THE MOUNT OF HOLY MEDITATION: OR A TREATISE Showing the nature and kinds of Meditation; the subject matter and ends of it; the necessity of Meditation; together with the excellency and usefulness thereof. By William Gearing Minister of the Gospel at Lymington in the County of Southampton.  Admiratio generat quaestionem, quaestio investigationem, investigatio inventionem; lectio ad cognoscendam veritatem materiam ministrat; meditatio coaptat, oratio sublevat, operatio componit; & contemplatio in i●●● exultat. Hugo in Meditat. 
LONDON, Printed for Francis Titan at the three Daggers in Fleetstreet, 1662.   

To the Virtuous Gentlewoman Mrs Elizabeth Ashe of Alsted, in the County of Kent; and to her Eldest and hopeful Son William Ashe Esquire.  
THe great God needeth none of his creatures, nor any of their services, all the service he requireth of his people, tendeth to their own good, and is no way beneficial to him; to think to add any thing to him, is to gild gold, or light a Candle at noonday: God is eternal, and was everlastingly blessed, before one Angel was created to attend him, as now there be thousands ministering unto him, and before there was one man form on earth to praise him, and do him service, as now there are variety of creatures to set forth his praise: God is infinitely above all advantages, which any of the services of the sons of men can afford unto him: a drop is more to the Ocean, than all the services of men are to God: If God had needed the world, or any thing therein, he could have made it long before; but Himself is his own blessedness; he is fully satisfied in himself; it is essential to him to be infinitely happy; therefore as his being, so his blessedness is essential to him: he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, self-sufficient, and infinitely happy in his own most glorious and transcendent excellencies. There is then in God enough to satisfy the souls of men and women; for if there be enough in him to satisfy himself, who is infinite, than who cannot think but there is enough in him, to satisfy all the finite capacities of poor mortals? the spring of all our wants ariseth from our distance from God; and indeed there is no want can make us truly miserable, but our want of enjoying God. We may cast about us, thinking to help ourselves in our straits and exigences many ways; but till we come to God, and feed upon his excellencies, our disease will never be cured.  
The proper habitation of the soul is God himself; and none are so well housed, as they that have God for their dwelling place; when God iS a man's habitation, there do the glorious Angels keep the door: happy is that soul that lodgeth in the bosom of his love; that seethe his face, and walketh in the light of his countenance; the more it is raised up above lusts and creature-comforts, the more taken up with the contemplation of the love of God, the more do the will and affections run out after him. Naturalists tell us, that the Bees hate all artificial savours; so he that hath been at the fountain of life, and drunk a large draught of the river of his pleasures, will not seek to quench his thirst at any broken Cistern, that can hold no water. Our corrupt spirits think, that unless we can satisfy such a lust, enjoy such a friend, and so much of creature-comforts, it will never be well with us; but these are but mere delusions of the Devil; for a man that wanteth God, to be discontented for any external thing, and to think to help himself by the creature, it is but to add vanity to vanity, and in fine misery to misery: for when a man expecteth satisfaction, and findeth nothing less, his misery is so much the more increased.  
St Augustine tells us of three sorts of men, that be not happy in this life: The first, he that enjoyeth not the thing he loveth, whether the thing he loveth be good or evil: The second, he that enjoyeth what he loveth, but the thing that he enjoyeth is not good for him: The third, he that enjoyeth what is good for him, but he takes no delight nor comfort in it: To all these he answereth in a word; Primus cruciatur, secundus fallitur, tertius aegrotat; The first is disquieted, saith he, vexed and tormented, because he hath not what he would have; he is not happy, because he is disquieted: The second, (he that enjoyeth what he loveth, but the thing he enjoyeth is not good for him) such a one is deceived and deluded with a show of happiness; the thing is hurtful to him, and therefore is not happy in his enjoyment: The third, he that possesseth what is good for him, but he loveth it not, he is sick and distempered, his heart is very much out of frame: but he that enjoyeth God, hath that which is best for him, and possesseth him, and this is true happiness.  
It is altogether impossible for man to be made happy, by any thing inferior to himself: there is something in man, superior to any earthly creature, viz. a reasonable soul; and there is nothing in worldly honours, riches, etc. that is comparable to the substance or faculties of man's intellectual soul: therefore if man cannot find happiness in himself, it is in vain to seek it in any earthly and sublunary thing; I mean true happiness, and real satisfaction. Man can never be happy, but by the possession of something more excellent than himself, and cannot possess any true contentment, till he comes to the possession of God. There is no one outward thing, that can relieve us in all our wants: meat nourisheth us, but clothes us not: our garments cover us, but feed us not: gold enricheth us, but defends us not from any danger: one good produceth but one single advantage to us but those that daily meditate upon God, 
Phil. 4.19.  do find enough in him to satisfy all their desires: he hath riches enough in himself to supply all our wants; and indeed such is the capacity of man's heart, that none but an infinite God can fill it.  
And now the design of this Treatise of Meditation (which I most humbly present unto you) is to lead us frequently to God, who leads us to Heaven; and what greater delight, than to be led to Heaven, by him that dwells there? our hearts are like a spring-lock that shut themselves, but do not open to any thing that is good; therefore we must open them every day with the key of meditation: and as in natural things, those that be highest, and nearest to the Heavens, are purest and clearest, and come nearest to the nature thereof; as the Element of fire, and the upper region of the Air be more pure and free from gross matter, than the middle and lower region, where the clouds and mists be engendered; so those that draw near to God by holy meditation, and are frequent in this heavenly exercise, are pure from those gross sins, with which others pollute themselves: otherwise men in high places may not unfitly be resembled to the Planet Saturn, of whom Astronomers and Philosophers tell us, that in sphere and place he is nearest to the Heavens, but in nature and quality most unlike them, and least of all partaking of the influences of Heaven.  
Let me beseech you still to keep close to God, and then the Lord will stick close to you, and vouchsafe his presence with you. Among all Rules of policy, these are the chiefest: to be faithful and upright to the Lord; to aim at his glory; to be guided by his Spirit; and walk according to the rule of his Word; then may you be assured, that you are more safe under his protection, than any arm of flesh can make you. I humbly crave your pardon for this my boldness; and that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, may bless you with all spiritual blessings in heavenly things in Christ, is, and shall be the prayer of  
Your most humble Servant in the Gospel WILLIAM GEARING. From my Study in Lymington. Sep 30. 1661.   

INDEX RERUM.  

CHap. 1. The Porch or entrance into this Work. Text, Gen. 24.63. opened.  
Chap. 2. 

Sect. 1. Showing that Meditation is a duty that concerneth persons of all ranks, conditions and ages.  
Sect. 2. That Meditation is constantly to be practised.    
Chap. 3. How Meditation and Contemplation differ one from the other.  
Chap. 4. How Study and Meditation differ.  
Chap. 5. Of the Gate of Meditation.  
Chap. 6. Of the kinds of Meditation; and first of rapt Meditation.  
Chap. 7. 

Sect. 1. Of set and solemn Meditation; the definition and branches of it.  
Sect 2. Of the ends of solemn Meditation.    
Chap. 8. Of the subject of Meditation. 

Sect. 1. Of meditation on the Works of God.  
Sect. 2. Of meditating on the Word of God.  
Sect. 3. Of meditating on Man; his Creation, his body, his soul, his privileges.  
Sect. 4. Of meditation on the fall of Adam.  
Sect. 5. Of the nature of sin, the number of our sins, with the aggravations of them.  
Sect. 6. Of the sufferings and death of Christ.  
Sect. 7. Of meditation on the Resurrection of Christ.  
Sect. 8. Of meditation on Death.  
Sect. 9 Of the fewness of them that shall be saved.  
Sect. 10. Of meditation on Hell.  
Sect. 11. Of meditation on the glory of Heaven.    
Chap. 9 Of timing our Meditations in the best manner.  
Chap. 10. An Exhortation to the practice of Meditation; showing also the necessity thereof.  
Chap. 11. Objections against setting about the work of Meditation, answered.  
Chap. 12. Setting down the Rules about Meditation.  
Chap. 13. Of the excellency and usefulness of Meditation.  
Chap. 14. The Motives to Meditation.    

The Authors cited in this Treatise.  

A  
AMbrosius.  
Bp Andrews.  
Anselm.  
Aquila.  
Aretius.  
Aquinas.  
Aristotle.  
Arias Montanus.  
Augustine.  
Ainsworth.   

B  
Ball.  
Sr Francis Bacon.  
Bp Babington.  
Beza.  
Bellarmine.  
Bernard.  
Boetius.  
Bodinus.  
Brathwait.  
Bonaventure.   

C  
Causin.  
Calvin.  
Cassius Severus.  
Climacus.  
Chaldeus.  
Cassiodorus.  
Charron.  
Cicero.  
chrysostom.  
Columella.  
Clemens Alexand.  
Chytraeus.  
Cyril.  
Concil. Melevit.   

D  
Dearing.  
Downham.  
Diogenes.  
Drexelius.   

E  
Erasmus.  
Euseb. Emyssen.   

F  
Fenner.  
Fulgentius.  
Dr Fulk.   

G  
Gasp. in Heracl.  
Gaul.  
Goulart.  
Genevens.  
Gerrard.  
Gerson.  
Gregor.  
Gualther.  
Gloss.   

H  
Bp Hall.  
Hebr.  
Hippolit.  
Hieronym.  
Hoord.  
Sam. Hieron.  
Hugo.  
Hpyocrates.   

I  
josephus.  
●tal.  
Junius.  
Isidor. Pelus.   

K  
Kempis.   

L  
Lorinus.  
Lumb. Sent.  
Luther.  
Lyranus.  
Leo.   

M  
Macarius.  
Martial.  
Marc. Herem.  
Marlorat.  
Melch. Adam.  
Minut. Faelix.  
Moller  
More's Demonstr.  
Montague.  
Musculus.  
Montaign.   

N  
Gr. Nazianz.  
Nebrissens.   

O  
Onkelus.  
Ovid.   

P  
Pet. Mart.  
Perkins.  
Plato.  
Plinius.  
Philo Jud.  
Plutarch.  
Bp Pilkington.  
Philip's.  
Polan. Synt.  
Prosper.  
Priorw.   

Q  
Quintil.   

S  
Seneca.  
Dr Sibs.  
Senault.  
Sozomen.  
Stiles.  
Strong.  
Struther.  
Suetonius.  
Suidas.  
Symmachus.  
Symonds.  
Stella.   

T  
Tertullian.  
Theodoret.  
Tostatus.  
Turner   

V  
Jac. de Valent.  
Vatablus.  
Vega.   

W  
Wall.  
White.  
Woodward.    

THE MOUNT OF Holy Meditation.  Genesis 24.63. 
And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the eventide.  

Chap. I. The porch or entrance into this Work.  
AFter the death of Sarah, Abraham feeling himself wholly broken with old age, and ready to go the way of all the earth, resolved to seek a match for Isaac his son; and for that end he calleth the steward of his house, and most faithful servant, and having commanded him to lay his hand on his thigh, he conjured him by the Name of Jehovah, to seek a Wife for his Son in the Land of Haran; which being done, this wise Nuntio began his journey in order to the fulfilling his Master's commands; and departing from Beersheba, he went directly to Mesopotamia, carrying with him ten large Camels laden with the choicest things that the house of Abraham could afford: In short time he arriveth at the City of Nahor, ver. 10. meditating with himself of the readiest means for the expedition of what had been given him in charge; and first he repaireth to a place without the City, where women in their turns used to draw water, there resting his Camels, waiting upon God's providence for the opportunity he desired; during which expectation he poureth out his request to God, begging him propitiously to favour the designs of his Master; which he had scarce ended when Rebeckah appeared with an earthen pitcher under her arm to draw water; of whom no sooner had Eliezer desired a little drink, but Rebeckah presently assented, doing all that which charity and courtesy required should be done to a stranger: Eliezer seriously weigheth all the actions of Rebeckah, as being one in whom he was to discern the footsteps of God's conduct concerning his Master and his Master's Son.— This prudent Ambassador having presented some earrings and bracelets to Rebeckah, takes occasion to inform himself of the conveniences that were in her Father's house for himself and those that were with him, together with his Camels; and being well instructed of the alliances of the Damsel, and being astonished that all should fall out so soon and so even with his desires; throws hsmself on the ground to render thanks to God, adoring his inexpressible goodness to his Master: Rebeckah hastens to her Parents, to let them know what had happened; which her Brother Laban understanding, he repaireth immediately to the well from whence Rebeckah came; & finding Eliezer, he earnestly entreated him to follow him to his Father's house; and having brought him thither, he gave hay and straw to his Camels, and water to wash his feet, and the feet of those that were with him; and meat being set before him, as a trusty servant, he is more careful to fulfil his Master's business, than to fill his own belly; then he openeth his Commission which he had from his Master, and declareth the artifices himself had used to bring this business to good effect, labouring thereby to know the will of God that Rebeckah should be a Wife to Isaac; then orderly and exactly he declareth, how his Master was blest by God, and honoured by men, that he was rich and wealthy, and that Isaac was heir to all his substance: the silence of Rebeckah testified her consent thereunto; and B●thuel and Laban readily yielded to the disposition of didine providence: at length the promise of marriage being given on both sides; Eliezer brings forth Jewels of silver and Jewels of gold, and of raiment, and presenteth them to Rebeckah, and giveth to her Mother and Brother precious things; and after a little time spent in doing those duties which honour & nature required, Rebeckah takes leave of her parents and kindred, and gets up upon the Camels, and with Eliezer and the men that were with him, advanceth with the best speed that could be made, to arrive at Abraham's house: Isaac, who was always in expectation, first receiveth the news of Rebeckah's arrival: Abraham's servant prays by the way when he went out, and prays and meditates at the end of his journey, and Isaac prays and meditates as they come home: And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at eventide; and he lifted up his eyes, and behold the Camels were coming.  
Isaac goes out to meditate, and to meet with God, and there he meets with God and Rebeckah too, and Isaac receiving her, brings her into the same Tent, which Sarah had while she lived, and immediately the marriage of Isaac with Rebeckah was accomplished according to the decree of Heaven and the desires of Abraham. But to return to the words of my Text: in them you have divers Circumstances considerable: 

1. The name of the person [Isaac.]  
2. His work [meditation.]  
3. His preparedness to it [he went out.  
4. The place where [into the field.]  
5. The time when [at eventide.]    
1. For the person, it was Isaac, a child that came by miracle into the world; one that was the joy of his aged parents; he that was a child of tears and desires, and now become an object of ravishing joy; the lively picture of Abraham and Sarahs' virtues, in whose seed all the Nations of the earth should be blessed.  
2. The work of Isaac, to meditate: the Chaldee renders it to pray; Hierom expounds the Hebrew word Suach, to speak in prayer, 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Orare. Chald. ad Orandum, Onkelus. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hebr.  viz. with muttering and whispering, the words not being fully and distinctly uttered; as 1 Sam. 1.16. Hannah saith; I have spoken out of the multitude of my grief, 
Loqui in oratione submisse quasi mussando loqui. Hieron. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Symmach. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Aquii. Sive secum ut meditabundi faciunt. Vatablus. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, exerceri, meditari, Lorinus.  whenas she spoke in her heart, only her lips moved. Symmachus renders it, to speak, as if he went out into the field to speak with his servants about some worldly business: Aquila, to speak with himself, as those do that are about to meditate. The Greeks render it by a word that signifieth sometime the exercise of the body, sometime the exercise of the mind; but chief it denoteth the exercise of the mind, I will meditate in thy precepts, saith David, Psal. 119.15. The greek renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, In mandatis suis exercebor; 
In Scriptures est continua quaedam exercitatio; & meditari idem est, quod continuò exercitati. Suidas. Exiit in campum à domesticis curis abalienare. Ambros. de Isaac. c. 1. De rerum naturalium contemplatione praesertim caelestium. Tostat. & Lyran. Gauls votiu. specul.  I will exercise myself in thy Commandments. Ambrose renders the words of my Text thus; he went out in the field to sequester himself from worldly cares and businesses; and most probable it is, that Isaac went out into the field to contemplate of things natural, and especially of heavenly things. We may conceive that Isaac went out to meditate what good he had done that day, what evil avoided, what dangers escaped, what sins committed, what good he had omitted, what grace and blessings he had received; or as one noteth, what a promise God had made, what a wife his father had provided, what a journey his servant had undergone, the time when he departed, and when also he would return: and while his thoughts and meditations had foreseen them, his eyes are upon them; he lifted up his eyes, and behold the Camels were coming.  
3. Consider his preparedness to it; he went out to meditate: The Scripture sets out the intenseness of a man's spirit upon some serious business, by the phrase of going out: The sour went out to sow his seed, Luk. 8.5. So Christ said to the people concerning John Baptist; What went ye out in the wilderness for to see? Luk. 7.24. So Isaac went out to meditate; he did not set upon so pious a work without serious preparation, and when he goes out in the field he makes it his business to meditate, he comes out with a spirit bend like a bow, ready furnished for this heavenly exercise.  
4. The place, in the field.] He withdraws himself into a solitude for devout retirement; his spirit being enlarged, could not confine himself within the covert of a narrow tent, therefore he goes out into the field, a place advantageous for the work of meditation, 
Grata est solitudo meditantibus, & ipsa deambulatio admodùm juvat animum meditationibus deditum. Muscul. ad loc.  where he might cast his eyes on various objects, and behold therein the wisdom, power, and providence of God: Solitude is grateful to those that meditate, and field-walks are very refreshing to the mind given to meditation.  
5. The time when Isaac went out to meditate; at the eventide, when the day had well nigh run her course, when the affairs for his calling were for that day dispatched; 
Egressus vesperi propter commoditatem refrigerationis, quae post diurnum aestum illis in locis omnium solet esse gratissima. Idem.  he is not so tired with worldly businesses, as to make himself unfit for holy exercises, but in the evening of the day, and at the end of his outward employment, he cometh to an higher employment, his spirit is ripe for pious thoughts and heavenly meditations; the active and the contemplative life go together.   

Chap. 2.  

Sect. 1. Showing that meditation is a duty that concerneth men of all ranks, and conditions.  
From this Text thus opened, I shall gather this point of Doctrine; 
Doct. Quotidie certa tempora recitandis precationibus, & piis meditationibus tribuenda sunt. Chytraus' ad locum.   
That it is the duty of every Christian to set apart some time and place every day for holy meditation: some time must be allotted day by day for prayer and meditation, saith Chytraeus: meditation is a duty of Religion, commanded by God. Josh. 1.8. This Book of the Law shall not departed out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein night and day: the word [Thou] is indefinite, and concerneth every Christian as well as Joshua, it belongs to men of all degrees, high and low, Ministers and people, young and old.  
1. This exercise of meditation doth well befit the Nobility and Gentry of our Land; who have more time and opportunities than others for this heavenly exercise: how ought they to take heed of the snares of great places and great confluences, which are great hindrances to the composing of the mind for holy meditations, causing them to entertain converse only with such fantastic spirits, from whom no other profit can be derived, than what vanity hath suggested, and the conceit of a deluded fancy hatched: it lies upon you to meditate much on your inward cure: restrain your eyes from those outward objects that may any way darken the prospect of your inward house; it is one of your great cares in Architecture, 
Hippolit. de Collib.  that your houses have a pleasant site, and be dilated to fair prospects; you will not endure any man, whose dwelling is near you, upon any new superstructure, or new raised story, to darken the light of your windows, Oh then suffer not any thing to encroach upon the liberty of your higher rooms, these glorious structures of your souls: let not pride over-top the luminaries of your souls, let not covetousness stop and straiten them, let not intemperance put out the eyes of your souls, let not lust deface them, nor anger lacerate them, nor envy obscure them, nor idleness and wantonness blemish them. Noble Gentlemen, reflect on your own worth, Gentility is not known by your stately garb, your sumptuous houses, and train of attendants, as by your noble virtues; let inward ornaments be your chiefest care, and the renewing and repairing of them your highest cure; take a turn with God every day upon the Mount of meditation, here you may find such choice flowers as will more refresh your souls, than any visible odours or fragrant flowers are delightful to your smell; you will then scarce think any earthly object worth beholding, when you frequently converse with heavenly things: this will teach you to contemn the vanities of the earth, to know the worth of time, and to redeem your precious hours for the highest employment, to conquer death itself, and to aspire to eternal excellencies; you will then be careless observers of vain fashions, which is the affectation of this fantastic age and desire to be clothed with the wedding garment, and be adorned with inward beauty, that the Lord Jesus may take pleasure in you, and marry you to himself for ever: it will be more to your honour that you have redeemed time, than that you have followed the mode and vain fashions of a sinful time: It is said of the Palmtree, 
Plin. Nat. Hist.  that when it grows dry and fruitless, ashes are applied to the root of it, and it soon recovereth: and that the Palms of your generous minds may be always green and flourishing, and your branches be ever blossoming, and never whither, renew them daily with some sweet and sovereign meditation, that when you shall return to the earth from whence you came, those that succeed and survive you, may collect how you lived while you were on earth, by making those high employments of yours, patterns for their perpetual imitation.  
Meditation is a work you see well becoming men of high degree; Joshua 
Josh. 1.8.  ● great Commander is commanded to ●ake it his daily practice; and David ● great King tells us, that meditation ●as his work all the day. Psal. 119. ●7. Mine eyes, saith he, are ever towards the Lord. Psal. 25.15. Thou hast possessed my reins: Thou hast covered me ●n my mother's womb: I will praise thee, ●or I am fearfully and wonderfully made, marvellous are thy works, and that my ●oul knoweth right well, etc. How precious also are thy thoughts unto me O God, how great is the sum of them? if I should count them, they are more in number ●han the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee, Psal. 139.13, 19  
2. Meditation also may be practi●ed by men of low degree, 
Bishop Hall's Contemplate.  as by men of the highest rank; A low man, saith one, if his eye be clear, may look as high as the tallest, the least Dwarf may from the lowest valley see the Sun or Stars as fully, as a Giant upon the highest mountain: he that stands by, may see as far into the Millstone as he that picks it: Christ is now in Heaven, it is not the smallness of any man's person, nor the meanness of his condition can let him from beholding him; the soul hath no stature, nor is God a respecter of person's, if God be but pleased to clear t●● eyes of any man's soul, he shall high enough to behold him: a po● man by holy meditation become poor in spirit, and rich in grace; b● meditation on the Scriptures he fin●eth his condition to be an holy Asylu● that heaven hath promised a particule protection to the poor; 
Evangelizare pauperibus misit me. Luk. 4.  that Chri●● came down from Heaven to instruct them; that he hath pronounced th● blessed in his Sermons, chose such f● his Disciples, hath made them the objects of his love, and designed the● for his favours. All outward goo● though precious cannot escape the di●asters that threaten them: cunning violence may rob us of them, the innocent lose their honour as well as t● criminal; 
Senault. Treat. 8. disc. 3.  the rich are as much afra● of sickness as the poor, nor are Kin● more secure from death than the Subjects; but be thou outwardly ●ver so poor, yet if rich in faith, gra● is a good which cannot be taken fro● thee, no violence can plunder thee it.  
3. This exercise of meditation ought chief to be practised by Ministers and Scholars: there are three things that make a complete Minister saith Luther, 
Luther.  viz. temptation, prayer, and meditation; their hearts are always to be inditing of a good matter, 
Psal. 45.1.  that their tongues may be the pens of ready writers: 
Plin. Nat. Hist.  when the people of Rome heard that the fields of some of their Colonies waxed barren, their advice was, that the Husbandmen should meliùs arare & minùs serere, plough better and sow less: so when God's field waxeth barren, by reason of a negligent kind of preaching of the Word; it were better such Preachers spent more time in meditation, though they were less seen in the Pulpit than they are; (I speak only against frothy preaching:) if they have fished all night and caught nothing, it were not amiss, saith one, 
Jer. Philip ● Serm.  that they should sit down a while upon the shore, and mend their nets, afterwards with God's blessing they may fish with better success: Paul exhorts Timothy to give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine; Meditate, saith he, upon these things, give thyself wholly to them, that thy profiting may appear unto all, 1 Tim. 4.13, 15. Ministers and Scholars must diligently watch not only over the actions of their hands, the words of their mouths, but also over the meditations of their minds; because they (of all men) are most busied with meditation, they must meditate on that which is good, and meditate upon truth, 
Psal. 2.1.  lest they imagine a vain thing, or meditate on heresy, whereto all men by nature are prone, which spreadeth itself so far, 
2 Tim. 2.17.  and eateth a● doth a Gangreen.  
4. Meditation is an exercise that well becometh young men, who are strong and vigorous; 
Non sufficit operandi molestia, nisi etiam accedat meditandi, cogitandi, considerandi, ac deliberandi industria. Musculus.  they are commanded to remember their Creator in the days of their youth, Eccles. 12.1. In the morning of thy youth sow thy seed, Eccles. 11.6. And it may be observed, that the wise man saith not in the years of thy youth, but in the days of thy youth, that is to cut off all occasions of delay: Some idle headed Mathematician might have made an Almanac of it, dividing it into four quarters, allotting the first to idleness, the second to wantonness, the third to covetousness, and the last (if any) to piety, devotion, and meditation: but Solomon by requiring us to remember our Creator in the days of our youth, cuts off these idle divisions, requiring the young man to spend the flower of his age in meditating on God. 
Exod. 22.29. Exod. 24.19. L●v. 23.10.  Under the Law the firstborn and the first fruits were to be sanctified to the Lord, they must offer a sheaf of the first fruits, not an handful of the glean; let us not think if we offer the flower of our youth to the Devil, God will be contented with the bran of our old age; he that is Alpha and Omega will have the beginning of our age, and the strength of our affections and meditations devoted to himself. Every man should likewise be careful that his children may be so brought up, as they may be fit to present unto the Lord betimes, as Samuel was, whom his mother offered to the Lord very young; and who ministered before the Lord in his side-coats, 1 Sam. 1.28. They which plant, do it in the spring time; youth is the spring time of ou● age, the fittest for holy meditation and as a new earthen Pot retaineth th● sent of that whereof it first took a tast● so the mind being seasoned with pious meditations in youth, 
Quò semel est imbuta recens servabit odorem. Testa diù—  will ever kee● the savour thereof: though for wan● of experience (the daughter of time) a young man cannot attain to tha● height of wisdom in act, whereunto those of riper years are grown, ye● notwithstanding if he daily meditate on God and his Word, he will every day add some augmentation; fo● now is he for vigour of mind and ability of body fittest to take pains, and ablest to endure labour and study whereby wisdom is attained, and increased by practice: Wherewithal shal● a young man cleanse his way, and b● brought to yield obedience to the Law o● God, but by taking heed thereto according to the Word? Psal. 119.9.  
5. Meditation is an exercise for ol● men as well as young: As for holy meditations wherewith the soul is ravished, and transported above th● clouds, they require not grea● bodily strength; but on the contrary when the good old man cannot without great pain stir hand or foot, and lies bedrid, he comforteth and cheereth u● his spirit with divine meditations fitting to his age; 
Mons. Goulart. Viell.  and while debauched and wicked wretches confound themselves in sinful delights and carnal pleasures, he is privately conversant with God, gives great attention to him inwardly speaking unto him, as one well observeth: what though a holy man for age hath lost his bodily sight, yet then may the eyes of his soul be opened to behold the wonderful mysteries of heavenly knowledge; the soul can then penetrate and inquire into things that be divine, when the eye of the body is shut and seethe nothing: with this Anthony the Hermit, 
Sozom. l. 3 c. 14  said to Didymus the blind man of Alexandria, a very devout and holy person, and of singular learning (as Sozomen reports of him) Thou oughtest not, friend Didymus, to hold it grievous to have lost thy sight, which Mice, Lynxes, and other bruit beasts have very quick and piercing, but rather to be glad, and judge thy condition happy, that thou hast eyes like the eyes of the holy Angels, by whose help thou beholdest the Lord, and dost perfectly see and discern the causes of his works: What is the cause of the impatience and waywardness of many old men, but this, that they have, forgotten those many and great favours which God hath bestowed upon them, having mercifully drawn them out of their mother's belly, tenderly brought them up, protected them from infinite dangers, upon the meditation whereof they will have great cause to praise God at all times, as David exhorteth them by his example, in the 34, 71, and 1 18, Psalms.   

