, But we perhaps have done something to merit the gift of God. What then? do not we work well? yes, we work, but how? he working in us because by faith we give place in our heart to him who in us and by us worketh good things .............. Harken to the same thing; what didst thou merit sinner? Contemner of God, what didst thou merit? see if thou canst meet with any thing but punishment, see if thou canst meet with any thing but pain: thou seest then what was due to thee, & what he gave thee that gave thee gratis. Perdom is given to the sinner, the spirit of justification is given, charity and dilection is given, wherein thou mayest do all good things: and above all this, he will give both life everlasting and the society of the Angels: all of mercy, boast no where of thy merits because thy merits themselves are his gifts. Dominum Deum tuum adorabis & illi soli seruies▪ Thou shalt adore thy Lord thy God and serve him alone, and thy neighbours erring and labouring thou must help as much as is lawful and commanded; so as this very thing when it is well done, we do understand God to do it by us, and deceived with vain glory challenge nothing to ourselves, by which one vice we be from height drowned in the deep. Aug. De quantitate animae, lib. 1. cap. 34. tom. 1. & de libero arbitrio lib. 1. cap. 14. Of our merit that it is volunrarie. For this that eternal law hath with immutable stability confirmed, that merit be in the will, reward and punishment in beatitude and misery. When therefore we say that men are voluntarily wretched, we speak not as if they had a will to be wretched: but that they be in such will, as whether they will or no, misery must necessarily follow: and therefore it repugneth not in the superior reason that all have a will to be blessed and yet cannot: for all will not live uprightly, to which only will, blessed life is due. And again. De morib. Ecclesiae Cath. lib. 1. cap. 25. tom. 1. Life everlasting is the whole reward, in whose promise we have joy: and the reward cannot go before ●e merits and be given a man before he be worthy of it? for what is more unjust than ●his, and what more just than God? we ●ust not therefore demand reward before ●e have merited to receive it.  
Aug. lib. de Beata vita. Meritis matris se vivere ●edit. Augustine thought he lived through ●is mother's merits; and lib. 1. Soliloquiorum. He disprooveth the error of those that ●hinke the souls to have no merit with God: of merit, see. Aug. most copiously in many places. Impressione Basileae 1543. Tom. 2. col. 161. a. 163. a. 161. c. 464. c. Tom. 3. col. 204. B. Tom. 7. col. 770. a. & Tom. 2. Epist. 105. What merits then of his own, shall he that is delivered boast of, who if he had according to his merits, should be nothing but damned? Are then the merits of the just none? they are verily, because they are just, but that they might become just there were no merits; for they were made just, when they were justified: but as the Apostle saith, justified by his grace gratis. Multa ibi vide. Tom. 2. col. 466. a. 486. B. Tom. 7. col. 1306. B. Tom. 8. col. 1104. B. Tom. 9 col. 26. a. Tom. 4. col. 1014. a. 1234. a. Tom. 10. 406. a. Tom. 3. 191. a. 162. B. 189. d. 190, B. 437. a. 584. c.d. 186. d. Tom. 4384. B. 169. d. 171. d. 1305. c. 876. c.d. 919. d.  
I IMPLORE THE ASSISTANCE ● PRAYER OF THE B. AND IMMACULATE VIRGIN MARIE AND O● ALL THE HOLY COMPANY O● HEAVEN] Concerning Prayer to Sain● it is in vain to ask of what opinion h● was that thus actually prayeth to our blessed Lady and all the Saints. So praye● S. Augustine to the Saints. You therefore tha● have merited to become companions o● the heavenly citizens and enjoy the clariti● of eternal glory, pray for me to our Lord that he will take me out of this priso● wherein I am holden bound and captive, etc. Tom. 3. l. de spiritu & anima, col. 898 And de ecclesiasticis dogmatibus, cap. 73. Th● same S. saith, the bodies, and chief th● relics of the blessed Martyrs are mos● sincerely to be honoured, as if they were th● members of Christ, and Churches called by their names, as holy places dedicated to the Divine worship, with most pious affection and devotion to be most faithfully frequented we believe: and of the mane● how the Saints ought to be honoured; at large. Lib. 8. De Civitate Dei: cap. 27. & Tom. 6. contra Faustum Manichaeum, lib. 20. cap. 21. The Christian people celebrateth the Martyr's memory with religious solemnity, both to excite themselves to imitation, and that they may be coupled in ●llowship to their merits, and helped by ●eir prayers: yet so, as to none of the martyr's, but to the God himself of the martyr's we constitute Altars, although in memory of the Martyrs. For which of ●he Bishops assisting at the Altars in places ●f the holy bodies, hath at any time said: ●e offer to thee Peter, or Paul, or Cyprian: ●ut that which is offered, is offered to God who crowned the Martyrs, at the ●emories of them whom he crowned: ●hat by the admonition of the very places ●reater affect arise to whet charity, both ●owards them, whom we can imitate, ●nd towards him by whose help we be ●ble to imitate. We therefore worship the Martyrs, with that worship of love and society, wherewith also in this life holy men of God are worshipped whose hearts ●e perceive to be prepared to the like passion for the Evangelicall truth. But ●hose by so much more devoutly, as more securely after all uncertain things overcome, and with how much more confident praise we preach them now victors in a more happy life, then as yet fight in this ●ife. But with that worship which in Greek ●s called latria, and cannot be spoken in one word in latin, being a certain servitude properly due to the Divinity, we neith● worship nor teach to be worshipped, b● one God, etc. Aug. in Psalm. 85. prope fine● Tom. 8. Our Lord JESUS CHRIS● doth yet intercede for us: All the Marty● that are with him make intercession for 〈◊〉 their interpellings do not pass until o● sighs have passed, etc. Lege de Civitate D● lib. 21. Tom. 5 & in Psalm. 105. Tom. 8. vers● Si non Moyses electus eius stetisset in cons●actio● in ●on●pectu eius. Aug, serm. 2. de anuntiatione fine. Tom. 10. serm de Sanctis. O Blessed MARIE who is able worthily to repay thee in th●nkes and preachings of thy praises who by thy singular assent didst succou● th● l●st world? what praises can human frailty pay thee, which in thy only commerce h●th found an entry to recovery▪ Receive ●herfore how small soever, how soever to thy merits unequal thancks-g●vings, and when thou hast received ou● v●wes, by prayer, excuse our faults. Adm● our prayers within the sacrary of thy hearing & bring us ba●ke an antidote of reconciliation: be it by thee excusable which b● thee we intrude, let that become impetrable which with faithful mind we ask, receive what we offer, give again, what w● ask, excuse that we fear, because thou ar● the only hope of sinners, by thee we hope for pardon of our sins, and in thee most blessed is the expectation of our rewards: Holy Marie secure the wretches, help the pusillanimous, refresh the sorrowful, pray for the people, stand for the clerecie, make intercession for the devout woman kind, let all feel thy help that celebrate ●hy memory. Assist readily to the vows of those that ask, and to all, repay the ●ished effect. Let thy daily studies be to pray for the people of God, who blessed ●ast merited to bear the Redeemer of the world that liveth and reigneth world without end.  
Very worthy and just is it to glorify he mother of our God ever most blessed ●nd undefiled, 
Chrysost. in liturg.  more honourable than Cherubin's, more glorious fare than Seraphins, ●ho without all corruption hast brought ●orth God, we magnify thee the true mo●her of God, hail Marie full of grace our ●ord is with thee, blessed thou among ●omen, & blessed the fruit of thy womb, because thou hast brought forth the Saviour of our souls.  
To thee we call most holy virgin, 
Athan▪ in Evag. de S. Maria Deipara  be mindful of us thou who even after thy delivery didst remain a virgin. Hail ●arie full of grace our Lord is with thee, the orders of Angels and all men do call thee blessed. Blessed art thou above all women, & blessed the fruit of thy womb. Make intercession for us O Mistress, O Lady, O Queen, and Mother of God.  

Greg. Nazian. Traged. Christi.  Thrice blessed mother, light of virgins, that dost inhabit the bright temples of heaven, free from filth of mortality, adorned now with immortalities' stole, yield a benign ear to my words from on high, and receive I beseech thee O virgin my prayers.  

Bernar. serm. 2. de Advent.  O blessed inventor of grace, bring forth of life, and mother of health, let us b● thee have access to thy son that by the● he may receive us, who by thee was give● to us.  
IMMACULATE] This is the prope● epithet of the Conception of our blesse● Lady. Others there are appropriated to he● virginity, as most entire, most pure, undefiled, not corrupted, not stained, untouched, etc. Whence may be gathered th● authors opinion of the immaculate Conception to be the same that our Seraphical Order hath even from the beginning raise● and maintained both in Choir & school that the B. Virgin was always Immaculate even in the first instant of her Conception as becommed the Majesty of God, that w● to be borne of her unspotted flesh. Cant. 4.7. Thou art all immaculate, etc.  
Pag. 17. §. 1. lin. 15. MEMBERS OF THE TRIUMPHANT CHURCH HAVE IN CHRIST COMPASSION ON THE MEMBERS OF THE MILITANT CHURCH] By reason of their union. For we believe in the holy Catholic Church the communion of Saints. The right order of confession required, 
Aug. in Encheridio. c. 56.  that after the Trinity the Church should be adjoined as a house to the dweller, and to God his Temple, and to the builder his City. The which is here to be taken whole, not only in that part in which it is a pilgrim here on earth, from the Sun ri●ing to the setting of the same praising the name of our Lord, and after the captivity of oldness singing a new song; but also in that part which always hath adhered to God in heaven from the time that it was first created, and hath experienced no evil of his fall: this stands fast, blessed ●n the holy Angels, and helpeth as it ought, ●o do his part that is in pilgrimage: because both shall be one by company of eternity, and now is one by the band of charity, which whole is instituted to ●orship one God.  

Psalm. 118.63.  David said, while he was yet living: I am partaker, with all that fear thee and keep thy commandments.  

1. Cor. 12.12.  As the body is but one and yet hath many members and all the members are but one body, so also Christ, for in one spirit we were baptised into one. The eye cannot say to the hand I need not thy help, nor the head to the feet you are no● necessary for me. God hath tempered the body, giving to it that wanted the more abundant honour, that there might be no schism in the body, but that the member together might be careful one for another and if one member feel any smart, all th● members do condole with it, or if any on member receive any comfort, all the members do congratulate with it, and you ar● the body of Christ and members of h● members, etc.  

S. Maximus, serm. de SS. Octavio, Adventitio & Salvatore martyribus Taurinensibus.  All martyrs are most devoutly to b● worshipped but especially those are to b● honoured of us whose relics we have 〈◊〉 possession, for those help us with the prayers, but these with their passion; wit● these we have familiarity for they be always with us, they dwell with us, that i● they keep us whilst we live and receive 〈◊〉 when we die; here, lest we offend, the● lest the horror of hell invade us. To th● end it was ordained by our forefathers, that our bodies should be laid by the Saints bones that whilst hell feareth them, pain may not come at us, whilst Christ illuminateth them, our darkness may fly away: Resting with the holy Martyrs we escape hell by their merits, but not unless we be fellows with them in their sanctity.  
Pag. 17. §. 1. lin. 18. 
In opinion Doct. subtilis.  INTO HIS FIRST SUBSTANCE] This can not be physically understood; but is morally taken for death; He died the 29. of june 1598. of a consumption, whereof he lay sick almost a year at his manor house of Temple broughton, and was, according to his will, buried in S. Mary's, the parish Church of Handburie, in the place where the high Altar stood in the time of Catholic Religion.  
Of what age he died I know not but gather that he could not want much of 60. It is evident in the Testament that he lived 40. years and upward unmarried; afterwards he had 12. children borne him by one wife at 12. several births. Howsoever, the life was short for a man of his worth, and yet long by reason of the worth of it: As it is said. Sap. 4. He that is consummate and perfected in short time, hath accomplished many times and ages.  

De fato sane in●ellige.  Seneca Epist. 4. de breviori vita non curandum. Our care must not be to live long, bu● to live sufficiently. To live long we have need of fate: to live sufficiently, a mind▪ Life is long if it be full: and it is full when the mind hath gotten the mastery o● good, and into its own hands power over itself. What avail a man 80. years passed in sluggishness? Such a man hath not lived, but made a stay in life, nor is he late dead but long.  
