ENGLAND'S New-year's Gift, OR, A Pearl for a Prince: WITH Such Grapes from Thorns, and Fruits from Foes, to the whole Land, as none shall be worse for wrongs, nor hurt by any but themselves, though the times should prove worse and worse.  Tolle & lege. Augustinus. Et experto crede Hieronimo ex Hibernia Redivivo. 
LONDON, Printed by Robert Austin. 1648.   

To every passive Reader.  
TO all, who parallel me with their wronged selves,  
In two climes shorn, torn, split on rocks and shelves:  
Best fruits from foes, this paper present shows,  
From mine own bowels drawn, as Silkwormes Clewes:  
Chief here my kindness creeps, which cannot go  
To all my Brides firm Friends, from whom, my Foe,  
Satan divorced me long: though love regains  
Spleens loss, if Sectaries forbidden not baines.   

England's New-years-Gift, or a Pearl for a Prince.  
IT is reported of Doctor Ridley, a faith-sealing Martyr, that the only way to make him a man's friend, was to do him an ill turn, at least this was the way to gain his prayers. Parallel to his practice was the Counsel, that M. Omstead lately (a zealous Preacher in Ireland) gave to one that complained of some emulating sneaks, or snakes of his own Tribe, who had stung him by detraction, and bitten him with a dogged and Theonine tooth, that if he might advise him in this case, he should presently go to the Throne of Grace and pour out his soul in prayer for him, as David put on sackcloth and mourned for his enemies, even such as Saul Doeg and Achitophel; and this is all the revenge he would take on them, as the best way withal to do himself good, since to do evil for evil, this was Paganish and Brutish, one Dog, Wolf and Fox tearing and devouring another: to do good for good was carnal and natural, manus manum fricat, & mulus scabit mulum, one hand rubs another, one scabbed mule knaps another, one good turn requires and requites another; to do evil for good, as Judas did to Christ, and Laffin the false friend to his Patron the French Byron, and as some Favourites and Traitors to their Kings, bringing down like Elder trees the walls in and by which they grew, as the Cuckoo tears the kind hedge Sparrow who bred her and fed her, this is vile and viperous, yea diabolical; but to good for evil, and to overcome evil with good, Rom. 12.21. this is truly Angelical, the highest pitch of Christianity, sympathising with Abraham, who prayed for Abimelech that would have wronged him in his wife, Gen. 20. with the Prophet whose prayer restored that withered hand of Jeroboams, which was stretched out against him, 1 King. 13. with Paul and Silas who improved their best to save the soul of that cruel Jailor, who whipped and abused their bodies, Act. 16. yea to Christ himself, who healed the ear of Malchus, one of his riotous and rigorous apprehenders, Joh. 18.10. and in this case of retaliating or remitting injuries, as Julius Caesar and Pyrrhus the Epirot, and many more which might be historified, gained friends from foes, chief the two Scipios, Asian and African, so I would have it seriously poized, that as patience is the most heroic fortitude, overcoming a man's self more than others, as fortius est qui se, quàm qui fortissima vincit, so impatiency is the greatest folly, yea a madness fit to be whipped in Bedlam; for a man not to take his cross quietly, and to bear it with Simon Cyreneus after Christ, but to make his Cross heavier by his own fretting, and fustian fuming then it is in it own nature, as Thales his Ass made her burden of wool heavier by laying herself down with it in the water, as before she had melted her load of salt lighter by the like posture, as if a man should give me a box on the one ear, I should give myself a box on the other, or lay another load on my right shoulder, because a heavy burden is imposed on my left; impatiency being such a salve for every fore, as soute, ink and tar is to the washing of a foul face to make it seem fair, or as the cutting of the thumb or the toe is medicineable to the curing of the Gout.  
But if by patience and penitence thou live like some fire-flies called Pyruustae, in brazen furnaces, in the heat of most scorching crosses, and come out of them as gold out of the fire more pure, with the dross and tin of thy hereditary corruptions more purged by the spirit of fire and of burning, Esa. 4. then thy most intestine and inveterate foes must do thee good whether they will or no, even sore against their wills; like that Roman, who resolving to kill his enemy in a Duel, by running his sword into his breast, so cured him of an Impostume which he broke, that he made him a sounder man than ever he was; as it is said of a bone, that after breaking is sound knit, proves stronger than it was before; to this purpose of getting summer fruits from tempestuous and winter foes, (as Virgil gathered gold from Ennius his dross, as Plato had a curb for his pride, by Diogenes trampling on his bed with greater pride, and as from the very oil of Scorpions the Italians are said to reserve Antidotes against the stinging of Scorpions, and Surgeons to cure the bitings of mad Dogs, from the very livers of the said dead Dogs,) so I heard of a patiented and religious Gentleman, that being unequally yoked and pestered with a wife, little better than Moses his Zepporah, Socrates his Xantippe, or Jobs wife, (thought to be Dinah,) as soon as ever her waspish and aspish spirit was so conjured up, that she gave him his broth all scalding hot, and scorched him with her tongue's wildfire, immediately he fled from her as from a Snake, and retired himself into a wood or solitary grove, where in his devout soliloquies he poured out his soul unto God in mental and ejaculatory prayer; in this and the like patterns of imitation and virtuous emulation, quod cuiquam id cuivis, it is easy for any man in the like cases or crosses, enriched with the like graces of prayer, patience, and penitence, to gather the like figs from thistles, the like roses of sweet refections from the briers, brambles, and nettles of the like afflictions, the like golden fruits from the like cross and cankered foes, more precious than any historified or poetized fruits in the Gardens of Adonis, or the Orchards of the Hesperides, kept so strictly by waking Dragons, or Gryphins, oh fortunati nimium si sua bona norint, happy are the patiented in what kind soever passive, all the waves that bluster against this rock of patience, more excellent than all the white cliffy rocks in our Albion besides, however impetuous in these tumultuous and tossing times, they do but dash themselves to some and froth, and wash it whiter, as the accusations of Potyphars wife, Phedra and the goatish Judges did the innocency of Joseph of Hippolytus and Susanna; the raging waves indeed, and wraths of Tyrants, and hell-hatched Heretics may bluster against the outside of the Church built on Christ the true Rock, as the storms beat against the out-walls of a house, a Palace, or a Temple, but they disturb not nor distract not the Inhabitants or Sojourners within; the insides of Rocks are not penetrated by the most roaring and surging seas, enemies indeed like serpents and toads, and ravenous beasts, may manducare terram, lick this dust of ours, feed as wolves on Carrion, on our outward mould, our terrestrial part; but ultra alam fortunae, they hurt our souls no more (if sanctified, anchored, and settled in our present Fluctuations) than a sword or a spear doth a spirit or an Angel, or the chop of an axe the beams of the Sun which shine upon a block; now what great hurt is there in the cracking of a shell, and the saving of the kernel, in the loss of a rotten purse, (emblems of our bodies) the soul, like pure gold being reserved and preserved safe.  