Sect. 2. That meditation is constantly to be practised.  
Now as meditation is to be practised by persons of all ranks and ages whatsoever, so we are to be constant in it; it is the character of a godly man, that he meditateth in the Law o● God, and exerciseth himself therein da● and night, Psal. 1.2. which must b● understood either literally and naturally for the presence and absence o● the Sun in our Hemisphere, as Gen 1.16. or else morally, for the time of prosperity and adversity, as 2 Kings 7.19. Luke 2.11. in youth and age, in all estates and conditions of this life, as before hath been noted: this duty ought every one to practise day by day without intermission: no time so well spent as that: 
Quocunque Deum nòn cogitaver is, pura te tempus illud perdid sse. Cassiodor. in Psalm.  what time soever thou hast spent not thinking of God or godliness, think that time but lost, saith Cassiodorus: this meditation (so it be of good matters) is an exceeding good companion; it is as Tully said of friendship, nunquam intempestiva, nunquam otiosa, never untimely, never out of season or troublesome: if we accustom ourselves to it, we may say as Scipio, that we are nunquàm minùs otiosi, quàm cùm otiosi, nec minùs soli, quàm cùm soli, never less idle than when free from business, and never less solitary than when we are alone and by ourselves; but this caveat at must always be remembered, viz. that we meditate on good matters, as David speaks, 
Quod animo insculptum est nisi cum vitâ eripi nòn potest Gass. Severus.  Psal. 45.1. for if by continual meditation we make a deep impression of evil things on our minds, we may say as Cassius Severus, that what is printed on the mind is not easily extinguished while life lasteth: and therefore when his Books were burnt by the command of the Senate; he is reported to have said, Nùnc restat ut ipse comburerer qui ipsos edidici, Now it remaineth, that I also be burnt who have learned them by heart; therefore it is not enough to meditate, but we must also meditate on the thing that is good, and be constant in it. Meditation saith one, 
Fenner de meditat.  is a coursing of the heart, like a blood-Hound's coursing a Hare in the snow, making her to stop here and leap there, and to go forward and backward, hunting it out of every starting hole, till it fix where it would have it.    

Chap. 3. Of the difference between meditation and contemplation.  
The work of meditation is to search after things that are hidden, the work of contemplation is to admire things that are c●nspicu●● saith Hugo: 
●editationis ●st perseruta● occulta, ●ontemplitio●is est admi●ari perspicua. Hu●o in lib. de ●rca mystica. Mountagues ●ssayes.  Contemplation, saith another, is a clear intuition, and a delightful admiration of perspicuous verities, whereby the soul d●th not lightly taste, but largely glut itself with spiritual delights; it is a voluntary exile from the earth, and an holy violence offered to Heaven; it makes Heaven to stoop, and earth to ascend to us; it is an antepast of eternal felicity: Contemplation is called by the Hebrews and Academics a precious death, 
Bodin. de Repub. l. 5.  for that it draws the soul out of this earthly body clearly to behold heavenly things; but meditation is an exercise more painful and difficult in matters pertaining to God; contemplation is more sweet to them that have had the exercise thereof: 
Unio intellectus cum re intellectâ.  Contemplation is a work of our understanding, after a sort uniting our wills to the will of God; the Schools tell us there is an union of the understanding with the things understood; meditation uniteth the heart to holy objects, Psal. 86.11. The sweetness of heavenly delights is not altogether in contemplation, but also in an affectuous meditation: the understanding doth not give sustenance to our souls, but only prepareth the meat that our souls are fed withal; but the understanding and the affections together do minister food to the soul: 
Did ac. Stella de contempt. mundi. part 2. White's art of meditat.  there is no pleasant taste nor savour in preparing that which must be eaten, but in eating ●f that which is prepared, saith Stella: Meditation, saith, one, is the blowing up of the fire, and contemplation is the flame of that fire: Some are exercised only in the intellectual part, and not in the effectual part of this work, not labouring to have the love of God and holy objects kindled in their hearts, but only to have curious speculations of the heavenly Majesty: Contemplation is an outgoing power of the soul to heavenly things, there is no separation of the soul from the body before death so real; but meditation makes use of all mediums whereby to gain Heaven; that which leads us the safest way thither is the best; nor is a Christian at any time nearer to his happiness, than when he is in the way that soon leads him thither; and were a man in the suburbs of Heaven; if all his exercises and actions be not ordained for the love of God, as well as to have the knowledge of him, he may like Moses, have a view of the promised Land (as he had of the earthly Canaan) but never enter in thereat.   

Chap. 4. How study and meditation diff●●.  
Every trade and calling in the world requireth study in it, and reason hath its proper work in every science, and every Mechanic that seems most excluded from it, hath his own discussive thoughts, and studieth about the several parts and branches of his profession, and how he may bring every piece of work he takes in hand to its just perfection: and more liberal professions think it their element: but Divinity claims it as her property: men of other callings are studious, but they keep still within their limits, and at their highest reach they go no higher than the earth: Though Astronomers soar aloft, and contemplate the nature of the Stars and Planets, the course of the Sun, and the revolutions of the Heavens, yet their speculation is not heavenly but earthly, because it springeth only from a natural power, and leads to a natural end: but meditation is properly, and only about things that concern our eternal welfare: Study is the beating of the brains, the work of the head; meditation is a work of the heart, a rousing up of the heart, and a fixing it upon its object: Study is the work of the understanding, meditation of the heart and affections: the understanding o● man since the fall of Adam is of the sam● nature with the earth, it is fruitful only in briers, and thorns, and thistles; if the heart be not broken up by the Plough of meditation, and tilled by the labour of this spiritual husbandry; it is fertile only in errors, and is delivered of nothing but doubts and scruples which rather fight against truth, than defend it; his ingeny serves him for no other end but to raise difficulties; his light is always mixed with darkness; and as if he were of the nature of Spiders, extracts nothing from the first Maxims of Religion, but that which doth perplex him.   

Chap. 5. Of the gate of meditation.  
This is nothing else but to propound to a man's self by imagination the matter or Subject whereon to meditate, or wherein to exercise our thoughts; as the objects of our imagination must be good, so we must labour to present them as good and profitable to the soul▪ this carries on the will after them with delight; our affections are suitable to our imaginations and apprehensions o● the object; affections raise the spirits, the spirits raise the humours, and so the whole man is moved; thence it is, if a thing be presented as evil to the imagination, it works strongly upon us; imaginary and conceited evils have the same effect as real: Jacob was as much affected with the imagination of Joseph's death, as if he had been really dead in his house, though fancy be but a frothy thing, yet it produceth real effects; the force of imagination we see in other creatures: 
Gen. 30.38, 39  Jacob takes rods of green Poplar, and of the Hasell, and Chesnut-tree, and peeled white strakes in them, and made the white appear which was in the rods, and set the rods before the flocks in the gutters in the watering troughs, etc. and the flocks conceived before the rods, and brought forth Cattle ring-straked, speckled, and spotted. Austin gives this very reason wherefore in Egypt there is never wanting a white spotted Ox, 
Aug. de civet. Dei. l. 18. c. 5  which they call Apis, and worship for a God: Hypocrat●s 
Hypocrates.  hath written a learned Discourse of the power of imagination; the looking upon outward objects doth much affect the inward senses, so that the imagination is made as it were like unto them: Imagination is a strong conceit of the mind touching any thing whatsoever it be, 
Perkins discourse of Witchcraft.  and by reason of the communion that is between body and soul being together, it is (as one observeth) of great force to work diversely within the man that imagineth:  
Hence it is that Papists and superstitious persons are full of cruelty, because superstitious devices are the brats of man's imagination; like Nebuchadnezzar's golden image, 
Dr Sibs souls conflict.  wherein he pleased himself so, that to have uniformity in adoring the same, he compelled all under pain of death to fall down before it: therefore that our imaginations may do us no injury, we must propound and present real and substantial things unto them; as the true excellency and abasement of the soul, the true and false riches, the true happiness and real misery of the soul; if false objects are presented to them, false conceits will arise therefrom, and false meditations and discourses will arise within us: as the taking in wholesome food expels flatuous distempers out of our bodies, so when serious objects are presented to the soul, when the mind feeds on nourishing truths, it is a way to expel windy fancies and vain imaginations.  
If thou wilt meditate of Christ on the Cross, imagine thyself to be on Mount Calvary, and to see all that he did and said in his passions and sufferings, in that manner that the Evangelists have set down, for by such imaginations we enclose our spirits within the bounds of the mysteries whereon we meditate, and keep them from roving excursions, for there is nothing so wand'ring as imagination, it is like to Theramenez Shoe, fit for all feet, it is as the matters are that are presented to it. Philo the Jew saith, 
Philo Jud.  the usual practice of the faithful (who lived in Alexandria, and made their most holy meditations on the Scriptures) was, that they tied themselves to the terms of the Hebrew Alphabet, and so passed into the most spiritual sense, there to see and understand the verities which were in a manner veiled: 
Ogni medaglia ha' il suo riverscio, Ital  Every outside hath his inside, saith the Italian Proverb: meditations thus form, do pour good motions into the will, and holy affections into the soul; as the love of Go● and our brethren; longing after Heaven and eternal happiness; the imitation of the life of Christ; rejoicing in God and his mercies; an admiration of his wonderful works; a fear of offending God; the consideration o● Heaven and Hell; the last judgement, an hatred of all sin; a confidence in God's goodness; a confusion at the thoughts of a misspent life: in these and the like, our spirits are to be dilated and poured forth as much as ma● be.   

Chap. 6. Of the kinds of meditation; an● first of rapt meditation.  
I now proceed to treat of the kinds o● meditation; 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, repentè inventa comparatque compositio. Budaeus. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, confidentèr animum ad aliquam rem appellere, cum re praesenti deliberare. Quintil.   
Meditation is of two sorts,  
1. There is a rapt meditation which is both sudden and occasional 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉; a sudden invention no composed by study, whereby a min● both pious and ingenious, spiritualize● every object about which it is conversant, or meets withal: Thus did ou● Saviour, when he was upon earth when he called his Disciples from the nets, he applied that vocation to a spiritual sense: Fellow me, and I will make you f shers of men; they should not alter their Trade, but only change some circumstances of it; as they were fishers before, so they should be still; but whereas before they caught unreasonable, now they should catch reasonable fishes; as before with hooks and nets they caught fishes for themselves, so now by the net of the Gospel they should catch men for God: As David that was a shepherd, was taken from the sheep-fold, and from following the Ewes great with young, was brought to feed Jacob, God's people, and Israel his inheritance, and though called to be a King was a shepherd still, Psal. 78.70, 71. so they called to be Apostles, are fishers still. When the multitude followed Christ for the loaves, he makes a spiritual, use of it, exhorting them not to labour for the meat that perisheth, 
Joh. 6.27.  but that which endureth to everlasting life. How often did our Saviour upon a sudden teach his hearers by similitudes and parables, and what are his parables, but similes, comparing of things, and explaining of spiritual things? So Christ compared the Kingdom of Heaven to leaven; to a grain of Mustardseed; to a Merchantman; to ten Virgins; to a net cast into the Sea.  

Pet. Mart.  A parable, saith a good Divine, is nothing else but a similitude or example taken from other things to illustrate the matter in hand; it is very ordinary for the Spirit of God in Scripture to use parables: I will open my mouth in a parable, Psal. 78.2. 
Mr Hieron.  The Learned say, that in a parable there are three things, 

Cortex,  
Radix,  
Fructus.    
1. Cortex, the rind or bark; that is, the words and terms wherein it is delivered.  
2. Radix, the root, which is the scope to which it driveth.  
3. Fructus, the fruit which is to be gathered from it.  
When the bark or rind is well pu● aside, and the root discovered, it wil● soon be seen what the fruit is that grow● thereon.  
1. This way of teaching and illustration is very profitable, it is a grea● help to the senses, and from things that are more known, we proceed to things that are less known, saith Aristotle. 
Aristot.   
2. It is profitable likewise to the memory, helping us to remember manythings that otherwise would be forgotten.  
3. It makes things delightful and pleasant, it is the best way whereby the ignorant are made to understand; for it is the easiest, readiest, and plainest manner of instructing.  
4. It hath a great influence upon the heart, it worketh much upon the affections, for what can quicken the hearts of people more than to hear and see? then may we say with David; 
Psal. 48.8.  As we have heard, so have we seen: we hear by doctrine, we see by similitude and example.  
Some have spoken against this manner of meditation and instruction, saying, that herein we let out our thoughts upon every base creature; but I say, unless a man will be wilfully blind, this way he will he made to understand; and God would not that we should look on earthly things without a holy and spiritual application; here each man in his Trade may learn something for his salvation.  
Art thou a Ploughman, meditate on the Parable of the Sour, Mat. 13. When thou art ploughing up thy ground, and turnest up the furrows of the earth, this should put thee in mind of ploughing up the fallow ground of thy heart; and when thou art breaking the clods of the earth, remember that God calls for a broken and contrite heart; when thou puttest thy hand to the Plough, take heed of backsliding; remember that of our Saviour, Luk. 9.61. No man having put his hand to the Plough, and looking back, is fit for the Kingdom of God; remember Lot's wife: the son of Syrach (after Iuniu● his translation) puts a grave question concerning him who holds the Plough, and such persons who maintain the state of the world; 
Ecclus. 28.26. Junius ad loc.  the question is, Whereby shall a man he made wise? At the last Verse of the Chapter in the Latin translation he answereth; By nothing, unless he be such a one who will apply his mind and meditation on the Law of the most High▪ 
Woodw. child's ●atrimony.  The Husbandman in that place, may seem to have (as he reads and s● pleads his case) a dispensation for his gross ignorance, but it is nothing so: That Scripture saith, that the holding the Plough, shows him the constancy of a holy profession, as before I hinted; that his ploughing up the ground shows him as in a glass the soreness of afflictions, 
Psal. 129.3. Jer. 4.3.  how the wicked plough upon the backs of the righteous, and make long their furrows; and what pains he should take also with his own heart, so preparing it for the true seed, the Word of life; and when he casteth in the seed in the season, he might understand his own season; and look that the seed of the Word sown in his heart rise up with great increase; and as that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die; so the body of man after it dies and rots in the earth shall rise again; and he that seethe not so much in the sowing and reaping his grain, 
1 Cor. 15.36  is a fool in the Apostles sense: he that thus meditates at the Plough, shall never be without a Sermon before him, every furrow being a line or sentence, and every grain of Corn that he soweth a lesson whence he may learn something of God.  
Furthermore art thou a Vine-dresser, meditate on that Parable, Luk. 13.7, 8. of a certain man that had a Figtree planted in his Vine-yard, and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none: By this certain man we must understand God himself, who in many places of Scripture for our capacity and comfort, is compared to a man, to draw them with the cords of a man, and the bands of love, Hos. 11.4. whereby he signified, that he used his people, not like beasts or slaves, 
Genevens. ad loc.  but lovingly and kindly, as men do, or should do one to another.  
Had a Figtree planted in his Vine-yard] that is, had a people whom he had chosen to himself, and both planted, pruned, and watered by his Word and Sacraments; by the Vine-yard was meant the Church of the Jews, 
jacob de valentia in Cant. 8.  or the Land of jury; and by the Figtree, the inhabitants thereof, and people contained therein; and this is no new thing either for the Church in the whole world, or more particularly, for the Church of the Jews to be compared to a Vine-yard, Cant. 8.11. Isa. 5.1, 7. Yea of God's particular dealing with this people, and planting this Vine, we read Psal. 80.2. where the Lord saith, that God brought a Vine out of Egypt, cast out the Heathen, planted it, prepared room for it, and caused it to take deep root, so that it filled the Land, the hills were covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly Cedars; therefore whensoever thou walkest like Adam among the trees of the garden, and beholdest the Vine, think of that mystical union that is between Christ and his Church, that he is the Vine, his people the branches, 
joh. 15.5.  and that whosoever abideth in him, and he in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: that the Church of God also is a Vine-yard of red wine, 
Isa. 27.2, 3.  that the Lord doth keep it and water it every moment; and lest any hurt it, he will keep it night and day.  
And as the Church is compared to a Vine-yard; so also men be compared to trees, as in Iotham's parable, who compareth Abimelech to the bramble, a base plant, usurping authority, when the more noble trees, the Figtree, the Olive, and the Vine refuse it, judg. 9.7, 16. men in Scripture are compared to trees; All the trees of the field shall know that I the Lord have brought down the high tree; i. e. all the people of the world shall know. Sometime you shall find him compared to the Olive-tree, and his children to the Olive-branches round about his table, Psal. 128. sometime to the lofty Cedars of Lebanon; sometime to the Oaks of Basan; sometime to the low shrubs in the valley of Suecoth; in a word, the good man is compared to the green tree, and the wicked unto the dry tree.  
Again, art thou a traveller in this world; meditate with thyself, how the world is like a forlorn wilderness.  
1. Because it is a strange Land, a solitary place, a forsaken Country, disertus; so that Christ saith, He is not of this world, nor prays he for it, Joh. 17.9.  

Si recogitemus ●psum magis mundum carcerem esse, ●xiisse nos è carcere intelligemus. Tertul. ad Martion.  2. It is a Land of darkness: This gave Tertullian occasion to compare the world to a prison; a prison is the receptacle of darkness, the Sun darteth no beams there; the world lies in ignorance, all men are born blind, and if the glorious Sun of righteousness enlighten them not, they live and die in gross darkness.  
3. It is like a wilderness, a place full of dangers, full of enemies; the people of Zion cry out, Our persecutors have laid wait for us in the wilderness, Lam. 4.19. The world is full of stinging Serpents, of lying vanities, a filthy deceiver; Christ hath foretold that in the world we shall have tribulation, Joh. 16.33. How should the meditation hereof make us to say with Abraham, I am a stranger; and with David, I am a stranger with thee as all my fathers were: and not to look for delights in a roaring wilderness; nor for meat where no Corn grows; nor a dwelling house or an abiding City where no building is; and though we groan sometimes under the weight of our travels, yet to acknowledge that the persecutions of the world are not so tragical as its caresses are.   

Chap. 7.  

Of set and solemn meditation, the definition and branches of it. Sect. 1.  
Having spoken of rapt and occasional meditation, I shall in the next place treat of set and solemn meditation, and shall thus define it;  
Meditation is a holy retirement of the soul, 
definite.  and a fixed exercise of the heart upon spiritual objects, that the heart may be affected with them, and bettered by them.  
1. I say, it is a holy retirement of the soul:  
A retirement from the world.  
A retirement from our own passions.  