He hath lived 80. years; all the matter i● from what day you count his death. He hath lived 80. years, rather he hath been 80. years: unless you mean he hath lived, so as trees are said to live. Let us not measure our life by time but facts. As in little stature a perfect man may be, so in a little term of time a perfect life may be. Age is an external thing: how long I am, is another's: but how long I am good, is mine. To live unto wisdom is the space of mos● ample life. Idem, lib. 1. de tranquilitate vital cap. 10. There is no viler thing than an aged old man that hath no other argument bu● years to prove that he hath lived long.  
Lin. 21. IT SHALL PLEASE GOD TO APPOINT] Man purposeth and God disposeth. Therefore saith S. james the Apostle. Epist. cap. 4. Say if our Lord will, or if we live, we will do this or that, because we know not what shall be to morrow.  
So the soul be safe, it is no great matter where the body lie: many a holy body lieth in the sea, many burned to asks, many devoured by wild beasts, etc. Yet every man ought so much to esteem of Christian burial, as he ought to seek for it by all lawful means, and is bound to ordain as providently as he can; and a good reason why is given in the leaf here before, out of S. Maximus.  
Pag. 17. §. 2. RUEFUL DECAY OF THE CATHOLIC RELIGION] Begun in England by Henry 8. breaking obedience with the sea of Rome by act of Parliament, 1533. and made more full by Q. Elizabeth.  
AS A TRUE FATHER] A true father is he that, according to the law of nature, provideth for those whom he hath gotten into the world, not only bodily, but spiritually: which law is so firmly engrafted in nature, as it needs no express law written, to command it: as the children have to honours their parents: the care of providing corporally for children is in some parents over much, and the provision for their souls (the chief part) too little.  
These are not true fathers, that care not to leave to their children a true inheritance: but false fathers, leaving inheritance of false riches; such as when they have slept their sleep, they shall find nothing in their hands. The true father hath his principal care to instruct his children in the law of God: that as, not only the earthly goods, but celestial doctrines were by his forefathers delivered to him; so he, keeping them in the customs and manners of his life, deliver the same to his posterity at his death. The sons, most commonly follow the steps of their fathers, and think all lawful to do that they see them use. Great is the obligation of parents in the education of their children.  

joan. 5.19.  The son can do nothing of himself, but what he seethe his father do; for whatsoever he doth, the son likewise doth.  

Isaias 38. Mat. 10.32. Marck 8.38. Luc. 9.26. & 12 8.  Pag. 18. §. 3. BE IT KNOWN TO THEM AND TO ALL THE WORLD] The father to his children shall notify thy truth. Every one tha● shall confess me before men, I wil● also confess him before my Father which is in heaven. And he that shal● deny me before men: I will also deny him before my Father which is in heaven.  
S. Aug. serm. 181. de tempore, 
Vide supra §. ●. by faith confessing.  Tom. 10. Heb. 11. Sine fide. Without faith it is impossible to please God, this faith he acknowledgeth in our hearts, that searcheth reines and hearts, but for conserving of the Church's unity; for the dispensation of this time, with faith of heart, is also necessary confession of mouth; because with the heart we believe to justice, and with mouth we make confession to salvation, not only of preachers, but also of those that are instructed: Otherwise one brother of another could not have notice, nor the Church's peace be conserved, nor one teach another, nor learn of another, necessary things to salvation, unless what he hath in his heart, with signs of voice, as it were, with certain chariots he sent to the hearts of others▪ Faith is therefore both to be kept in the heart, and brought forth with the mouth: for faith is the foundation of all good things, and beginning of humane salvation: without this no man can come to the number of the sons of God, and without it, neither doth he obtain the grace of justification in this world, nor shall he possess life everlasting in the world to come. And if one walk not by faith, he shall not come to vision. The holy Apostles, having regard to this, delivered a certain rule of faith, which, according to the Apostolical number, comprehended in 12. sentences, they called the symbol, by which the believers might hold the Catholic unity and by which they might convince heretical pravi●ie, etc.  
A MEMBER OF CHRIST'S TRUE, CATHOLIC, AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH] Signs of the true Church are, that it is one, holy, Catholic, and Apostolic, therefore he adjoineth [OUT OF THE UNITY AND FELLOWSHIP WHEREOF THERE NEVER WAS, NOR IS, NOR CAN BE SALVATION] No more than was for those that were without the ark of Noe. The true Church can be but one, in as much as truth is one, and can be but one: error manifold, and in a manner infinite. A man that going a journey, bend to one place if he leave the right way, which can be but one, it is no more matter which way he take, of so many ways as lie round about him, for in all he erreth, and shall not come to the place intended, because he hath left the way that only leads thereunto. 
Aug. serm. 181. de tempore, prope finem, Tom. 10  Symbol. Apost. The holy Catholic Church. It is to be known that we must believe the Church, and not believe in the Church, because the Church is not God, but the house of God. Catholic, he saith, diffused over all the whole world, because the Churches of divers Heretics are therefore not called Catholic, because they be contained in places, & every one in their own Provinces, but this, even from the Sun rising, to the setting of the same, is diffused with the splendour of one faith. There are no greater riches, no treasures, no honours, no greater substance of this world, then is the Catholic faith: which saveth men sinners, illuminateth the blind, cureth the infirm, baptizeth Cathecumen, justifieth the faithful, repaireth penitents, augmenteth the just, crowneth, martyrs, ordaineth clerks, consecrateth Priests, prepareth for the kingdom of heaven, and in the everlasting inheritance communicateth with the holy Angels. Whosoever he be, and of what condition soever he be, he is no Christian that is not in the Church of Christ.  
Our Lord JESUS CHRIST like a whole perfect man, both head & body: 
Aug. in Psal. 90. Concio. 2 Tom. 8.  the head woe acknowledge in that man which was borne of the Virgin MARIE, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was buried, arose, ascended in to heaven, sitteth at the right hand of the Father, from thence we expect him, judge of the living and the dead: this is the head of the Church; the body of this head is the Church, not which is in this place; but which is in this place, and over all the world: nor that which is in this time, but even from Abel unto those which are to be borne, and to believe in Christ even till the end, all the people of Saints, pertaining to one city, which city is the body of Christ; whose head is Christ.  
Whosoever separated from the Church is conjoined to an adulteress; is separated from the things promised to the Church; neither doth he appertain to the rewards of Christ, that leaveth the Church of Christ, he is an Alien, he is profane, he is an enemy; he cannot now have God his father, which hath not the Church his mother. If he could escape that was without the ark of No, than he shall escape that is without the church. Cyprianus tract. de simplicitate Praelat. sive de unitate Ecclesiae.  
I following no first but Christ, am consociated to thy beatitude, that is, to the chair of Peter: I know the Church was built upon the Rock, whosoever out of this house eateth the lamb, is profane. If any one be out of the ark of No while the flood rageth, he shall perish. Hieronymus, epist. 1. ad Damasum, tomo 2.  
The Roman Church in all I seek to follow. Ambros. lib. 3. de Sacramentis, cap. 1. post ●edium, parte 1. No man blotteth out of heaven the constitution of God: no man blotteth out of earth the Church of God. Aug. epist. 162. in fine.  
That is the holy Church, the one Church, the Catholic Church, the true Church, fight against all heresies: fight it may, be vanquished it cannot. All heresies have gone out thereof, as unprofitable sprigs cut from the vine, but she remaineth upon her root, upon her vine, upon her charity, the gates of hell shall not overcome her. Aug. lib. 1. de symb. ad cathecum. cap. 5. in fine.  
The sun is easier extinguished, than the Church obscured. Chrysost. hom. 4. in 6. Esaiae.  
Theodosius the great, 
Aug. de Civitate lib. 5. cap. 26.  gloried more that he was a member of the Catholic Church, then that he reigned upon the earth.  
What is more honourable than the Emperor to be called a child of the Church, 
Ambro. de Eccl. non trad. Haereticis. Heb. 11.  this is that Moses preferred before the Egyptian treasures, denying himself to be Pharaos' son, and choosing rather to be afflicted with God's people then to have the pleasure of temporal sin. 
Gregor. Naz. epist. ad 150. Episc▪  For before God there is nothing so magnificent and illustrious, as pure doctrine, and a soul instructed and made perfect with divine opinions.  
Pag. 28. §. 3. lin. 11. I acknowledge God the Father my maker, God the Son my redeemer, etc. Matth. 28.19. Going teach all nations baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Ghost. 
Aug. l. 1 de fide ad Petrun, c. 1. Tom. 3.  The faith of the Trinity. In what place soever thou be'st constitute, because, according to the Rule promulgated by the command of our Saviour, thou knowest thyself to be baptised in one name of the Father, & Son, and holy Ghost; principally, and without doubt, retain with thy whole heart, that the Father is God▪ the Son God, and the holy Ghost God; that is, the holy and ineffable Trinity, to be naturally one God; 
Deut. 6. Mat. 4.  of whom in Deuteronomie it is said: Hear Israel, thy Lord thy God is one God: And thou shalt adore thy Lord God, and serve him alone: Yet because this one God, who only is naturally the true God, we have said to be neither Father alone, nor Son alone, nor holy Ghost alone, but together Father, Son, and holy Ghost, we must beware, lest as we truly say the Father and Son & holy Ghost, in that belongeth to their natural unity, to be one God; so we dare say, or believe, (which is altogether unlawful) that he which is Father is the same that the Son, or holy Ghost; Or ●e that is Son, either Father or holy Ghost; Or he that is holy Ghost, called properly, in the confession of this Trinity, to say or believe, that he is personally the Father or the Son. For that faith which the holy Patriarches and Prophets, received from God before the incarnation of the Son of God; which also the holy Apostles heard from our Lord himself in flesh; and, by the magistery of the holy Ghost instructed, not only preached in word, but also to the healthful instruction of posterity left in their writings, preacheth the Trinity to be one God: that is, Father, Son, and holy Ghost. But it were no true Trinity, if one and the same person were called Father, and Son, and holy Ghost: For if, as the substance of the Father, and Son, and holy Ghost, is one, so the person were one; there were nothing wherein it might be truly called a Trinity. Again, it were indeed a true Trinity, but that Trinity should not be one God, if as the Father and Son, and holy Ghost, are in propriety of persons distinct from one another, so they were distinguished in diversity of natures.  
But because in that one true God Trinity, not only that it is one God, but also tha● it is a Trinity, is naturally true; therefore that true God is in persons a Trinity, and in nature one. By this natural unity, all th● Father is in the Son and holy Ghost; al● the Son in the Father and holy Ghost▪ all the holy Ghost in the Father and Son none of these is without any one of them▪ because none is before another in eternity, or exceedeth in greatness, or surpasseth in power; because, in as much as pertaineth to the unity of the divine nature, the Father is neither before nor greater than the Son, nor holy Ghost: nor the eternity and immensity of the Son, as it were before, or greater, can naturally precede or exceed, the eternity and immensity of the holy Ghost.  
Aug. de Trin. cap. 4. Tom. 3. All that ever I could read of, that before me wrote of the Trinity, which is God, the Catholic handlers of the divine books both new and old, have intended to teach this out of the Scriptures: that the Father, and Son, and holy Ghost, of one and the same substance, with inseparable equality, do insinuate the divine unity: therefore they be not three Gods, but one God: Although the Father have begotten the Son, and therefore the Son is not, whom the Father is: and the Son is begotten of the Father, and for that he is not Father which is Son: and the holy Ghost is neither Father, nor Son, but only the spirit of the Father and Son: himself also coequal to the Father and Son, and pertaining to the unity of the Trinity: And yet not the same Trinity borne of the Virgin MARIE; under Pontius Pilate crucified, and buried; to have risen the third day and ascended into heaven; but only the Son. Nor the same Trinity to have descended in likeness of a dove upon JESUS baptised: or on the day of Pentecost after the Ascension of our Lord with sound made from heaven as if a vehement blast were carried along, and in divided tongues like fire, to have sitten upon every one of them, but only the holy Ghost. Nor the same Trinity to have said from heaven: thou art my Son: when either he was baptised by john, or upon the mount, when the three disciples were with him, or when the voice sounded, saying: I have both clarified & again will clarify: but only the Father's voice to have been made to the Son; although the Father, & Son and holy Ghost, as they are inseparable, so do they inseparably work. This is also my faith, because this is the Catholic faith.  