When Zuinglius that zealous Belgic Light, received his death's wound in the wars of the Quinque Pagi about Religion, his last words (as his ultimum vale) to the world were these, Corpus occidi potest animam occidere non possunt, my enemies can kill my body, but they cannot kill the soul, this divinae, particula aurae, this celestial heavenly infused soul, as it is immaterial, so it is no more penetrable by any terrestrial weapons than the Sun, the Moon, the Planets and the Angels and Intelligences which more them, this soul is extra alum, beyond the power of Tyranny and Cruelty, a note above the Ela of humane hostility, tuned Anaxarchi Vasculum Anaxarchum non laedis, a Phalaris a Busiris, an Anacreon may knock in pieces the out-vessell, the out-cask, the out-cabinet, the out-cage of the body, the continent of the soul: but the soul itself which is in a manner totum hominis the whole man or the best of man, this inward wine they cannot tilt, this enclosed Pearl of Pearls (better worth than a world) they cannot plunder, this Phoenix, this bird of Paradise, they cannot kill; though the lightning which we see, and the thunder that we hear breaking the enclosed clouds, chief the condensate bolt oft break the bones and the mettled sword without any great signals on the flesh or the scabbard, according to Aristotle and Seneca, yet when truculent Tyrants speak lapides & fulmina, stones and fire-bolts, and lighten and thunder, as Jezabel once against Elias, Eudoxia that second Herodias against S. Chrisostome, Innocent or Nocent the third against the Emperor Otho, Innocent the fourth against Frederick, Gregory the second against Leo Isaurus, Zacharias against the French Childericke, Pius (or Impius) Quintus against Queen Elizabeth; yet these Bruta Fulmina, as the French Author derides them, 
a See the Book called Brutum Fulmen.  and our Roffensis 
b Adversus Bellarminum, pag. 944. & pag. 974. , these roaring Bulls of Basan, these squibs and fireworks, how ere like Davusses or Devils, they disturbed the peace of their States and Kingdoms, as their Incendiaries and Firebrands the Jesuits, have set all in a Phaetonian confusion in Moravia, Helvetia, Silesia, Austria, France, England, and Ireland: yet they wrought and brought no more prejudice to sanctified souls then the curses of the Witch Balaam to Gods own Israelites, Numb. 23.19, 20. Hence it was a wise Consolatory speech of Augustus Caesar to his daughters Livia and Julia, telling him that all the people of Rome spoke evil of them, he thanking his Gods, that though they spoke evil of them, yet it was not in their power to do them any evil, 
Apud Plutarchum.  and therefore wished them to suffer free speech in a free City, which free speech all the wit and worth of man, yea of Innocency itself, can no more curb in malignant minds and mouths, than they can stay the winds, or stint the waves, or shackle the Hellespont, or do such impossible things, as once Xerxes and Canutus attempted, since Lions have been tamed, and Elephants in the wars of King Porus and Pyrrhus, Otters have been tamed like Water-Spaniels, Ravens have been tamed and lured as Hawks, Wolves and Foxes, wild and vild Dogs, have been tamed as household Curs, Quoy-ducks have been tamed to deceive the tame; so Storks, Cranes, Crows 
c Ave Caesar. , popinjays, all kind of birds, and some kinds of Serpents and Fishes 
d See instances in Cornelins de Lapi de in cap. 3. Jacobi. ; but the tongue-like Panthers and Field-mices is indomable without the help of Mors and Morpheus, death and deadly sleep: Angels men and Devils cannot tame it, the wild fire in it kindled from hell, Jam. 3.6. like the coals of Juniper, yea like hellfire itself unquenchable: the Innocence of an Elias counted a troubler of Israel, 1 King. 18.17. of Paul held a factious fellow, Act. 24.5. of Joseph of Hippolytus the Paganish Joseph; of Susanna, of Abner, of Eugenius, accused of incontinency, of Athanasius called Sathanasius, and taxed as a Murderer 
c Apud Centur. Magdeburg passim.  of Cato and Scipio, oft produced and traduced before the Roman Senate: of S. Jerome, branded by the Priests of Rome 
d Of which he complains in many Epistles.  for his holy and honest conversing with Paula, Paulina, Eustochium, Demetriades and other chaste Matrons and Maids, yea the purity of Christ himself conversing with Publicans and Sinners (as the Sun shines upon Quagmires and rotten Bogs without any contamination) could cause none of these to escape the aspersions and calumnies of scandalising tongues, no more than the Sun and the Moon can muzzle the barkings of some dogs against their lusterous shyves, as Doegs and emulalating Momists and Zoilists still will bark, invita Minerva, against shining gifts and graces, and places amongst Arts and Arms, yet as we have a greater and more certain tutelary God, than Augustus had, we may condignly thank this God, that though in unbloudy persecutions we daily hear the mocks of Romish Michols, 2 Sam. 6.20. the railing of Atheistical and Papistical Rabshakehs, 2 King. 19.22. the flouts of rejected Ismaels', Gen. 21.9. the curses of Satanical Shemcis, 2 Sam. 16. the scoffs of malignant Tobiah'sses, Nehem. 4.3. and Sanballats, all haters of God, of the godly and of all goodness, all opposers, Remoraes' and obstacles of Religion and Reformation, all as intestine enemies to all of the house of David, Zech. 12.8.9. all Ezekiasses, Ezraes and Nehemiahs, who would rebuild and purge our polluted Temples, as ever Hannibal was unto the Romans a sworn Antagonist; or Haman the cursed Amalekite to Esther, Mardocheus and all the religious Jews, yet Gratias superis, God be praised, these whelps of Cerberus, though they bark and show their tongues and their teeth, they cannot by't further than God pleases to unchaine them and unmuzzle them, and set them upon us, for our playing the pranks of wild Heifers and indomable Bullocks, breaking over the hedges of all commanded and limited obedience into forbidden pastures, as David in his Adultery, 2 Sam. 11.9. and Solomon in his uxorious Idolatry, for which God set Absalon, Semei, Sheba and Ammon against the one, 2 Sam. 16. & 13. & cap. 20. and Rezon and jereboam 1 King. 11.23. & v. 26. against the other, all the Organs of evil to Zion, all the Factors and Agents for Antichrist, for the Scarlet Whore, for the Prince of darkness, chief in their unlawful, lustful, and unlimited wars against the Saints, all and every one of them are under the power and command of the King of Zion, the Father of the Saints, he hath all the malignant powers, plots and policies of earth and hell, even Witches, Conjurers, and infernal spirits themselves, all the sorcering Sorcering Masspriests and Friars of the Romish Hierarchy, and all the Irish Nigromanticks at this day, the Lord of Hosts hath them all as Wolves and Dogs in their chains, as Lions in their grates, as roaring Bulls at their stakes, and Bears at their rings, he keeps them all in as Seas and rivers within their banks and bounds, or lets them out as in the inundations in Ducalions' time, and in Noah's flood; he hath all created powers as staves in his own hands, as arrows in his own quiver, as David his stones in his sting, to keep in or employ at his pleasure: he being the true Aeolus who hath all the winds in a bag, all the waves in a bank, all the wicked Heretics and Tyrants within and without the Church, hooked by their noses, as he had Pharaoh, Senacherib, Rabshekch, 2. King. 19.27, 28. Holofernes, Antiochus, Epiphanes, proud Cosroes, Saul before his conversion, Act. 9 cap. 22. & 26. and all sanginnolent persecutors in all times, letting them play their reaks and pranks so long, till he got himself a name upon them, either in the conversion of some few of them, or the confusion of the most of them; when their sins like the sins of the Amorites Gen. 11.16. and Sodomites were at the full ripeness, and fit for the sickle of deserved vengeance, this then is the first cordial I give to the corrosives of the Saints, the first ground of comfort to our present mourners in Zion, Ezek. 9 the wicked which plough deep furrows on our backs, God himself yokes them, they are but rods in the hands of our Father, but the Jailers and the Executioners of the will and decree of our Father Judge, as a modern Divine sweetly alludes to God, they are but God's Sergeants to arrest us, for our undischarged debts, our unrepented sins, they cannot hurt us more than a sword in the scabbard, till it be drawn and laid on by a valiant Martialist, being of itself a dead instrument without a living hand to wield it; as indeed the creature of itself, whether animate or manimate, can do us neither good nor hurt, without the restraining or managing of the Creator, as Doctor Preston hath lively demonstrated as an experimental Divine, in his golden work of God's All-sufficiency: and I have fully explained in the Book called the Arraignment of the Creature: And indeed this is a wonderful ground of comfort to all that by the spirit can cry Abba Father, Rom. 8.15. that their crosses come from a Father, not from a severe Judge, that they are but love-tokens from the Bridegroom to his Spouse, Rev, 3.19. healing pills from a Physician, castigating rods and ferulaes in in the hand of a Father, Heb. 12.5, 6, 7. as Queen Elizabeth said once in some real or imaginary Delinquencies of her heroic Essex, ad correctionem non ad ruinam, to correction not to destruction; as God's scourges were so Idolatrizing and Adulterizing Solomon, whom though he afflicted in the revolt of ten Tribes, and in excited enemies, 1 King. 11. yet he rejected not, he took not his mercy from him as from Saul the Reprobate, 2 Sam. 7.14. 1 Sam. 16.1.14. Oh, this is indeed Oleum vulneris latificans Galeni, mell in o'er melos in aure, as the phrases be melody to the ear, music to the mind, and honey to the heart, yea as Rosa Solis and Aqua vitae to our dead sows and fainting spirits, that though we be whipped for extraordinary sins and rebellions with sharp rods, even as it were of wire and knotted cords, not with ordinary willows and birches, as in former times, that yet notwithstanding a whipping Father is a Father, and purposes to bestow his inheritance upon his crying Child if as penitent as peccant: he takes not a sword to run him through, nor a Dag to pistol him when he is prostrate on his knees imploring mercy, like the Gospels' relenting prodigal, with a mouth of confession and tears of contrition, extracted by the heat and fire of love from the Limbeck 