Mens nostra ●d contem●anda inter●a nòn perdu●itur, nisi ab ●is, quae exte●ùs implica●ur, studiosè ●ubtrahatur. Greg. Moral. ●. 5. Nemo ad meditationem pervenit occupatus. Senec.  1. A retirement from the world: Stars which have least circuit are nearest to the Pole, and men who least perplex themselves with worldly business are nearest to God: Devout Bernard confesseth, he learned much of his Divinity under the trees of the Wood: When Elijah was in the wilderness far from his own habitation, and the company of men, than the Angel speaks unto him; when we are alone sequestered from worldly cares and distractions, than God opens his mind unto us, and reveals many things to us, which he will not do, when he finds our hearts taken up with the cares and troubles of worldly business; God is a Spirit, and therefore when we converse with him, he requireth not only a bodily but also a spiritual retirement: Thus God call● Ezekiel 
Ezek. 3.22.  into the plain, that he might there talk with him; and allures the Church into the wilderness, that he might speak unto her heart: Privacy (as one observeth) is the seat of contemplation, 
Brathwait Engl. Gent.  though sometimes made the recluse of temptation; from which the Cell is no more exempted than the Court; but to a pious heart privacy is a great advantage to meditation; 
Mihi oppidum carcer; solitudo Paradisus. Hier. Epist. ad Rustic. Erasm. Tom. 5. de contempt. mundi.  The City to me (saith jerom) is a prison, and solitariness is a Paradise: Erasmus hath written much concerning the liberty, tranquillity, and pleasure of a retired life: and the Psalmist bids us to commune with our own heart upon our bed, or within our chambers, as some translate, and be still, Psal. 4.4. Be still from the world, yet then must the heart be stirring towards God: they that sail at Sea, to the end to attain to the land, they look more up to the Heaven than down to the Sea; carnal men are drowned in fleshly delights and worldly cares, their hearts are not purged or elevated to converse with God.  
2. A retiring from our own passions: the heart must be settled and well composed, before it ascend the hill of meditation; God requireth a spirit settled for so high a work; In quietness and confidence shall be your strength, 
If a man do not first discharge both himself and his mind from the burden that presseth her, removing from place to place will press her the more; it is not enough for a man to have sequestered himself from the concourse of the people; a man must sequester and recover himself from himself. Montaign Essays. l. 1. c. 38.  Isa. 30.15▪ Be still and know that I am the Lord, Psal 46.10. We can never savingly know him, till our hearts be free from these perturbations: therefore when we come to meditate, we must as well retire from the perturbations of our hearts, as from the world: Wasps and Drones make more noise than the Bees, but make no honey, but wax only; so they whose hearts are troubled and perplexed, are very unfit for so high an exercise of the soul: the showers that fall gently make Corn and grass abound, but falling violently much endanger the Corn and meadows: it is not enough we are separated from men, if we are entangled with our own passions; and indeed herein consisteth one of the most assured means of our spiritual improvement; therefore he that will meditate on holy objects, must call back his spirit very frequently into the presence of God, and consider what God doth, and what himself is doing crying out to God, O Lord why do I not always look toward thee? Why dost thou think on me so often, and I on thee so seldom; our proper place is to be with thee? Thrice happy is that soul, that can lift up himself to God, and can truly say, Lord thou art my dwelling place, my refuge, my shadow against all temptations; it is good for Christians to retire frequently into the loneness of their heart: yea when they are in company with others, for then thy heart may be alone with God: so saith David, I am continually with thee, Psal. 73.23. I have set the Lord always before mine eyes, Psal. 16.8.  
2. 
Actus religionis, seu exercitium spirituale. Jer. Turner Serm. in Prov. 4.23.  The second branch of meditation is, that it is a fixed exercise of the heart upon spiritual objects.  

1. It is an exercise of the heart.  
2. A fixed exercise.   
It is an exercise of the heart; therefore one defines it to be an act of Religion or spiritual exercise; it is an heart-imployment, therefore may well be called a spiritual exercise; not only because the matter of meditation is always some spiritual thing, but also because the act of meditation is a mere spiritual act, proceeding from the spiritual part of man, as being an act of the heart: other parts of man are taken up in other things; the eye in seeing, the ear in hearing, the hand in touching and working, the tongue in speaking; the heart is only exercised in meditation; therefore David's meditations are called the meditations of his heart, Psal. 19 ult. My heart saith he, was inditing of a good matter, Psal. 45.1. Meditation is the heart of devotion, the soul of piety, by which we sound the depths of divine love, whereby we apply ourselves really to God, and communicate much of his grace and comfort; it fills the heart with sweet odours and spiritual refresh, that it resembleth a pillar of smoke from Aromatical wood, kindled with Myrrh, and all the sweet powders of the heavenly perfumer.  
2. It is a fixed exercise of the heart; the heart must be fixed on God that will meditate upon him, Psal. 57.1. Therefore when we begin this exercise, we must then resolve that our minds shall not wander from him; we must lift up our hearts to God in the Heavens, Lam. 3● Psal. 25.1. Christ was transfigured on a mountain, and often withdrew himself into a mountain to pray and meditate, not only for privacy, but to note unto us, that a man that will meet with God, must ascend higher in his spirit. God was at the top of Jacob's ladder, where Angels were ascending and descending: to this purpose Ambrose saith, No man can see Jesus, while he standeth upon the earth: Zacheus could not see Jesus till he climbed up a Sycamore-tree: 
Nemo potest videre Jesum constitutus in terra. Ambros.  the composition of our bodies is such, as a man cannot look up to Heaven with one eye, and down to the earth with the other, to teach us to look up to Heaven fixedly with both.  
Pliny 
Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 8. c. 3.  reports strange things of bruit beasts; he saith, There was an Elephant not so capacious of instruction as the rest of his fellows, to learn what was taught him by his Keeper; whereupon being oftentimes beaten for that stupidity of his, he was found in the night (after his manner) to be as it were cunning and studying those feats, which he had been taught in the day: and Plutarch 
Plutarc. de solert. animal.  tells of a Pie, that to learn certain tunes which she heard Minstrels play, waxed dumb many days after; at length upon a sudden, she broke forth into t●e same tunes which those Minstrels had played before, to the astonishment of all that heard her. Meditation is that which in the old Law was signified by the chewing of the Cud: transient speculations of things do but little good, let in bu● little light, unless we chew them Cud, and exercise the mind about them: holy things are like unto leaven, to Corn, to rain; now unless the leaven be put into, and by stirring and working, as it were incorporated into the dough, it cannot season it; and though the Corn be sown in abundance, yet if it meet not with apt ground, tilled and prepared, but fall among thorns, by the highway side, or in stony places, it bringeth forth no fruit; and though the rain fall plentifully, yet if it light ou● hard and hilly Countries, it is not received, it makes not such places fruitful; so fareth it with holy things: let a Minister bestow never so much of the leaven of the Word, yet if the hearers hid it not in their hearts, like leaven i● the meal, it will never season them and make them fit manchet for th● Lord's table: let never so much goo● seed be sown, yet if it take not roo● downwards in our hearts, it will neve● bring forth fruit upwards in our lives let the words of God's messengers drop as the rain, and distil like the dew, or like the showers upon the herbs and tender grass, yet if the heart receive it not, if it dwell not in the heart richly, it will profit us nothing: indeed it is almost as much to find our own heart in a duty, as to find God in it.   

Sect. 2. Of the ends of solemn meditation.  
The end of meditation is both to affect the heart with the objects on which we meditate, and that the heart may be made better thereby.  
1. I say, one end of meditation is to affect the heart, it is very delightful to those that are conversant in it: he that hath changed his mind or opinion upon meditation never accuseth her of tyranny; meditation is very persuasive, clearing our judgements, calming our passions, and gaining our consent to that which is good; it far surpasseth eloquence, and like a Sovereign reigns without arms; it hath no need of our ears to win our hearts: by itself it transmitteth itself into the inmost recesses of our souls; finds out reason in ●er throne; carries more light into ●he mind, and kindleth in the will a more fervent love to God, 
Qui audit mel esse dulce, & nòn gustat, nomen mellis scit, gratiam & saporem nescit: gustate ergo, & videte quam suavis sit. Dominus Bonavent.  making a man in love with what he formerly hated. Meditation opposeth the charms of grace against the allurements of sin▪ and so sweet and powerful is holy meditation, that it blots out all earthly cogitations; it sets before the eyes of our souls such taking and alluring objects, which are more prevalent than those of sin, and by these holy delights our hearts are ravished, and grace easily prevails against the corruptions of nature: these are the first fruits of those everlasting pleasures the Saints shall reap in the Kingdom of Heaven, whereby those that feed on God and his promises by holy meditation here, do taste one part of that felicity which the blessed do feed upon in Heaven; this hath ever been very affecting to the Saints: My meditation of him, saith David, shall be sweet, Psal. 104.34. or my word of him shall be sweet; it signifie● a word secretly spoken, 
Symonds fixed eye.  as one observeth: the heart speaks of God in meditation, and those words are music in the soul; the word imports a sweetness with mixture, like compound spices or many flowers mixed together; such variety of sweetness this meditation of God yields to him, whose mind is upon him, whose heart is toward him: the operation of the mind makes up a sweet delight; there is more content in meditating on the love of God, more refreshing to the heart, than wine can give to the body; his love is better than wine: We will remember thy l●ve more than wine, Cant. 1.2, 4. David tells us that the thoughts of God are precious, Psal. 139.17. they are so to a heart that is in a right frame; and saith he, My soul is filled as with marrow and fatness, when I remember thee upon my bed, and meditate on thee in the night watches, Psal. 63.5.  
Meditation 
Meditatio co● memoriae.  is the rubbing up of the memory, and may not unfitly be called the whetstone of memory; for even as a whetstone or grindstone addeth an edge to the Knife or other instrument which is whetted thereupon; so this sharpeneth our memories, and gives us occasion to call that to mind, which otherwise would have been forgotten; or it may be compared to the steel and stone of a Tinder-boxe, neither of which severally will yield any fire, but being smitten together, the fire cometh forth incontinently; so fareth it with men that are of good capacities, that can conceive much at the instant, but remember little, because they use not their memories, and exercise not themselves in pious meditations: Meditation is the heart, life, and soul of remembrance, making whatsoever we read and hear to abide with us, and be our own, else it will away: meditation with (Philip's Page) must daily knock at the doors of our hearts, and cause us to call to mind what we have learned, else by corruption we shall soon forget it; this made Periander King of Corinth to say, Meditatio totum. It is an undoubted maxim, that a thing be it never so good and excellent, yet it is not very  of us, till it begit to affect our hearts, though it hath more charms than beauty, and more lustre than outward glory, more invitations than secular profits; yet if it convey not pleasure into the will, it knows not how to beget love unto it.  
2. Meditation also bettereth the heart as well as affects it: It is said that King Mythridates having found out Mythridate, he so strengthened his body, that endeavouring to poison himself, to avoid the servitude of the Romans, he could by no means effect it: so whosoever shall feed on holy objects by meditation, and use it frequently, shall so fortify his heart, that it shall not be poisoned with any evil affections.  
Meditation is a heart-warming duty; study only warms the brains, but meditation warmeth the heart; therefore when holy truth falls upon a prepared heart, it hath a sweet and strong operation: Luther 
Luther. Melch. Ad in vit. Sta●  confesseth, that having heard Staupicius a grave Divine to say, that that is kind repentance which gins from the love of God, ever after that time the practice of repentance was sweeter to him: another speech of his likewise did much affect Luther, viz. that in doubts of predestination we should begin from the wounds of Christ, that is, from the sense of God's love to us in Christ; therefore the warming of the brains in study, without the warming the heart by meditation, is but a dead and cold speculation: serious meditation puts lively colours upon common truths, which operate strongly upon the heart to make it better.    

Chap. 8. Of the subject of Meditation.  

Sect. 1. Of meditation on the works of God.  
I now proceed to discuss the subject-matter of meditation; 
first subject meditation, works of 〈◊〉.  and here I am launching into a great Ocean, but like the dogs of Nilus, I shall but lick and away.  
The first subject of meditation is God's works of Creation; a fit matter for our serious meditations: I remember the days of old, saith David, I meditate on all thy works, I muse on the work of thy hands, Psal. 145.5. He looketh up to the Heavens, and considereth the work of God's fingers, meditating on all those works that were visible to the eye of man, 
●al. 102.25.  Psal. 8.3. called elsewhere the work of his hands. Isa. 48.13. My hand hath laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand hath spanned the Heavens; it is for that they are of such excellency, as if they had been his handiwork indeed, which yet were made by his word only, as Moses, and St John do declare, Gen. 1.6. Joh. 1.3. That great advancer of learning hath an excellent passage suitable hereunto; 
Sr Francis B●con's advancement of learning. l. 1. p. 27  It is to be observed, saith he, that for any thing which appeareth in the History of the Creation, the confused mass and matter of Heaven and earth was made in a moment, and the order and disposition of that Chaos or mass was the work of six days; such a note of difference it pleased God to put upon the works of power, and the works of wisdom: wherewith concurreth, that in the former it is not set down that God said, Let there be Heaven and earth, as it is set down of the works following, but actually, that God made Heaven and earth, the one carrying the stile of a Manufaction, the other of a Law, Decree or Council. It is not enough that we barely look on the works of God, but we must meditate upon them; for if we do no more than see them, the Ox, the Bull, and the Horse, do as much as we: If we see nothing in the Heavens, 
Dearing Heb. Lect. 5. c. 1. vers. 10.  saith a grave Divine, but that they are lightsome, and above our reach, the Horse and Mule see this as well as we; if we see nothing in the earth, but a place to walk in, or to take our rest upon it, the beasts and fouls see this as well as we; if we see nothing in our gorgeous apparel, but the pride of a goodly colour, the Peacock seethe that in his feathers; if in all our refreshment from the creatures we know nothing but the pleasure and sweetness of our sense, the Swine hath as great a share herein as we; if hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, feeling, be all the comfort we can find in the works of God, the dumb creatures have these senses more exquisite than we, and we have turned the hearts of men into the hearts of beasts, who with wisdom and reason can do nothing, 
●. Isidor. ●usiot. l. 2. ●st. 135.  and the words of the Prophet are fulfilled in us, Man being in honour understandeth not, and is like the beasts that perish, Psal. 49.20. therefore the sight of God's works must affect us more than so, else shall we be but as the beasts, and follow them.  
Now you are to meditate how God brought forth all his works in the space of six days, before he finished them; he did not create the world all at once, but took time for the Creation of it, to teach us to take special time duly and orderly to consider and meditate on the works of God: if he that could have made the Heavens and the earth, the Sun, Moon, and Stars, and all creatures, in a moment; yet it pleased him to take time for the creating of them; this should teach us to select some space of time for the meditation of them: we must not think it enough to look upon them at one view, but to pass from part to part, from one creature to another, and in every creature to admire the workmanship, power, wisdom and goodness of the Creator, as we are taught, Psal. 92.4, 5. Thou Lord hast made me glad through thy works, and I will triumph in the works of thy hands: O Lord how great are thy works, and thy thoughts are very deep: a brutish man knoweth not, neither doth a fool understand this; which Psalm as the Title tells us, was a meditation penned for the Sabbath day: therefore I say, God would spend six days about the Creation of the world, whereas he might have done it in an instant, and in a moment of time, to the end that we might the better meditate upon it from point to point, for which purpose he presently ordained the Sabbath: Thus Job 
Job 36.24  tells us, that we must not idly behold the work, 
●upellex or●ata hominem ●guit, & mun●us Deum. ninut. Faelix. ●ctav.  but must magnify the workman; Remember that thou magnify his work which men behold; this we will do coming into the Shop of an excellent Artisan. The eternal power and Godhead is seen by the things that are made; but most of us have great cause to be ashamed, that we have spent so little time in meditating on the works of God; yea who can truly say, he hath spent so much time in meditating on God's works, as God spent in making them? how few are there that have set apart so much time ever since they were born, as (if it were all laid together) will make up six days one entire week? what a shame is it for man whom God made on purpose to view his works, 
●ria sunt ge●era meditati●num; unum ● creaturis; ●num in Scriptures; unum ●n moribus: ●rimum surgit ex admiratione; secundum ex lectione; ●ertium ex circumspectione. Hug. medit.  and by them to glorify him, not to spend so much time in meditating upon them, as God spent in making of them; therefore we have great cause to become more careful and studious readers of this great Book of nature for time to come: There is a threefold Book into which a Christian is to make inspection,  
The Book of nature, or of the creatures.  
The Book of the Scriptures.  
The Book of conscience.  
The Book of the creatures hath a powerful conviction; meditate upon it, and observe God's power, or thou art an Atheist.  
The Book of the Scriptures hath a power of conversion; meditate on it, and learn the will of God out of it, so to serve him, or thou art an hypocrite.  
The Book of conscience hath a power of accusation; meditate on it, or thou art an Infidel.  
The Book of nature hath God spread wide open, and before us, 
Seculum speculum.  that he that runs may read; Austin calls the world God's Book in folio; every creature should be to us a page in this Book, and every part of a creature a line in this Book: How careful should we be to take these things into our thoughts: our Saviour saith, Matth. 24.15. When ye shall see the abomination of desolation (spoken of by Daniel the Prophet) stand in the holy place, who so readeth, let him understand: So say I, let him that readeth in this great Book of nature, understand to what end these creatures were created, even to the end that we might view them, and in them glor●fie the Creator.  
And seeing God hath not only acquainted us, in the gross, what he di● in general, but hath condescended s● far, as to tell us, what he did eve● day; what he did the first day, wh● he did the second day, etc. I da● boldly affirm, that it were very convenient and expedient every day to ● apart some time on that day, to meditate on the works that were created ● that day; it is as convenient a method, as any I can imagine, for it is following of God in the Creation this being considered, together with th● dulness of our apprehensions, an● how apt our thoughts are to turn aside to vain and unprofitable objects, th● order will be found to be very necessary.  
I shall give you a taste of such kinds meditations, from one of the day's o● the week, the first day of the wee● called the Lord's day: on this day se● apart some time to meditate on th● works that were on that day created first, the works of the evening, th● the works of the morning.  
1. The works of the evening; as the ●reating that huge body of the Heavens: when we see that vast body, and how God stretcheth out the Heavens as a curtain; the greatness of the Heavens ●hould teach us to meditate on the greatness of the infinite Jehovah: if ●he Heavens do so far exceed our thought, how great then is he whom ●he Heaven of Heavens are not able to contain: if the earth be so glorious (as ●t is in the spring time) how unspeakably glorious are the Heavens which far ●xceed the earth; and here we may admire his greatness, who was able to ●et up such a rich canopy and covering over the earth; and here also let us meditate on the unspeakable goodness of God to man, that he hath made for man not only a rich dwelling here be●ow, but also provideth for him a dwelling place in the Heavens, there ●o sit down with him in his Throne, Rev. 3.20. That man that is but dust and ashes, a lump of earth here below, ●hould be exalted to the highest place of the Creation: this should check us or our folly, in suffering the earth to steal away our hearts from God, as if there were no greater happiness to b● had than here below: what stupid creatures are we to spend more time i● getting a few white and red pieces o● earth, than in getting a glorious possession of the Kingdom of Heaven, fo● the attainment whereof we shoul● think no time too much, no pains to● great, no affections too strong.  
Furthermore, bring your meditations to the earth, created on the sam● day also, that which yielded matte● and stuff for the making of all cre●tures here below: consider, that th● earth was a formless lump before Go● beautified and adorned it, it was ● mere nothing: Painters can draw 〈◊〉 pictures without colours; Architect● raise no buildings without materials and if you take away Marble or Po●phiry from Engravers, they can car● neither Images nor Statues; 
Senault. Treat. 5. disc. 8.  It is o● God that actuateth nothing, that formeth being out of a nonentity, as one well ●teth: the earth receiveth its being, ● beauty, and all it hath from God.  
The meditation hereof should ● suffer us to let any thing in the ear● to withdraw our hearts from God: ● sore God made the earth it was nothing; ●ilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is ●ot? 
Prov. 23.5.  Why should that which is nothing draw away our hearts from God who is full of all perfection; the earth also at first was a confused mass of ●hings, without form, and void: 
Rudis indigestaque moles. Ovid.  this ●hould draw out from us this meditation; to make us to consider, that we ●hat are of the earth are altogether polluted in sin, lying in our blood, our ●ouls being all stained with sin, and without any form of holiness and righteousness, yea void of all the sa●ing graces of God's Spirit: In me, ●aith Paul, that is in my flesh, there ●welleth no good thing: and as darkness was then upon the face of the dee●, so darkness is upon the face of our souls; ● man may see, hear, read, but can ●ave no true discerning of spiritual ●hings, till the daystar arise in his ●eart, for spiritual blindness is upon ●he face of his soul.  
Here then is condemned the folly of ●hose that think ignorance the mother ●f devotion; but while men remain in ●heir natural blindness, they can per●rm no pleasing service to God; blind services may be acceptable to ● Prince of darkness, 
God made Heaven for himself principally, the earth for us: let us consider our condition by Creation, affection, disposition; then shall we say with Abraham, we are but earth, dust and ashes, Gen. 18.27.  but they are abominable to the Father of lights: lig● was the first thing that God ma● in the Creation; and when there w●● light, the earth lay for some days dead and senseless lump, and could n● so much as bring forth one grass o● herb, till the Spirit of God moved ● on the face of the waters: so in ● new Creation, when there is so● light wrought in the understanding yet canst thou not bring forth one pleasant fruit of holiness, till the Spirit▪ God flutter over thee, and by a divin● heat and warmth move and stir th● soul, and enable thee to perform acceptable obedience to God.  
2. I come to the work of the mo●ing: then he created the light on th● first day of the week, commanding t●● light to shine out of darkness; now us set apart some time to meditate this excellent creature, the light, which the glory of God is greatly manifest: there was nothing before ● utter darkness; then the Lord crea● the light without the Sun, in w● the power of God is admirable; should greatly wonder at midnight to see a great light to shine forth, and expel the darkness of the night: this may lead us to this meditation; that as God caused on this first day of the week light to arise, and break out of darkness; so on this first day of the week also, he caused his own Son the light of the world, to arise out of the grave of darkness, who shined through many dark thoughts and apprehensions, into the hearts of his disconsolate Disciples; for his own Disciples did then begin to doubt; We trusted, said they, ●hat it had been he which should have redeemed Israel, Luk. 24.21 Here also we may meditate on the excellency of heavenly knowledge; that wisdom excels folly, 
Eccl. 2.13.  even as light excelleth darkness: Light is comfortable, and sweet it ● to behold the light of the Sun, Eccl. 11.7. Darkness makes men sad and timorous: so wisdom makes a man's face ●o shine, but ignorance is uncomforta●e: light manifesteth things as they ●e, but darkness hides them: light ●stinguisheth one thing from another, ●rknesse confounds things all alike: so knowledge gives us a right discerning of things, but ignorance overwhelms us with horror and amazement: light directs a man in his way, but darkness misguids him: so wisdom shows us the true way, whereas the ignorant wander in by-paths, and fall into the bottomless pit. I shall conclude this Section, 
Clamant dupliciter, 1. Ostendunt dignitatem. 2. Ostendunt bonitatem. Quocunque te vertis, veritas vestigiis quibusdam quae operibus suis impressit, loquitur tibi, & te in exteri ora relabentem, ipsis exteriorum formis intùs revocat. Aug. de libero arbitrio.  with that meditation of Austin, Heaven and earth, saith he, and all things therein contained, do make a continual cry round about me, that I should love thee; O Lord they show thy worthiness, and declare thy bounty; such a world; such Heavens; such an Ocean; such an earth; such earthly creatures; insensible; sensible, reasonable; and all wonderfully framed▪ Lord how mighty, how wonderful, how wise art thou that madest them, and therefore worthy our love; and being thus made thus to bless, to continue, to increase, t● multiply them: yea more, to fill us with them; and therefore thy bounty, thy supper abundant bounty must needs make us to lo● thee.   