Pag. 18. §. 4. lin. 1. I BELIEVE AND HOLD] The Apostles Creed, the Nicene Creed, Athanasius Creed, the 10. Commandments, the 7. Sacraments: and in a word, all that the Catholic Church teacheth and holdeth; for, to believe profiteth nothing unless we also hold and keep in work, what we believe; and that wholly, and entirely. 
Epist. jacobi. c. 2. 10.  Whosoever keepeth otherwise the whole law and offendeth in one point: becometh guilty of the whole, as if he had transgressed in all. That the Sacraments are the conducts whereby the grace of God is derived unto mankind: Their number, order, names, etc.  
1. BAPTISM] He reckoneth the Sacraments in such order as they occurred at the present to memory, 
Matth. vlt.  Whose right order is, first baptism: whereby we are, regenerate, and borne a new in Christ to spiritual, and everlasting life; who before were borne of our parents in the world, to corporal, and, without this Sacrament, to everlasting death.  

joan. 20. Act. 2.  Confirmation; whereby we be spiritually strengthened and grow, as in our infancy we be lapped and bound corporally until our joints be knit and we made able to stand by our natural forces.  
Eucharistie, 
joan. 6. praedicatur Euch. Mat. 26. jacob. 5 joan. 20. Mat. 16.  whereby we be nourished and fed in soul, as by corporal food we be fed in body.  
Penance; whereby the wounds of sin that we receive in our souls after baptism are cured.  
Extreme unction: 
jacob. 5 Marc. 6.  which strengtheneth us in our passage out of this life, when of ourselves we be too weak to resist the assaults of the devil, who then most of all rageth; tendens insidias calcaneo nostro. Of these five; see Scotus in 4. D. 2. Q. 1. Conclusione 1. Whose words are these: Like as in the natural life first is generation, after followeth nutrition, and corroboration, and reparation of the health lost, and these 4. appertain to every singular person: and yet besides these, something is requisite pertaining to the community, by which a man is constitute in necessary degree toward some act necessary for the community. So spiritually, to complete perfection outwardly, there must be some help pertaining to spiritual generation: and secondly, something pertaining to nutrition: thirdly, pertaining to roboration or strengthening: fourthly, to reparation after falling: and fifthly, besides these things is required some being, whereby he that departeth be finally prepared: For this spiritual life is a certain way, ordaining that he who liveth well in the same, may without impediment pass out of it to the other, for which he is prepared. These things therefore are required as necessary helps to every person for himself.  
Of the other 2. Order, and Matrimony. Scotus ibi.  
And for the good of the community observing this law, is required also carnal multiplication; because the same is presupposed to the spiritual good, as nature to grace: and spiritual multiplication of others in the same law. So therefore it was congruent to have seven helps bestowed upon the observers of the Evangelicall law; wherein might be both intensive and extensive perfection, and sufficient for all things necessary to the observance of this law; and these are, as the Master of Sentences hath in his text: Baptism, appertaining to spiritual generation: Eucharist, necessary to nourishment: Confirmation, for strengthening: Penance, to the reparation of those that are fall'n: 
Mat. 19 ex 1. & 2. Genesis. Mat. 26. joan. 20.  Extreme unction, to the final reparation: Matrimony, to multiplication in the being of nature, or carnal being: and Order, to multiplication in the being of grace, or spiritual being.  
CONFESSION] By this name the Author calleth the sacrament of Penance, as by the part of that Sacrament which then was, and always hath been by the devil, and his ministers the Heretics, most opposed. The first part of the Sacrament of Penance is contrition, or inward sorrow of heart through consideration of God's goodness and our own wickedness. No Heretics are so barbarous, nor any people in the world, that acknowledgeth any God, but they hold this part necessary, as indeed it is, and hath always been, to salvation. This they call repentance, and not improperly, if rightly understood. But whereas they hold this to be sufficient to blot out sins committed after baptism, it is false: for since the coming of our Saviour Christ and preaching the law of grace (which taketh not away, but accomplisheth the former law) sin is not remitted by only contrition, but confession of it to a Priest is also required: and moreover Satisfaction must follow: that the party wronged, whether God, or our neighbour, may again be appeased, and satisfied: yea, even before the time of our Saviour Christ these seem to have been in use: 
2. Reg. 12.13.  David confessed his sin to Nathan the Prophet, and did satisfaction by penal work, adjudging also him that had wronged the poor man, by taking his sheep, and sparing his own, to fourefould restitution, The people of all estates that came confessing their sins to S. john the Baptist, 
Luc. 3.10.  demanded, and were by him enjoined what they should do. 
Luc. 19 8.  The rich Zachaeus offered our Saviour to give the half of his goods to the poor, and restore four times as much, to any man that he might hap to have defrauded. In confession is the greatest humility, a man will easier part with his goods, or pain his body, to satisfy, or be contrite in heart, than in Confession to accuse himself; which kind of Pride we inherited from our first parents: Adam would not confess his sin to God that knew it, 
Aug. de Civis. l. 13. c. 11. in fine.  but cast the fault upon the woman: nor she confess, but cast the fault upon the serpent: deceived in this, that to God rebuking and chastizing, he esteemed he should bring a just excuse, and such as easily he would admit, if he should say he did it, to gratify his companion; and that companion, not which he had assumed to himself, but which our Lord had given him.  
How many hard labours, and painful pilgrimages have some men undergone to expiate their sin: which never the less they could never disburden their conscience of until they confessed. So much availeth confession, as when it can be had, without it no contrition doth suffice; and when it cannot be had, to make contrition valuable to salvation, we must have confession at least in desire and will.  
Aug. lib. 50. hom. Tom. 10. hom. 12. Dear beloved brothers, in all the divine Scriptures we be profitably, & healthfully admonished, that we ought to confess our sins, continually, and humbly, not only to God, but also to holy men, and those that fear God: For God will not therefore have us to confess our sins because he cannot otherwise know them, but because this the devil desireth, that he may find what to object against us before the tribunal of the everlasting judge; therefore he had rather we would defend than accuse our sins. On the contrary side, our God, because he is pious and merciful, will that we confess them in the world, that we be not confounded for them in the world to come. The devil therefore knowing the virtue of pure confession, with all his forces endeavoreth to hinder a man that he do not confess, and as at first he suggested to make man fall, so after the fall he hindereth us from rising, because he knoweth we cannot rise without confession.  
It is worse that a man will not confess, then to contemn the law. That a man will not by satisfaction appease the offence of God, is worse than by sinning to offend the goodness of God: for although sin be forgiven by contrition, yet vocal confession is necessary, either in deed, when opportunity is had, or in purpose, when the article of necessity excludeth the same, and not contempt of Religion; and so, the necessity of confessing after contrition, is not in such case, for necessity of the remedy, but for the obligation of the precept.  
Conveniently was confession instituted, that he who being in his own power had departed from God, put under the power of an other, with humility, and devotion, may return. Chrysost. hom. 3. op. imperfect. de Confessionis util. Confession of our sins is a sign of a good mind, and the testimony of a conscience that feareth God. Perfect fear breaketh through all shame, and there only is the turpitude of confession seen, where the pain of the future judgement is not believed. And because the very shame is a grievous pain, therefore God commandeth us to confess our sins, that we may suffer the blushing for pain: for this very thing is part of the divine judgement. He is worthy of pardon that seeketh not to excuse his sin, for where confession is, there is remission, because shamefaced confession holdeth the next place to innocence.  
Aug. de poenitentiae utilitate. Because it is a great shaming to confess one's sins, he that undergoeth this shame for Christ, is worthy of mercy.  
Greg. lib. 12. moral. c. 14. Let those that will marvel at, in every just man, the continence of chastity, let them marvel at the integrity of justice, let them admire the bowels of piety, I do no less admire at the most humble confession of sins, than so many sublime deeds of virtue.  
Aug. ubi supra. O fool, why art thou ashamed to tell to a man, that which thou wert not ashamed to do in the sight of God? Remove from thee shame, run to the Priest, reveal thy secret, confess thy sin, otherwise contrition of heart will nothing profit thee, unless confession of the mouth, if thou cannest, do follow it. Confession is the health of souls, dissipatour of vices, restorer of virtues, oppugnatour of the devils: what will you more? it stoppeth the gates of Hell, and openeth the gates of Paradise.  
Pag. 19 §. 5. SACRAMENT OF THE LORDS SUPPER] Although, not only in many other places, but even in the immediately ensuing words the mind of the author he sufficiently declared, yet because the wise (that few are) must speak with the multitude, and accommodate themselves to wise and unwise, to whom we are debtors, with the Apostle: It is here to be noted, concerning this manner of speaking. Every word absolutely set down standeth first for his principal, and more general signification. So that Dominus, unless it be limited, and drawn to more particularity of signification, by some term of restriction, must after his general signification be called, A Lord: or, The Lord: and not our Lord, more than your Lord, or my Lord, or his Lord, or their Lord; which signification it must take from some of these adjoined expressly, our, their, his, mine, etc. Which of itself it hath not, but a more noble, because less limited. Far more it is to be The Lord, by which we understand The Lord of all, than Our Lord: which, according to the very letter, doth not sound Lord of all, but rather excluding others, would seem to be ours, & not theirs. In some places, as where it is said, Ego Dominus: it can have none other sense but, I The Lord: for senseless it were to say, I our Lord, and not much better to say I your Lord: the true is, I The Lord.  
The Lord, and Our Lord neither kind of speech is to be reproved but according to the occurrent matter both used indifferently.  
Dominicam Coenam, saith S. Paul, 1. Cor. 11.20. The Lord's Supper, and vers. 26. Mortem Domini, the Lords death: which is better expressed in the other sacred tongues as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eth Adonai 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉; the death of the Lord.  
When this speech, Our Lord, is used out of a more fervent devotion towards God, it is to be applauded, because we will show therein a particular relation that we have to him more than all other creatures have: and that he is Our Lord, with dominion over us that are after his likeness, more than over other creatures, that are less, or nothing after his likeness: which is insinuated to us in the book of Genesis, where God is never called The Lord, before the creation of man, but 35. times 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God, and after Gen. 2.4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord. What dominion hath a man unless over men, that are of his likeness and using reason? Over the brute beasts he useth no special act of lordship or dominion, but as he serveth himself with them, so also he serveth them. Over insensible more improperly is man said to have dominion: because they cannot obey his command, but are disposed of by the labour of his hands. Those things we are most properly said to be Lords of, which do most immediately obey the power of our will. Man's will is immediately subject to Gods will, and not as other creatures are, by the government of Angels, or influence of the heavens: And man ought to call Our Lord, and not The Lord, when the matter spoken of is directly belonging to his will subject only to God and to no creature whatsoever. Which freedom he hath given us, because he will show himself a loving, and not a tyrannical Lord. In these places as of the Lords supper, etc. There is no special mention of our subjection, but of his voluntary gift, etc. Therefore it may well be called, The Lord's supper, The Lords death, etc.  
Pag. 19 §. 5. lin. 3. OF THE ALTAR] The Heretics of these times have none: only Catholics have an Altar. Heb. 13, 10. Mala. 1.10.  
Lin. 3. WORDS OF CONSECRATION] How can that which is bread be the Body of Christ? Ambros. de Sacramentis. lib. 4. cap. 4. By consecration. Consecration then with what words, and by whose speeches is it? by the words and speeches of our Lord JESUS: for, by all other things that are said, praise is given to God, prayer is made for the people, for Kings, for others, when they come once to make the venerable Sacrament, the Priest useth not his own words, but the words of Christ. The speech of Christ therefore maketh this Sacrament. What speech of Christ? verily that by which all things are made. Our Lord commanded and the heavens were made: Our Lord commanded and the earth was made: Our Lord commanded and the seas were made: Our Lord commanded and every creature was engendered: you see of what operation the word of Christ is. If therefore there be so much force in the speech of our Lord JESUS, as that which was not, beginneth thereby to be, of how much greater operation is it, to let the things be which were, and change them into other things? the heaven was not, the sea was not, the earth was not, but hearken to him that saith: He said the word, and they are made, he commanded, and they are created. That therefore I may answer thee, there was not the body of Christ before the consecration, but after the consecration, I say to thee, that now it is the body of Christ: He hath said, and it is made; he hath commanded ●●d it i●●●●●ted  
SACRIFICE. MASS. Malach. 1.11. In every place i● sacrificed and offered to my name a pure oblation which none have but the Catholic Church.  