a Few fathers prove Tyrants to their own children, like the Roman Manlius, and Brutus, or as once Manasses was before his conversion, and the Jewish Saul to his Jonathan, whom he would have executed.  of a heart full of compunction, Luk. 15.17, 18, 19 Oh paululum supplicii satis est patri, a little punishment is enough for a father, as we may see in the passages betwixt David and Absalon, 2 Sam. 14.21. & cap. 18.33. the best Father and the worst child: all the water of the Sea will not wash away the love of a Father, it is as strong as death, even when he frowns outwardly, he favours inwardly, as Joseph did his Brethren, when he spoke roughly to them, Gen. 42.6. aequa tamen semper mens est & amica voluntas: Oh suck this refreshing honey, as a second Jonathan, in thy faintings in the wilderness of thy woes, that though the evil of sin this malum culpae be from Satan and thyself, yet this malum paenae, the evil of punishment is from God, Amos 3.6. & cap. 2.4. per totum, punishment do I call it? I think I must recant the phrase, for though we read of the plagues of Egypt, of Sodom, of Moab, of Edom, of Damascus, of Ashur, of Gaza, of Teman, of Ammon, and of Tire, Amos 1. per totum, yet Divines dislike the phrase of punishment ever to be inflicted on the Church of God, or any living members of the Church, the punishment of the sins of all believers being already and at all times laid upon Christ the true Atlas who hath borne the burden of his Father's wrath, paid the ransom of his brethren, discharged all their debts, canceled all their bonds, and given them their quietut est and Acquittance out of the Chancery or Exchequer of mercy, though they were clean cast by Moses and his infringed Law at the King's Bench of Justice, Esay 53.4, 5, 6. Rom. 3. v. 19, 20, 24, 25. cap. 5.1. & Ephe. 2. per totum, and in this respect it being unjust with the Judge of heaven and earth, Gen. 18.25. to do aught but right, in craving a debt twice to be paid by the principal, when it is paid by the surety, 1 Joh 1.9. the soul married and espoused to Christ by faith, Hos. 2.19. Eph. 5.25. being now as under covert Baron, not liable to the debts and the arrests of her widowhood, when she was estranged from Christ, Eph. 2.12. Christ her husband being liable unto them, who hath satisfied and paid them by his blood, Eph. 1.7. 1 Pet. 1.18. even eo nomine in this very case, the child of God being freed both from the guilt and punishment of his sin in life, and death, and judgement, whatever happens to him, being not in the nature of a punishment from a stern Aeacus, Minos, Radamanthus, or an Orbilius Flagellator, or a Dionysius in schola, a severe Tyrant, an enraged Schoolmaster, but a castigation from a Father, non quod odio habet sed quod amat, not out of hatred, but out of love, what a motive is this to drink patiently, as Christ his Master before him, Mat. 26.39. and Job. job. 5.11. and Ezekias, Esa. 39.8. and David, Psal. 39.9. and old Eli, 1 Sam. 3.18. and all the Martyrs jam. 5. v. 10. and Confessors, the Physical cup his Father hath prepared for him, though very bitter, in the divine providence so much the better; if another man equal to thyself, or inferior, yea if superior, hit thee a blow on thy ear, or spurn thee with his foot, perhaps thou art moved, and waspish, even a Micah or a Paul himself, suffering humani aliquid, some reluctance, to be unjustly beaten by a Zedekias, a false Prophet, a Prelatical Ananias, a painted wall, 1 King. 22.24. Act. 23.2, 3. or to be scourged unjustly by a Governor, Act. 22. v. 25. but put the case that thy King, thy Liege Sovereign, or thy natural and affectionate Father give thee a blow or two, (chiefliy upon thy demerits) will't thou grudge? wilt thou grumble like a cursed Cur? whilst thou as a whipped dog fly in thy Father's face? surein this case of muttering, murmuring, impatiency, like the carnal Israelites, against God, against Moses, against Aaron, Exod. 16.2, 3. cap. 17.2. Num. 21.5. in every cross and loss that hath befallen thee in thy past or present pressures, thou showest thyself not a mournful dove, but a hissing Snake, yea a stinging Serpent, not a patiented plundered sheep, but a gruntling Hog, a tusk-whetting Boar, when the hand of heaven toucheth thee, chief if Satan enter so fare into thee, as he did into judas, joh. 13.27. and into Ananias, Act. 5.3. and into Elimas' the Sorcerer, Act. 13.10. and into Eden's Serpent, Gen. 3.1. and into the Pithonist or Ventriloquist at Philippos, Act. 16.16. as still he speaks in seducing Friars and Jesuits, in blaspheming Heretics, and in all cursing and accursed swearers, that instead of blessing God in thy crosses, in thy losses by the plundering Chaldeans, or Papal Babylonians, as job blest God in his greatest exigents, job. 1.20, 21. thou rave and rage's like a Bedlam, set thy mouth against heaven, like Homer's Centaurs to sight with jupiter, curse thy Creator, in the devilish Dialect of jobs wife, blaspheme thy Redeemer in tearing again, worse than the Jews on the Cross his heart, wounds, blood, as a Dog doth a harmless Hare, and a Wolf an innocent Lamb. In this case thou hast a soul as black as pitch, stinking and sulphurous. I say of thee, as Simon Peter said of Simon Magus, Act. 8.23. thou art in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity, in the very snare of the Devil, 2 Tim. 2.26. yea his sympathising son, joh. 8.34. he blaspheming God in hell, or in the air where ere he carries his hell about him, and thou on earth, like a Dutchman, a Frenchman, a Spaniard, or an Italian, thou may be known by thy Tongue, to what Country thou belongest, even to the lower and infernal Regions, to the real Styx, Tartaerus, and Phlegeton, thy very speech betrays thee, Mat. 26.37. were Satan on earth, in the form of a man, or Cain, judas, Achitophel, julian the Apostate, Porphiry, Libanius, Hacket, Kett, Michael, Servetus, Dioscorus, Nestorius, Arrius, here again returned out of hell, they would bring their hell-fired tongues with them, and blaspheme just as thou blasphemest, they would be (as birds of a feather) fit companions and comrades with all God-dam-mees, and Roarers, whose mouths like Butcher's dogs, are bloody with bloody oaths, Herod and Pilate, Ahab and jezabel, Simeon and Levi, the Atheist and the Papist, the Caldean and the Sabaean never agreed better now or heretofore in any mischief plotted or performed, than thou, both in thy mouth and in thy mind, would consort with such Satanical sympathizers with thy hellish humours: Oh this course, this carriage, is not to kiss thy Father's rod, like a dutiful, a patiented, a penitent, a submissive Child, but to snuff up the wind like an Onager or wild Ass, yea to kick and spurn (like jesurum, Deu. 32.15.) with the heel, as a Mule, when God would catch thee, as we catch wild Colts, in a straight, in a lane, or betwixt thorny hedges, as judah catched Adonizebek, judg. 1.4. and the Assyrians Manasses amongst the thorns, 2 Chron. 33.11. this shows thou art (as M. Deering once used the phrase at the Court) not tanquam ovis, as a sheep silent before the shearer, Esa. 53.7. who never bleats when the Butcher's knife is at the throat, but indomita juvenca, an untamed Bullock, bellowing when saul's Doegs or Dogs be about thine ears: I tell thee Siboleth and Shiboleth did not more clearly distinguish an Ephraimite from a Gileadite, judg. 12.6, 7. or the fire doth not more distinguish gold from dross, or the touchstone gold and pure silver from counterfeit and adulterate metals, than patience and impatiency, blessing or blaspheming, the language of Canaan and the language of Ashdod; show thy heart (thy mouths fountain) to be carnal or spiritual, degenerate or regenerate, the habitation of Christ, 1 Cor. 13.5. Eph. 3.17, or a den of Devils, a cage of Scorpions and a nest of unclean Birds, Mat. 15.19. yea, I say, the blue spots nor the Carbuncle broke out, do not more show the plague, nor the white spots the Leprosy of a Gehezi, a Miriam, a Naaman, nor a stinking breath demonstrates not more infected lungs, nor the red ploukes and rubies in the face and nose of a Drunkard, testify not more plainly a too much heated and inflamed Liver, than oaths, curses, and blasphemies demonstrate a rotten, an ulcerous, a poisoned and a polluted heart.  