Sect. 2. Of meditating on the Word of Go●  
The second subject of meditate that I shall lay before you, is the Wo●● of God: 
The second subject of meditation, the Word of God.  It is said of the godly ● that he meditateth in the Law of God night and day, Psal. 1.2. How often doth David profess he will meditate in God's statutes, Psal. 119.48. 
Psal. 119 97  and it was his practice, vers. 23. The Law of God was his meditation all the day long. Meditation fastens the Word upon the heart; the soul for want of meditation retaineth but little spiritual food; the Word of God by holy meditating upon it, produceth the same effects upon our souls, as Manna 
Manna nò● solum sanitatem, sed & animum Judaeis conferebat. Josephus.  did upon the Israelites; for some Writers say that it restored health; infused strength; and inspired courage into them; that they owed those formidable victories they gained from their enemies, to this meat that came down from Heaven; so pious meditation on the Word changeth the qualities of men, making them of a sound mind, producing courage and assurance in the hearts of those, that before were full of weakness, fears and doubtings; the Devils fly such men who lodge the Word of God, the sword of the Spirit in their souls, beholding their Judge seated in their hearts as upon his Throne: this heavenly bread it was that animated the Martyrs to the flames, that gave them courage to daunt their executioners; the same food that nourisheth them, defends them, and that which cures their maladies, subdues their enemies; its strength no way hinders its sweetness, there are charms in it, that make it pleasant to every Palate, that by faith and meditation tasteth thereof.  
1. Meditate on the transcendency of the Word: that it is a transcendent rule of holiness: every Nation hath its Laws, and there is none so barbarous, whom nature or custom hath not furnished with some polity: the Greeks lived according to the Laws of their sages; the Romans followed the twelve Tables; and those that had neither Kings nor Lawgivers, had the Law of nature for their guide: the Jews were governed by the Law of Moses, chief by the Law of the two Tables, 
Senault. Treat. 7. disc. 5.  which if it gave them not strength enough to resist sin, it gave them light enough to know and avoid it, as one well noteth: for saith the Apostle, By the Law cometh the knowledge of sin; now the whole Word of God both Law and Gospel, is a most transcendent and most holy rule; God is holy in his works, but most holy in his Word, Psal. 138.2. in it shineth the purity of his nature, not capable of the least imperfection: the Angels (though as fine gold) yet are unclean in his sight, saith Bernard; 
Bernard.  how much more the sons of men, who are but clods of earth, and worms: this meditation makes the holiest man to tremble at his presence, and cry out with the Prophet that he is undone: they that by derivation from him are most holy, in comparison with him are most unholy, saith Austin; yea the Angels themselves, when they draw near unto him, cover both their feet and faces: if Angels that stand at the Mercy-seat do tremble, oh what shall sinners do that stand at the bar of justice?  
2 Meditate on the exactness of the Word of God; the Law forbids all sin, commands all obedience; every passage in the life of man is ordered in it; as Theodoret observeth of the Ceremonial Law, and the furniture of the Tabernacle, that every particular thereof was exactly prescribed by God: 
Theodoret.  now if the Ceremonial Law were so accurate and precise, how strict is the Law of Moral holiness; the Law of the Lord is perfect: we read that the measures and weights of the Sanctuary, were double as much as the ordinary measures; a man's actions may carry weight and be allowed among men in common conversation, 
Aug.  which will be found too light, being weighed in the balance of the Sanctuary of God, saith Austin: bring we our actions to this standard, and our defects will soon be discovered, and that which will seem warrantable and commendable before men, will appear sinful and abominable before the Lord.  
3. Meditate on the spirituality of God's Word; it requireth exactness of soul and spirit; it aweth the thoughts, and judgeth of external actions according to the heart: I the Lord search the heart, to give to every man according to his works, Jer. 17.10. The natural heart (it may be) will be content with Herod to do many good things, so he may have a dispensation in one reigning sin; and it may be to suffer a little; to do penance with a Papist, and then sin again, this it could brook well enough; but to be restrained in every thing, this flesh and blood cannot endure; but whatsoever liberty the flesh can desire, whether in thinking, speaking, or doing, contrary to that duty which belongeth to a man's place; as he is inferior or superior to others; or contrary to the good of the persons, or chastity or good name of others, though it be but in secret corruption, or secret working of heart, still the Word of God doth oppose it in every thing: the Pharisees forbade the outward act of uncleanness, but the Law of God forbids the impurity of the thoughts; they make the Law like John Baptist, who had a leathern girdle about his loins; but the Gospel represents Christ to have a golden girdle about his Paps; they represented only the first rise and motions of sin: this makes the Saints mourn for the first conceptions of sin, though they prove abortive, saith chrysostom, 
Chrysost.  making them to pray with David, to be purged and freed from secret sins, and sinful cogitations.  
4. Meditate upon the operativeness of the Word; it is not a dead letter, but hath a quick power in it to work upon the heart; the Spirit of God accompanies it, making it active, and mighty in operation: as in the frame of a man's body, under every vein there runs an artery full of spirits; so under every vein of truth in the Word of God, there is an artery of Spirit, quickening, searching, cutting, discovering, condemning: What's the reason most men's spirits rise up against the Word; it is because as the Elephant troubleth the waters before he drinketh, that he may not see his ugly visage; so the Word of God troubleth the mind of a sinner; it terrifies his conscience, making his sin appear very sinful to him; it makes a man a burden to himself; these spectacles are too true for the sinners false eyes: Ahab cannot endure to talk with Michajah, nor meet with Elijah; men can endure the generalities of the Word well enough; but when it comes near them, toucheth their Copyhold, corrupt hearts run away from it, because for want of serious meditation, they are unacquainted with the spiritual nature of the Word of God: Oh study I pray thee, 
gregor. Moral.  saith Gregory, and daily meditate on the words of thy Creator, and learn the mind of God in his Word, that thou mayst look up to eternal things; for so much shall thy rest be the greater in Heaven, by how much the more it hath been even now from the love of thy Creator here on earth.   

Sect. 3. Of meditating on Man; 
The third subject of meditation is man; his Creation, his body, his soul, his privileges.  his Creation, his body, his soul, his privileges.  
Man cometh in the next place, as a fit subject for our meditation and consideration: man was the last of God's creatures, as the end of his Creation; all made for him, and all represented in him; the rest by his word commanding; whereas his body by his hand-working, and his soul by his breath-quickning, became alive: and here let us meditate first on man's Creation, who is, as Plato saith, 
Plato.  the miracle of all miracles, and as it were the soul of this world; and you will see how every circumstance showeth the Creators' goodness, and man's many obligations.  
Let us begin with the meditation of man's body, which is, as one saith, 
More's demonstrat.  the pattern of the universal world.  
1. Meditate on the provision God made for man before he made him; God sets up an house, and furnisheth it; then puts man into this house ready furnished to his hand: other things are but as essays of God's power, man the perfection: Adam the last of all God's works, and the Lord and sovereign over them, under his sovereign Lord; Heaven would have nothing wanting to man, that he might wholly mind the things of Heaven.  
2. Meditate on God's proceeding hereunto: the Father as it were calls a Council; God deliberateth upon the enterprise of this work, and the Council is held in the conclave of the most holy Trinity; Let us make man, Gen. 1.26. Adam is business for the whole Trinity: all were employed about this creature, to the end that being created, he might be wholly employed about the service of God.  
3. Meditate on the form of man's body: God hath neither made us to lie along on the earth as beasts, 
●truth. Obser●at. 36. Cent. 2.  or stick on it as trees, but by upright stature set our head to Heaven, and our feet to the earth, as one observeth.  

Os homini sublime dedit, coelumque videre  

Ovid.  Jussit, & erectos ad sidera tollere vultus.   

God with a lofty look did man endew,  
And made him Heavens transcendent glory view.   
God hath given us an upright stature, not like other creatures that look downwards to the earth, to teach us to look up to Heaven by holy meditations, and to look up to the hills whence our salvation cometh; our face is toward Heaven, to teach us that our hearts should not be nuzzeling in the earth: man hath one muscle in his eyes more than any other creature, which may teach him still to look up toward Heaven.  
4. Meditate on the matter of man's Creation: 
Ad coelestia magis rapiatur, ad terrestria minùs capiatur. Columella l. 5. c. 9 Ecce pulchrum lapidem, putre cadaver tegentem. Gasp. in Heraclito. Homo bis creatus, 1. Seminaliter, seu causaliter. 2. Formaliter, seu visibiliter. Aug. de Genes.  he was made of the dust of the earth; so as howsoever we appear beautiful and amiable in the eye of man, which is fixed only on the external part; yet when the oil of our lamp is consumed, and we reduced again to our first original matter, there will be left us no better Epitaph than this, Behold here a spetious shrine covering a stinking corpse: man is twice created, saith St Augustine; 

Seminally or causally,  
Formally or visibly.    
The first according to his soul: the second according to his body: man's body of earth doth represent whatsoever is between Heaven and earth; yea the very Heavens themselves are figured; all natural causes contained; and their several effects produced therein.  
The three Heavens are resembled by the body of man; the lower serving for generation and nutriment, are like the lowest Heaven, within the compass whereof the elements are found: for as from them all beasts, plants, trees, and other things have being, receive nourishment, growth, motion and sense: so of four humours there engendered, all the members are made, fed, moved and augmented, the same agreeing in nature and number with the elements, and producing effects in all answerable to them: the upper part which is the seat of the heart, may be compared to the middle Heaven, the eighth sphere wherein the Stars are fixed, which holding one even and constant motion, giveth light and life to the world beneath, through its rays and comfortable influences: so the heart being still in motion, preserveth the whole body in life and health, by sending forth the vital spirits, dispersing themselves into all the parts by veins and arteries: Lastly, the head, the highest part of the body, and noblest seat of the soul, where she acteth her highest operations; and as it is the noblest part, so it is placed nearest to Heaven, and is as the third and highest Heaven; there sits the mind as in a Tower, beholding, governing, and directing all the actions of the whole body, causing it to move, to rest, to act, and to forbear; even as God from his high seat moveth the Heavens, directeth the Stars, and preserveth all things within the compass of the world: God hath form all the parts of the body together; opening the eyes; boring the ears; fashioning the nose; lengthening the arms; extending the shoulders; fastening the legs; and perfecting all together.  
2. From the meditation of man's body, let us proceed to the meditation of man's Creation in respect of his soul: man was made last of all the creatures, because he was to be the creature of the world, 
Lumb. sent. l. 1. distinct. 3.  as the Master of the sentences calls him; either propter excellentiam, by reason of the excellency that he hath above all other creatures, excepting the Angels; or propter convenientiam, by reason of the agreement he hath with them, participating some thing o● them all, and communicating in some things with them all; and that he is so styled in Scripture, see Mar. 16.15. And indeed Philosophers say, that man is Microcosmos, a little world, being as it were a compendium of the greater world: men can represent the world in maps, but God hath drawn Heaven and earth together in the map of every man.  
1. Man hath his esse and being, common to him with liveless creatures, which only have a bare being, and no more.  
2. He hath his vivere to live, common to him with herbs, and plants, and trees, which be animata, but not animalia.  
3. He hath his movere & sentire; to move from place to place; to see; to hear; to taste; to smell; common to him with bruit and unreasonable creatures.  
4. He hath his intelligere, his reason and understanding, and discerning faculty, common to him with Angels.  
As man's body is a fair picture of the world, so his soul is a lively image of God, the same dwelling in that earthly Tabernacle, as God sitteth in his heavenly Throne: man is not the bare footsteps only, but the very image of God; reason is as it were a spark of the Divinity; our faculties a manifest emblem of the Trinity: this image of God in Adam consisted partly and principally in exact knowledge: now one special part hereof, as an ancient Philosopher hath observed, consisteth in the knowledge of ourselves; therefore he wrote over his School door, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, called afterwards a golden sentence, being written in golden letters: and Cicero interpreting that precept of Apol●o, saith, 
* Nòn credo id praecipit, ut membra nostra aut staturam figuramve noscamus; neque nos corpora sumus; neque ego tibi dicens hoc, corpori dico; cum igitur corpus quasi vas est, ut aliquid animi receptaculum, ab animo quicquid agitur, id agitur à te. Cicer. Tusc. quaest. 1.  I do not think he commandeth ●hat to the end, we should know the stature ●r feature of our outward parts; for bodies ●e are not; neither I speaking this, do ●peak to thy body; when then he saith, know ●hy self, he saith, know thy mind; for the ●ody is but as a vessel or receptacle of the ●ind, that which of thy mind is done, is ●one of thee, for the mind of every man is ●very man: but because these men saw but through nature's dim spectacles, a● by Moonshine; therefore Calvin in the beginning of his Institutions, 
Calvin Institut.  divideth true wisdom into two parts, viz. 

The true knowledge of God, and  
The knowledge of ourselves.   Both which were in Adam after a transcendent manner: God heaped in together in one vessel form out o● clay and dust, all the treasures of wisdom, righteousness and holiness▪ his head was stored with all sciences▪ and his heart with virtues and graces his understanding was great, being able to impose a name upon every creature agreeable to its nature, Gen. 2.19, 20. his will and affections were every way correspondent, and no way out of joyn● or frame, but in all points both we composed; his mind was free from cares, fears, grief and sorrow: Th● made Austin break out into this rapson of spirit, 
Aug. Solilo qu. c. 9  Thy hand O Lord could have ma● me a stone, or a bird, or a serpent, or fo● bruit beast; but it would not for thy goodness sake: This also made Anselm 
Anselm. meditat.  walking in his Garden, and beholding a little worm creeping upon the ground break forth into this meditation, De● Lord, thou mightst have made me like this crawling despicable creature; but thou wouldst not, and it was thy mercy that thou wouldst not: Oh! as thou hast ennobled me with the image of thyself, make me conformable to thyself, that of a worm I may become an Angel; of a vassal of sin, a vessel of mercy; of a shell of corruption, a star of glory in thy heavenly mansion.  
3. Let us meditate on man's privileges in his Creation, that were conferred upon him; a privilege of power: Adam Lord Paramount over every living creature: Princes on earth acknowledge no superior in their own dominions; scarce was Adam created, but he found himself in a Paradise; and from the morning of his birth, placed under the most delightful Climate that nature could afford; he is put under the shelter of the tree of knowledge and immortality; he treads upon beds of roses and lilies; the sight of Lions, Bears, Tigers, and other furious beast's do not affright him; God hath give● him power to rule over them, and all creatures give respect unto him, he being created to be Lord and ruler over all the creatures: and had man continued in his integrity, he should have wrought, as appeareth, Gen. 2.15. but never have been weary; it should have been a pleasure, not a pain to him; he might have fasted, but should never have fainted or been feeble; he should have lived still without headache, or so much as grey hairs; all the creatures should have continued their subjection to him; the earth should have been fertile and fruitful in all good things, there should have been no briers, and thorns and thistles, nor any thing hurtful and noisome; the woman should never have had sorrow and pain to bring forth, nor yet trouble and care to bring up her children: In a word, they should have been warm without ; naked without shame, for so they were before their fall. This doctrine of man's Creation may help us to divers fruitful meditations.  
1. A meditation of our original; to look to the rock whence we were hewn; a man's principles prove not his worst instructions to humility: O man whatever thou now art, thou wa● once little enough; thy Creation implies a nonentity; thy beginning smaller than dust; he that seriously meditates on his first nothing, will ever afterwards hardly conceit himself to be any great matter.  
2. Art thou God's creature; then meditate thus with thyself when thou art in afflictions, that God takes no pleasure in the destruction of his workmanship: preservation is a greater mercy than a simple being; God will not leave any of his most excellent works done to halves, but perfect what he hath begun.  
3. Let the meditation of thy Creation spur thee on in the service of God: even by nature we tender him our service, from whom we receive our being, saith Aquinas: 
Aquinas.  in the first age of the world there was no thought of any idolatry: blessings are then most taking with us, and work most upon us, while they are freshest in memory; man came then but newly out of his Maker's hands, and could not so soon forget him. When we consider likewise that the creatures were made to serve us, let us also consider, that the end why he created man, was for the service of himself: Excellent was his meditation, who imagined the beasts to intimate thus much to man, Qui fecit me propter te, fecit te propter se; He that made me to serve thee, made thee to serve himself: if therefore the creatures that were made to serve us, do now (as many times they do) annoy us, and rebel against us; this should put us in mind of our rebellion against God by sin; for had not Adam, from whose loins we are all descended, and who was God's Viceroy, and the first created Ruler on earth, been disobedient to his Maker, and broken the Laws of the sovereign Lawgiver of Heaven unruliness had not broken forth; neither of subjects against their Princes▪ nor of the inferior creatures against man their superior. Marvel 〈◊〉 saith Austin, 
Mirari noli, si ea quae deseruit superiorem, paenas patitur per inferiorem. Aug. de verbis Apostol. Serm. 12. Bp Pilkington in Haggai. Vide Theodor. Graecor. affect. curate. Serm 4.  if that creature [man who forsook his superior, be punished 〈◊〉 his inferior: There is not a Horse, a Dog or an Ox, or any other living creature but it must have many stripes, before it wa● be brought to any good order to serve us, Bishop Pilkington observeth: In word, our disobedience to God, w● the cause of the disobedience of oth●● creatures to us; so that when we 〈◊〉 any disorder in nature, in what kind soever, we must neither blame God nor the creatures, but only thank ourselves and our sins.   

Sect 4. Of the fall of Adam.  
The next subject of our meditation is the fall of Adam: 
The fall of Adam the fourth subject of meditation. Compurationes multas. Arias Montan. in Latina version.  Adam and Eve were happy in their Creation; but alas! this happiness is not long lasting: Man being in honour abideth not, Psal. 49.20. God made man upright, but man sought out many inventions; many computations, as one renders, Eccl. 7. ult. seeking what in him lay to mar God's workmanship, and deface his image: Eve being overcome by the Serpent, eats of the forbidden fruit; and Adam overcome with the persuasion of his Wife, takes from her hand that fatal Apple that choketh all his posterity, which being done, he is smitten with sudden fear, seethe his nakedness and is ashamed, and hides himself; and his eyes are now opened to see evil by experience; for before his fall, he had no experience of the evil of sin, and of the curse of God: therefore he broke the command of God and did eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil; he sinned because he knew not the misery of sin; but after his fall he seethe the difference between grace and sin; what he is himself; and what he was before▪ and all the future miseries that are like to befall his posterity; and he that before treated him as a son, cannot no● look upon him but as a slave and vagabond: Adam blames his Wife; E●● the Serpent; and instead of pleading guilty to their indictment, to sweeten the rigour of the Judge, they frame excuses to inflame his anger, and to render themselves more uncapable of pardon: Ah how far more wisely had both of them done, 
Aug l. 11. add lit. c. 3.  saith Austin, if prostrate o● the ground with tears in their eyes, o● sighs from their hearts, and humbe confe●sions from their mouths, they had crie● out, Lord pity us and all our miserable posterity: 
Causin. Histor. sacr.  It was for this, saith Gregory, th● God called them, and his voice as it we●● solicited them to humble them by the swee● accents of his fatherly goodness; but alas they are insensible; God passeth a severe doom upon them; the woma● shall conceive with pain, and in sorrow bring forth children; the ma●● to eat his bread in the sweat of his ●rows, and put his hand to the Plough, and be the companion of beasts in tilling of his ground, which though he trod ●nder his feet, he could not subdue without the labour of his hand; and throughout his whole life (which is a ●ife of sorrows) he is to combat with all distempers, never suffering him to be at rest, till he return into the bo●ome of the earth from whence he ●ame; and immediately a flaming Cherubin bars up the gate of Paradise, and shuts it for ever against these miserable exiles.  
And now he that was the Monarch of the world; the father of all mankind; the first; the richest; and greatest Lord that ever was on earth, he began the fray, whereof all his mi●●rable posterity have felt the blows; his fall being their foil; and his punishment the pattern of their pain and mi●ery; and now his heart is the fountain which powers out its qualities into the substance of his children's souls; 
Rom. ●▪ ●0▪ 〈…〉 8.  and ●ver since this infection hath passed ●rom father to son, as by hereditary ●ght; and now man is naturally void of all goodness and righteousness, and become a vassal of sin, Joh. 8.34. a slave of corruption, 2 Pet. 2.19. a slave of Satan, Eph. 2.1, 2, 3. and liable to eternal death: that we are all by nature stained with sin, appeareth, Job 15.14. where Eliphaz saith, 
This is that which our fabulous Poets have shadowed unto us, in the tale of Pandora's Box, which she opening through her curiosity, filled the whole world full of all manner of diseases.  What is man that he should be clean, and he that is born of a woman that he should be righteous▪ and the Kingly Prophet makes this doleful ditty to a lamentable Elegy and sad plainsong, Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me; and what he saith of himself in particular, Paul affirmeth of all men in general, Rom. 5.12. saying, that by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; whereby he understandeth the bitter root of original corruption which daily and hourly brings forth the cursed fruits of actual transgressions, whereby we become culpable and liable to eternal ruin.  
Sin and death are two twins born at a birth; yea howsoever sin be the elder Brother in time, because it's the cause of death, yet in nature they come ver● near each other; for as soon as eve● sin was committed, death entered, according to the commination of God to Adam, 
Si nòn peccasset Adam, nòn erat expoliandus corpore, sed supervestiendus immortaliter. August.  Gen. 2.17. Had it not been for the sin of man, nothing had ever discomposed his quiet; the seasons had not been irregular; nor the Elements waged war against him; the earth had been fruitful without the labour of man; no thorns or briers had ever covered the face thereof; no drowning deluges; nor scorching drought; nor raging pestilence; nor devouring sword; nor wasting famine, should ever have made any devastation upon an innocent state; the two parts that compose man had not been separated; nor the masterpiece of the Creation been ruined, as Austin speaks; and the soul reigning with Angels, had not beheld her body devoured by worms: of all the strings of the world's great Instrument, Adam's only brake, and caused a jar; and having run from God, hath drawn all his posterity after him: the sin of Adam is the fountain of all the evils and miseries that befall his posterity; we sinned in him, because we lived in his person; and the offence of one man is become the obliquity of whole nature, because it was included in him, as the tree in the kernel: 
Ball's Treatise of meditation.  now that man enriched with so many graces and privileges, should in such a place as Paradise; and in the sight of the tree of life; and having familiar converse with God; and leave to eat of all other trees of the Garden; yet that he must taste of the only forbidden tree, having power from God to have resisted the temptation of the Devil, these are great aggravations of Adam's sin, as a judicious Divine hath well observed.   

Sect. 5. Of the nature of sin; the number of our sins; with the aggravations of them.  

〈◊〉 fifth subject meditation is 〈◊〉 nature of 〈◊〉 etc.  Orders will require that we should now meditate on the nature of sin; the number of our sins; together with their aggravating circumstances: sin came not into the world by Creation, but was the Devil's bird, brought in afterwards by corruption, Gen. 3.1, 2, 3. Jam. 1.13, 14, 15. where the manner of sins conception and birth is described.  
Now for the nature of sin consider,  
1. That sin is a spot, 
〈◊〉 ●s a spot.  staining the soul; the mind and conscience is defiled by sin, Tit. 1.15. things that are unclean, clean, are vile and loathsome, so is sin; it is very odious; it makes a man like filthy Swine; like a spotted Leopard; it corrupts him as the flies did Egypt, Exod. 8.24. so as the Lord saith, they are become filthy or stinking, Isa. 64.6. Thence it was that so many washings and purgations under the Law were appointed: We are all as an unclean thing, saith the Prophet, and all our best righteousness is but filthy rags: thence it is that holy men have been so earnest with God to cleanse them, and wash them from the filthiness thereof, Psal. 51.2. We have need of washing and cleansing, ●rom the sole of the foot to the crown of the head, there being nothing whole ●herein, nothing but wounds, bruises, ●wellings and putrifying sores: 
Ad incu●iendam horrorem a peccato, tanquam à re immundâ. Musculus.  This Metaphor is used in Scripture, saith Musculus, to strike terror into a man to ●un sin, and fly from it, as an unclean ●ing: They that are all clean, have need 〈◊〉 wash their feet, saith our Saviour; to ●hich devout Bernard alluding, hath his meditation, That though we choose ●●r way, and cull out our paths to walk in, voiding the mire and dirt, yet in the best ●●d cleanest ways our feet will gather some  
2. Sin is in Scripture called by the name of folly; 
Sin is folly.  sin is the greatest folly of all other: a good understanding have all they that do Gods Commandments, Psal. 111.10. therefore sin being the transgression of the Law of God, the sinner is the greatest fool: to call a wilful sinner a fool will bear no action of slander in the Court of Heaven: 
1 Sam. 25.25.  thus Abigail said of her Husband, Nahal is his name, and folly is with him: thus Job calls his Wife, Job 2.10. and God calls all Atheists so, Psal. 14.1. and Christ calls the rich man in the Gospel so, Luk▪ 12.20. Who dares call a rich man a fool; yet so doth our Saviour call him that is rich to the world, and is not rich towards God: Every one bereft of reason and judgement is a fool, 
He doth not ●ean that sin had abolished the substance of their hearts, secundum esse naturale, but perverted and spoiled the qualities thereof, secundum esse morale.  so be sinners: there be some sins that take away the heart. Hos. 4.11. Ephraim is a silly dove without heart; the sinner like a fool seeks after trifles, and let's go things of the greatest importance; he prefers a Counter before a piece of gold, and will not leave his babble (according to the Proverb) for the Tower of London; he knows not where a good bargain is to be had, like children running up the hill to catch the Moon, sweeting and toiling themselves to catch Butterflies; so the sinner chooseth vain things that cannot profit him.  
Sinners like fools are foolhardy, and will not be corrected or reclaimed, being struck by Aaron's rod, or reproved by the Spirit of God; and as fools mock at wise men's actions, so do the wicked scorn at the ways of the godly. Fools only care for a little meat and drink for the present, pins and points, and such like trash, but look not after an inheritance; so sinners are creatures of sense, and like bruits are altogether for present ease, and present contentments.  
3. Sin is called a burden: 
Sin is a burden.  Mine iniquities, saith David, are gone over my head; as a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me, Psal. 38.3. The Prophet Zachary compares it to a talon of lead, the heavyest of all metals: the women that are led aside by seducers, are said to be silly women laden with sins, 2 Tim. 3.6. Salt, sand and a lump of Iron, 
Ecclus. 22.  is easier to bear, than an unwise, foolish, and ungodly man, saith the son of Syrach; and it's proved to be a burden, by the effects of hanging on and pressing down, Heb. 12.1. We see this made good by the example of Jonah, that the sin of one private person is likely to sink a Ship in the Sea; for he being laden with a Commission for Nineveh, and disburdening himself of this Message of God, became such a burden to the Ship, that though the Mariners had cast out all their wares into the Sea, yet the greatest burden was behind, the sin of jonas: Peter thought it of force to sink more than one Ship, Luk. 5. for when two Ships fraught with Fish were ready to sink, he fell down at the knees of jesus, and said, Go from me O Lord, for I am a sinful man, thinking that his sin had so endangered them.  