FIGURATIVE SPEECHES] By connexion of one place with another, by comparing the antecedent with the consequent words of Scripture: Scotus in 4. D. 10. Q. 1. num. 3. Will have us to gather whether things be spoken figuratively or not: and argueth that here they be not figurative, out of the words following; for when Christ had said; Take and eat this is my body, to declare that he meant his very body, and no mystical body, he said immediately, which shall be delivered for you; and his body was the same night delivered to death for all mankind, betrayed by the false Apostle judas.  
Pag. 20. §. 6. lin. 1. EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE] Whereof the Apostle. 1. Cor. 11.28. Let a man prove himself: and 31. if we would judge ourselves we should not be judged.  
No pain is more grievous than a wicked conscience. An evil conscience is tossed with his own prickings: if public fame condemn thee not, thy own conscience condemneth thee, because no man can fly from himself. Wilt thou be never sad? Live well: good life hath always joy, the conscience of the guilty is always in pain. Bernard. Tract. De interiori domo. cap. 45.  
Among the manifold tribulations, and innumerable molestious afflictions of a man's soul, there is no greater affliction than conscience of sin. Greg. in septimum Psalm. penitent. verse. penult. And, on the contrary, there is no greater consolation, than a conscience adorned with virtues. Vide Aug. serm. 10. ad frat. in eremo, Tom. 10. & serm. 45.  
How beautiful is the brightness of the soul! How happy the conscience full of good works! If he be potent, that commands the world, how happy is he that in his conscience beareth God? Aug. serm. 7. de Tempore.  
By good life a good conscience is gained, that by the good conscience no pain may be feared: let him therefore learn to fear that will not fear, let him learn for a time to be solicitous that will always be secure. Aug. serm. 214. De tempore.  
No man rejoiceth in God, that liveth i● vice. Aug. lib. 50. Hom. hom. 33. in medio. & serm. 215. No man hath unjust gain with out just damage: where gain is, there i● damage, gain in the coffers, damage i● the conscience,  
There is no better pleasure than th● grace of a corrected conscience, Amb. lib. 2 de Abraham, cap. 11. Tom. 4.  
REPENTANCE, AND AMENDMENT] Confession maketh contrition or repentance more intense, and as itself is caused by them, so it doth again cherish and increase them, and of them both proceedeth amendment: for he that with contrition confesseth, submitteth himself also to make amends, and do satisfaction according to the judgement of him to whom he confesseth: and not only to amend by leading a new life, but as well by satisfying for that is past. Of satisfaction▪ or penance for sins, Daniel. 4.24. Matth. 3.8. Luc. 3.8. Whereupon see. Greg. hom. 20. in Evangel. Bernard. serm. 66. in Cant. Chrysost. hom. 10. in Matth. Aug. aut poenitendum, aut ardendum. Look to do penance, or to burn.  
Pag. 20. §. 7. lin. 2. INVOCATION OF SAINTS] Who being like the Angels of God, can both attend to our need & the vision of God. Mat. 22.30.18, 10. Luc. 15.10.  
PRAYER FOR THE DEAD] Saint Peter instructed us, to have a guard over the acts of our life every hour: he instructed us also to bury the dead, and to perform their exequys diligently, and to pray for them, and to give alms. Clemens, epist. 1. ad jacobum fratrem Domini.  
Dionies. de Eccl. Hierarch. cap. 7. Then coming the venerable Prelate readeth a most holy prayer over him, that the divine clemency will forgive the dead all his sins committed through humane infirmity, and place him in the light and region of the living, in the bosom of Abraham, Isaac, and jacob, in the place whence is banished all sighs, sorrow, and sadness.  
Chrysost. hom. 69. ad populum. It was not rashly ordained by the Apostles, that in the dreadful mysteries, there should be commemoration made of the dead.  
They that love their friends, dead in body, and not in soul, with spiritual love, and not carnal alone; let them carefully, and instantly, exercise those things that help the souls of the dead: as offerings, prayers, and alms. Aug.  
Lin. 4. PURGATION OF SOULS] Matth. 5.25.26. & 12.32. Luc. 16.22. 1. Cor. 3.13.  
CHRISTIAN WORKS] The just man is judged by his works. jacob. 2.22 2. Petri 1.10. Apoc. 22.11. Which places mak● also against sole faith. 1. Cor. 15.58.  
Pag. 21. §. 8. lin. 4, TEACHING HE● ALL TRUTH] joannes 14.16. & 16.13.  
Lin. 6. GATES OF HELL] Mat. 16.18  
Lin. 10. ANGELS OF LIGHT] A● Gal. 1.8. But although we, or an Angel from heaven, evangelise to you another thing besides that we have evangelized to you● Anathema. Idem 2. Cor. 11.13.  
Lin. 11, DELICACY OF WORLDLY men's DELIGHTS] Contrary to th● delights of good men, who, renouncing th● world, have fixed their delight in God. O● such the Apostle warned his Disciple 2. Tim. 3. Know that in the last day's ther● sh●ll be dangerous times, and there shall b● men loving themselves, covetous, lofty proud, blasphemous, disobeying Parents ungrateful, wicked, without affection without peace, laying crimes upon others incontinent, rude, without benignity, traitors, saucy, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God, having the appearance of piety, but denying the virtue thereof. Avoid these.  
Lin. 17. FORTY OR FIFTY YEARS] Luther fell from the Catholic Church anno 1517. Yet there was no public profession of Lutheranisme, or liberty, so soon.  
Pag. 22. lin. 5. A CITY SET UPON AN HILL] Mat. 5.14.15. Where also of the light of it: and, Marc. 4.21. Luc. 11.33.  
Pag. 22. lin. 12. THIRTEEN HUNDRED YEARS] England first received the Christian religion from joseph ●b Arimathia, that buried Christ and came after into England, preached there the Gospel, and baptised them that believed, as Gildas Sapiens, wrighteth, Venerable Bede, Polydore, Vergill, and others: And Baronius, at the year of our Lord 35. num. 3.  
But more fully it was converted 180. years after Christ in the reign of King Lucius, by S. Fugatius and S. Damian, sent thither from Rome by Eleutherius Pope.  
And also 400. years after that, by S. Augustine and his fellows, sent thither by S. Gregory the great, about the year 600.  
Pag. 22. §. 9 I HOLD AND BELIEVE ALL THAT THE CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH] If any one come to you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into the house, nor say to him, God save you. 2. joan. 1.  
Ambrose. He denyeth Chr●st that confesseth not all, things that are Christ's.  
Hilarius. It becometh the ministers of truth to profess true things.  
Aug. lib. de fide ad Petrum, cap. 39 Most firmly hold, and no way doubt, that every Heretic, or Schismatic, baptised in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Ghost, if he be not aggregated to the Catholic Church, how many almesdeeds soever he do, although he shed his blood for the name of Christ, can by no means be saved: For to every man, that holdeth not the unity of the Catholic Church, neither Baptism, nor Alms, how copious soever it be, nor death for the name of Christ undergone, can be of any value to salvation, as long as he persevereth in that heretical, or schismatical pravity which leadeth unto death.  
Cap. 40. Most firmly hold and no way doubt, that not all which are baptised within the Catholic Church shall receiu● life everlasting, but they which having received baptism do live a right, that is, wh● have abstained them from the vices an● concupiscences of the flesh. For the kingdom of Heaven, as Infidels, Heretics and Schismatics shall not have it, 〈◊〉 wicked Catholics can never possess it.  
Vincentius Lyrenensis. He is a true and natural Catholic, that loveth the truth o● God, the Church, the body of Christ, who before the divine religion, before the Catholic faith, preferreth nothing, not the authority of any man, not love, nor wit, nor eloquence, nor Philosophy; but despising all these, and there remaining fixed and steedfast, whatsoever universally, from all antiquity, he knoweth the Catholic Church to have holden, that only he decreeth with himself to hold and believe; and whatsoever afterward he perceiveth new and unheard of to have been introduced by any one, otherwise then all, or contrary to all the Saints, that he understandeth to appertain, not to Religion, but rather to temptation.  
Lin. 4. GODLY CEREMONIAL RIGHTS] He that will condemn the ceremonies of God's Church, let him first try if he can himself lead a humane life amongst civil men without all ceremony; let him separate all substance from his accidents and see whether it be worth the looking upon. As in accidents there is difference, and some make the substance to be better accepted than others, for example's sake, in colour, in savour, etc. So ceremonies do, according as they are better or worse, set out the substance of the thing wherabout they be used. What is any artificers work, although according to the substantial part it be wholly finished, unless i● be also polite. As God gave to his people i● the old law precepts Moral, judicial, and Ceremonial, so in the new testament there are Doctrine, Sacraments, with their ceremonies, and Discipline. Deut. 6. Keep the precepts of thy Lord God, & the testimonies, and ceremonies, which he hath commanded thee.  
Lin. 13. CONTINVALL PRAYER] Luc. 18. We must always pray and never fail: 
Psalm. 118. Psal. 5.  Vtinan dirigantur viae meae, ad custodiendas iustificationes tuas. Dirige Domine Deus meus in conspectu tuo viam meam. Be instant in prayer, watching therein, with . Coloss. 4.2. Pray without intermission. 1. Thess. 5.17. Psalm. 24. Dirige me in veritate tua & doce me ...... dirige me in semitam rectam. 89. Opus manuum nostrarum dirige.  
Pag. 23. §. 10. FROM A RESOLUTE HEART] No temptation doth so soon seize, or overthrow, him that is well resolved, and constantly settled in his mind; as it doth him that is doubtful and wavering. 2. Cor. 8.12. If the will be prompt: according to what it hath, it is accepted.  
The works of our will that spring immediately from it, cannot suffer violence from any power, but in those works or acts that are of other powers, commanded by the will, she may suffer violence.  
S. Thomas. 1. 2. Q. 6. A. 4. Violence, Fear, Concupiscence. Ignorance, etc. May assail the will, but, cannot overcome it, to cause it do a thing: for that no agent in his action can be compelled. Violence, and fear, may diminish, and make an act less voluntary; Concupiscence ofter encreasseth, and maketh it more voluntary, Ignorance maketh it, not to be voluntary; but not involuntary, or against ones will.  
He that doth but foresee the dangers, is less strooken by the dint of them. 
Heb. 13, 9  The best thing, saith the Apostle, is to establish the heart with grace. And Ecclesiastic. 2.1. Coming to the service of God stand in justice, and fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation. Our wavering mind addeth forces to the temptation.  
Prosper. 3. de vita contemplativa. Every man, until by certain definition he confirm himself in that he hath chosen; being as it were in a forked way of uncertain deliberation, is torn in pieces by the very diversity of wills. Virtue exhorteth, and provoketh a man, that, all ambiguity of definition deposed, he undertake his spiritual purpose, that h confide, not in his own possibility, but in the miseration of our Lord, to persever in the labour of his conflict undertaken, 1. Thess. 5.24. He is faithful that hath called you, who also will do it. 
Esai. 40.31.  They that hope in our Lord shall change their strength, they shall assume wings like Eagles, they sh●ll run and not labour, they shall walk and not faint.  
Pag. 24. lin. 6. AFFECTION OF WIFE OR CHILDREN] Luc. 14.26. If any one come to me and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brothers, and sisters, and moreover his own soul, he can not be my disciple. Idem, Matth. 10.37.  
Pag. 25. §. 11. By COUNTRY FARE DIVIDED] Shee being of Acton, by Long Melforde, in the county of Southfolke.  
TRUE GENEROSITY] Seneca lib. de moribus. The nobility of the mind is the generosity of the sense: The nobility of body, a generous mind.  
NOT IGNOBLE] Evil nobility it is, that by pride maketh a man ignoble before God. Aug. serm. 127. de tempore. Summa ingenuitas ista est, in qua servitus Christi comprobatur. Off. Agath. 5. Feb.  