Oh, look to it! thou sayest it is thy nature, to curse, and swear, and tear when thou art abased, abused, wronged or exasperated, thou art of a hot and choleric disposition (so indeed are all Serpents which make them by a kind of Antipathy with the moisture of the soils, to die as soon as ever they are brought into the Islands of Gaulon in Crect, or into the Northern Lapponia, or to Ebusus, or Sardinia, 
a Apud Aelianum lib. 5. Hist. c. 2 cum Solino, cap. 9 cap. 25. cap. 31. & Mela, lib. 2. ca 5.  as well as they died in Ireland, for the same cause, ere ever S. Patrick was born) then, thou hot spawn of the old Serpent know this, that in this plea of nature, thou showest there is in thee little grace, rectifying, ruling, conquering, curbing, crucifying nature, with all natural lusts, affections and infections, Gal. 5.24. alas! if there be in thee nought but unclean and polluted nature by generation, without regeneration by grace, in thee new birth, the true birth, thou shalt (dying in that polluted estate) come to heaven, when the Devil and the damned come out of hell, Joh. 3.6. 1 Cor. 15.50. Rev. 21.8. & 27.  
Besides to brush down the Cobweb lawns of this excuse, and to show thee the weakness of this poor paper cloak, to keep off the showers and the storms of deserved vengeance, may not a Dog as well as thou plead, it is his nature to bark, to by't at strangers, to worry sheep; the Wolf, (yea the Irish Wolf called Rebel) that it is his nature to devour our English Lambs? the Hog, that it's his nature to gruntle, to despise Pearls? the Ass to bray? the Lion to roar? the Horseleech to suck blood like a biting Usurer? the Scarabean Flea, like a Lecher, to delight in filth and dunghills? the drunken Ape and the Monkey to desire strong liquids? the silent Serpent Dipsas, like the poisoning whisperer and caluminator, secretly to sting? the Turkeycock like an open railer, to bluster? the house Cur like a dogged detractor to by't at the best, if they feed him not with crusts? the Parrot, like a trencher Parasite and a Buffoon, to prate for an Almond? the Swan and the Peacock like a fautastick to be proud of their plumes, without ever looking at their foul and black feet? and so the rest of beasts sympathising with graceless men, in name, natures, and nurture's, 2 Pet. 2.12. Tit. 1.12. may plead nature for their worst properties most prejudicial unto man, as well as natural men for their belluine and brutizing conditions, poetized by Ovid to be turned into beasts. But let me expostulate with thee a little further, what gettest thou by thy impatient imprecations or execrations? (which thou mayest as well spare as dirt from thy nails, or smoke from thy chimney) they gain thee not so much as a shoe latchet; nay, (like jealousy and gnawing envy) they are their own plagues, causeless curses like balls thrown up into the air, light pat on thine own pate; thou hurtest none by them but thyself, like squibs they flash and crack, and send their stink in thy own nose: the ball thrown against a wall hurts not the wall, no more than the waves which dash against the rock hurt the rock, but break themselves to froth and foam: in raging against God or man thou kickest against an Iron prick, and the Iron enters into thy own soul, Acts 9.6. thou roasts at thy own fire, and hurts thy fretting furious self: besides impatiency in a cross cures it, as mire and soot wash thy face fowler and fouler, what is it but as Mercury to a green wound more to fret it? yea, as the horse in a quagmire, a bird in the limebush, and the rabbit in the Warreners net; the more the impatient madcap strives and struggles, the more he entangles himself; if he belongs unto God, he will make him quiet for all his plunging: if he be his Child by adoption, he will use more rods, and lay them on more sound, but he will ere he have done with him, make him as calm as a Lamb, and as meek as a Dove: when God's winds of wrath begin to blow and bluster against any soul, he will either make it bow by humiliation, like a yielding reed, as did David, Psa. 6.5, 6. Ezekias, 2 Chron. 32.24, 25, 26. Manasses, 2 Chron. 33.11, 12. and oft repenring Israel, Judg. 2.5.6.7. 1 Sam. 7.6.7. Judg. 3.9. or he will blow it down as a stern and stubborn Oak, by an utter rooting out and subversion, as he did Pharaoh, Exod. 14.27. Ahab, 1 King. 22. Jeroboam, and Jeconiah, buried (like many now) with the burial of an Ass, with millions more in all ages, 1 King. 3, 34.  
Besides, I say unto thee, in thy curses and execrations against this Malignant and that Round-head, in City, Court, or Camp, or sound head, as our turbulent times have made the unhappy distinctions, as once betwixt the Guelphs and Gibellines in Italy, betwixt the Aurelians and Burgundians in France, and betwixt the Lancastrians, and those of the house of York in England; as once God said to Rabshakeh and Senecharib, whom hast thou reproached and blasphemed? and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, even against the holy one of Israel, 2 King. 19.21. against whom dost thou cast thy squibs and darts and firebrands? against whom (like an Armenian Dragon) dost thou spit fire? thou sayest against man, a weak worm like thyself, I tell thee, nay, it is against God, as I have before made it plain, who now hath set man against thee, as his rod to whip to scourge thee, as he calls the King of Ashur, his rod against Israel, even the rod of his anger in the hand of his indignation, Isai. 10.5. as Attilas the cruel Goth, called himself Flagellum Dei, the whip of God to scourge the world, as Tamberlane was but God's rod against Bajazet: the Turk, and as the Turk in his conquests of Cyprus, Rhodes, Famagusta, Constantinople, Malta, and in his inroads still into Hungary, Transilvania, Dalmatia, Cracovia, and lately into some Sea coasts in Ireland, hath been and still is God's rod and scourge to Idolatrous, Adulterous, bloody, cruel, extorting, proud, drunken, profane, and hypocritical Christendom, to apostatising Europaeans from their first faith, as well as the Romans now in some points, and as the Mahumetanized Churches of Asia, once planted by the Apostles: so what are the Imperialists and Austrians now, but the rod of angry Nemesis against Germany, and the Palatinate for their contempt of the Gospel, chief for their overspreading painted Popery called Arminianism, and so what is the confederacy now of Ephraim and Manasses, against Judah, our Hibernified Atheists, Papists, Carnallists, with Irish Cannibals, spoiling the goods and sucking the bloods of many truehearted Naboths and nathanael's: what are these but God's rods upon us to correct our long forborn Delinquencies now visited in God's great Audit or Correction day, Jer. 9.6, 10. yea one of us fight against another of the same Religion and Profession, as many heads of the Serpent Amphisbena are said to fight one with another, as we lately (like the Midianites in gideon's time, Judg. 7.22. against the Midianites, the Ammonites, and Moabites in Jehosaphats time, against the Syrians, 2 Chron. 20.23. as the servants of Abner and of joab in David's time, 2 Sam. 2.15, 16.) sheathing our swords in the bowels one of another, as it is writ of Cadmus his brethren, and of Brennus and Brentius, Polynices and Eteocles, Romulus and Remus, one of us destroying another, like Bees in a Hive, in a bloody faction, not Bees against Church-Drones, and State-Catterpillers at home, or against Romish Wasps and Asps at home and abroad; what are these but rods in God's hand, by which in his just & unsearchable justice, he makes us to whip and scourge one another more bloodily than the jews once scourged S. Paul, 2 Cor. 11.14. or then the Monks of Bangor whipped once poor King john; the result of all is, when any man is an instrument to do us any good, as Obadiah to a hundred poor Prophets, 1 King. 18.13. and David to lame Mephiboseth, 2 Sam. 9 and the good Ethiopian Ebedmelech to jeremy, jer. 38.7, 8. Paul to Onesimus, and Philip to the noble Eunuch, Act. 8.36.37. such a man is unto us a rod of beauty in Gods right hand, Zech. 11.10. when any doth unto us any damage and detriment, either in plundering our goods, as Chaldeans to Job 1.17. or shedding our bloods, as Cain did abels, Gen. 4. or imprisoning our bodies, as the Philippian Magistrates did Paul and Silas, Act. 16. or smiting us, as Pashur the Prelate did Jereremy, Jer. 20.2. or doing us much evil, as Alexander the Coppersmith did Paul, 2 Tim. 4.14. in these cases and the like, man is unto us (as he is called in Zachary,) a rod of hands in God's hands, yea how ever man is to man, homo homini Deus, aut demon aut lupus, a God, a Devil, or a Wolf, though in sheep's clothing, whether a Jonathan, a joab, or a judas, he is but an instrument of God to plague man, or to pleasure man, God himself setting even Kings themselves over men good or bad in justice or mercy for his own secret ends; the same God (if we believe S. Augustine) who gave Augustus Trajan, Adrian, and good Emperors, Fathers of their Countries, giving also Nero, Caligula, Decius, Domitian, and other truculent Tyrants: David was so sensible of this truth, that when Shemei reviled him, he attributed to God the setting this Bandog upon him, 2 Sam. 6.10. so Job attributes his plunderings not to the Sabeans, the instruments, but to God's permissive providence, giving and taking Goods from him, Job 1.21. and Joseph ascribes his selling and sending into Egypt not so much to his brethren as to God himself, Gen 45. v. 5. yea whatsoever Herod and Pilate, and the jew and the Gentiles, and Judas did to Christ in his crucifying, the Apostles attribute it to the Counsel and Decree of God, Act. 4.26, 27. Judas acting in the death of Christ out of covetousness, Luk. 22.5. the Pharisees out of envy, Mar. 15.10. Pilate out of base and servile fear to displease Caesar, and the Jews, Mar. 15. v. 15. but God wrought in all these permissively and dispositively, to the glory of his mercy and justice, to the redemption of his elected one, Col. 1.14. the obduration of the reprobates, the rising and falling of many in Israel, Luk. 2.34. as I have reflexed fully on this point in my origen's repentance.  