Quest.  Though sin be as heavy as Salt, sand, Led, Iron, of sufficient weight to sink Ships, yea burden enough to sink the world; what may the reason then be, that many sinners are so merry, and go so lightly away with it?  
I answer with St Austin, 
Resp.  that the custom of sinning hath taken away the sense of s●n, and so becoming ordinary, it's therefore not odious or irksome, by reason of custom, and the help which Satan lends the sinner; it seems no burden; he feels not the weight of it; sin settling itself in the heart it doth quiescere in propria sede, rest in its proper place: It is an axiom in Philosophy, 
Elementa in loco proprio nòn ponderant.  that the Elements are not heavy in their own proper place; as the air is not heavy nor any burden to the birds; the water to the fishes; the earth to worms or moles, because they are in their proper places; no more is sin heavy to a sinner, settling itself in the heart where the element of sin is, it weighs light; and except the wrath of God fall upon the conscience, (sin lying in its Region) the sinner never cries out like Cain, Oh my sin is greater than I can bear: judas his heart was laden with hypocrisy, treason, malice, and covetousness, enough to sink him down; yet it was no burden to him, till the wrath of God touched his conscience, than it pressed him down to his own place.  
4. Sin is a debt, 
Sin is a debt.  and the sinner is a debtor to God's Law and justice: I have read of Augustus Cesar, that hearing of a sale of goods belonging to a Gentleman of Rome, that was deeply indebted; 
Sueton.  be demanded if the party used to sleep well, saying, that if he did, he would buy his bed, whatever it cost him, for surely there was some extraordinary virtue in it: and if Cesar thought a man could not sleep being indebted to men such as himself, who at the most were able but to seize on his body; then what may sinners think of themselves, that are indebted to God more than they are able to pay, and who is able to lay them fast, and punish them in soul and body, and that for ever; and yet it may be feared, that many men never break an hours sleep, nor abridge themselves of any pleasure that cometh in their way for the matter: the reason hereof is, because they never cast about what it may cost them, before they commit it; being like a man riding cross some great River, or arm of the Sea, with his face towards his Horse tail, so as he never seethe nor feareth the danger he is to pass, 
Vega in Psal. 32.  but only looks back to the banks from whence he came, and whither he will not return, and so at length his Horse failing him, being tired, and able to swim no further, both be drowned. It is good therefore every day to look over our Debt-book that we may prevent running ourselves into further arrear a●●s for time to come, and to spend all our time on the great business of our salvation: he is a thriftless Farmer that suffers the debt of one year to run in another; 
Struth. observ. Cent. 2.  every day hath its own burden, and how shall that crop discharge two years, that pays not one? By these Metaphors we see something of the nature of sin.  
2. Let us meditate on the number of our sins: David that had not sinned so frequently as we have done, yet when he takes a survey of the number of his sins, he gives up this account, Mine iniquities are more in number than the hairs of my head; they were so many that he could not count them: upon which place Saint Austin hath this devout meditation; 
August.  David saith he, had little sins, little and small as hairs, but yet multiplying and increasing as the hairs of his head: and thus chrysostom compareth sins to rags, 
Chrysost.  to show that as rags the longer they be worn, the more they be increased; so sin the more it is practised, the further it is enlarged: and Bernard 
Bernard.  gives this advice, When thou drawest near to God, consider O Christian, whether thou canst meet him with ten thousand sins repent of, that cometh against thee with twenty thousand sins that thou never thoughtest of? 
Psal. 19.12.  Who can understand his errors, saith the Psalmist? Who knows the nature of all his actions, whether they be erroneous or no; warrantable or no? indeed for the substantial duties of a Christian, he deserves not the name of a Christian that knows them not; but for many particular Cases of conscience, many Questions incident to the life of a Christian, who can resolve them? Some actions indeed are notoriously evil, sins of the first magnitude, such as are taxed and made manifest by the very Moonlight of nature; some are o● weaker evidence, as sins of infirmity; some not discerned, and scarce known as sins, as sins of ignorance and incogitancy; you may see them represented in three Parables, Luk. 15. of the lost Son, the lost sheep the lost piece of silver; now draw, out thy meditations, and examine thyself, see whether thou art not like the lost Son; hast not thou often run away from thy Father's house by wilful rebellion? and if not so, yet mayest thou be as the lost sheep, gone astray from thy God by a sin of infirmity? and if not that, yet who hath not been as the lost piece of silver? have not many of thy actions slipped out of thy hand by incogitancy and ignorance?  
3. Meditate on the aggravations of your sins; a sin that at first sight seems little, yet by aggravation becometh exceeding sinful; though the substance of men's actions be good, and their intentions good, yet they may have some malignant circumstances that may blemish them. Job respecting the substance of his actions, and the good intentions of his heart, cries out, O that I were weighed in a balance; but if he take in the erring circumstances, then if he will be weighed, he must follow Bernard's advice, The beam and standard must be the Cross of Christ, and the worth of his merits must help down the weight or else it will be too light. Gather together all the aggravating circumstrnces of thy sins, meditate thus with thyself, Such a sin I committed at such a time, in such a place, when I should have been better employed, I a man of such a Calling, a Magistrate, a Gentleman, a Minister, a professor of Religion, a Father of children, a Governor of a Family, a Master of servants; and so my example hath been an occasion of stumbling to many; I did it at such a time, after confession of sin, and sorrow for sin, after I had renewed my Covenant against sin, after some grace and strength received to resist sin; these and such like aggravations will make a small sin to become exceeding sinful: Now the serious meditation of our sins is very profitable.  
1. It brings us to a true sight of our sins, and makes us to hate sin so much the more, and to groan under the burden of sin bringing us to Christ, with a desire to be eased of its burden.  
2. Like Peter's Cock it will be our awakener, and bring us to weep bitterly, it will wound our conscience, and lead us to bitterness in spirit, who by our sins have wounded so sweet a Saviour.  
3. It is a great advantage to humility, that man cannot be proud that daily meditateth upon the nature and number of his sins.  
4. It makes us ply the Throne of Grace more earnestly, wherein we shall find matter enough to beg daily for the pardon of sin, and matter of praise to God upon the meditation of many bypast sins remitted to us.  
5. It is the best salve against all our sores, knowing we have no reason to complain of our sufferings, when we meditate on the number and greatness of our sins; and that we suffer justly, because we suffer for our sins, and so ought to kiss the rod, and quietly to bear the indignation of the Lord, because we have sinned against him.   

Sect 6. Of the Sufferings and Death of Christ.  
The next subject of meditation I shall treat of is, 
The sixth sub- of meditation, the sufferings and death of Christ.  the Sufferings and Death of Christ, who was wounded for our transgressions, whose soul was made an offering for our sins. The sufferings of Jesus began with his life, he had enemies, as soon as he had subjects; when the w●se men were doing him homage at his Cradle, Herod at the same time was conspiring his death, he commits his safety to his flight, and seeks a Sanctuary in Egypt, passing his minority in a Country where his people had long before for four hundred and thirty years been in bondage; his whole life varied little from his beginning, he was not in security but while he was unknown, he never was at rest, but while he got his living by daily labour: No sooner did this glorious Sun appear to the world, but he was persecuted; the Pharisees hate him for his Doctrine, and envy him for his Miracles, they plot his death, when he had raised Lazarus from death to life, and never cease till they bring him to his Cross, and his Grave.  
The matter of his sufferings were all the miseries whereunto the life of man was subject, whether we mean pains of body, or grief of heart, and sorrows of mind, he suffered them all in an extraordinary measure and manner, as I have elsewhere more largely declared.  
The ends of his sufferings (wherein also I may include the form thereof, sc. his meritorious satisfaction for the sin of man) may be discussed; for had not the first Adam sinned, the second Adam had not suffered; and whatsoever he did by his active obedience, or suffered by his passive obedience, was to make up that rent and breach which was made by Adam's transgression, as Au●in tells us, 
Nos in Adamo immortalitate malè usi ut moreremur; Christus mortalitate benè usus est ut viveremus, Aug.  We all in the first Adam, behaving ourselves ill, in a state of immortality forfeited it, and became liable to eternal death, therefore Christ the second Adam behaving himself well in a state of mortality, recovered again for us, and restored again to us th● right of eternal life. Joh. 1.29. John Baptist calls him the Lamb of God that takes away the sin● of the world; and Paul tells us, how he was delivered to death for our sins, Rom. 4.25. He was apprehended, arraigned, condemned and crucified, that we might be acquitted, pardoned and discharged; the Death of Jesus Christ is the last testimony of his love, his wounds are so many bleeding mouths breathing forth his love unto us.  
And this is very admirable, his power was increased by his death, he was never more absolute than upon the Cross, spoiling Principalities and Powers; this Sun never darted forth more rays than when he was in an eclipse; nor did the Lord Jesus ever more triumph over his enemies, than when they upbraided him with his infirmities, and made a mock of his sufferings, than was it, that he conceived the Church in his wounds, giving his children life by his death, and founding his Church with his blood: His Church cost him much more pain and trouble than Eve did the first Adam; his Spouse never broke his sleep, 
Sicut dormientis Adae costa detrahitur, ut conjux efficiatur, ita & Christo morienti de latere sanguis effunditur, ut ecclesia construatur communicantes namque corpori & sanguinis efficimur ecclesia Christi conjux August.  rising from his side without any pang or violence, he awoke from his sleep into a Marriage with her that was a piece of himself; but Jesus Christ laid down his life to give it to his Church, his body was pained, and his heart pierced to form his Bride, this Spouse was to be sought for in the bowels of her Father, yet even then did our Lord Jesus in his lowest abasement act like a Sovereign; he pardoned Delinquents, when himself was numbered among transgressors; he gives eternal life, when they bereft him of a temporal life; he disposeth of an heavenly Kingdom, when they disputed his Kingdom on earth; he made his power appear in his weakness, his glory in his shame, his innocency in his execution, his grandeur in his reproaches; and now was the Son of man glorified upon the Cross, making his innocency manifest at his death, that to the confusion of the Jews, the Judge that condemned him should plead his excuse, that the Thiefs that died with him should publish his Sovereignty, that the Soldiers that nailed him to his Cross should become his adorers; yea that the Sun (the great eye of the world) should hid his head, and whole nature be in mourning for him, lamenting his death who was the Prince and Lord of life; and however Christ was accounted of, yet the Robes of Kings are not to be compared with the rags of Christ, nor the Thrones of Princes with the cross and thorns of our Saviour; 
Joh. Wall Serm. in Heb. 9.12.  upon which consideration, one breaks forth into this meditation, O Lord if thy shame be glorious, what is thy glory? how shall we be advanced by the strength of thy power, that are so dignified by the weakness of thy sufferings?  
1. This may teach us in our meditations to distinguish between Christ's sufferings, and the sufferings of all Saints and Martyrs whatsoever; for theirs were private, and profited only themselves, but his were public, and the virtue thereof extended and redounded to all the faithful his members, he being the head of the Church; for,  
1. Their sufferings were chastisements and loving corrections to bring them to the sight of their sins, to be sorry for them, and forsake them; or,  
2. For trials of their faith, patience and constancy to suffer for his sake, they were no way meritorious and satisfactory either for themselves or others, as Leo sometime Bishop of Rome affirmed, contrary to the Doctrine of the present Papacy, The just by their sufferings received Crowns themselves, but procured none for others, 
Acceperunt justi, nòn dedere coronas, & de fortitudine fidelium nata sunt exempla patientiae, nòn data dona justitiae. Leo.  and that from their constancy in suffering, others might receive examples of patience, but no rewards for other men's righteousness: But Christ being a public person, and our Surety, and having no sin of his own to suffer for, his sufferings were in regard of himself works of supererrogation and therefore not needing them himself, he might bestow them upon us, as the Apostle tells us, he did, Gal. 3.13.  
3. Hence we may meditate on that infinite hatred that God hath against sin, seeing he will lay the punishment of it upon his only Son, rather than suffer it to escape, and go unpunished, 
Christ's wounds are blue with grief, and shining with love, therefore by the opening of his wounds we ought to enter into the secrets of his heart, Gerrard Meditat. 7.  Leu. 44.29. The Papists use the meditation of Christ's passion to move them to hate the Jews, let us use it rather as a motive to make us loath and leave our sins; for had it not been for them, one hair of his head had not fallen to the ground; nay all the Jews in the world, and all the Devils in hell could have done nothing against him; every sin of ours was as ● thorn to his head, a nail to his hands and feet, a spear to pierce his tender side: Let us therefore look upon him whom we have pierced, and mourn hearty for our sins the causes of his sufferings: But alas! Christ's death is often the occasion of the fall of many, who persuade themselves that he that bought them, is too much concerned in their salvation to destroy them; upon this vain hope they give up themselves to all wickedness, and turn this precious antidote into poison.  
4. Let the meditation of Christ's sufferings make us patiented in all our sufferings; if the meditation of the sufferings of the Fathers, Confessors, and Martyrs of the Church will cause us to endure afflictions patiently, shall not much more the meditation on the sufferings of Jesus Christ, who is as well tam speculum patiendi, 
Bernard in Cantic.  quam proemium patientis, a perfect glass to show us how to suffer, as a sure reward for those which do suffer; for, what will not the servant suffer willingly for his Master, when his Master hath patiently endured, 
Nil adeò grave est, quod nòn aequanimitèr toleretur, si Christi passio ad memoriam reducatur, Gregor.  things not only wonderful and grievous, but (considering Christ's person) things unworthy to be suffered Gessit mira & pertulet dura, nec tantùm dura sed etiam indigna, saith Austin, hath Christ willingly endured all this for us, and shall not we patiently endure a little for him? therefore if the water of afflictions seem bitter to thee, cast in that sweet Tree the Cross of Christ, and it will soon be very pleasant; he that came into the world without sin, went not out of the world without suffering, and yet he patiently endured the same, showing that we that came into the world full of sin, and have ever since lived in sin, should deservedly look for correction, and when it cometh, endure it patiently. martials Fly played so long under a tree, till it was wrapped in amber, 
Sic modo quae fuerat vita contempta manente, Funeribus facta est nunc pritiosa suis. Martial.  congealed in the drops that came from the boughs; the best of us are but as worms, let us not despise to to be as this Fly, still hover about the Tree of the cross, and the ointment of his blood, till we be entombed and enclosed in the precious amber of his bleeding wounds, and the sacred gum that grows in the Tree of Life; For if we suffer with him, we shall also reign with him; and if we be conformed to the image of his death, we shall be transformed to the image of his glory.   

Sect. 7. Of the Resurrection of Christ.  
Now it is requisite that we should meditate on the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead: 
The seventh subject of meditation is the Resurrection of Christ.  The Disciples of Christ before his Resurrection had not learned their own Creed, which they were taught, not so much by our Saviour, as by his Sepulchre, whose opening mouth when it sent forth Christ the word of God, pronounced his Resurrection which is the Epitaph of God: Joseph's devotion bestows a Tomb upon our Saviour, but our Saviour at his Resurrection bestows it upon death, which ever since hath been buried his Tomb: If the eye of our faith will adventure to see the active horror of the grave, behold Ionas herein a type of Christ, and his quick Tomb made a Tomb of salvation to him; three or four days he lay in his new night of amazement, as if he had found an Egypt in the Whale, at last the grave by unacquainted instruction cast up the living; the Whale was no longer a Sepulchre, but a Fish, and Ionas no longer a Corpse, but a Prophet; he had surely died, had he not been buried, and here was a resurrection, though not a reviving, a resurrection from disobedience and the Whale: Thus this rare Anchorer, and his Tomb were both alive; but the Tomb of our Saviour was as desperate as his death, what could be expcted from a grave, and a carcase, yet behold this carcase reviveth into a man, nay into a God, he arose when night ariseth into morning, and at that season when Winter is quickened into a Spring; it was on the first day of the Jews week, a week well begun, and it was the first day of the Christian creation. The Angel made a little Earthquake in the grave when he removed the mighty stone with which the vain Jew tried to oppress our Saviour after his death, as if he would have sealed him up to an impossibility of a resurrection; but since the Angel hath opened the Tomb for us, shall we go and see the place whence Christ is risen, yet shall not we make such haste, but that the speedy devotion of the two Maries will be there before us, whose feet were as swift as their love, and their love as swift as time, nay more than time which hindered them by the delay and command of their Sabbath, a Sabbath indeed only to their bodies, which while our Saviour lay in his grave, were but the Sepulchers of their souls, which found no Sabbath till they found the Lord, they came with prepared spices and ointments for him whose Divinity prevented balm, who esteemed their piety of more value than their ointments; but alas! they are no sooner at the Sepulchre, but they find it as empty of our Saviour as full of wonder, and instead of the body of the Lord they behold the Angel of the Lord sitting upon the stone which be had conquered to obedience, his raiment white as snow, his countenance like lightning; but that which was more wonderful I the fearful women were encouraged by the Angel, and their innocence, while the guilty Soldiers beholding the same sight with them, were full of faintness, being at once almost disarmed of their weapons and souls, they became as dead men, and were rather the prisoners than the keepers of the grave; but in the mean time the Angel comforteth and instruct●th the women, who are now his Disciples, and receiving a Commission ●o preach the Resurrection of our ●aviour, they hasten out of the ●omb with the confused expedition ● fear and joy was not this a strange ●grimage to run from the Sepulchre of the Lord, whenas multitudes of Popish Votaries travel to his pretended Sepulchre? but yet it was more strange, they seek the Disciples and find Christ; here was a comfortable mistake, and indeed he comforted them with his presence and speech, when immediately they fall upon their knees, at his knee whose resurrection these female Evangelists are again sent to teach, and the first Scholars they must teach must be Christ's own Disciples, who show their obedience as ready as their love, and speedily find Peter and john for their hearers; here was zeal and tenderness; the fierceest and mildest of the Apostles, and these no sooner hear their words, but they ran as fast to the Tomb, as the other ran from it: john came first unto it, but Peter went first into it; love was swiftest, but zeal was boldest; where they were no sooner entered, but they find Christ's victory, and his spoils of death.  
And here let us meditate on the accidents that happened at his resurrection, before his ascension into Heaven: the Evangelist tells us, he came into the house where the Disciples were met, when the doors were shut, Joh. 20.19. We are not bound to believe it was at the beginning, or first shutting in of the evening, but the night might be well spent before he appeared to them; nor are we sure it was very late, for they might go to supper betimes, and the two Disciples going before to Emmaus, making haste might come to Jerusalem before the dead time of the night and whereas it is said, Luk. 24 33. that they found the eleven, whenas it is evident Thomas was not among them; it's a Synecdoche, setting down all for the greater number, as joh. 20.12. Thomas one of the twelve; whereas they were then but eleven in all, for Judas had lest them, and hanged himself, and Mathias was not yet chosen, and added to the number Act. 1.  
The main Question is about the manner of Christ's coming in, for St: john 
Joh. 20.19.  tells us, he came in the doors being shut: Divers are the opinions of the learned about this point.  
1. Some think it probable enough that some body within might unbolt or unbar the door, though the rest of the company took no notice thereof, nor the Evangelists mention it, so Marlorat: 
Marlorat. ad loc. Aretius. Boetius.  So he came in when the doors were shut, that is, very late, when it was time the doors should be shut, say others.  
2. The Papists say, he came through the doors, as they also say, he came out of his mother's womb, clauso utero; that his body is really present at ●he Sacrament in an invisible manner; but they only say it, but prove it not: 
Dr Fulk.  A learned man saith, Some incredulous jew perhaps will not be persuaded, that St. Peter 's sword went between Malchus his ear and head, it wa● so soon healed again: so some perhaps will not believe that the doors were at all opened, they were so soon shut again; but it's clear, though the● were shut presently before and after his passage, yet they were open 〈◊〉 the instant of his passage, else sha● we grant a penetration, or th● there were two solid bodies at 〈◊〉 same time in one place, which 〈◊〉 not be; for so Austin saith even 〈◊〉 glorified bodies, Tolle spacia corporibus, & corpora nòn erunt.  
3. The soundest opinion is to acknowledge, that he came in, 
Creatura cessit Creatori, Beza. Calvin. Cyril. Polan. Synt. p. 419. Calv. Instit. l. 4. c. 17. Sect. 19  in a most miraculous manner, clausis januis, but not per clausas januas, so that there was not penetratio sed cessio corporum solidorum: he came not through the wood, iron and steel of the door, but the door opened to him of its own accord, or by his divine power, as Act. 5.19. Act. 12.10. the ●reature gave place to the Creator.  
And that they might not doubt of his resurrection, he proveth it by an evident demonstration, bidding ●hem behold his hands and his feet, and ●ells them it was he, Luk. 24.29, 30. 〈◊〉 if he had said, a spirit hath not parts ●ad members and dimensions as I have; herefore you may assure yourselves, ●●at it's my very body which you ● that was buried, that is now risen ● in: We may observe further, ●t Christ bids them make use not ●y of their eyes to see, but also of ●r hands to feel him; and unless 〈◊〉 had done so, it had not given satisfaction to incredulous Thomas, whose faith lay in his fingers, and will believe no more than he seethe and feeleth, to whose infirmity our Saviour condescendeth.  

Quest.  Here then a Question may arise, whether the scars remained in Christ's body after his resurrection or not?  

Resp.  I answer, It seemed they did, how else could Thomas see and feel them, as he is bid for his full satisfaction to do, Joh. 20.27. If it be demanded whether they be blemishes or not; I answer, they were no signs of defect, 
Vulnerum signa, virtutum insignia. Aquin. Euseb. Emiss. Perkins in Symbol.  but ensigns of victory; but that it's not likely they now remain in Heaven, or shall be seen at the last day, Mr Perkins showeth, saying, that we may as well think that the veins of his body shall be empty, and without blood, because they were so upon the Cross, as that the scars in his body shall then appear, because he had them, when he appeared to Thomas.  

Object.  But how cometh it about that he ●loweth that to Thomas and the 〈◊〉 which he will not afford to Mary M●dalen, sc. to touch him, notwithstanding he loved her very well. Joh. 20.27 He said unto her, Touch me not; ●e bi● Thomas not only touch him, but also to put his finger into his side, which is more than to touch him.  
1. Some say, 
Resp.  she believed the resurrection by seeing him, therefore needed not this further confirmation by feeling; but Thomas would not believe, unless he both saw and felt, Joh. 20.25. the rest are so affrighted, that they know not what to make of it.  
2. Others say, 
Marlorat. ad loc.  he would not then be touched of her, to intimate to her, that she came with too much a carnal mind to touch him, a mind too low in regard of this glorious occasion, Christ being now risen and glorified, for his resurrection was the first degree of his glorification: it did not satisfy her to answer, Rabboni, but she runs to him, and claspeth him, and clingeth about him, as the affection of love did dictate to her: but saith Christ, Touch me not in ●uch a manner; 
Dr Sibs Serm. on joh. 20.16. Vide Bp Andrews Serm. in loc.  this is not a fit man●r for thee to touch me in, now I ●m risen again: She thought to converse with him in that familiar manner, as she did, while he was on earth, when she poured ointment upon his head; though he were the same person, yet his condition was changed; he was before in the state of abasement, now in a state of glorification; and that she must not touch him carnally, 
Aretius' ad loc.  nor any longer expect his bodily presence upon earth, but follow him in her heart and affections to Heaven, but touch him by the hand of faith, when he was ascended to his Father, as Austin saith, Mitte fidem in coelum, & tetigisti, Send up thy faith to Heaven, and then thou touchest Christ.  