Pag. 25. §. 12. lin. 6. EDWARD THE FIRST] This was the son of Henry the third, King of England, and began his reign the 16. of November, 1272. the same day that his father died.  
Pag. 26. §. 13. lin. 8. & lin. 11. HENRY THE 8.] By the death of his father King Henry the 7. began to reign the 22. of April 1509. Of one Arthur Plantagenet; there is mention in Stow, at the fourth year of this King, anno 1513.  
Pag. 27. §. 14. FORCED TO GIVE OVERDO] In suits of Law it is not enough to have a just cause, or good title; but a man must have a good head, understanding and insight in the laws, ability and strength of body to follow the suit by ones self; and above all other things a good purse that will never be drawn dry.  
Quam praestat, pro Deo, renuntiasse mundo: 
Matt. ●. 40.   
Auferenti tunicam, dimisisse pallium!  
Pag. 28. §. 15. GOD FORGIVE THEM] Pater dimitte illis. He prayeth for his enemies, according to that; Matth. 5.44. Love's your enemies, wish well to those that curse you, do good to those that hate ye, and pray for those that persecute and reproach ye. Idem Luc. 6.28. & add Rom. 12.14.  
Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice, because theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. You are blessed when they shall curse you, and shall persecute ye, and speak all evil against ye, for me, lying against the truth. Matth. 5.10. Idem. Luc. 6.22.  
If sinning, and beaten ye suffer: what glory is that? but if doing well ye sustain patiently, this is grace with God. 1. Pet. 2.20. & 3.14. & 4.14.  
Pag. 29. lin. 20. I LEAVE IN MODESTY TO SPEAK OF] If I presume to speak a little, I hope I shall not sin against modesty: 
●. Cor. 12.6.  Veritatem enim dicam.  
First, for his Eloquence he was esteemed, where he was known, for an other Cicero; and so much grace was in his speech, as therewith he was able presently to appease whatsoever tumult or commotion risen among the people. In his younger years when Queen Elizabeth came in progress to Worcester, he made there an oration before her, at the request of the city, for which they gave him 20. pounds: The Queen commanded also to give him a reward, but Sir Robert Dudley making answer, Madam, he is a Papist, he Lost that reward.  
Always going in circuit with the judges of Worcestershiere he employed the spare time he had, in visiting the prisons, speaking with every of the prisoners in particular, exhorting them, and giving them counsel how to answer in their own causes, the best way for their good, and giving them encouragement. Those that by their cause he saw would receive sentence of death, he would both before, and after, dispose to die in the most Christian manner, and if he saw any good to be done, and that a Priest were to be had without imminent danger they should not want him: according to his ability he would also relieve them with his worldly goods.  
For many years after his death, if any thing were done in the commonwealth against justice in commutation, or distribution: no other voice was heard among the people than this alone: things were not thus when Mr. Bel was living, nor would not be if now he lived.  
Briefly, I may justly return upon him all those commendations which he giveth Sir john Throkmarton in the §. 16. Pag. 29. For he had in himself whatsoever he required in his children, or commended in his friends.  
Pag. 31. §. 17. lin. 5. TOWARDS GOD SO RELIGIOUS] Rightly doth he call her Religious, that did not content herself with exercise of ordinary perfection, but aspired to the proper exercises of religious profession; delighting in the abnegation of herself, and corporal austerities, and in the same instructing her children: being so much given to prayer, as besides the office of our B. Lady, of the Dead, the Gradual, and Penitential Psalms, Hymns, Litanies, Office of the holy Ghost, and H. Cross, prayers of the Manual, which were her daily exercise: in the time of lent she would never sleep before she had read over the whole Passion of our Saviour, according to one of the 4. Evangelists, in Latin; which she understood well. Living many years a widow with all the care of a great family. She meditated notwithstanding continually the Law of God, reading also, with licence of her ghostly father, the new Testament, with the Rheims notes, Sir Thomas Moor's works, and other books of Controversies very much, by which she often defended the Catholic faith against the heretical Ministers that would come to dissuade her from it; but found her ever , as a Rock. Ecclesiastic. 26. Everlasting foundations upon a solid rock the Commands of God in the heart of a holy woman: Whose praise in holy Scripture is manifold. Proverb. 11.16. A gracious woman shall get glory. 12.4. A woman of virtue is a crown to her husband. 14.1. A wise woman buildeth up her house; and 31.30. The woman that feareth God shall be praised. 18.22. He that hath found a good wife, hath found a great good, and shall get good will of our Lord. Ecclesiastic. 25.11. Blessed is he that dwelleth with a prudent woman. 26.1. Blessed is the man of a good woman, and double is the number of his days. The gift of God is a woman silent and prudent, and no change is to be given for a well instructed soul. 16. Grace above Grace, is a modest & faithful woman, and no weight is worth her continent soul. The Sun rising in the highest of Our Lord, and the beauty of a good woman in the ornament of her house. 7.26. The woman that honoureth her own man shall appear wise before all. Depart not from a wise & good woman, for her grace is above gold▪ 25.1. Beautiful before God, and before men: The concord of brothers: Friendship of neighbours: Man and wife that agree well together, etc.  
Line 7. VOWED CHASTITY] That is, conjugal chastity, or as they vow that are of the third order of S. Francis in the world, and amidst the cares thereof.  
I REQVIRE AND CHARGE YOU] That is here charged, is like the charge of old Tobias, laid upon his son. Tob. 4.3. Son if I die, bury me, and despise not thy mother: Honour her all the days of thy life, and do what is pleasing to her, and do not make her sad, etc.  
Pag. 33. §. 18. CONTINVALL PRAYER] Again, the author urgeth this point, as a thing for this life most necessary. Ask and it shall be given. Mat. 7.7. & 21.22.  
PROVINCIAL DARKNESS] This term he useth because in respect of the whole Catholic Church, from which it received the light of faith, this Kingdom, as also any other, is but a Province; and, as it is a province in the respect of the light, so also in respect of the darkness, which it hath fall'n into by shutting itself from the whole.  
So in regard of S. Francis whole Order, spread through all the world, this Kingdom is called the Province of England.  
Pag. 35. §. 19 FERVENCY OF ZEAL] The first condition he requireth in Prayer, is FAITH] whereof jacob. 1.6. Let him pray in faith, not wavering: for he that straggereth is like a wave of the sea, moved and tossed with the wound. Let not that man think he shall receive any thing from God. Marc. 11.24. Luc. 11.9. joan. 14. 13. & 16.23.  
Prayer is an ascent of the mind to God. Damascen. lib. 3. de Fide, cap. 24.  
Augustin. Prayer is a pious affect of the mind directed to God. Vigilate & orate ut non intretis in tentationem. Cyrillus. Christ prayeth with 3. companions, so must we; with Peter, that is, faith; with james, that is, sequestration from the world, which to us is supplanted; john, that is, fervour of grace and Charity. Frequent prayer our Saviour taught praying the same thing 3. times. Iterate not a word in thy prayer. Ecclesiasticus 7. That is, make it so full as thou needest not to supply that was by negligence omitted, & 53. The prayer of him that humbleth himself penetrateth the clouds, etc. CHARITY] He that turneth away his ears from hearing the law, his prayer shall become execrable. FERVENCY] The end of prayer, well made, is more fervent than the beginning, for the motion increaseth the heat Eccles. 7. Better is the end of prayer then the beginning. Of Prayer Clem. Alex. l. 4. & 7. storm. In the last acclamations of our prayer we stretch forth head and hands, we stir our feet to heaven, by promptitude and alacrity of spirit flying towards the essence, of which none lays hold but by intellectual touch: we strive together with our speech to raise our bodies above the ground: we strain our erected and elevated souls by desire of better and better things to go forward into the holy of holies, through greatness of courage, scorning to be kep● down by the clog of the body.  
Pag. 35. §. 20. OF THE EFFECTS OF PRAYER] Let Moses or Elias speak▪ To win in fight; 
Exod. 17. 3. Reg. 17. 4. Reg. 6 17. & 20.  to stop the plague; to bind the clouds, and let them lose. Ask Helisaeas, or king Ezechias, what it is. S. Peter, S. Gregory, S. Anthony of Milan, some one, or all the multitude of Thaumaturgs, since Christ, or preaching of the Gospel shall declare. And of the most sweet comforts thereof, believe the Author here, or seek by experience in thyself, which better is, to find it out: inquire among the hardly numerable number of Extatike Saints within the seraphical Order even from S. Francis and S. Giles, until these times, wherein the B. Mother Lovysa life's and many more, of little lesser note. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rapt, ecstasy, which is an abstraction and alienation, and illustration, proceeding from God, by which God draweth back the soul, from above, fall'n to inferior things, again from inferior to superior, and so she is left half dead bereft of the senses. Pythagoras. If thou, leaving the body, dost pass freely in to the sky, thou shalt be an immortal God, dead to this world. Cicero. When the soul is come to that state which is the highest degree of contemplative perfection, then is she ravished from all created likenesses, and understandeth, not by acquisite species, but by looking into the Ideas, and by the light of them, knoweth all things: of which light Plato saith, very few men in this life are made partakers.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Attention or intention, is of so much force in work, as the more secret Divines do say, that by words and prayers, nothing can be done without intention. Hence is the common Proverb; Imagination maketh chance, as Avicenna, and others writ. Hence the Apostle, I will pray in spirit, I will pray in mind, I will sing in spirit, I will sing also in mind: insinuating that unless the mind attend, the prayer is none, and altogether void. Although working in holy things, the defect of this attention do withstand us, because the reasonable number and harmony most efficacious in work, is wanting: yet a greater obstacle it is to us, when our domestic works are contrary to the sacred works. Isaias 1.15. When ye shall multiply prayers I will not hear, because your hands be full of blood. In things of Religion, no work of any marvelous efficacy can be done, unless some of the supernal powers be present, spectator, and accomplisher of the work. Humane nature can neither undertake speech, nor prayer of God, without God, nor yet do any divine work without him: for it is so weak and dull, as it hath no remedy of its nullity, but only some portion of divine light coming from above, without which no divine thing is done by us. jamblicus de Aegyptiorum mysterijs.  
Those that can draw any thing more of the spectacle of God, or of good, do oftentimes, as it were, oversleeping themselves at the most beautiful vision, die. ............ Then shalt thou behold it, when thou mayest have nothing to say of it: for the knowledge and contemplation thereof, is silence, and rest of all the senses; for he that hath understood it can understand nothing else nor can he speculate any thing else, that hath seen it, nor hear of anything else, nor move his body at all: for all the correption of the corporal senses and motions resteth. But searching over all the mind and all the soul, it enlighteneth and withdraweth from the body, and changeth the whole into the essence of God. For possible it is, O my son! that the soul be deified in the body of a man, when it hath seen the beauty of good, which is, to be deified .............. oftentimes the mind flieth out of the soul, and at that time the soul neither seethe nor heareth, but is like a brute beast. Hermes Trismegist. clavis, fol. 129. a, 6. & 132. a. 6.  
Plato in Tymaeo. The soul that often, and with greatest intention contemplateth divine things, with such nourishment waxeth so strong, and able to get out, as it overgroweth the body, and overgoeth it more than the nature of the body is able to bear, and with the most vehement toss thereof, doth sometimes, as it were, fly out of it, or as it were, seem to dissolve it. Marsilius Ficinus de studiosorum sanitate tuenda, lib, 1. cap. 4.  
S. Bernard. serm. 52. de modo bene vivendi. When in the sight of God thou singest Psalms, and Hymns, handle that in thy mind which thou singest with thy voice. Let thy mind agree with thy voice, let it accord with thy tongue; do not think one thing and sing another. If thou sing one thing in thy mind, and another in thy voice, thou losest the fruit of thy labour. If thy body stand in the Church, and thy mind wander abroad, thou losest thy reward. Whence it is said: This people honoureth me with their lips, and their heart, is fare from me. But as the Apostle saith I will sing in spirit, I will sing also in mind, I will sing with mouth and heart. Good therefore it is, always to pray God with mind. It is also good with sound of voice, and Hymns, and Psalms, and spiritual Cantikles to gloriefie God. Idem in meditationib. c. 8.  