These premises considered, thou never looking up to God in thy present losses, crosses, pressures, plunderings, the chief efficient cause, jam. 3.38. not to thy own unrepented sinnus, the meritorious and deserving cause, 1 Sam. 12.18.19. jam. 3.39. but merely unto man the instrumental cause, like a Swine, who hath eyes only to look downward to the earth, but never upwards to heaven, looking upon the creature with the eyes of carnal reason, without the Creator, thou art enraged against this man and that man, thy heart riseth at him, as at an Incendiary object, as Turkeycocks and Unicorns be enraged at the sight of red Stammel, and as Bullocks bellow at the sent or sight of blood; hence thou goarest thy enemy in the sides, thou tearest him with thy tongue, as a chased Horse or Boar, thou casts thy scums and froths upon him, and art as much exasperated against him, as the Romans against Cassius, Brutus, and Dolabella, when they saw the bloody garments of stabbed Caesar.  
In these mad postures of thine acting the parts of a second mad Ajax against Ulysses, or of Hercules, Furens, or Orestes, in the Tragedians, against mere man, never looking up to God nor into thyself; what dost thou but like a testy dog which runs after a stone thrown at him, which he bites and snarls, never looking at the hand that throws it, as if a fool should break an arrow all to fitters which hits him and hurts him, wreaking his wrath on it (as the fabled Weasel to her own burning, bitten the hot iron which fell upon her foot) never looking to the arm which drew the bow and shot it; as some graceless Felons and their friends as I have seen, throw stones at the Hangman and curse the Executioner, never considering that it is the Judge, the Law, and their own demerits and felonies which execute them, the poor hangman doth but his office: thou in this case that ragest against thy foes, thy formal friends, plunderers, yea, against Committees, Excize men, Sequestrators and the like, licking their own fingers, and feathering thou thinkest their own wings, (some of them as receivers, deceivers have been, yea, Empsonians, Dudleans, Zacheusses, and Publicans have sitten at the receipt or deceit of custom, customarily in all ages;) thou art possessed with such a mad and malignant, spirit as whisome that great hearted Byron in France, and Fisher the Arch-Traitor in England who in their impatiency breathing revenge, even in death would have wreaked their wraths on their very Executioners, whom our once noble Essex, Sir Walter Rawely, Sir Thomas Moor and the late Hibernian Heroes as freely forgave, as S. Stephen did his stoners, Act. 7.60. Christ and his primitive and modern Martyrs, their Crucifiers, Luke 23.34. vade & tu fac similiter, do thou the like according to Christ's practice and precept, Mat. 5.44. if thou willest be a patrizing sympathising son of a heavenly Father.  
And to set a further edge upon thee to the performance of this duty and to curb and bridle thy corrupt heart, which is ever meditating moulding, plotting, searching and projecting revenge against those that have made thee extremely passive in plucking thy golden feathers, and making thee as naked as a worm, or as Esop's Crow, when she was deplumed, nothing (according to machiavels rule and the Italians practice) being sweeter than revenge, to give a Rowland for an Oliver, to pay an enemy home in his own coin in retalinted vengeance, an eye for an eye, even as one mad dog or wolf devours another; but chief since this forgiving and forgetting injuries as the Ostrich forgets her eggs, writing wrongs in dust, is durus sermo, a bitter pill to swallow a hard morsel to digest, going against the hair, against the heart, against the very stream and torrent of corrupt nature, against the course and custom of the world and worldlings, since hoc opus hic labour, to subdue thy rebellious nature, and conquer thy corrupt heart in this case is more than an Herculean task, a greater Conquest then to subdue a Cacus, a Cerberus, an Hydra, a Leana, a Caledonian Boar, with Meleager, or a Serpent at Bagrada, with Regulus: therefore to help thee in this conquest; this one consideration may be as valiant a Champion for thee as Achilles for his Patroclus, namely, that those against whom thy heart so riseth and rageth, are not thy enemies, and then with whom sightest thou thus, but with thine own shadow? or as a Don Quixot with Rams and Windmills? but at this thou startlest as Moses at his rod turned Serpent, Exod. 4.2. and criest out, as once Michay and Laban, Gen. 31.30. they have stolen away my Gods, Judg. 10.24. my goods, my golden Calf which I adored. Col. 3.5. and are they not mine enemies? but bona verbil quaeso, be not so hasty, festina lentè, pause a little upon it, and thou wilt find that if thou couldst but follow the rule of Plutarch a Pagan, how to make use of enemies, and to get fruits from foes, even grapes of grace from the thorns and thistles of their hostility, as Samson got honey even out of a dead Lion, Judg. 14.8. than thou wouldst see, that as Isaac mistook Jacob for Esau, Gen. 27.24. so thou hast all this while mistook thy friends for thy foes; and as one cried in Stobeus, O philoioudè philoi, O friends, no friends, so thou shouldst cry, O foes no foes; or if foes in the effects of your Vatinian hate, yet in the effect you are no foes, as you better mine estate, as you are fierce winds to drive my sin-fraught soul to the haven of grace, to the port of peace, as you are like gall and soot laid to the desired duggs of the bewitching world, to wean me from it, as Surgeons with sharp Goads to Phlebotomize my vain veins, to cure me in the dangerous Pleurisies and burning Fevers of my boiling lusts, to prick and break (though with your swords and rapiers) the secret Impostimes of my putrid hypocrisy, my sordid covetousness, with the swelling tympany of my pride, and vain glory, getting thus good from the intended harms of thy foes, as joseph and Mardocheus were brought to exaltation by a envious opposition, Daniel to further grace with Darius, and his three companions to higher places by calumination, and detraction, Gen. 40.38. Esther 7. Dan. c. 3. cap. 6. which was also the case of Herod at the table of Augusius Caesar in josephus, and of Themistocles in Athens, exiled to his advancement: I say if thou get sweet siggs of grace from the and wormwood of thy enemies, as Physicians and Paracelsians extract Antidotes and Mithridate against poisons, and Restoratives against Consumptions, even from poisonous Toads, nuts and Serpents, than thy supposed foes are but men made of straws, but Scarecrows in Cherry Trees; thou fightest but with shadows, as some Hyperboreans are said to fight with the North wind, and Pigmees with Cranes, thou art more frighted then hurt with these Eutopians, as children with Bugbears, who only (like the Apes in Plutarch, who marched with green boughs in their Claws on the side of a mountain) seem to be enemies, but are not, or at most enemies in their acts, but friends in their effects, as the divine providence disposeth of their evil wills to effect in thee his own good work, as their deep furrows ploughed in thy humbled and rend heart, fits it by receiving the seed of the Word, the Gospel of grace to bring forth the harvest of sanctified fruits more abundantly with patience, which being the very mark I shoot at, and the nail I drive at, that the City may be answerable to the gate, this Tractate to the Title of Fruits from Foes, let me but hammer into thy head and heart these subsequent considerations.  