Calv. ad loc.  3. Others say, it was not an absolute peremptory prohibition of touching him at all, but only of immoderate embracing, for both she and other holy women afterwards took him, and held him by the feet, Mat. 28.9. Oh how glorious are the feet of the Lord of the Gospel?  
4. Cardinal Bellarmine 
Bellarm.  hath a conceit, that perhaps may be sound enough, that it was not a perpetual prohibition, but only to be in forc● for the present time, which he conjectureth from the reason, for I am not yet ascended, or ascending; I am not yet leaving you, but have yet many days wherein I am to be conversant with you, during which you shall have time and leisure enough to touch me, and therefore forbear now at this time, and do that first which is most needful, Go to my brethren, and tell them that I am risen, and that I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.  
1. The meditation on the Resurrection of Christ, may teach us that Christ arose as a public person, and therefore all the faithful shall rise again; the Resurrection of Christ is a certain pledge of their resurrection; as in the first fruits all the rest were sanctified, so by Christ all the harvest of the faithful is consecrated to a joyful resurrection, 1 Cor. 15.20. Hence Christ is said to be the first begotten from the dead, because he is the cause of the resurrection of all the faithful, Joh. 11.25. Col: 1.18.  
That God by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, doth testify to all the children of God, that the guilt of their sins is taken away; for if there had been any sin that Christ had not satisfied for, he should have lain in the grave to this day, 1 Cor. 15.17.  
3. That the virtue and power of our Regeneration in this life, cometh from the power and virtue of Christ's Resurrection, Eph. 4.8, 10. This confuteth the Socinians, that hold Christ's Resurrection only exemplary, and the Pelagians that say we have power to raise ourselves, therefore every one of us should labour to know the virtue of his Resurrection, by an experimental and practical knowledge, according to that of the Apostle, Phil. 3.8, 10. and because we cannot have this knowledge of ourselves, let us pray to the Lord to give it us, Eph. 1.19.  
1. Let us labour to know the power of God in raising up Christ from the dead, our faith and hope is grounded upon the power of God, 1 Pet. 1.21. that raised him from the dead, that therefore he will bestow all good things upon us: And here we must consider the will of God, for his power is effectual when it is according to his will, Joh. 6.39, 40. God hath promised to be our God, and to bestow all good upon us; thus considering of the power of God, as it is an effectual and working power joined with his will, it is a means whereby our faith and hope cometh to be in God.  
2. Let us meditate on the goodness of God in raising Christ from the dead; we call him our Father, and Almighty Father, for otherwise if we consider the power of God without his goodness, it will make us to fly from him, rather than to trust in him; this goodness of God is manifest in that God raised him up, and gave him glory, and all for us, and our glory.   

Sect. 8. Of meditation on Death.  
The next subject of our meditations is is Death: 
The eighth subject of meditation is death.  Life and Death are common accidents to all living creatures saith Aristotle, God made not death, but death crept and entered into world through the envy of Satan, and man's disobedience: If God had made death, he would not with tears have bewailed dead Lazarus, whom therefore he restored to life, that the Devil might see, it is but lost labour, with rage to pursue the children of God to take them out of the world, forasmuch as those whom men may deem utterly lost and destroyed do live unto God.  
The meditation of Death belongeth to all sorts of persons, seeing it is appointed to all men once to die, and that by reason of sin, Rom. 6.23.  
Obj. The Pelagians say, That Adam should, and must have died, though he had not sinned, even by the necessity of nature, and by the condition of his creation, being made of corruptible, or mutable matter, and with a mortal body.  
Resp. I answer, That as some things are mutable, which nevertheless shall never be changed, as the good Angels might have fallen (as the evil did) before they were confirmed, so there may be something mortal, which ye for all that need not die; for as the 
* Mortal duplicitèr vocatur; viz. vel quod naturae necessitate mori oportet, vel quod peccati merito mori potest. Quod quicunque dixerit, Adam primum hominem, mortalem factum, ita ut si●è peccaret, sive nòn peccaret, moreretur in corpore, hoc est, de corpore exiret, non peccati merito ed neessitate naturae, Anathema sit, Concil. Melevit. cap. 1.  Learned have observed, A thing may be called mortal two ways, either that which must die by the necessity of nature, or that which may die by the desert of sin.  
For the first, Adam's body was not so mortal, that it must have died by condition of his creation, for he was created to live, and not to die, being made in the Image of God, whereof immortality is a part; and therefore it was directly concluded by one of the Councils, that whosoever should say, that Adam the first man was made mortal, so that he should have died corporally, whether he had sinned, or not sinned, that is, that he should have gone out of the body, not by the desert of sin, but by the necessity of nature, let him be accursed; and God doth not make it the cause that Adam should die, because his body was made of the dust of the earth, as the Pelagians falsely collect from, Gen. 3.19. but becauss he had disobeyed the voice of God, harkening to the voice of his seducing wife, 
Vid. Polan. Syntagm.  Satan's Instrument to tempt him, and so took and eat the forbidden fruit, as appeareth vers. 17. therefore he should die; and that which cometh afterward, doth not declare the cause why he should die, but only let him understand, 
Lumb. Sent. lib. 2. Distinct. 9  that there was no impediment but that he might die; and that his body which was before only mortale, of that nature that it might die, he now by sin had made morti obnoxium, subject and liable to death; thus Paul tells us plainly, that sin brought in death as the wages thereof.  

Object.  It may be demanded, seeing Jesus Christ hath abolished death, and that by him we are reconciled to God to obtain eternal life, how is it then that we are subject to death?  

Resp.  St. Austin answereth, that heretofore death came and was by sin brought into the world; but now death takes away our temporal life, to the end we should cease from sin, and that the meditation of our death doth keep us in our duty, and so by God's mercy the punishment of sin is become a shield against our sins. chrysostom censureth those wretches, who fear death, and fear not sin wherein they are ensnared, nor the unquenchable fire which gapeth for them; to fear death is an evil more dreadful than death itself: 
Stella de contempt mundi.  A wise man's life is the meditation of death, saith Stella: Good reason it is that we should betimes meditate on death, and think upon the freedom, liberty, life and immortality which ensue; he giveth death a joyful welcome, who is before hand prepared for it: Shall any man think that death doth not approach because he thinketh not of it, or shall he think it draws nearer because he meditateth upon it; 
Gerrard Meditat. 43.  Whether thou thinkest upon it or no, saith one, it hangeth always over thy head, life was lent unto thee, not given thee as a freehold. Verily, the meditation of death is not irksome, nor ought we to defer it from one year to another, but on the contrary, to think that nothing doth so much safeguard us in the midst of adversities and dangers as the meditation of death; it is that which makes us sober in prosperity, and ready prepared for all events; death would be vanquished as soon as it should come, if it were well thought on before it cometh; and indeed he is unworthy of comfort in his death, who in his whole life is forgetful of death.  
Guericus hearing those words out of Gen. 5. read in the Church, And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years, 
Drexel. considerate. de aeternit.  and he died; and all the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years and he died; and all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty and nine years, and he died, etc. Hearing, I say, these words read, the very thoughts of death wrought so strongly upon him, that he gave up himself wholly to a devout life, that he might die the death of the righteous, and attain to eternal life: I have read a story of one that gave a costly Ring to a young gallant with a death's head in it, upon this condition, that for some weeks he should spend one hour every day in looking and meditating upon it; he took the Ring in wantonness, but performed the condition with diligence; but it pleased God, after a frequent view and meditation thereof, it wrought a notable change upon him, so that he became an excellent Christian; well were it, if men of all ranks would frequently meditate on death; and then by the grace of God they would find a great change upon their lives; 
Nil sic revocat a peccato, quam frequens mortis meditatio, August. Nebrissens. Dec. 2. lib. 3. cap. 1.  there is nothing doth so effectually call a man back from sin as the frequent meditation of death. Lewes the eleventh King of France did on his deathbed restore two Counties to the heirs of John King of Arragon, to which before in his life time he would never condescend. 
Cùm igitùr mortem nòn meditamur, molestior vitae finis expectandus nobis est. Diogenes in Epist. ad Monemum.  Death is the clock by which we set our life in an order, and the memory thereof doth restrain our immoderate love to worldly things; did we frequently meditate on death, we should find a bitterness in those things which now seem sweet unto us; the meditation hereof cleanseth the heart, as a strainer cleanseth all the liquor that is poured into it: A man is never more heavenly minded, then when he meditateth on his own frailty, 
Sicut cibis omnibus panis utilior est & magis necessarius, ita praestat omnibus operibus mortis cogitatio. Climacus Grad. 6. de discreet.  and thinketh that he must shortly die. Let us herein take heed of the arrogance of the Stoics, and the vain confidence of the Epicures, who never think on death, but think they are in league with it, persuading themselves, it shall be easy for them to put by the blows of death; and let us have no part in their effeminency, 
Mons. Goulart. Viel.  who are affrighted at the very name of death, not thinking that in death itself there is so much evil, as in the solicitudes and fears with which many times in a day they kill themselves, without any ease to their unbelieving hearts. Such meditations of death are foolish and unprofitable, seeing as the Prophet tells us, There is no man living that shall not see death, and be able to save his life out of the hand of the grave, Psal. 89.90.   

Sect. 9 Of the fewness of them that shall be saved.  

The ninth subject of meditation, The small number of them that shall be saved.  In this Section, the subject of our meditation shall be the small number of them that shall be saved: Christ's flock in Scripture is called a little flock, Luke 12.32. the number of the Elect is but small, and by consequent, there are but few that shall be saved: Thus much one of the Fathers collecteth out of the destructions mentioned in the Old TeTestament, 
August. de verb. Domini in Mat. 13.  whereby they say signified the manner of the last judgement, which they make types thereof; thus at the general Deluge commonly called Noah's Flood, a very few escaped, and a small number were preserved, but eight persons, Gen. 6.18. At the destruction of Sodom there escaped fewer, but three only, viz. Lot, and his two Daughters, Gen. 19 and at the destruction of Jericho not many preserved, but only Rahab and her household, as was promised, Josh. 2. and performed Josh. 6. 
2 Esdras 8.1.  An Apocryphal Writer tells us, That the most High made this world for many, but the world to come but for a few: he illustrateth the point by a plain familiar similitude, saying, As the earth yields much matter for pots, but little for gold, so there be many created, but few that shall be saved; yea Christ himself affirmeth, That the gate is wide, and the way broad that leadeth unto life, and there be but few that find it, Matth. 7.13, 14. and St. Paul out of the Prophet Isaiah tells us, That though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand on the Sea, yet a remnant only shall be saved.  
A Learned man divideth the world 
Priorw.  into thirty parts, and he saith, bu● eleven parts only have the means of grace, the rest remain in darkness; or that have not had the Gospel purely preached unto them: now without faith there is no salvation, and without the Word preached, ordinarily not faith; and then how many Jews, how many Turks, Pagans, Infidels must needs perish? for as out of Noah's Ark there was no safety from the Flood, so out of the Church, no salvation, or escaping of eternal destruction, Act. 4.12. And  

Vide Aquin. Ainsw. & Moller. in Psal. 14.1.  1. Among those that profess themselves to be Christians, how many secret Atheists be there, who perhaps are afraid or ashamed to say it with their tongues, yet never blush to say it in their hearts, yea to proclaim it by their lives, that they believe there is no God; for, if they confess his Essence, at least they deny his providence, thinking that he never provideth Heaven for the godly, nor Hell for the ungodly; all which persons be of the fraternity of fools.  
2. How many Hypocrites be there, who be like Nebuchadnezzar's image, Dan. 2.22, 23. whose head was of gold, the breast and arms of silver, the belly and thighs of brass, the legs of iron, but the feet partly of iron, and partly of clay; a fit emblem of the retrograde courses of some seeming good Christians, whom the longer a man is acquainted with, the worse he will like them; for many times they have holy words and hollow hearts, not caring to be good, but only to be thought so.  
3. All such persons as turn piety into policy, make profession of Religion only for preferment, and other by-respects; howsoever they be in the Church, yet they be not of the Church, Joh. 2.19. Now if all these and their like be cut off from the account, we shall see that Christ's flock is but a little flock, and that there are but few that shall be saved.  
But it may be said, 
Object.  that our Saviour saith, Mat. 8.11. Many shall come from the East, and the West, and from the North, and from the South, and shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of Heaven; and we read likewise, Rev. 7.4. that there were twelve thousand sealed out of each tribe of Israel, except the tribe of Dan, all which put together make an hundred forty four thousand, besides those numberless numbers that come out of other Nations in long white robes, in token of their innocence's, and palms in their hands, the ensigns of victory over worldly vanities; and Christ is said to be the firstborn among many brethren, Rom. 8.29. how then doth it hold, that Christ's flock is but a little flock, and there are but few that shall be saved?  

Resp.  1. You are to know, that all things in the Scriptures are not spoken, or to be taken simply, but sometime by way of comparison: as for example, when jacob is brought before King Pharaoh, and questioned by him about his age, he told him, that his days had been but few and evil, which must be understood in comparison of his ancestors, for otherwise an hundred and thirty years had been a fair age, Gen. 47.9. so Christ's flock is but little in comparison of the Devil's drove, and there are but few that shall be saved, in comparison of the multitude that shall be damned. Thus Austin expounds the words of our Saviour on Mat. 13. 
Multi salvabuntur, & pauci, multi simplicitèr, pauci comparatiuè, pauci comparatione periturorum, multi in societate Angelorum. Aug. Serm. 32. de verb. Domini.  Many shall be saved, yet but few; many simply, few comparatively; few in comparison of those that perish; there are many in the society of Angels: the distinction may be made plain by this similitude; If a man should suddenly see a thousand or two thousand armed men in the field, he would surely think them a great Army, but if (but turning his head) he should see ten thousand or twenty thousand in another company, he would alter his opinion, and think the first company but small, even an handful only in comparison of the latter: the Prophet complaineth of the number of God's elect, to be like the summer fruit, and as the grape glean of the vintage, Mic. 7.1.  
2. They are many in relation to Christ their Head; for he is a King, and a King is not attended with a few; he is a Saviour, and his blood was shed for many, Mat. 26.28. By his obedience he hath justified many, Rom. 5.19. God the Father is also Master of a great Family, as the Devil who is the God of this world hath many vassals, so God hath many Sons and Daughters that must be brought to glory, Heb. 2. ●0 they are a numberless number that are to follow the Lamb wheresoever he goes, Rev. 14.1. In this respect the Elect are many; yet (as I said before) compared with the multitude that shall perish, they are but a very small number.  
1. Here we may meditate on the folly of the Papists, in making universality a note of their Church, the consent of the multitude, a note of true Religion; whereas Christ himself tells us, His flock is but a little flock: all Abab's false Prohets are against Michajah, all Zedekiah's Courtiers against Jeremy, all Darius his Nobles against Daniel, all the Scribes and Pharisees against Christ and his Apostles; all the Arrians against Athanasius: In a word, if number and multitude might carry it, neither the Papists, nor the Protestants would have 〈◊〉 Church, but the Turks would take it from us both.  
2. The meditation on the small number of them that shall be saved, will make us take heed of following the multitude, and doing as the most do, lest we go to the Devil for company; as it is reported of a King of Friezeland, that being like King Agrippa, almost persuaded to be a Christian, 
Gualther. in Luk. 13.  and demanding of the Bishop that was to have baptised him, what he thought was become of all his Ancestors, that died unbaptised, and unconverted to the faith; who answering modestly, That it was not meet for them to dive into the secret counsel of God▪ who might save some of them extraordinarily, but for any thing that was revealed in the word, he could not see but they must be damned; but that He was infinitely bound to God in reserving him till that time, making known to him the means of salvation, which was hid from them; whereupon my Author saith, he plucked back his foot in a rage, saying▪ That he would also follow them, and go to Hell likewise for company: The meditation on the small number that shall be saved, should make us strive to be of that small remnant.  

Greg. Nazianz. ad Arian. & de seipso. Orat. 24.  Nazianzen speaking of his own time, saith, Where are they now that upbraid us with our poverty, and boast so much of their own wealth, who define a Church by multitude, and contemn a small sheepfold? that is not always the safest way to go where many go: Esteem not of their number saith Austin, 
Aug. in Psal. 39  I grant they are many, who is able to number them? few they are that go the straight way; bring me hither the scales, begin to weigh, see what a deal of chaff is hoist up in one scale against a few balney corns in the other: And chrysostom saith, What profit or advantage is it, to be rather a great deal of chaff, than a few precious stones? Thus the Fathers: and yet saith Bellarmine 
Bellarm. de Eccles. milit. l. 4. c. 7.  One note of the Church is multitude of believers.   

Sect. 10. Of meditation on Hell.  
Let us now draw forth our meditations on Hell, 
Hell the tenth subject of meditation.  and first let us consider the names of the place prepared for the damned: It is called Tophet, Isa. 30.33. whence Jerome saith, the Latin word Gehenna cometh, sometime it is called Utter darkness, Matth. 22.13. sometime it is called Infernus, a place beneath, a place most opposite and furthest remote from Heaven, 
Nunquàm erit homini pejus in morte, quam ubi erit mors sine morte.  to signify the most desperate and dejected estate of the damned, who shall be even trod upon and trampled under the feet of the godly, Malac. 4.3. Thus they that now would put their hands under their feet, because there is yet hope they may do them good, shall then be so far from pitying, as they shall praise God for plaguing and punishing them; it's called also a burning lake, the second Death or Hell.  
2. Consider we the sorts of the punishments of the damned.  
1. They shall be tormented with the worm of conscience, the never dying worm: this worm that shall gnaw the wicked in hell, is nothing else but the guilt of an evil conscience, thoroughly awakened in hell; called a Worm, because as worms proceed from putrefaction, and do torment by biting and gnawing; so this worm proceedeth from the putrefaction of sin, afflicteth by gnawing and tormenting the sinner for ever: Though the consciences of wicked men are sometime asleep in this life; and though they commit many notorious sins, and they have a dull and sleepy conscience, and having no sense of what they do; and though sometime they put out the eye of conscience, and cannot discern between moral good and evil; and though they have a secure conscience which thinks not of any penal evil, and so they seldom think of Hell torments; and though sometime they put a muzzle upon conscience, and labour to stop its mouth; and though sometime their consciences are cauterised, and become altogether senseless, yet when they come to die, but especially when they go into Hell, their consciences shall be perfectly awakened and that for ever; then wicked men will even gnash their teeth, because conscience did no sooner use its teeth, they will then gnaw their tongues for sorrow, because conscience had no tongue to speak, nor they no ears to hear what it spoke till it was too late: Conscience hath a reflecting power, and when sinners come into hell, all the evils that ever they have done shall come fresh to their remembrance; as the glorious Saints do remember all the good that ever they have done here, for their comfort; so the wicked in hell shall remember all the evil that ever they have done for the aggravation of their misery; they shall then call to mind all the evil they have done, and all the good they have left undone, the means of grace that hath been offered them, and they have slighted, the thoughts whereof shall sting them for ever.  
2. They shall be tormented with fire: where we may note,  
1. The universality of it, every part must go into it, and be tormented in that infernal fire; we see many here pained many ways; one cries out of his head; another of his teeth; another hath a pain in his bladder; another in his stomach; another in his belly; and these pains pinch so for a time, as many had rather die than long endure them: now if the stone or gout taking and holding us but in some one member, be thus terrible to us, what would it be to feel them altogether? surely not so much as a flea-bites compared with the torments the wicked endure in Hell; for they feel intolerable pain in all their senses, both outward and inward, in all the powers and faculties of their souls, in all the parts and members of their bodies: wanton eyes shall then be affrighted with fearful shapes of ugly Devils; 
A certain Ruffian oft assaulted a chaste Lady to satisfy his lust, with many protestations that she was the only creature whom he loved so well, as for her sake he would undertake any task, though never so tedious: and being earnest with her to try him, she bade him, but one hour hold one of his hands in the flame of the candle, that was burning before her: hearing his doom, he discontentedly replied, that the request was unreasonable; is it so said she an unreasonable suit that you for my sake should endure but an hours pain, and hazard but one limb, and is it not more unreasonable, that I for your sake should hazard the final loss of my soul and body to be tormented in Hell fire for ever.  delicate ears with the hideous noise of damned ghosts; the curious taste afflicted with hunger that never shall be staunched, and thirst that never shall be quenched; the nice smell with the noisome savour of fire and brimstone; and all the senses shall feel the fury of an angry God.  
2. The extremity of it, it shall be in fire: such is the heat of our elementary fire, made for our use and comfort, as a man would hardly be ●ired to hold one hand in it an hour, ●o gain a Kingdom; how then shall ●he wicked be able to endure their whole bodies in that fire, which is much hotter, and created only for ●orment?  
3. It's everlasting fire: if a man were laid upon our fire, it would in ●hort time consume his body to ashes, ●nd put an end to his misery; but men's bodies shall then be immortal, ●o that they shall ever be burning, ●ut never consumed; yea when they have been there as many thousand years, as they have been days or hours upon the earth, they be never the nearer the end of their pain; and ●o straight is the allowance of that place, as nothing shall there be obtained, as might give them the least hope of ease or refreshment: the rich glutton whose ●ody hath been finely clad, delicately ●ed, and softly lodged, is now in a scorching surnace of fire; that ●ongue of his that was wont to be de●ied no sauce, to make his meat relish, and go down merrily, 
Dives in inferno cogente inopia, usque ad minima petenda perductus est, qui sua tenacitate ad minima neganda pauperibus restrictus est. Gloss. in job 27. Ibi dolor permanet, ut affligat, & natura perdurat, ut sentiat, quia utrumque non deficit, nec poena de ficiet. Aug. Et sic morientur damnati, ut sempèr vivant, & sic vivent, ut sempèr moriantur. Bern. meditat. c. 19  cannot now come by one drop of water to cool itself; what less thing could he have desired, yet this little he is denied? There saith Austin, doth pain remain, that it might always torment and there doth nature endure, that i● might ever feel the pain; and because neither of these be wanting, therefore the punishment can never have a ceasing so shall the damned die, that they may always live, and so live, that they may be always dying: then those whose iniquities could not b● consumed with the vehement flame● of God's burning love, shall be fo● ever frying in the everlasting burn: and the hearts of those tha● would not be mollified with the refreshing dews of God's blessings o● earth, shall be hardened to endure the vengeance of eternal fire.  
Damascen tells us of a certain King who was desirous to breed up his So● in continual pleasures; for whic● purpose he caused him to be educated in a Palace, which seemed to b● consecrated to all kinds of pastimes all which nature and art could do 〈◊〉 delight the senses, was here enclosed, 
Suetonius reports of Tib. Cesar, that being sought to by an offender to hasten his punishment, he answered him, Nondum tecum in gratiam redii: so if one of the damned, after many thousand years burning in Hell should entreat for a speedy death, God would answer him in the same manner.  nothing was permitted to be presented before his eyes, that might any way displease him; in the end this happy creature was troubled at his golden cage, and delightful prison, and desired to leave it, and take a view of the world: Oh than what a horrible bondage will it be to be in a fiery lake, in an ugly, stinking and loathsome pit of darkness, where he shall have Devils tormenting him for ever.  
4. Meditate on the contrariety of those torments in respect of their qualities: there is a perpetual flaming fire, and yet an horrid mist of darkness; heat continually boiling; and yet cold continually congealing, the fire always burning, yet no light appearing: thus saith Gregory, Hell torments in the destruction of the wicked do disagree from their natures, because while the wicked lived upon earth, they disagreed from the will of their Creator.  
The serious meditation of Hell is of singular use to us: chrysostom saith, that nothing is more profitable for people, than that Ministers preach often, and people meditate much on Hell fire, and that the surest way to be freed from Hell, is to meditate much upon the torments of Hell: and saith he to his people offended thereat; If you be troubled at the hearing of the torments of Hell fire, how would you be able to feel the torments of it: and he addeth; Whether I preach of it, or you think of it or not, the fire burneth, and to think often of it is a sovereign remedy for the soul: and let me add; You that will not now meditate on Hell fire, a time shall come that you shall have nothing else to do but to think of it; you that will not now think of Hell to prevent it; a time shall come that you shall have such thoughts as these; Once I had a day of grace; God gave me space for repentance, but now there is none; once this misery might have been prevented, but now neither ease nor end of this misery is to be expected; then wilt thou cry out against thy sin that brought thee to this place of torment; then wilt thou see the wickedness of depraved nature; the deceitfulness of thy lusts; and that all the world's enticements have been mere enchantments. To think seriously and frequently of Hell here, 
Kempis de imitat. Christi.  preserveth a man from falling into Hell; have a care to repent while yet there is time for pardon; what else shall the fire devour but thy sins; the more thou heapest up sins, the more matter thou layest up for the fire.   