Ineffable is the dignation of the Divine bounty, that daily seethe us wretches, averting our ears, hardening our hearts, and nevertelesse calleth unto us, 
Isaias 46. Psal. 45.  saying: Return prevaricatours to the heart, take heed, look to it, for I am God. In the Psalm God speaketh to me, and I to him▪ and yet when I say a Psalm, I attend no● whose Psalm it is. Therefore I do grea● injury to God, when I pray him to hear my prayer, hich I that make it do no● hear: I pray him to attend to me, and I do● neither attend to myself, nor him: bu● which worse is, tossing unprofitable and unclean things in my heart, I cast a horrible stink before his face.  
Franciscus Georgius Harmonia, Cant. 3. modul. 20. Wh●n v●e come once to the first & highest, we must rest, & go no farther, because farther than the highest, nothing can be given: hereof jeremias: She shall sit solitary, & hold her peace, because she hath elevated herself above herself. 
Psal. 4.  And David: In peace, in the thing itself, will I sleep and rest: and again Psalm. 65. vulgat. 64.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Silence is thy praise God in Zion. Which said she must be silent, because she is now come to the place where silence is, because there every one becometh inward and most inward with the highest; so that forgetting all exterior things, and separate from them all, she hath none to whom she may speak, conversing only with him before whom there is no speech required, because he beholdeth all things; and withal, because she beholdeth and is delighted with those things, which if she would, she cannot express: hence therefore she must be silent, unless by the command of her Prince she manifest something to inferiors, according to the capacity of them that are to receive it, for their profit. As S. Dionies. saith of the Angels; That they be declarers of the divine silence, as clear lights, interpreting that which is in secret, etc.  
Pag. 36. lin. 7. INPRISONMENT IN AN INNOCENT CAUSE] Non poena sed causa. As death in an innocent cause, maketh a Martyr, so imprisonment and other sufferings in like cause, maketh a Confessor: in whose number I am very confident, in the goodness of God, I may place the Author of this Testament, who, not only in death, but all his life, and in every occasion, hath confessed Christ and his Church with constancy and perseverance. 
S. Max. hom. 59 2. de S. Eusebio  And the caution of the Divine word; Praise not a man in his life, is, as it were, a command to Praise him after life: Praise him after his consummation.  
Pag. 37. §. 21. lin. 9 YOUR SEVERAL CALLINGS] He speaketh of states, by which men are settled in the world to become apt members in the body of the commonwealth; as Governors, or Magistrates, Doctors in Theology, Law, Medicine, or Practitioners in any of the sciences, or liberal arts. Religious in any of the Regular Orders, that serve the commonwealth in Preaching, administering Sacraments, Sacrifices, Prayers, Comforting the afflicted, disposing to life everlasting the dying, and all works of mercy: in any of the several states of the Plebeians, or the Mechanike arts, whatsoever, and not alone of those that the Prince-Apostles speak of, vocation to the faith, 2. Pet. 1.10. Do your endeavour brothers more and more, by good works to make sure your calling and election. Et Ephes. 4. I beseech you walk worthily in the vocation wherein you are called, etc. Yet of the former callings S. Paul seemeth to have admonished. 1. Cor. 7.20. Every one in what vocation he is called, in the same let him remain: Thou art called, to be a servant, let it not trouble thee; but if thou cannest become a freeman do in God's name. He that in our Lord is called a servant, is our Lord's freeman: And he that is called to be a free man is the servant of Christ.  
Pag. 37. §. 22. lin. 6. TIME, AN ENEMY TO THE THRIFT OF A DISTRESSED CONSCIENCE] Riches, that are seldom gotten together with a good conscience, are with more danger of detriment to the conscience, gotten together in short time. Matth. 19 A rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven. id. Marc. 10. And Luc. 6. Woe be to you rich men. Whence the Apost. 1. Tim 6.17.18. Command the rich men of this world to give easily.  
Every rich man is either unjust, or the heir of some unjust man. Hieronym. lib. 2. in jerem. cap. 5. paulo ante finem, & epist. ad Hedibiam. q. 1. in medio. All riches descend from iniquity, and unless one man lose, another cannot find, whence that common saying seemeth to me most true; That every rich man is either unjust, or the heir of one unjust.  
B. Laurent. justinian. said that rich men could not be saved but by Almesdeeds. We burn in Avarice, and disputing against money, lay open our laps to gold, and nothing is enough for us. What is said of the Megarens may well be applied to the miserable churls: They build as if they were to live ever, they live as if they should die the next day. Hieron. ad Geront. de monogamia. Tom. 1.  
Not he that little hath, but he that much coveteth is poor. Seneca lib. de paupertate.  
No man liveth so poor as he was borne: Seneca, lib. de providentia divina.  
Children of Adam! a covetous, and ambitious kind, harken; What have you to do with earthly riches, and temporal glory, which neither are indeed, nor are yours? gold and silver is it not earth, red and white, which only man's error maketh, or rather reputeth precious? If they be yours take them away with you. But when a man perisheth he shall take nothing with him, neither shall his glory descend with him. True riches therefore is not wealth, but virtues, which the conscience carrieth with it, to make it rich for ever. Bernard. serm. 4. de Aduentu Domini.  
Whom God enricheth no man shall make poor. Cyprian. Tom. 1. epist. 2.  
Those only are good riches which we have in hope and expectation. Greg. Naz. orat. de Machab.  
Neither is any thing a greater terror to us, then lest we should fear any thing more than God. id. ibid.  
He is abundantly rich, that with Christ is poor. Hieron. ep. ad Heliodor. de vita solitaria. Est quaestus magnus, pietas cum sufficientia. 
1. Tim. 6.6.   
The beauty of riches, is not in the sacks of rich men, but in the poors sustenance. Amb. lib. 7. epist. 44.  
The Bishop's glory is to provide for the poors wealth, the ignominy of all Priests is to look only to their own riches: Hiero. add Nepotian. Tomo 1.  
To the faithful the whole world is riches. Amb. lib. 1. de jacob. & vita beata c. ulti. Tom. 4.  
Poverty and riches, are two names of want and satiety, neither is he rich that wanteth something, nor he poor that wanteth not. Amb. Tom. 3. l. 7. epist. 44. Victuals and clothing are Christian's riches. Hieronym. ad Paulinum. Tom. 3.  
To me all plenty which is not my God is want. Aug. Conf. l. 13, c. 8.  
Pag. 38. §. 23. lin. 6. INSTRUCTED IN LEARNING] And the reason is, because knowledge is a great help to serve God with; for as nothing is in the understanding which was not first in the senses, so nothing is in the will which was not first in the understanding. Discipline and science are two wings that with swift flight carry a man to heaven.  
Ambros. in office expos. Psal. 118. Life is to be sought before Doctrine ......... Good life, even without doctrine hath grace, Doctrine without life hath no integrity .......... Again, speaking of moral, and mystical things, he saith: In those is life, in these knowledge: so that, if thou require perfection, let neither life be without knowledge, nor knowledge without life, let one help another. The end of all knowledge is to give a man the true knowledge of his creator that accordingly and in truth he may serve and worship him.  
There is no secure joy in knowing many or hard things in the divine Writ, but in keeping of the things that we know. Greg. 22. Moral. c. 4. in fine.  
As long as thou art ignorant so long must thou learn; and, if we believe the proverb, as long as thou livest. Senec. lib. 10. epist. 77.  
So great is the profundity of Christian letters, as I should daily profit in them, if from my very infancy until decrepit old age, at greatest leisure, with greatest diligence, and the best wit, I shoul endeavour to learn and apply myself to them alone. Aug. ep. 3. Tom. 2.  
The studies of science without facts, I know not whether they do not more involve us. Amb. lib. 1. office c. 26. ●n fine. Tom. 1. & lib. 2. c. 3. in medio. Innocence, and science▪ make a man blessed.  
Pag. 33. §. 24. lin. 3. TRAINED IN SCHOOL TO LEARNING] Not only these two children, but of 12. 8. that lived; were, both sons and daughters, brought up at school, all together till they understood the latin tongue.  
Pag. 39 §. 24. lin. 7. A GRATEFUL ENTERTAINMENT] Music is not alonely so, but moreover, a thing celestial and divine, above all the objects of humane sense, and none doth so much raise the mind, or elevate the soul towards God, the chief and beginning of all order, of all measure, and of all number, as this harmoniacall number, and therefore above all others, God is served with it in his Church; and how much it pleaseth God, so much it offendeth the devils and casteth them fare off. Consult David through all his facts and writings. Music joyeth the heart, forbidden it not. Eccli. 40.20. & 32.4.  
Pag. 39 §. 26. lin. 1. ITEM IF FRANCIS] This was his first son, and died in childhood. I gather hence that the Author was devoted to S. Francis, considering that none of all his ancestors was called by that name. This §. and the 27. and 28. were noted, as it were left unperfect, or other wise ordained.  
Pag. 41. §. 29. lin. 4. JACTA SUPER DOMINUM, etc.] This was the Author's Motto, or Devise. The §. 30. and 31. were noted as before.  
Pag. 44. §. 32. lin. 17. Mr. FRANCIS DANIEL.] Here, in gratitude, and for conscience sake, I must acknowledge myself to have perpetual obligation to this my uncle, not only for 6. years of my education, but also for his assistance and furtherance to put me into the course and state of life in which I am, and by the grace of God shall and will die.  
The §. 33. Goeth noted as before, and where a word is left out in it, lin 21. I suppose the Author would have said, Unjustly, but durst not, considering the dangers of that time.  
Pag. 46. §. 34. IN MOST AMPLE MERIT] This §. the Author had himself noted with a hand monstrant, in the margin, which gave me the first motion of dedicating this work to whom it is, and aught to be dedicated, as is mentioned in the epistle dedicatory. Here I cannot but commend and extol the gratitude of the Author to every man of whom he had at any time received a benefit, according to the Apostolical precept. Coloss. 3.15. Grati estote. Upon which precept read S. Bernard's sermon, entitled by him: Against the most vile vice of ingratitude. Bern. serm. de diversis, pag. 403. 404. etc. This §. was also noted as the others, 4. lines before the end.  
Pag. 47. §. 35. lin. 7. TO USE TRUTH] 3. Esdras 3. Truth surpasseth, and overcometh all things, & 4. And all said; great is the truth. David 116. The truth of our Lord remaineth for ever, and 117. Lord, all thy commands, all thy ways, the beginning of thy words, are all truth. Prou. 26. The deceitful tongue loveth not truth. Zach. 8.16. Every one speak truth. Matth. 22.16. & Luc. 20.21. Thou teachest the way of God in Truth. & joan. 14.6. I am the way, truth, and life. Ephes. 4.25. Laying away lies, speak truth every one with his neighbour. 2. Cor. 13.8. We cannot any thing against Truth. What more? all the new and old Testament is full of the commendations of truth: and as much in the reproving of lying, dissimulation, and falsehood. Coloss. 3.8. Lay away all Anger, Indignation, Malice, Blasphemy, Fowl speech, lie not one to another. Idem, Ephes. 4.13. & 1. Pet. 2.1. Laying a●ay all malice, and all deceit, and dissimulation, and envy and detraction. Et Heb. 12. What desireth the soul more strongly than truth. Aug. tract. 26. in joan. No man can long bear a feigned person: for feigned things fall soon to their own nature. Things that are borne up by truth arise from solid ground and by time proceed to better and better. Seneca, de clementia, lib. 1.  
§. 35. lin. 15. PLEASE GOOD MEN] Paul. ad Gal. 10. If yet I should please men, I should not be the servant of Christ. Know this most certainly, that no man can please God and wicked men, your brotherhood therefore make account that so much more it hath pleased Almighty God, as it knoweth itself to have displeased perverse men. Greg. l. 8. Regist Indict. 3. c. 36. Principibus placuisse viris non infima laus est.  
Pag. 47. §. 36. lin. 1. DELIGHT NOT IN RIBAWDRIE] Apost. ad Ephes. 5.3. Fornication and all manner of uncleanness, or avarice, let it not be so much as named amongst you: or filthiness, or foolish talk, or scurrility, which do not appertain to the purpose: but rather thanksgiving. Speak no bawdy thing, for by little and little shame with words is shaken off. Senec l. de moribus. Matth. 12.34. From the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. Idem, Luc. 6.45.  