First, that if thou be a foe to thine own lusts, which fight against thy soul, 1 Pet. 2.11. and hatest merely what God hates, sin in thyself and others, as did David, Psa. 119.115. and Lot, 2 Pet. 2.7. and jeremy, Jer. 9.1. it is an evident argument to thy own soul, that as was said of Abraham, Jam. 2.17. of Lazarus, John 11.11. and Christ's Disciples, John 15.11. thou art God's friend, and therefore no marvel if the world be thy foe; for if thou wert of the world, the world would love his own, John 15.19. as every Ape her own young, every Crow and Owl her own Bird, every Ethiopian Mother her own Child, though as black as herself, as cicada cicadae chara, & Graculus assidet Graculo, one Jay jangles to another, and birds of a feather flock together; Ego novi Sinonem, & Sinon novit me, as Erasmuus hath it in his adage, a couple of Knaves are as well met, as the biting usurer and his broker, the thief and the refetter, the braggadochean Thraso and his trencher Parasite Gnato, and as a luxurious Prince and a Gaveston his fatal Pander, a covetous Prince that like a Hawk would pounce golden game, loves such Officers as are Spaniels to spring it, and a drowsy, dull, dead hearted people, love such a Pastor as will charm them asleep in their Lethargical security, and sow pillows under their elbows, to further their slumbering in the shadow of death, but a Boanerges, a son of thunder, that will sound in their ears Isaiah Trump, and ring Aaron's Bells, and cry with the voice of a Baptist to awaken them ere the Trump of Judgement, 1 Thes. 4.16. he is no Lettuce for their lips, away with such a fellow from the earth, Act. 22.22. similis simili gaudet, like loves his like, by a natural sympathy and similitude, causa amoris, similitude draws love as the adamant the iron, and the Caesian winds the clouds, but dissimilitude breeds dislike and distaste in judgement and affection: Hence if thou be'st in Christ, and crucified to the world and the world to thee, Gal. 2.20. & cap. 5.24. there is as great an Antipathy betwixt thy enemy and Christ's enemy, and the world's friend and favourite that is merely carnal, 1 Cor. 3.3. Jam. 4.4. 1 Joh. 2.15. and thou that art spiritual, 1 Cor. 2.15. and truly answerest thy name Christian, Acts 15.26. as there is a disagreement betwixt grace and nature, light and darkness, God and Mammon, Christ and Belial, 2 Cor. 6.15, 16. Michael and the Dragon, Rev. 12.7. yea as there is contrariety betwixt the Elephant and the Unicorn, the Fox and the Lamb, and the Wolf and the Sheep, whose very guts made into strings will never accord and tune together in a Lute, more than the bloods of Polynices and Eteocles would mix together after they had slain each other: assure thyself, let a carnal man, either an open profane wretch like Esau, or a rotten hearted hypocrite sycophantise with thee and observe thee for his own sinister ends, and adhere unto thee as Demas once to Paul, 2 Tim. 4. yet so long as thy works are good and his evil, and thy life and light a real Sermon to blame and shame his, he loves thee no better than Judas did Christ whom he betrayed, than Herod did the Baptist whom he beheaded, though he reverenced and heard him gladly, Mar. 6.20. nay he hates thee inwardly for the same cause that Cain hated Abel, 1 John 3.12. Jezabel Elias, 1 King. 19.2. and Ahab Micaiah, because he prophesied no good unto him, 1 King. 22.8. because thy right steered life, like Noah's once amongst the worldings, and Lots among the Sodomites, Luk. 17.27, 28. shames the irregularities of their vain discourses and vicious courses, Lux oculis aegris odiosa, thy light which shines before men, Mat. 5.16. offends their blood-shotten eyes, as the Sun doth the purblind Owl, the Lion, Wolf, Fox, Badger, Otter, Fowmant, Weasel, Poulecat, and all beasts of prey, love the night better than the day, darkness more than light: now thou art of the day, if Christ the Daystar be risen in thy heart, Luk. 1.78. and shine in that Orb by faith, Eph. 3.17. thy enemies are of the night, 1 Thes. 5.4, 5. therefore however they seem to collogue and to close with thee, they are as discrepant from thee in their dispositions, and at as fare a distance in their infected affections, as the Northern and Southern Pole; the Raven is thought by some to forsake her young ones for a time, because in their first hatching they are white and downy, then God is said to feed them; but after a while when she returns and finds them black like herself, she takes to them as her own, fabula de te narratur, Bercorius in his Moral Reductory, and Geminianus in his Similes make the Application.  
Now is this no fruit from a Foe, that his hostility proclaims thee to be Christ's friend? whose love will stand thee in a thousand times more stead than jonathans' did David, or Damon's to his Pythias: A wise Courtier had rather have his King his friend, with his Ego & Rex meus, though all the emulating Court be against him, then to curry favour with the Court, and be at a frowning distance with the King, si Deus nobiscum, quis contra nos? if God be with thee, who can be against thee? Rom. 8.31. if I have the Sun shining in my face, what need I the lesser twinkling Stars, or the light of a candle which may go out with the least windy puff, and leave in my nose a stinking snuff? it's some content to be assured I am in the right way in my Pilgrimage to my heavenly home, though all the Dogs (and Doegs) bark at me in every Town through which I pass.  
Secondly, as a Corollary to this consider seriously, that if thou be patiented, sustinendo & abstinendo, in which Epictetus epitomised Moral Philosophy, in sustaining and bearing the brunts and blasts of thy foes, and in abstaining and forbearing from revenge, than God is engaged by promise, which he ever performs, 1 Thes. 5.23. to be thy avenger on thy enemies if in thee they oppose him, Rom. 12.19. as he avenged David of michal's mocks, 2 Sam. 6.16.20.23. of Shimeies' revile, 2 Sam. 16.10. 1 King. 2.44. of Nabals' churlishness, 1 Sam. 25.39. Ezaekiah of the rail of Rabshakeh, and the blasphemies of Senacherib, 2 King. 19.28.37. Abraham of the intended wrongs of Abimelech, Gen. 20.7.18. a zealous Prophet on jeroboam, whose hand he withered, 1 King. 13.4. Moses on Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, whom the earth swallowed, Numb. 16. Lot on the Sodomites whom he first blinded, Gen. 19.11. and then burned, V 24. as he did Valens the Arrian in a Shepherd's Cottage, the great enemy to S. Basil, 
a Apud Marcell. lib. 3. Hist.  so he avenged the Counsel of Chalcedon on their grand enemy Anastasius whom he smit with a Thunderbolt, Eutropius, lib. 3. cap. 5. Azariah the high Priest, on presumptuous Vzziah, whom he smit with Leprosy, 2 Chron. 26.20, 21. Athanasius on Constantius the Arrian Emperor, whom he cut off in great distraction of mind, 
Idem Hist. lib. 12. Amb. lib. 5. Epist. 52.  S. Ambrose on Valentinian his persecutor, who was hanged by his own servants, Gregory the best Roman Bishop of those that succeeded him, on Mauritius the covetous Emperor slain by Phocas a cruel coward 
d Blondus lib. 3. decade. , with many more which might be enumerated in all times and ages, the Lord ever siding with his Zion, his Militant Church, against all her malignant opposers, as he did with his Christ her Head and Husband against Herod, the Scribes, the Pharisees, Annas and Caiphas, chief on Pilate, who hanged himself after his disgraces with Tiberius and Caius, as their Tragedies are recorded, not only by Eusebius, Hist. lib. 2 c. 7. and Nicephorus, lib. 2. c. 10. but even by the Paganish Writers of the Olympics of the Greeks.  