Sect. 11. Of meditation on the glory of Heaven.  
The last subject of our meditations here, shall be the glory of Heaven: 
The last subject of Meditation, the glory of Heaven.  wonderful and unspeakable is that glory, such as all the Kings and Emperors in the world cannot give; they can leave their Kingdoms but to one of their sons, the rest must be put off with Dukedoms, and other dignities; as the children of Abraham by Keturah and his Concubines, must take their portions and be gone; Isaac only must be his heir, Gen. 25. but all God's children shall be heirs, and crowned Kings, Rev. 20.6. and inherit such a Kingdom as the world never saw nor dreamt of: it is sometimes called the Kingdom of Heaven, Mat. 8.11. sometimes a bosom, a place of rest and sweet refreshment, Luk. 16. sometimes Paradise, in allusion to the earthly Paradise, a place of all delights and pleasure, where our first Parents lived before their fall, Luk. 23.43.  
I dare not undertake to describe the joys of Heaven, but by circumstances we may guess something at the greatness thereof.  
1. Let us conceive of it by this world which we see, and wherein we live; which is enlightened from the Sun, Moon and Stars; covered with the fair Canopy of the Heavens; environed with the Sea; interlaced with many winding Rivers; replenished with variety and plenty of Cattles, Fowls and Fish, for the use and service of man; and why was this world built, but to be a resting place for man, to stay in for a short time: if then God hath given us such a cottage to be Termers in, what shall we think of our eternal Mansions, where we must abide for ever? yea if God hath afforded such entertainment to his enemies here, what may we think he lays up for them that love him?  
Some conjecture at the joys of Heaven, by comparing the three places of man's abode together, scil. his mother's womb; this world, and the Kingdom of Heaven: and they affirm, that the third, viz. the Kingdom of Heaven, as far excelleth this world in largeness, beauty, and all manner of delights, as the whole world doth the womb of one woman; yea as much, and more than the mightiest and wisest man on earth, doth exceed a poor Infant or Embryo in the mother's womb, in strength, beauty, wit, understanding, etc. doth the least and meanest Saint in Heaven, exceed the wisest and mightiest man on earth: yea less comparison is there between the nine month's abode of a child in his mother's womb, and the oldest man's life on earth, than between the age of Methuselah, who lived nine hundred sixty nine years, and the time of our abode in Heaven; or between the thing that is finite, ●nd that which is infinite, there is no proportion.  
When Ahasuerus that reigned in Asia over an hundred twenty seven Provinces, even from India to Aethiopia, was disposed to make a Feast to all the Princes of his Kingdoms, Esth. 1. no doubt but it was a royal Feast, and most bountiful Banquet; but yet surely but a scambling, if we compare it with that Feast which the Lord of Hosts will make in his holy Mountain, it must needs far surpass the Feast of Ahasuerus in all things.  
1. For continuance of time: that was to last an hundred and eighty days, and then to have an end; but this more than an hundred and fourscore thousand years, even for ever and ever without end.  
2. For the servitors: Ahasuerus Feast was to be served in by men, who might mistake and misplace something, or commit some oversights; but this is to be served by the Angels, who know how to do all things in the best fashion: yea to let the guests see how wonderful welcome they shall be, the Son of man himself, though he be maker and Master of the Feast, yet will gir● himself, and serve, Luk. 12.37.  
3. For the company at Ahasuerus Feast: though it were great; yet a great part of it was not very good; but here shall be none but God and good company, viz. Angels and Saints.  
4. For the provision, it far exceedeth: for that was but what some few parts of the world, whereof he had the command, might afford; but this shall be to open the treasures, and show forth the goodness and greatness of the Almighty, who is King of Kings, and Lord of Lords; yea whose riches and revenues more exceed those of Ahasuerus, than his did the poorest man's living. 
Aug. Soliloq. c. 35, 36. Aug. Mannal. c. 7, 8. Bern. Medit. c. 4.  Many are the things that the Ancients have written in commendation of this heavenly inheritance: the Scripture compares it to a City most absolute, wherein is wanting neither beauty of building, nor order of government, nor plentiful provision of all things. In a word, we must admire it in silence, for it cannot be expressed by humane or Angelical eloquence: the joys of it are so great, that they cannot enter into the possessors; therefore they must enter into them. Mat. 25.21. Christ will say to all his friends, enter into your Master's joy, enter friends, and take your comfort; enter servants, and take your wages; enter children, and take your patrimony; enter brethren, and take your portion; enter all ye that seek the Kingdom of Heaven, and take your Crown: The poor, saith one, 
Jo. Wall. Serm. in Mat. 25.21.  is not shut out for want of money; the rich is not turned back for the abundance of his comforts; the weak is not thrust out for want of strength; nor the mighty refused for the danger of their Forces, but every one that hath right to it, taketh possession of it.  
And though there be degrees of glory in Heaven, Mat. 18.28. Dan. 12.3. yet is it true what Austin tells us, that they that have least shall have no want, to make them grudge or murmur against them that have more than themselves; and they that have much shall have nothing too much, to move them to scorn or contemn those that have less than themselves: for even as divers vessels of divers sizes being cast into the Sea, though all be full of water, yet all cannot hold and contain the like quantity and measure of water; so it may seem that those persons that hold most grace on earth, shall have likewise most glory in Heaven: but there shall be no complaining occasioned through want, nor any contempt by reason of abundance; for that inheritance being infinite like God himself the giver, is tanta omnibus, quanta singulis, not lessened or diminished by the number of heirs; therefore we may conclude with David, In thy presence is fullness of joy, and at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore, Psal. 16.11.  
Here our knowledge is mixed with darkness; we see God but in Aenigmaes; the very species that discover him, conceal him; these glasses are too scant fully to represent his greatness to us, and our spirits are too weak to bear the splendour of his glorious Majesty; but in Heaven the mind shall lose her darkness, and be fortified with a capacity to behold the King in his glory: O blessed sight to see God in his glory; to see God in us, and us in him, saith Bernard. 
O beata visio, videre Deum in seipso, videre Deum in nobis, & nos in ipso. Bern.   
There are three things in this world which oppose our happiness, and hinder us from knowing God perfectly.  
The first is his greatness which astonisheth us: therefore he is said to dwell in light to which no mortal can approach, and the darkness is said to cover him, and hid him from our sight.  
The second is his absence: for though he be in every place, yet when he pleaseth, he hideth his face, and withdraweth his presence from us.  
The third is our impotency, which cannot here abide a full manifestation of the glorious presence of God: but in Heaven all these hindrances shall be taken away from the blessed; God's Majesty is no longer terrible; his greatness which here is astonishing to us, shall then give being to our felicity; and the love of God having cast out all fear from our hearts, we shall then treat with our Sovereign as our beloved friend; we shall not then lament the absence of the chiefest good, but be possessed by him whom we possess; we shall be as full of God as our hearts can hold or desire.  
And as the knowledge, so also the love of the Saints to God in Heaven shall be complete: here our love to him is very slender; it is faint, because we possess not the highest good which we most ardently affect, and being separated from him, we are as well his Martyrs, as his lovers; Tùnc implebuntur vota: but then saith Bernard, shall our longing be satisfied, and our desires accomplished: here our love is divided, because self-love is not yet extinguished; and the more we indulge ourselves, the more we rob God of his due: we love not God so purely, as not to seek ourselves when we pretend to seek his glory: we are here more earnest with him for riches and honours, than for graces; but in Heaven our love shall be free from such imperfections: our love shall not then be blind, because we shall see him whom we love; and the splendour of God's glory that enlightens us, is a ray that shall dispel all the darkness of our understandings: our love to God in Heaven shall not languish, nor spend itself in its own long, because than we shall possess what we love, and being infinitely united to the fountain of happiness, we shall never be separated from him: our love then shall not be divided; for the souls of the blessed shall then be purified, when they shall quit their bodily prisons: the glory of the great King shall be the end of all their desires; yea in Heaven itself, the Saints shall not seek so much their own happiness, as God's glory: St Austin saith, that the knowledge and love of God, 
Tantum gaudebunt beati, quantùm amabunt, tantùm amabunt, quantum cognoscent Deum. Aug.  shall be the two grand employments of the Saints in Heaven: the blessed in Heaven shall so rejoice in God, as they shall love him, and so love him, as they shall know him: the good works which the godly did on earth, shall be banished from Heaven: there shall be no need of mercy, in estate where misery cannot approach: there shall be no need of visiting the sick; for sickness and death cannot annoy those that dwell in the Land of immortality: there shall be no burying of the dead in the Land of the living: no need shall be of Hospitals, because no pilgrims shall be there: there shall be no need of clothing any of Christ's members, who shall be all clothed with long white robes, dipped in the blood of the Lamb: there shall be no trouble about reconciling enemies, because peace shall eternally reign in Emanuel's Land.  
The miseries of this life, saith one, 
Senault. Treat. 8. Disc. 8.  compel men to build houses; to protect them from the injury of wind and weather; to make  to keep them from shame and cold; to till the earth for their ●●triment; but there shall be an end put t● all these employments, where God shall be all in all to all his people: they shall then fear nothing, where the possession of all good necessarily produceth the exclusion of all evil: we shall not then dread hunger and thirst, because we shall lodge in the house of a great Lord, where is plenty of all ●hings, where we may bathe our ●elves in the rivers of his innocent delights: neither heat nor cold shall annoy us, because the Sun of righteousness that warms us with the beams of his ardent love, shall also refresh us with his shadow: weariness shall not make us faint, because God shall be our everlasting strength: there shall be no labour that shall need repose; nor shall the night ever draw a curtain over the day: there shall be no traffic or commerce, because in God all things shall be possessed: there shall be none in servitude, because all the Subjects of this Kingdom are crowned Kings: If you ask me, saith Austin, what shall we do then in a place, whence pain and trouble are banished? I shall answer with the Prophet, Vacate & videte, quoniam ego Deus sum, Be still and se● that I am God: this meditation shall wholly take them up, and that fo● ever. This is that glory, saith tha● devout Father, which the Angels admire, which obscures the Sun; ye● which (could it appear to the souls of th● damned) would like the sweet tree in th● bitter waters, make even Hell it se●● seem a Paradise of pleasures.  
Now let us draw out our medit●tions on the Heavens: they are the most glorious part of the Creation, and their very pavement is more beautiful, than all the earth's glory: neither Art nor nature can produce, nor man can think of such things as they contain: if the under part of that pavement be more glorious than this lower house of the world, how glorious shall that house above be? if the visible Heavens do so affect us, what will the Heaven of Heavens do; and above all God himself, the glory of the Heavens? When God would stir up Abraham to obedience, he bids him lift up his eyes, 
Gen. 13.14, 15  and look from the place where he was, Eastward, Westward, Northward, and Southward, and see the Land which God would give him, and his seed: so say I to you that hear me this day, lift up your eyes, and behold the Heavens that God hath provided for your souls, for which God requireth you to leave your pleasures, profits, credit, goods, good name, or whatsoever else is dear unto you.  
Again, Wouldst thou be freed from the arrows of bitter tongues, meditate on Heaven, and look u● thither: if thou canst but once get thither, thou art safe, and shalt be secretly kept in a pavilion, from the strife of tongues.  
Wouldst thou fain be rich? art thou discontented with thy poor and mean estate? meditate on Heaven, there is riches enough for thee: be thou never so poor in the world, if rich in faith, 
Heb. 10.34.  thou art an heir to a Kingdom: your substance on earth is little and perishing, but in Heaven ye have a better and more enduring substance: you that are godly poor, that have scarce an house to put your heads in, that cry out for want of room on earth, meditate on Heaven, there is Rehoboth, room enough for you all: Thus Christ comforteth his Disciples, 
Joh. 14.2.  In my Father's house are many mansions: it was the place whence he came, and whither he was going before them, to take possession of it, and to prepare places for them there; therefore they might be contented to want his bodily presence on earth, and be a little straitened here below, they should have room enough in Heaven. Yea meditate on Heaven, and look up thither with an eye of faith, and thou mayst with Stephen, see Christ sitting there at the right hand of God; Christ thy Head, thy Husband, thy Advocate, thy friend, thy Saviour, there making intercession for thee to his Father, presenting his own merits continually before him. Let these meditations cheer thee up, and comfort thee against all distracting thoughts, and dark apprehensions, and refresh thee in the midst of all crosses and wants. It was a comfortable speech which the Emperor used to Galba in his minority, when he took him by the Chin, and said, Thou Galba shalt one day s●t upon a Throne: 
Tu Galba quandoque imperium degustabis.  and let this meditation cheer the Saints of God, how little soever they are in the world's eye, that one day they shall sit upon Thrones: though now they lie among the Pots, and like Job upon the dunghill, yet one day they shall be gathered with Princes, with the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords: therefore we should not think ourselves Citizens of the world, as the Heathen Philosophers did, but Burgesses of Heaven, as all the faithful have done, as Paul professeth, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, our City-like conversation is in Heav●n, Phil. 3.20. and then let us cry out, Quousque Domine, How long Lord, make haste, make no long tarrying? Lord thou hast been the strength and food of all that travel by the way, 
Cibus viatorum, salus beatorum. Fulgent  so be now the Crown and glory of all that are come to the end of their way.    

Chap. 9 Of timing our Meditations in the best manner.  
1. It is good to begin every year with holy meditations: men usually handsel the year with some new-years gifts; let us look higher, even to God: certainly this is our best new-year's gift, to give a heart to God, fraught with heavenly meditations. To this purpose, such meditations as these are useful; namely, to try one year by another; whether grace thrive or decay in us; to see according to our years, what progress we have made in the way to Heaven; if for every year of our life, we are passed a station of the wilderness of this world, to the heavenly Canaan; if as our outward man decays, our inner man be renewed day by day: it is of great advantage to Christians, to begin the year with such meditations; and better it is to fill our minds with these, than our bellies with dainty food: this work of meditation is a part of our yearly Rent to be paid to God: every new year we renew the lease of our lives again of God; and therefore pious meditations are a task answerable to such a time: the new man in the beginning of the new-year, is to meditate on his over year sins, and hearty bewail them, and repent of them; to meditate on the renewing his Covenant with God for new obedience; and according to the work of grace in him, to strengthen his communion with God.  
2. It is good also to begin every day with meditation: In the morning sow thy seed, Eccles. 11.6. 
Psal. 130.6.  David's meditations did prevent the morning watch; his soul was flying to Heaven before the Sun was up, or the morning got out of its bed: and saith he, Psal. 139.18. When I awake, I am still with thee: to which Ambrose 
Ambros. in Psal. 36. It is good to set our souls in order every morning, perfuming our spirits with some holy meditations. Dr Sibs.  alluding, saith, Let a devoted spirit prevent the morning, that it may be enlightened by Christ, before the earth be illuminated by the rising of the Sun. We bend our heart to God in the morning, when we lift our heart to God, and give him our first thoughts and affections; then shall he fill us with his mercies in the morning, that we may rejoice all the day long. 
Cicer. Tusc. quaest. l. 4.  Demosthenes was troubled, that a Smith should be at his Anvil, before himself could be at his Study; much more should it grieve us to be prevented by them.  
Season your minds in the morning with such meditations as these:  
1. Meditate on the great favour which God hath vouchsafed to thee the night past; and if thou hast not remembered God upon thy bed; nor thy reins instructed thee in the night season; and if God hath not been in all thy thoughts, think of humbling thyself before him, and crave his pardon.  
2. In the morning meditate thus with thyself: this day is given me to give all diligence, to make my calling and election sure; to obtain eternal life; to take a firm resolution to employ my whole life to that purpose; and to think seriously of the reckoning I must give to God.  
3. Meditate upon what affairs thou mayst meet with the day following, as helps or hindrances to thee in God's service: use the best means offered to promote thy service of God; and think how thou mayst carefully resist, and overcome whatever is contrary to God's glory, and thy salvation.  
4. Meditate how unable thou art to perform any pious resolutions, be they either to shun the evil, or do the thing that is good; and offer up thy heart in the morning, with all thy holy purposes, to the heavenly Majesty, praying him to take it and them into his gracious protection.  
5. Think with thyself every morning: this day for aught that I know, may be my last day; how ought I then so to spend this day, as though death were presently to arrest me. By these or the like morning meditations, all that shall be done the day after, may be bedewed with the blessing of Heaven.  
As in the morning you are to take a spiritual repast by meditation; so in the evening 'tis necessary to take a devout and spiritual collation. Isaac in my Text went out in the evening to meditate: One adviseth, that meditation be our key to open the morning, and our lock to close the evening withal. Get a little leisure after all your worldly employments, to call up your spirits to the consideration of some holy object, which thou mayst present to thyself simply, by an inward cast of thy thought, kindling the fire of meditation in thy heart, by a few holy inspirations and ejaculations to the Lord, either in repeating, what thou hast best relished in thy morning meditations, or by some other as thou best likest.  
Now such meditations as these in the evening, before our going to bed, may not be unprofitable.  
1. To meditate on God's great goodness, in preserving thee the day before, from many troops of dangers, that lay in ambuscado against thee.  
2. To meditate and examine thyself, how thou hast carried thyself in every part of the day; which to do the more easily, you are to consider with whom, and in what employments you have been busied.  
3. If a man hath done any good, to think of praising God for it; if any ill, in thought, word, or deed, to be humbled, and ask pardon for it, with a resolution carefully to amend it.  
4. So to end the day in holy duties, that by our morning exercise, we may open the windows of our souls to the Sun of righteousness, and going to take such rest as is necessary for us, we shut them up against the Prince of darkness.  
Meditation is also a good night companion. David would remember God upon his bed, and meditate on him in the night watches, Psal. 63.6. Mine eyes prevent the night watches, that I might meditate in thy Word, Psal. 119.148. The night, saith chrysostom, 
Chrysost. ad popul. Antioch. Hom. 42.  was not made to this purpose, that we should sleep all the time, and lie lolling on our beds; the manuary Trades, and Horsekeepers, and Merchants, can witness as much unto us▪ Rise thou at midnight as doth the Church; mark the motion of the Stars, the deep silence of all things then being, their rest they then enjoy, and admire the providence of God above; then is thy soul more pure, more light and subtle, more lofty and quick; the very darkness itself, and that great silence may induce thee to much contemplation: and saith he further; Look toward the City, and thou shalt hear no noise at all; cast thine eye on thine house, and all thy family shall seem as if they lay in their graves or sepulchers; all this may stir thee up to high and heavenly meditations: and saith the same Father elsewhere; 
Chrysost. in Gen. Hom. 30.  In the night no body is troublesome to us; then have we a great tranquillity of our thoughts, when our businesses are not troublesome, when there is none that can hinder us from having access to God, when our mind knitting itself together, is able diligently to mak● reference of all to the Physician of souls. I shall not prescribe which of these is the fittest time for meditation, but to me the morning seemeth to be the fittest; but no time comes amiss to a prepared heart.   

Chap. 10. An Exhortation to Meditation; showing also the necessity thereof.  
Let me now exhort you to set about, and to be frequent in this necessary duty of meditation: Be often retiring yourselves to God, and breathing after him: question him daily about thy salvation: give him thy heart: lift up thy soul to God: cast thine inward eyes on his mercies; give him thy hand as a little Child doth to his Father, that he may lead thee and guide thee: plant him in thy heart, that God may be in all thy thought: make many motions in thy soul after him: from every thing in the world, may be presented many pious meditations, and profitable discourses: unhappy are they that use ●he creatures in turning them to sin, and happy they that turn them to the meditation of God, and his goodness. This exercise of meditation is very necessary:  
1. Because much of the work of holy devotion consisteth in it: it is that which may stand in stead of many other things, but the lack of this can hardly be supplied by any other means; for without this, rest is but idleness, pain taking but vexation.  
2. Meditation is necessary to beat down the flesh, and to keep the sensual appetite in subjection to the Law of the Spirit. It is a great mischief, saith Austin, to enjoy those things we should but use, and but use those things we should enjoy; we should enjoy spiritual things, and but use corporal, which when the use is turned into enjoying, our reasonable soul is turned into a brutish and beastlike soul.  

Animae viaticum est meditatio. Bern.  3. Meditation is necessary to concoct the Word of God in our minds: There are some that feel some tenderness of spirit, that will weep at a Sermon, that one would think their hearts full of devotion; but when it comes to the trial, we find that as the sudden showers in the heat of Summer, falling in great drops enter not, but bring forth Toadstools or Mushromps; so these tears falling on a vicious heart, a heart not mollified by constant meditation, the Word works not upon it, but becomes unprofitable: meditation softens the heart, and fits it for any holy impression. This made David cry out, O Lord, how sweet are thy words unto my taste; they are sweeter than honey, and the honeycomb: and certainly the least comforts of the Word, wrought in the heart by holy meditation, are more worth than the most pleasing recreations in the world; they that have tasted of them, hold all other consolations to be but gall and wormwood in comparison of them. Oh that now I could persuade men to this necessary duty of meditation: withdraw yourselves from your worldly affairs at least once a day, for the exercise of meditation. O holy soul, saith Bernard, 
O sancta anima, fuge publicum, fuge domesticos, an nescis te verecundum habere sponsum, etc. Bern.  eat public places, and the company of those of thy household; knowest thou not that Jesus Christ thy Husband is bashful, and will not be familiar in company: Come my beloved, let us go forth into the field, there will I give thee my loves, Cant. 7.11.   

Chap. 11. Objections against setting about the practice of Meditation, answered.  
Object. 1 But here some will be ready to say, We are convinced that meditation is a necessary duty, but it is a duty strange to us, and that with which we are altogether unacquainted.  