Pag. 48. §. 37. MAKE CHOICE OF HUMILITY] Prou. 15.33. Before glory goeth humility. And 29.23. The pride of a man shall humble him: and the humble of spirit shall attain glory, & 13.10. Among the proud are always contentions. And 15.25. The house of the Proud our Lord will overthrow. Deut. 17.12. The proud that will not obey the Priest or judge, let him die. 
Prou. 16.18.  Before a fall goeth pride and before a ruin, loftiness of spirit. Pride is not greatness, but a swelling, § that that swelleth seemeth great, but is not sound. Aug. serm. 26. the temp. So great is the utility of human humility, as by his own example the divine sublimity would commend it (and that most of all appeared in the washing of judas the traitors feet.) For Proud man had for ever been lost, unless humble God had sought him out. Aug. tract. 55. in joann. Behold O man! what God is become for thee. Acknowledge at last the doctrine of humility, even before thy Doctor speak. Thou wert once in Paradise so eloquent, as to every living soul thou couldst give a name. And for thee thy creator, lo, lieth an infant in a manger and calleth not so much as his own mother by her name. Thou, in the most spacious orchard of fruitful wood didst lose thyself, neglecting obedience. He obeying came mortal into the wide world; that dying he might seek the dead. Thou being man wouldst become God, that thou mightest perish: he being God would become man to find out what had perished. Humane pride did so much depress thee, as nothing but the divine grace could sublevate thee. Aug. Tom. 10. serm. 25. the temp. in medio.  
Those that of our Lord JESUS CHRIST have learned to be mild and humble of heart, do profit more in considering and praying, then in reading and hearing. Aug. Epist. 112. He that without humility doth good works, carrieth dust in the wind. Aug. serm. 70. ad fratres in eremo.  
There is no other way that leadeth unto life then humility, which is by him defended, that, as God, seethe our footsteps, and the same is the first humility, the second humility, the third humility, and as often as thou shouldest ask me I would say the same thing; not because there be not other precepts to be said: but because unless humility do go before, and wait upon, and fellow all things that we do, both the things proposed us to look into, and things opposed us to stick unto, and things imposed us to repress us: when we now rejoice of any good thing done: Pride wrists it all out of our hands. Aug. epist. 57  
A very marvelous thing it is, when humility of manners reigneth in the hearts of the sublime. Whence ye may think that all the potent, when they savour of humility, they attain the top of virtue, estranged, and set, as it were, a fare off, and rightly by this virtue they eftsoons please our Lord: because they humbly offer him that sacrifice which mighty and potent men can hardly get. It is a most subtle art of living to hold height, and depress glory; to be in power, and not know that we be powerful; by bestowing of good things, to know one's self to be potent, and in repaying of hurt, to be ignorant of all the value of power. Rightly therefore of such is said, job 36.5. God casteth not away the potent, being himself also potent: For he desireth to imitate God who administereth the height of power more busily in other men's profits then elevated in his own praises: who being put over others, desireth to profit them, and not to be above them. The swelling of loftiness is a crime, the order of power none. Power God giveth, but the elation of power, the malice of our mind hath invented. Let us take away that which of our own we brought, and the things are good which of God's gift we possess. Creg. lib. 26. Moral. c. 24.  
Pag. 48. §. 38. ENTERTAIN ALICE MEN] Leviticus 19.31. Before the hoary headed arise, and honour the presence of the old man. Prou. 22.2. The rich and poor God made them both.  
Pag. 48. §. 39 lin. 3. AMONG WISE MEN] Prou. 1. The wise man hearing wil● become wiser. 3. Reg. 10.8. Blessed are thy servants that stand before thy face, always hearing thy wisdom. Prou. 10.13. In the wise man's lips is wisdom found, & 11▪ 2. Where humility is, there is wisdom.  
Lin. 6. SUCH SHALL THEY BE JUDGED TO BE) Psalm. 17. With the holy thou shalt be holy: and with the man that is innocent thou shalt be innocent▪ With the Elect thou shalt be elected; and with the perverse perverted.  
Pag. 49. §. 40. BE NOT RASH] Define no doubts, but hold thy sentence in suspense: Affirm nothing without experience; for every thing that hath appearance of truth is not forthwith true; as also what at first did seem incredible is not still false. Truth sometimes retaineth the face of a lie, and a lie is hid under colour of truth. Seneca, the 4. virtutibus. And again: Let nothing be sudden to thee but look into all things before hand; for he that is prudent, saith not, I never thought that this would have been, because he doubteth not, but expecteth; nor doth he suspect, but taketh heed. Inquire the cause of every deed, and when thou hast found the beginning, thou shalt think upon the end.  
Between an angry, and a mad man, there is but one days difference; the one is ever mad, the other every day angry. Seneca, lib. de moribus.  
Pag. 49. §. 41. USE FEW WORDS] Proverb. 10.19. In much sgeech sin will not be wanting: and he that keepeth his lips, shall be understanding. As chosen silver, is the just man's tongue.  
Let thy opinions be judgements, vagabond cogitations and like to dreams receive not; in which if thy mind take delight, when thou hast done and disposed of all, thou remainest sad: but let thy cogitation be stable and certain, whether it deliberate, search out, or contemplate, let it not departed from truth. Let not thy speech be vain, but let it either persuade, or move, or comfort, or command. Praise sparingly, dispraise more sparingly, for overmuch praise is as reprehensible as immoderate dispraise; that, is suspected of flattery; this, of evil nature, or malignity. Seneca, lib. the 4. virtutibus.  
Love's silence, where much speech is, there is oftentimes lying; where lying, there is sin. The speech showeth what the man is. In the mouth of the Priest or Religious let never any word be, wherein the name of Christ soundeth not. Tom. 4. epist. Euseb. ad Damas'. de morte Hieronymi, in medio.  
WITH DISCRETION] Coloss. 4.6. Your speech always gracious, with a grain of salt: that you may know how to answer every man.  
Young man, speak when there is need of thee; if thou be twice asked, let thine answer have a head. Ecclesiastic. 32.9. According to the septuagint: Bring thy answer to a brief sum or answer compendiously.  
Use thy ears ofter than thy tongue, and whatsoever thou art to say, say to thyself before thou say it to others. Seneca, lib. de moribus.  
§. 42. BE NOT CURIOUS] Nothing is sweeter to men, then to speak o● other men's things, and to have care of other men's matters, chief if it chance that they be prevented with love or hatred towards some: from whom always the truth is hidden, or, at least obscured. Greg. Naz. in Apolog.  
Only observe thyself, 
Deut. 4.9. 1. Cor. 10.11. Matt. 7.3.  and keep thy soul very warily. He that thinketh himself to stand, let him look he do not fall. What seest thou a mote in thy brother's eye, and dost not see the beam in thine own eye?  
O man that judgest, thou art inexcusable, 
Rom. 2.  for in judging another thou condemnest thyself, doing the same things that thou spendest thy judgement upon.  
§. 43. BE SECRET AND SILENT] Prou. 25.9. Reveal not the secret of another. Id. 31. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Isaias 24.16. My secret to myself, my secret to myself. Ecclesiasticus, 32.5. Where others harken, pour not out speech, and with importunity have not a will to seem wise.  
Pag. 50. §. 44. lin. 3. LOOK TO YOUR CALLING] Ecclesiastic. 3.22. Seek not things above thee. Rom. 11.20. Be not overwise, but fear.  
Lin. 4. LIVE IN OBEDIENCE] Ephes. 6. Col. 3, Children obey your Parents; Servants obey your Lors, and masters. Heb. 13. Obey those that are put over ye. Tit. 3.1. Admonish them to be subject to their Princes and superior powers, to obey their word, etc.  

4. Reg. 9 1. Par. 11. & 28. Prou. 21 Tob. 12.6. 1. Pet. 2.13. & 17  LEAVE KINGS AND THEIR CAUSES TO GOD] They be supreme governor's under God. The Anointed of God. The elected of God. Their hearts are in the hand of God, and he directeth th●ir counsel. To hide the mystery of the King is good: and to be subject to him and honour him is commanded.  

Prou. 16 14.  Lin. 8. HATH DESTROYED] The Kings anger is the messenger of death, and a wise man will appease it. In the light of the King's face is life: and his good will is like a cloud of the evening rain.  
Page 50. §. 45. USE TEMPERANCE] S. Aug. Tom. 1, l. 1. de lib. Arbit. c. 13. Temperance is an affection bridling and keeping in the appetite from those things that are coveted with foul desire. Et de morib. ecclesiae Cath. lib. 1. c. 15. Temperance is love, yielding itself entire to that is loved. Fortitude is love, easily tolerating all things for that is loved. justice is love, serving the beloved only, and therefore rightly bearing rule. Prudence is love, wisely selecting the things by which it is helped, from those by which it is hindered. But this is not the love of whosoever, but of God, that is, of the chiefest good, of the chiefest wisdom, of the chiefest concord: therefore you may define it so, & say: temperance is love keeping itself entire and uncorrupt to God, etc. And Tom. 4. l. 1.83. Q. 31. Temperance is a firm and moderate rule of reason, over lust and other, not right motions of the mind. The parts thereof are continence, clemency, and modesty. Continence, by which concupiscence, by the government of counsel, is ruled. Clemency, by which minds rashly provoked and stirred up to hatred of any one, are by gentleness retained. Modesty, by which honest shame getteth clear and stable authority. And Q. 61. Prudence is knowledge of things to be desired and to be shunned. Temperance, the refraining of concupiscence from those things that do temporally delight, Fortitude is a firmity of the mind against those things that temporally molest us. justice, which is diffused through them all, is the love of God and our neighbour.  
BEWARE OF DRUNKENNESS] As a thing tumultuous, 
Prou. 20 & 31.  and that can keep no secret forbidden by the Apostle. Rom. 13. & Gal. 5. With drunkenness is always joined luxury. Hieron. l. 3. in Ep. ad Gal. c. 5. I will never believe that the Drunkard is chaste. Hieron. in c. 1. Ep. ad Titum, pag. 246.  

Eccles. 9.25. Eccle. 5.  §. 46. lin. 2. THE RASH MAN] Is odious in his word. Speak nothing rashly, nor be hasty to bring forth thy word before God, for God is in heaven and thou upon earth, therefore let thy words be few: for as sleep comes in multitude of business, so the voice of the fool in multitude of words.  
Pag. 51, §. 47. BE CONSTANT] Act. 23.11. Sap. 5.1. The just shall stand with great constancy. A good man, what he thinketh he may honestly do: although it be laborious, he will do it: although it be loss to him, he will do it: although it be perilous, he will do it: And again, that which is dishonest, he will not do it, although it bring in money, although it bring pleasure, although it bring power. From the honest he will by nothing be deterred: to the dishonest he will by no hopes be invited. Seneca, lib. 10. epist. 77. in medio. Horace. justum & tenacem propositi virum, etc. Impavidum ferient ruinae.  
jacob. 1.8. The man of two minds is unconstant in all his ways.  
Sap. 4.12. The inconstancy of concupiscence, perverteth even the mind that is without malice.  

Eccl. 6. & 9 & 12.  FAST IN FRIENDSHIP] There is a friend only at table, a table fellow, but do not thou forsake an old friend. A new friend is like new wine. A friend cannot be known in good, but in malice you shall know him, etc.  
Pag. 51. §. 48. USE PATIENCE, 
Psal. 9 Prou. 19 Luc. 21. jacob. 1 ] The Poors patience will not be lost in the end. A man's doctrine is known by hi● patience. In your patience you shall possess your souls. It hath a perfect work: The arms of the just are by giving way to overcome. Amb. lib. 1. off. cap. 5. Tom. 1.  
If any adversity befall thee, and it seem grievous and bitter to thee, bear it so as thou think nothing to have befallen thee but according to nature when thou readest naked was I borne, naked shall I go hence, what our Lord gave our Lord hath taken away: and he had lost both goods and children, and thou shalt in all keep the person of a wise and just man, as he kept that said: As it pleased our Lord so is it done, be the name of our Lord blessed, etc. Amb. lib. 1. off. cap. 38.  
No man can be blessed, no man becometh a citizen of heaven, no man is constituted the friend of God, that among evils is not found patiented. Aug. serm. 32. ad fratres.  