Now is this no fruit from a foe, that as his wrongful, undeserved, unprovoked hatred and opposition shows thee (as I have proved) to be Christ's friend, so reciprocally Christ to be thy friend: as Pylades was to Orestes, as well as Orestes to Pylades 
e  praestem Piladem aliquis mihi praestat Orestem.  Nisus to Euryalus, Titus to Gisippus, as well as Euryalus to Nisus, Gisippus to Titus, according to the rule, ut ameris amabilis esto, love begetting love, as one candle lights another, one burning coal kindles another, yea, as Naphtha is said to take fire at the near approach of fire: and is Christ's friendship barren of golden, of gracious fruits? Can a true friend indeed, an alter ego, a second self, a Philadelphus, a sworn brother, a friend and a brother, in the bond of blood, in the nearest link of love, as Christ is to his Church, Heb. 2.12, 17. stand by and see his friend need and bleed, yea in the paw of a Wolf, or a Lion, or in the fangs of a mad Dog, or on the horns of a Bull of Basan, and he administer no help from a strong and an armed arm? Can a father, though as stern as a Manlius, or a Brutiu, do this to a child, if there be any storge or spark of affection in him, if he do not more stupidly than a Stoic or stock, hominem exuere, put off all that speaks him man, like a brutized monster? yea, can a Husband do this that loves his Wife in the nearest and dearest union, which Tully himself makes marriage, in his book of friendship. Now was there ever any Father loved a Child as Christ doth all his Children by adoption, who cry Abba, Father, Rom. 8.14, 15. Did Abraham ever so love his Isaac, his son by nature and by promise, as Christ doth every believer the son of Abraham by faith, Gal. 3.7. as Zacheus was called, Luke 19.10. Was there ever in the best improvement of love, such a near and dear union and communion of moral love, betwixt Solomon and Hiram, Agamemnon and Nestor, Theological love, betwixt Basil and Nazianzene, Augustine and Alipius, Eusebius and his Pamphilus, natural love betwixt Jacob and joseph, Helena and her Constantine, Matrimonial love betwixt Jsaac and Rebecka, Elkanah and Anna, Admetus and his Alcestis, Brutus and his Portia, Collatinus and his Lucrece, as betwixt Christ and his espoused and contracted Church, and every living and loving member of the same? Hos. 2.19. Eph. 5.23.24.32. now thou art engrafted into Christ as a wild Olive by nature into a good Olive tree, Rom. 11.24. and in him brings forth much fruit, John 15.4, 5. this is one fruit amongst the rest which grows on the tree of thy penitence and patience, that if thou stand for Christ, for his Truth, for his Religion, as once that Athanasius called the Atlas of the Faith, he will be sure to stand for thee, and to be with thee as thy Champion, and deliver when thou passest through the waters, and through the rivers that they do not overflow thee, as he was with Moses, and Aaron, and Israel in the red Sea, Exod. 14. and with Noah in the first universal Deluge, Gen. 7.1. and he will be with thee when thou walkest through the fire, as he was with the three Jewish Martyrs in the furnace, Dan. 3.25. and with S. john in the furnace, into which Domitian cast him, 
a Tert. in praescrip. adversus Haeret.  according to his promise to all true Israelites, the spiritual sons of jacob, Esay 43.1, 2, 3. yea he will be with thee as he was with wrestling and conquering jacob, Gen. 32.24. when any Laban or Esau comes against thee for any intended mischief; Oh assure thyself he will be with thee when thou art amongst Lions, as he was with Daniel, cap. 6. and when thou fightest with such beasts as Paul fought with at Ephesus, 1 Cor. 15.32. with Bears as David, 1 Sam. 17. with young Lions as Samson, Judg. 15. and with men whose tongues are swords and sharp arrows, and under whose lips is the poison of Asps; yea if thy enemies with the horn of their power push thee into prison he is with thee there also, as with joseph, in Putiphars Goal, Gen. 29.21. with jeremy in the dark Dungeon, Jer. 32.2. with Paul and Silas in the Philippian Prison, Act. 16.25, 26. yea with pious Philpot, once in the Bishop of London's Coal-hole, and with that Martyr in Mr. Fox his martyrology, who writ from his prison his delectable Paradise in Algiers, yea if thou be'st exiled and banished from thy house and harbour, he is with thee where ever thou art racketed and bandied, as he was with Abraham in a strange Country, Gen. 12.7. with Isaac amongst the Philistines, Gen. 26.12.24. with Jacob in Padan-Aram, Gen. 20.43. and in Egypt, Gen. 47.27. yea if thou be'st led to execution and to suffering for his name's sake, to which there is a blessing pronounced, Mat. 5.12. he is with thee there also, as he was with Peter and Paul, crucified with their heads downwards, with Laurence roasted on a Gridiron, with Polycarpus, grinded to be pure Manchet for Christ, with the teeth of Lions, with Dagilla, Tecla, Quintilia, Petronella, pulled and torn in their flesh from the bone with burning Pincers, yea with our Q. Mary's Martyrs, sincere Saunders, blessed Bradford joyfully paying his vows in Smithfield, trusty Tailor skipping in joyful Levaltoes when he was near his burning sacrifice, godly Glover sensible of the approach of the Spirit, and with that young man who at the stake no sooner cried Sun of God shine upon me, but in a dark and gloomy day the Sun cast such gleams on him on a sudden, as astonished all the Spectators, yea as their last foe and enemy that is to be subdued is death, 1 Cor. 15.  
Christ according to his promise, Psal. 41.3. is with his Saints, they have him with old Simeon in the arms of their faith: and with Paul live and die by faith; both in their natural death as he was with Jacob bowing and worshipping on his sick bed; and with Theodosius, Augustne, Ambrose, Luther, Calvin, Oecalampadius and others, whose last spiritual breathe, with Spirits surrendered into their Father's hands, are recorded to exultation and admiration by Grineus in his Apothegmata morientium, amongst his Thesis in quarto, as also he is with them in the most virulent & violent deaths, which cruelty and tyranny can invent; as he was with every one of his Apostles, who were martyred (excepting S. John) whose acts, lives and glorious deaths, are fully recorded to any that will for consolation and imitation peruse them in Eusebius his first book of Histories cap. 25. his second book, cap 1. his third book. cap 1. his ninth book cap 1. Nicephorus his second book cap. 40. his fourth book cap. 7. Sabellicus his seventh book Eneid. 4. Russinus his first book cap. 9 Hierom in the life of Paul, the Magdeburgians in their Centuries, Cent. 1. lib. 2. cap. 10. and Hosiander their Epitomiser, Cent. 1. lib. 2. cap. 30. which I allege as Inns by the way, where the learned reader may drink if he will, the unlearned pass by them if he like them not.  