Resp.  The light though fair and pleasant to the eyes, yet dimmest then, after one hath been long in the dark: before one cometh to be acquainted with the Inhabitants of any Country, they will seem strange at first, be they never so courteous; so upon the change of thy life, thou shalt find some inward alreration, and in this general adieu thou shalt give to the world, and to all thy sins and foolish toys, thou shalt have some touch of grief and discontent: but have but a little patience, it is but a little astonishment the novelty brings thee; pass that by, and thou shalt receive many comforts and cordial delights, so pleasing and contenting, that thou wilt esteem all other as nothing to them; he that hath throughly tasted of this heavenly Manna, cannot relish any worldly pleasures, nor set his affections upon them: the delights of holy meditation are the foretastes of those immortal delights, that God gives to the souls of those that seek him.  
Oh but saith the soul, this mountain Object. 2 of meditation is very high, and the work is difficult, how shall I be able to climb up this holy hill? I am weak and unable for so high an exercise.  
The work indeed seems harsh and difficult at first, 
Resp.  but when we are exercised therein, it will be familiar with us. The young Bees at first are called Nymphs, and live on the honey that is in their Hives; but when once their wings are grown out, they fly abroad, and gather honey for themselves, on the flowers of the field, and on the mountains. It is true, we are all Nymphs and worms in devotion at first, not able to ascend this hill of meditation; but when once we be form in our desires and resolutions, we then put fort●, and so may hope to become spiritual Bees, and then to fly higher and higher in our meditations; in the mean time to feed on the honey of God's Word, and of holy instructions, praying to God to give us the wings of a Dove, that we may swiftly and speedily fly unto him. The greatest difficulty is in the first beginning of this exercise of meditation, it being as one saith, 
Io. Downham's guide to godliness.  so harsh to corrupt nature, and so cross to carnal principles; but the constant practice of it will make it easy to us. He that goes to learn a language, finds it difficult at first, but the Nutshell being broken, they soon taste the sweetness of the kernel: Doctrinae radices amarae, fructus dulces: The roots of learning are bitter, but the fruits are sweet; so the thoughts of the benefit we shall receive by meditation, will take away the thoughts of tediousness.  
Object. 3 But I am dry and barren, and have no matter for meditation.  
This is no sufficient pretence ●gainst the practice of meditation. 
Resp.  Look but upon an earthly minded man, 
W. Strong. Serm. at Westminst. 1652.  saith one, and he will have matter enough to meditate upon in worldly things; strange than it is, that any man should object want of matter. Thou complainest of dryness and barrenness; look to the cause whence this evil cometh; we are oft the cause of our own dryness and barenness: when we neglect to gather the fruits of the love of God, then doth he take it from us, as from the Israelites, who not gathering their Manna in the morning, found it all melted when the Sun was up: and if thou art sensible of thy dryness, bewail it before God; acknowledge thine unworthiness and misery, saying, Alas, what am I! how am I left alone? I am nothing but a piece of dry ground, rend in every part, witness the drought I have of heavenly dew: In this case cry unto God, Blow upon my Garden, O thou gracious wind of refreshment, and take this dry wind from me; then shall my spices flow forth, and give out the odours of their sweetness. As God gives these heavenly dews, so sometime he takes them away, to the end to teach us to eat dry bread, and to be more firm in pious devotion, enured by the trial of distastes and temptations; and then we must patiently bear those drinesses, when God hath ordained them for our trial: but if we have constant recourse to God's storehouses, we shall soon find our hearts more fruitful in meditation; if we gape and pant for God, he shall come to us as the rain, as the latter and former rain to the earth, Hos. 6.3.  
Sometime this barrenness springs from indisposition of body: as when by much fasting, watching, and labour, a man is overcome with weakness, drowsiness, and other infirmities, which though they be incident to the body, yet fail not to hurt the spirit, by the straight bond that is between them: The remedy therein is, to fortify the body by lawful comforts and delights; and though one should be long afflicted with these drinesses and disheartenings, yet if we strive against our indispositions, God will in the end and in an instant, give us sweet refresh.  
Some will not go to meditation, except devotion bring them to it, saith Gerson; 
Gers de monte contemplate. part 3. c. 43.  and all seems unprofitable to them, except the duty affects them, and goes to their hearts: These kind of men, saith he, are like him that is stiff with cold, and will not go to the fire, except he were first warm; or like one that is ready to starve with hunger, and will not ask meat, except he be first filled; for why doth any man give himself to meditation, but that his heart may be more inflamed with the heat of God's love, or replenished with his gifts and graces. They are very much mistaken, who think the time lost in meditation, if they presently be not refreshed with a shower of devotion: and saith he, if they strive for this as much as in them lieth, doing their duty, and are in continual fight against their own thoughts, being displeased because they depart not, not suffering them to be quiet; such men are more accepted, than if the heat of devotion had come to them suddenly, without any such conflict: the reason is, because they go to warfare for God, as it were at their own cost and charges, and serve him with greater pains and labour.   

Chap. 12. Setting down the Rules about Meditation.  
The next thing I shall do, is to lay down some Rules concerning meditation.  
Rule 1 Before thou goest to meditate, see that thy nature be changed; that thou art renewed in the spirit of thy mind; it is only the good man that hath a good treasure in his heart; 
Mala mens, malus animus.  an evil mind cannot meditate well: before the heart be renewed, the judgement of man is wholly depraved about his last end, seeking happiness where it is not to be found; wickedness proceedeth from the wicked, according to the Proverb: were the apprehensions of sinners as large as Satan's, yet if they have not new wills and affections, they will busy the imagination, in devising satisfaction to themselves: the will is stirred up by the imagination; and as the will is ●ffected, so operates the imagination: now when God by his Spirit writes his Law upon our hearts, so that there is an holy compliance between our hearts and God's Law, than the heart hath a strong inclination to holy thoughts and meditations.  
Labour to have the love of God Rule 2 and holy things rooted in your hearts: Amantium mos est de amato sempèr loqui & meditari, saith Austin; The lover is ever speaking and thinking on the thing beloved: 
Psal. 119.97.  O how love I thy Law! it is my meditation all the day; our affections are our wings, and our will is our guide to conduct us to Heaven. You think perhaps, 
Iter tuum ad coelum voluatas tua, gradus tui, affectus tui: ambulas affectibus, nòn pedibus, accedis ad Deum amando, recedis negligendo; stans in terra in coelo es si diligas Deum. August.  saith Austin, you must build a Tower to ascend thither; that the Angels must be invited down to assist you; or that the wings of an Eagle must be borrowed to carry you thither: but your love is your Polestar; by your desires you scale those heavenly regions; by your negligence you stand at a distance from them; and loving God upon the earth, you may boast yourselves already in Heaven: for it is not with the soul as with the body; this cannot stir without changing of place, but that needs only change her affection, 
Sicut in aquis ignis durare nòn potest, ita nequè turpis cogitatio in cord Dei amante. Marcus Heremita.  and in a moment she ascends into the hill of the Lord, and stands in his holy place, and is where she would be; and we can never be better, than when we are with him in our meditations, whom nothing can equal in goodness; thither we go not walking, but loving; and God is so much the nearer to us, by how much our love is more pure and vigorous: then he brings in God speaking thus, I command you to love me, and I assure you, that in doing so, you shall enjoy me; sinners possess not all they love: there are some greedy worldlings that sigh for gold, and yet are poor: ambitious persons that are passionate for glory, and yet are despicable: but every one that loves me, finds me; I am with him that seeks for me; his love makes me present in his soul; as soon as he longs for me, I am in his embraces.  
Rule 3 Let not your hearts be overcharged with worldly cares; they are great hindrances to us in heavenly meditation. The Angels have care of our preservation, 
As in a race one Chariot hindereth another in the way stopping the path, even so earthly cogitations hinder heavenly when they have gotten the start. Macarius. Ita sarcina seculi veluti somno assoler, dulcitèr premebar, & cogitationes quibus meditabar in te, similes erant conatibus expergisci volentium, qui tamèn superati soporis altitudine remerguntur. August.  and endeavour it diligently, yet are they not perplexed about it, for their care proceeds from charity: carking cares about the things of the world, trouble a man's reason and judgement, so that he cannot meditate on God as he ought; the Wasps and Drones make more noise than the Bees, but make no honey, but wax only. I was overwhelmed with worldly cares, as with a deep sleep, saith Austin, and the meditations I lifted up to Heaven, were like the vain endeavours of men striving to awake, who beaten down with the weight of drowsiness, fall asleep again at the very instant they awake. It is impossible he should be heavenly minded, that dotes upon earth; or have any passionate long for Heaven, who is strongly wedded to the things of this world.  
Spend not too much of your time Rule 4 in recreations. It is necessary sometimes that we recreate both our bodies and spirits; as to walk abroad; to take the air; to entertain our company with some pleasant discourses; to ring; to play on some instrument; these are recreations so innocent, that to use them well, needs nothing but discretion, that gives to every thing its order, time, place, and measure: but here we must beware of excess; for if we employ too much time therein, it is no more a recreation, but an occupation, that neither recreates the body, nor the spirits, but rather dulls and distracts them: and above all take heed of setting your affections on any of them; for let our recreations be never so lawful, it is vicious to set our affections on any of them; to long after them; to study on them; or vex ourselves about them: there are some recreations indeed, that as they are commonly used, tend to much evil; there is (as Physicians say of Mushromps) a quality of poison in them, though never so well cooked; they are spongious, and full of pores, and easily draw any infection to them, and if Serpents be about them, they take poison from them: so such recreations are very dangerous; they divide the spirit from pious meditations; cool charity; and awaken in the soul many sorts of ill cogitations. Therefore when you are in the use of any recreations, labour to wind up thy heart to Heaven; use some godly meditations; think how thy time passeth away, and death draws on; see how it calleth thee to his dance, where the music shall be elegies and lamentations; that thou shalt make but one step from life to death.  
When thou goest to meditate, fix Rule 5 not thy thoughts on many things at once: 
Cogitatio vaga incessa semper hùc & illùe divertit. Hugo in lib. de Area mysticâ.  variety of thoughts are like many men in a crowd or throng, where all are stopped, and none can get out: variety of meats, if the stomach be good, do always offend it; if weak, it overthrows it: fill not thy soul with the thoughts of many things at once, for these will trouble and distract thee: a soul that feels itself much purged from evil humours, hath a great appetite after spiritual things, and as half famished, the thoughts run upon many exercises of piety at once; and this is a good sign to have so good an appetite; but thou must look how thou canst digestall that thou desirest to eat; take every thing therefore in order, and feed on them moderately, that thou mayst digest them, and not be cloyed with them.  
Rule 6 Let examination and meditation go hand in hand together: without examination meditation will be ineffectual; as for instance, when thou hast been meditating of the graces of God's Spirit, examine whether those graces are seated in thy heart: meditate on the beauty of heavenly graces: make comparison between graces and vices, in themselves contrary: what sweetness in meekness in regard of revenge; in humility in regard of pride; in charity in regard of envy; and all the graces have this to be admired in them, that they affect the soul with incomparable delight and comfort, after they are practised; whereas the vices leave us distracted and ill entreated: and as for vices they that enjoy them in part, are never content, and they that have them in abundance, are much discontented; but as for graces, they that have the smallest measures of them, yet have they content, and so more and more as they do increase.  
When thou meditatest on sin, examine how stands thy heart affected towards sin: hast thou a resolution in the strength of Christ, never to commit any sin? hast thou any inclination to small sins, or any affection to any of them?  
When thou meditatest on God's Commandments, examine thy heart: doth it find them to be good, sweet, and amiable, and agreeable? as he that hath an exquisite taste, and good stomach, loveth good food, and refuseth the bad.  
Examine how thy heart stands affected to spiritual exercises: dost thou love them, or are they tedious to thee? do they distaste thee? to which of them dost thou find thyself more or less inclined? to hear God's Word, or to discourse about it; to pray; to meditate; to fly up to Heaven, etc. and what in all these is thy heart against? and if thou find any of these, to which thou art not inclined, examine whence this distaste ariseth, and what is the cause thereof.  
Examine what is thy heart toward God himself: is it a delight to thee to think on him? dost thou feel a particular taste of his love? dost thou delight in meditating on his power, his goodness and mercy? if the thoughts of God do come into thy mind in the midst of business, and worldly employments, when it cometh, dost thou give place thereto? doth it settle in thy heart? dost thou perceive thy heart to lean that way, and in some measure to prefer it before any other thing? dost thou love to speak to God, and of God? is his honour and glory dearer to thee than all other things? dost thou love his children, and the glory and beauty of his worship and Ordinances? for want of this examination, meditation doth often come to nothing.  
Rule 7 Both begin and end this exercise of meditation with prayer: Meditation without reading is erroneous; without prayer unfruitful, saith Bernard. 
Meditatio sine lectione erronea, sine oratione infructuosa. Bern.  Let prayer go before it: go to God, and beg of him to inspire thee with holy meditations; it is God that with his own hand puts them into our mouths, 
Noah is commanded to make a window in the top of the Ark, and a door in the side of it, a window is for the eye to look out at, a door is for the whole body to go out; and he that will ever be a good Christian, must not only make a window for contemplation, as Daniel did, at which he prayed thrice a day, but a door for action, as Abraham did, at which he sat once a day: at the window of meditation he must contemplate with a good heart, at the door of action, he must go out to bring forth fruit with patience. Matt. Stiles.  for of ourselves we are not sufficient for one good thought: prayer of itself lifts up the soul to God, who is our only joy and comfort; as is the sight, so will the affection be; and as the affection is, so will the desire be. Pray at the end of your meditations, as David doth, Let the words of my mouth, and the meditations of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord my strength and my Redeemer, Psal. 19.14. Pray that God would keep these things for ever in the imagination of your thoughts, 1 Chron. 29.18.  
The last Rule is, that all our meditations must be reduced to practice: Thou shalt meditate in this Bo●k of the Law, that thou mayst observe to do according to all that is written therein, Josh. 1.8. the end of meditation is practice: I thought on my ways, and turned my feet unto thy testimonies, Psal. 119 59 In passing from our meditations, we must resolve carefully to put them in execution, without which meditation is not only unprofitable, but rather hurtful to us; for virtue's meditated on and not Rule 8 practised, are apt to puff up the spirit, in taking ourselves to be such as we resolved to be; therefore we must join practice to meditation. To conclude, as they that go into a goodly Garden, go not out without gathering of some Flowers to smell to long after; so our souls having by meditation fallen upon some pleasing points, must take two or three most fit for our furtherance in piety, to think on the rest of the day, and as it were spiritually to smell unto.  
Now as it is necessary that all these be settled in our hearts; so in withdrawing ourselves from our meditations; we must pass very gently to other affairs, for fear lest the liquor of our resolutions (the result of our meditations) do leak out, and not penetrate into all parts as it should, even into our hearts and souls; yet all must be done without violence, either of body or mind.  

Object.  But who is able to put his meditations into practice, the directions and exercises thereof being so many?  

Resp.  If one were to put them all in practice every day, he should do nothing else, it would take up his whole time; but that is not required, but as time and place shall serve, and as occasions shall offer themselves. Renew thy resolutions often, and say with David, I will meditate in thy precepts, and have respect unto thy ways, Psal. 119.15. I will for ever keep thy Word; and when thou failest herein, take in hand thy protestation, and offer it with thy whole heart to God. This free confessing of our desire to serve God, and to be wholly consecrated to him by a particular affection, is very pleasing to him.   

Chap. 13. Of the excellency and usefulness of Meditation.  
Having given you Rules about meditation, I shall in the next place show you the excellency and usefulness thereof.  
1. Meditation breeds knowledge, sc. the knowledge of God and his benefits, and our sin and unworthiness. As there is no moment, wherein man useth not God; so ought there to be no moment, wherein he hath him not present in his memory: 
Sicut nullum est momentum in quo homo nòn utatur Deo, sic nullum esse debet momentum, quo eum praesentem nòn habet in memoriâ. Hugo l. 3. de anima. Babingt. in Num. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Clem. Alex. Aug. de civ. Dei l. 21. c. 6. Aquin. in Joh 5.  this continual meditation on God and his mercies, is that blessed union of our spirits with God, which holy men so much regarded in their times: a man given to meditation, is a man that walketh not in darkness, nor in the shadow of death, as those do that seldom or never think of him. Clemens of Alexandria calls the meditations of holy men, Candles that never go out, like the Candle which was among the Pagans, in the Temple of Venu●, which was called inextinguishable, as Austin relateth: without this men are but snuffs in respect of their use and service, as Aquinas saith. Meditation doth not reveal any divine truth unto us, that only is the work of God; but after God hath revealed them, faith apprehends them: then meditation illustrates to the soul what faith believes, and so our knowledge is increased: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased. 
Fenner de meditat. Dan 12.4.  It is not saith one, the bodily removing of man from place to place, so much as the busy stirring of the mind from one truth to another by meditation, that increaseth spiritual knowledge.  
2. Meditation rectifies the affections of the soul: it opposeth serious considerations against vain imaginations; and because our imagination is apt to raise false objects, and thereby false conceits and discourses in us, therefore meditation propoundeth true objects for the mind to work upon, from the meditation whereof, the soul rightly conceives of things, and discourseth upon true grounds of them, meditating thus with himself; if things be thus and thus in reality, then must I live according to these principles: this is the spring of all holy affections in the soul, as the true love of God; the true joy and delight in him and his ways. Meditation is like the player on an Instrument, who by touching of the strings, finds them that are out of tune, winding them up, or letting them down; so after meditation hath examined the love, the hate, the fears, the hopes, the griefs, the joys of our souls, if it find them out of tune in expressing their harmony, which is the glory of God, it than puts them in tune again.  
3. Meditation fills the heart with joy: My meditation of him shall be sweet; I will be glad in the Lord, Psal. 104.34. When the Spirit of God doth open the eyes of the soul, and it is brought forth into the light, then doth meditation clear up to the soul those grounds of joy, which are exceeding comfortable. Holy meditation shows the soul the face of God reconciled; his pardon sealed; an entrance into the everlasting Kingdom; the heart of God opened toward him; and his name written in Heaven. 
Activa vira habet solicitum cursum, contemplativa gaudium sempiternum. Prosper. l. 1 de contempl. virâ.  Meditation clears up the promises to him, that he never saw before: he saw them before as by Candle-light, by common light and reason; but now he seethe them in another complexion. Meditation clears up their interest in God and his promises; and this is great matter of rejoicing. Meditation works in the soul a frame of heart, suitable to the Gospel; what is more suitable to the Gospel, than the joys of the holy Ghost? therefore when meditation works thoroughly upon the heart, it yields comforts suitable to the Gospel. It is good for Christians to meditate much in God's promises, which do convey much joy into the heart: then dost thou improve the promises, when thou dost so relish them, as to rejoice in them, according to that sweetness that is revealed and contained in them.  
4. 
Quae alii di● pariendo levia faciunt, sapiens levia facit diù cogitando. Charron. de sapient. Psal. 119.150, 151.  Holy meditation is a great support to the soul under afflictions: when trouble is near, it represents God as near, or nearer than any trouble can be: suppose it be trouble of spirit, that is very near indeed, for that is in the vitals, it is a soul-sickness; but meditation shows them: though Satan may draw near to them to devour them, yet God is nearer to them; a God nearer to save, than any michievous enemy to destroy. Meditation labours to affect the heart with the sense of God's continual presence with it: this is indeed our great weakness, and our great unthankfulness, that we are apt to muse more upon God's afflicting of us, than of God's perpetual presence with us: there is a savour in the ointments of the Lord Christ, sufficient to perfume any soul that comes near him.  
5. Frequent meditation on God, makes a man more holy, more like unto him; it sees so much beauty and goodness in him, that it makes a man cast away every unsavoury lust, and all those affections that have a strong sent of the flesh, that they may be made like to God in holiness. Those Flowers that grow in the Sun, are far more beautiful, and fragrant, and pleasant, than those that grow in the shade; but if we suffer our souls to be over-shadowed with carnal thoughts and affections, these dark bodies will interpose between God and us, and hinder the influences of his love upon us: If the Needle that is but touched with the Loadstone, stands Northward; then the soul that is touched with God, will stand Heaven-ward, and labour to be conformed more to him in holiness.  
6. Meditation is a great help to perseverance in well-doing: the serious and frequent meditation of this promise, 
Psal. 94.12, 14.  that the Lord will not cast off his people, nor forsake his inheritance, makes them to cleave fast unto him. This is the foundation of a people's blessedness, that God will not forsake them, when he doth most sharply correct them; that the same privilege that belongs to the whole Church, belongs to every member of it; for it is as possible for God to cast off his people, and his whole inheritance, as to cast off any one particular member of it: for, for God to cast off his people, were to disinherit himself; God would have his people to meditate hereof. Thus saith God to Jeremy, 
jer. 33.24, 25, 26.  Considerest thou not what this people have spoken, saying, the two families which the Lord hath chosen, he hath cast them off: but in the words following, see how God doth assert his unchangeable Covenant, against this false assertion: If my Covenant be not with day and night, and if I have not appointed the Ordinances of Heaven and earth, then will I cast away the seed of Jacob, etc. as if he had said, If ever you knew a day, that had not a night succeeding it, and a winter without a summer, and ever found the Laws of Heaven abrogated, then may you give way to your unbelief, and think that I will cast off my people; but if you see a perpetual interchange of day and night, though some days be more bright than others, then will I never cast off any people, that I have taken for my own. The meditation hereof, is a special means to keep us close to God, even then when the foundations of the earth are shaken.  

Meditate seriously on such things as may serve actually to convince thee of the unfitness and unreasonableness of thy yielding to the sin to which thou art tempted, and of the mischief that may come by yielding. When we muster up such thoughts, we levy store of good soldiers which will fight with us, and for us, and do us good service while we are under temptation: by this means alone (with God's grace accompanying) have many servants of God held their own, when the Devil would have killed them. Hoord. Serm. in Ephes. 4.30.  7. Meditation is a strong barricado against the temptations of Satan: the soul finds so much sweetness in God, that it strongly guardeth the heart, will and affections, against temptations to sin; it finds such delight in the meditation of God, that it loathes the sweetest sin. He that is used to choice meats and drinks, can very ill brook unsavoury things; so a man that is heavenly minded, is brought to disrelish those sins, that others drink down like water with greediness: meditation makes the heart very tender, and sensible of lesser sins, and stir of corruption. In a still, silent, clear night, a little sound will be easily heard, which will not be taken notice of in the day time, when there is much business in hand; so when Christ and the soul do rest, and converse together, the soul is very quick of hearing: if the old Serpent doth but hiss never so little, Satan then finds the soul upon its guard, and that it hath a wakeful enemy. A soul that is constant in the meditation of God, is like a bright clear shiny day, when any little cloud will be taken notice of, at the first rising; and like a calm Sea, where a little stirring of the water will be discerned, when the water first ariseth.   

Chap. 14. The Motives to Meditation.  
I shall now proceed to lay down divers Motives to meditation.  
Meditation is delightful to God. Motive 1 It was the saying of an Heathen, If God took delight in any felicity, it was in contemplation. God delights in holy meditations, because in them we come nearest to the purity and simplicity of God: in nothing do we more converse with him, than in our pure and active meditations: by these when we are as it were absent in body, we are present with him; for when the body lies upon its bed, and takes its rest, the devout soul solaceth itself with God.  
2. This exercise of meditation may be done, when other duties cannot. When we want an opportunity to hear the Word, to read, to pray solemnly, we may have liberty to confer with God by holy meditations.  
3. The Lord heareth the meditations of his people. David prays to God not only to consider his words, but also to consider his meditation, Psal. 5.1. As our ears, saith Austin, 
Aug. in Psal. 48. Hom. 16. Aug. in Psal. 41.  are to our words, so are God's ears to our thoughts: and in another place saith he, We hear not one another, without the benefit as of our lungs, so of our tongues; but Cogitatio tua clamor est ad Dominum, thy very thoughts are shrill in the ears of God: and elsewhere he saith, 
Aug. Confess. ●0. c. 2.  My confession, O my God is made in thy sight secretly, and yet not in secret; Tacet enim strepitu, clamat affectu, it makes no noise at all by way of sound, and yet it is clamorous by reason of her love. 
Gregor. in job.  They are not our words, but our desires and thoughts, that yield a most forcible sound in the most secret ears of God. There is, saith Peter Martyr, 
Pet. Mart. in 1 Sam. 1.12.  no need at all of voice, when we make our private prayers to God, in regard that God heareth our hearts and minds.  
4. Meditation brings the soul to rest itself in God. One saith, 
Struth. Observe. 87. Cent. 2.  that contemplation is both the labour and the rest of the devout soul: it carries up the spirit of man into the bosom of God's love; it exalts a man so high, as to make him look down upon these sublunary things with contempt, as Peter, James, and John, 
Luk. 9.33.  following Christ to the Mount, where he was transfigured, seeing some of his glory, cried out, Master it is good for us to be here: so when a Christian follows Christ upon the Mount of meditation, he is where he would be; he cries out, it is good for me to be here.  
5. A man given to meditation, is a growing Christian. As holy meditations do thrive with us, and abide in us; so doth the grace of God increase in us: holy meditations are good tokens of present grace, and do enkindle strong desires after more grace: the man that is barren in meditation, is barren and unfruitful in grace.  
6. Meditation is a great evidence of sincerity. As men may know us by our actions, as the tree is known by his fruit: so a man may know himself by his constant thoughts; for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he, Prov. 23.7. And God looks not so much upon what we do, as upon what our hearts are most upon; not so much upon what is uttered by the lips, as upon what the heart indites: by this we draw virtue from God himself, and are full of the life of God.  
7. Meditation is a Christian's Heaven upon earth. This is, as one saith, the measure that God gives in this life; a beginning that shall be finished; an earnest that shall be followed with the full sum. The soul that keeps daily intercourse with God in holy meditations, is in patriâ, 
Contemplatio dicitur cibus in hâc vitâ, ubi in sudore vescimur pane nostro; potus in futurâ, ubi liberè & sine dolore sumitur; ebrietas in ultimâ, cùm animo recepto corpore congaudebit. Bern. Sent.  when he is in viâ, at home when he is in the way: he quits earth to live in Paradise; the love and Magnificats he bestows on God, are his chiefest employment; in this one object he finds all his happiness, and his diversion; his heart is no longer in the earth; he mounts up to Heaven by his desires, and converseth more with Angels, than with men, and hath already a large taste of the sweetness of heavenly pleasures▪   
FINIS.