Humane impatience will not have the patience of God. We wretches that will have God to be patiented, and ar● ourselves impatient with our enemies. If at any time we sin, we desire God should be patiented, if another sin against us, we will not that God have patience with him. Hieron. in Psalm. 93. ad, usquequo Domine peccatores gloriabuntur. Tom. 8.  
FORBEAR REVENGE] That it is peculiar to God, see Deut. 32. & 2. Reg. 22. Psal. 17. & 139. & 149. & Rom. 12. Leave the revenge to me and I will repay them. Et Ezech 9 Eccl. 35. Esaias 1. etc.  
If thou be Magnanimous, thou wilt never think thou hast injury done thee: thou wilt say of thine enemy, he hath not hurt me, but had a mind to hurt me: and when thou seest him in thy power, thou shalt esteem it sufficient revenge, to have been able to revenge. Know that it is honest and a great kind of revenge to forgive. Seneca, the 4. virtutib. l. 1. & de Clementia lib. 2. Clemency is a temperance of ones mind in the power of Revenge, or, lenity of the superior to the inferior in constituting punishment, and cruelty is fierceness of mind in exacting of Punishment. He is better that contemneth an injury then that grieveth at it: for he that contemneth it, despiseth it, as if he felt it not: but he that grieveth at it, is vexed with it, as if he felt it. Amb. lib. 1. off. c. 6. Tom. 1. Magnarum virium est negligere laedentem.  
§. 49. 
Seneca, lib. de moribus  BE NOT TOO LIBERAL] Liberality is the mean between avarice & prodigality, and consequently a virtue: which always holdeth the mean, flying the extremes of too much, ever a vice.  
To have, and give to others, is an argument of a Wealthy man. Basil. hom. 29. de poenitentia.  
Avarice in old age, is like a monster; for what greater folly is there, then as the way groweth shorter, to increase the viaticum. Seneca, lib. de moribus.  
These things withdraw from right: Honours, Riches, Power, and the like, which in the opinion of men are dear; in price vile. Seneca, lib. de Paupertate. Vide Chrysost. Tom. 5. hom. 15. ad Antioch.  
All vices wax old with a man, only avarice waxeth young. Aug. serm. 48. ad frat. in eremo.  
§. 50. lin. 3. BE THANKFUL FOR EVERY COURTESY] Not to render thankes for benefits is foul, and so holden with all men; therefore of the ungrateful even the ungrateful do complain; when notwithstanding, this same that displeaseth all, sticketh to all, and so fare men go on the contrary side as some are to us most odious not only after benefits, but even for benefits. He is ungrateful that denyeth the benefit he hath received: he is ungrateful that dissembleth it, he is ungrateful that repayeth it not, he is most ungrateful that forgetteth it. Seneca lib. 3. de beneficijs.  
Some, when a gift is sent them, do untimely restore another, and say they own nothing. They are to be rejected: it is a pledge to send presently another gift to him that sent to thee, and extinguish gift with gift. Sometimes being able, I will not restore a benefit, when I shall detract more from myself then help another: when he shall receive no increase by the receipt of that, which restored me would stand me in good steed. He that maketh haste to repay, hath not the mind of a grateful man, but of a debtor. And, to speak briefly, he that desireth to repay too soon, oweth against his will, he that unwillingly oweth, is ungrateful. Seneca lib. 4. de beneficijs.  
Lin. 4. LET TIME BREED THE FRIENDS] Thou knowest not how great the price of friendship is, if thou do not understand that thou givest him much to whom thou givest a friend. A thing not in houses alone, but in ages rare, which is no where more wanting, then where it is most of all believed to abound. Seneca l. 6. the benef.  
He can not be friend to man, that is unfaithful to God. Ambros. l. 3. off. c. 16. & l. 6. epist. 40. True love is proved by constancy.  
Slender friendship is that which followeth the friends felicities and riches: such men seem to me not to love their friends but themselves. Hieron. in c. 7. Micheae. Tom. 6. pag. 161. & ad Ruffin. Tom. 2. pag. 195.  
True friendship must not dissemble what it feeleth. Prosperity getteth friends: Adversity is the surest proof of them. Seneca, lib. de morib. ante medium.  
Pag. 52. §. 51. lin. 3. 
Rom. 13  WITH DUE REVERENCE] Let every living soul be subject to higher powers.  
When thou sittest to eat with a Prince, 
Prou. 23.  considering consider what is before thy face, and if thou be thine own man, set thy knife to thy throat. 
Eccl. 32 13.  In the midst of great men presume not to speak. Where Ancients are speak not much. 
Rom. 12.10. Rom. 13 7.  Preventing one another with honour, give honour to whom honour is due. In the midst of the brethren their Ruler shall be had in honour. 
Eccl. 10 24.  Fools have decreed to yield to no man, nor to regard distinction of persons, or degrees: on such as do regard the same, they cast the crime of flattery, or acception of persons: And being great friends of confusion, to beware of pride in their betters, they take no heed of it in themselves: in stead of order, they show irreverence. S. Bon. spec. discip. c. 6.  
Pag. 52. §. 52. RELIEVE ALL THAT ARE DISTRESSED] jacob. 1.27. Pure and immaculate Religion before God and the Father is this: to visit pupils, orphans, & widows in their tribulation, & keep one's self unspotted from this world. Psal. 40. Blessed is he that hath consideration of the poor and needy, our Lord will deliver him in the evil day. Matth. 5.7. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. jacob. 13. judgement without mercy to him that hath not done mercy.  
A FRIEND] Forsake not thy friend, and the friend of thy father. Prou. 27.10.  
Pag. 52. §. 53. HAVE CHARITY WITH ALICE MEN] He showeth us, with the Apostle. 1. Cor. 12.31. Yet a more excellent way: For to speak with tongues of men or Angels; to have the faith that removeth mountains; to feed the poor; to yield the body to Martyrdom, is of no value without charity.  
The latitude of the commands is charity; because where charity is, straits are not. Wilt thou not be driven into straits on earth? dwell in latitude. Whatsoever a man doth to thee he cannot vex thee, because thou lovest that which hurteth not. Charity therefore is not brought into any straits. Augustin. tract. 10. in Epist. joan. & Epist. 62. I do ever owe charity, which alone being paid holdeth me still debtor. The bestowing of it payeth it, & although it be bestowed, yet is it still owed, because there is no time in which it ought not to be bestowed: and when it is bestowed, it is not lost, but rather in the bestowing is multiplied, for it is bestowed by having and not by wanting it. As it cannot be bestowed unless it be had, neither can it be had unless it be bestowed: And when a man bestoweth it, in the same man it increaseth, and is so much more gotten as it is ofter bestowed ............. Charity therefore is not so bestowed as money; for besides that in bestowing, this is diminished, that encreassed, there is between them this difference, that to whom we give money we are so much the more benevolent as we seek to receive nothing again, but of charity; he cannot be a true bestower that is not again a benign exactor: for money when ●● is received cometh to him to whom it is given and departeth from him that giveth it; but Charity, increaseth, not only in him that exacteth it from whom he loveth, although he do not receive it of him; but also he from whom he doth receive it, then beginneth to have it when he yields it. Wherefore I do gladly render mutual Charity, and willingly receive it: that which I receive I do yet require again, that which I render I still owe.  
Charity being one and the same thing, if it fully possess the mind, doth manifoldly enkindle it to innumerable works. Greg. l. 10. Mor. c. 7.  
He that followeth charity, is humble towards all. And the keeper of peace, provoketh none to brawling. Amb. in illud 2. Tim. 2. juvenilia desideria fuge, Tom. 5. pag. 415. What thou wilt have secret, tell it no man, if thou hast not commanded thyself silence, how shalt thou hope for it in another. Seneca, lib. 2. de moribus.  
Pag. 53. §. 54. EMBRACE CHASTITY] Commended in judith 15. & 16. Exhorted, 2. Cor. 6. 1. Tim. 2.3.4. & 5. Chastity without Charity is a lamp without oil, take away the oil and the lamp giveth no light: take away Charity, and Chastity pleaseth not. Bernard. Epist. 4●. Chastity without her compagnions', Fast, and Temperance, soon decayeth, but strengthened with these helps, will easily be crowned. Chrysost. hom. 1. in Psalm. 50. Tom. 1. & de praeparat. advent. Domini. Chastity of body alone sufficeth not to the integrity of the heart.  
The flesh cannot be corrupted, unless the mind be first corrupted. Amb. ad virg. lapsam, c. 4. Tom. 1.  
Dost thou command continence? Lord, give that thou commandest, and command what thou wilt. Aug. l. 10. Conf. c. 29.  
To live in flesh, not according to the flesh is not an earthly, but a heavenly life. Whence, in flesh to attain the Angelical life, is of more merit then to have it: for to be an Angel is felicity; to be a virgin, virtue: Whilst the virgin by her own forces with grace, endeavoreth to obtain that which the Angel hath by nature. Hieron. ad Paul. & Eustoch. de Assump. B. MARIAE, Tom. 4.  
BEWARE OF THE ALLUREMENTS OF THE HARLOT] Her lips are a dropping honniecombe. Prou. 5. The fornicator sinneth against his own body. 2. Cor. 6.  
Pag. 53. §. 55. lin. 4. CANKER OF VSURIE] Prohibited. Exod. 22.25. Levit. 25.37. Deut. 23.19. Nehem. 5. Ezech. 18.8. Foenus pecuniae, funus est animae. Use of money is the soul's funeral, and he that by others loss coveteth to be enriched, is worthy to be punished with everlasting want. S. Leo, serm. 6. de ieiunio decimi mensis.  
Pag. 53. §. 56. APPLY YOUR SELVES IN COMPANY] Rom. 12.15. Rejoice with those that are glad, weep with those that are sad. Seneca, l. the 4. virtutibus. Let not thy poverty be undecent, nor parsimony vicious, nor simplicity neglect, nor lenity languishing, and if thy goods be slender, yet let them not be pinching ..... fear no man more than thyself ... Have not scurrility, but grateful urbanity: let thy jests be without tooth, thy disports without harm, thy laughter without noise, thy voice without clamour, thy gate without tumult, thy quiet not sluggish; and when others play, do thou also some good and honest exercise ... Fly flattery, and be as loath to be praised of the dishonest, as to be praised for dishonesty: be glad when thou displeasest the evil, and think their evil opinions of thee, thy truest praise. Fear not bitter, but fair words ... fly vices thyself, and of others vices be neither curious searcher, nor bitter reprehender, but without reproaching, a corrector; so as with cheerfulness thou prevent thy admonition, and give lightly way to pardon error: Extol not, nor deject thou any ... Be to all benign, but fond of none: familiar with few, equal towards all ... Be a concealour of thy virtues, as others are of their vices: a contemner of vain glory, and no bitter exactor of the good wherewith thou art endued ... Be docible, and covetous of wisdom, men when they teach, do learn; what thou knowest, without arrogancy, impart with those that require it, what thou knowest not, without hiding of thy ignorance, pray others to impart it to thee.  
Pag, 54. §. 57 lin. 14. BREACH OF THE DEAD MAN'S WILL] The laws have: Let them in all things obey the will of the testator. If any one will do contrary to the will of the testator; Let him go without the inheritance. Aug. orat. de 5. haeresib. c. 6. Tom. 6. Careat aeterna haereditate hareticus contraveniens voluntati testamenti JESV.  
Pag. 55. lin. 8. TO ARTHUR MY SON] This was my name in baptism, not once mentioned in all the testament before: whence it is manifest that these fragments were not written at the same time with the Testament, but added by the author after 1590. the year that first bereved me of a years life.  
Prima quae vitam dedit hora carpsit.  
Nullius ultima rapuit plus quam prima.  
FINIS.   

ERRATA.  
Pag. Lin. Err. Correct. 26. 23. Arthour. Arthur Plantagenet. 28. 2. Orford. Oxford. 29. 10. heath. health. 29. 13. afforced. afforded. 43. 14. that do. that I do. 69. 29. faling. failing. 74. 14. of the the. of the years. 107. 25. w●. we. 110. 3. Pag. 28, Pag. 18. 156. 26. Author. Author. 165. 29. Lors. Lords.