The result of all is this, if thou be a Believer, (for I have Cordials only for such as corrosives to the slaves of sin and Satan) if thou hast such relations to Christ as I have touched upon, as to a head, a husband a father, a friend, then let who will be the rod in God's hand to afflict thee, the instrument or executioner to torment thee, be they Achitophel's and haman's for pestilent plots, Judasses' and Joabs' for treachery, Nero's, Caligulaes', and Periander's, for cruelty, Serpents for subtlety, Lions for power, Foxes for policy, though they spin never such Spider's webs to catch thee, set never so covered snares to entrap thee, though they despise thee, despite thee, vilify thee, nullify thee, revile thee, peesecute thee, and hunt thee as Saul did David, as jezabel did Elias, and Pope Leo Luther, though they defame thee and slight thee, as the false Apostles did Paul, as the Pharisees did Christ, as the Arrians the Orthodox Christians, as the Papists all Protestants, some calling their very hounds by the name of Luther, Calvin, and the like, as the mad and unwormed whelps of Cerberus, our Familists, Fantastics, new Seekers and Anabablers, term now all zealous and judicious Divines no better than black Dogs barking in Pulpits, in Steeple and Stone Churches, as Satan speaks in them as at first, so still in Serpents: I faith, if they could hate thee, and howl at thee more than julian the Apostate, Porphiry and Lucian the Atheist against thy incarnate Saviour, yet nevertheless I can give thee this mirth in mourning, joy in tribulation, light in darkness, rejoicing in suffering, Act. 5.40. 1 Cor. 4.9, 10. honour in thy disgrace, 1 Sam. 2.30. and such an Ariadnees thread to bring thee out of the mazes and Labyrinths of their perturbations, (as I have given Cordials for every other cross in the end of my seven helps to Heaven) that thou mayest be sure of a good issue in a victorious Trophy and Triumph over all thy enemies, if thou canst but rest and rely by faith and affiance on the Lord of Hosts, who fights in thee, with thee, and for thee, as he fought in and for David against Goliath, 1 Sam. 17.45. in and for jonathan against the Philistines, 1 Sam. 14.6. for Gideon against the Midianites, Judg. 7.20. for jehosaphat against the Amorites and Syrians, 2 Chro. 20.12.13. in and for Abraham against five Kings, Gen. 14.13. in and for Joshuah against the Canaanites, Jos. 1.5. cap. 5.14. in and for Abiah against Idolatrous Jeroboam, 2 Chron. 13.9, 10. in and for Asa, who relied on him against the Lubims and Ethiopians, 2 Chron. 16.8. in and for Barak and Deborah, against Jabin and Sisera, Judg. 4. yea besides infallible Scripture instances, as he is the same God to day, yesterday and for ever, Heb. 13.8. semper praesenter hic & ubique potenter, as the great soul of the world, as Plato calls him ever present and resident with his Church, Mat. 28.20. ever near to them who draw near to him, Jam. 4.8. as a friend to help at a dead lift, even in the last exigent of extremity, which is usually his opportunity, even when a red Sea is before his Church, and a Pharaoh behind: so why can he not, why will he not deliver thee, yea this whole nation according to his promise, Jer. 18.4, 5. in his due time, since his hand is not shortened, Esay 59.2. as well free us from our inbred enemies to our Zion, to our grace and peace at home, as he delivered Rehoboam and all Israel from the Egyptian Shishak, a mighty foreign enemy abroad, could we act the same parts with them in godly sorrow which brings salvation, 2 Cor. 7.10. as we re-act their sins, yea, the very sins of Sodom, Ezek. 16.49. Esay 1.10. yea, though all things in Church and State seem to be luxate and disjointed, as a body without nerves and sinews, as once in Israel, when there was no King, Jud. 18.1. or as some say in Rehoboams time, when the green blades were preferred before the riper heads, the young counselling Phaeton's before the solid Senators, yea though all things, as some mutter, some vociferate, & utter, seem to be turned suique deque, topsie turvie, upside down, in our antipodized times by the wracks of war, as if a dish were turned with the bottom upward, and a ship with the sails downward, in such a Hysteron Proteron, as few Ages have ever seen, chief Plebeian Owls throwing down Eagles nests, Crows chattering, and Nightingales the sweet singers of Israel, silent, learned and Orthodox Buclarks Ciphers, and Dolts and Dorbells Figures, knowledge a mere mute, and ignorance a sounding Vowel, though never Consonant, Mechanical, blind arrogance perking into Moses his Chair, with as much peril to mushroom ungifted, uncalled usurpers, both to their own souls and others, as once to leprous Vzziah intruding into the Priest's Office, 2 Chron. 26. to Vzzah in staying the tottering Ark without a call, 2 Sam. 6. to Nadab and Abihu, in offering strange fire, Leu. 10.1, 2. and to Dathan, Korah and Abiram resisting proudly and rebelliously Moses and Aaron, Numb. 16. as though they were dropped out of the clouds to curb, yea to crush both Magistracy and Ministry, which took too much upon them, and that they had such a flash and flux of Revelations to guide and govern both themselves and others for life and Doctrine, that Christ as Office perdie, clean out of Office, unable or unwise to rule Church or Commonwealth by his Powers or Ordinances secular or spiritual, might take them back again to heaven if he would, and lock them as Aeolus the disturbing winds into his own closet, they had no more need of them then the Ephesians had of Paul's Gospel, when they would cry up their Diana, Act. 17. then Idolatrous Israel had of Moses when they caused Aaron to set them up a golden Calf of their own making, Exod. 32.3. then john a Leyden, Knipperdolin, and Munster had need of any other warrant from the word, but Revelations for massacring a hundred thousand Commons besides Nobles in their Rustic Belgic War, or then the Fratricelli, the Flagellants, the Beguardines, the Familists, the naked Adamites of latter times in Germany and Italy, with the Enthusiasts and David-Gorgians, the Swinekfeldians, and the Anabaptists, Michael Servetus in Geneva, Gentilis in Berne, jack Cade, Wat Tiler, and Straw in England, Ket the blasphemous Arrian in Norfolk, Hacket once in London, yea Montanus and Priscilla, who both hanged themselves in Tertullia's time, the Donatists and Circumcellians in Augustine's time, or any that would set up thirteen or fourteen Religions in one Kingdom against one Truth, one Christ, one Salvation, Joh. 14.6. Eph. 4. all as erroneous as the Jews Thalumd or Tucks Koran, and with as much warrant, as to grant thirteen wives to one husband, thirteen Suns in one Firmament, thirteen Kings in one Land, should for all their folly, fantasticalities, blasphemies, and heresies of old, from hell new varnished, stand any more in need of the Word, of Scripture, Counsels, Fathers, or Schools of the Prophets, then of a sixt-finger Revelations and a pretended spirit, like the Pope's all-commanding unerring Authority in his Chair must be the Domine fac totum, that which strikes with the great hammer hits the nail on the head, the great Apollo, the Ipse dixit the deciding Judge, the Oracle of truth; though from a Diabolical Delphos from which there is no appeal, like Hercules his pillars, nè plus ultra, now I say though in such Apostatising in part or whole, many have forsaken their first faith, fallen from their first love, set up strange Gods, strange Idols, even as Israel in Rehoboams time were said to forsake the Law of the Lord, and the Lord to forsake them, 2 Chron. 12. yet there is hope in Israel, as repentance hath ever won what sin hath lost, as may be seen in Manasses, 2 Chron. 33.9, 10, 11, 12. in Nebuchadnezar, Dan. 3. in the Ninevites, jonas 3. in Peter, and oft in sinning and repenting Israel, judg. 3.9 cap. 6.7. cap. 10. v. 10.  
So had we but Ninevehs and Rehoboams humiliations, 2 Chro. 12.6. why might not we have their exaltations? if we could sow in tears, why might we not reap in joy? Psa. 126.6. if we have a wet seed time, why might we not have a hopeful harvest? if we did mourn, why might we not yet be comforted? Mat. 5.4. why might not all things prosper as in Rehoboams time, ver. 12. and go well with us, and with our posterity? why might we not have Halcyon days after all these storms and clouds? why might not our Horizon clear after all these showers of blood? why might we not, like a bone that is broke and right knit, be stronger than ever we were, both with God and man? Psal. 51.8. could we with Jacob wrestle with God, we should prevail with men yea with our foes, with ourselves being our own foes, as I hope by degrees to manifest, Gen. 32.28.  
Let the conclusion of this pressed point be this, let us turn like Jordan and the red Sea backward, all the stream and torrent of our hostility and hatred one to another, against ourselves and our own sin, which only make us odious unto God, which are only the Ates and Hags, which throw the balls and brands (as Adultery betwixt man and wife) of division betwixt God and us, Esa. 59.2. take away the cause, and the effect will cease; take the mote out of the eye, the thorn out of the heel, the thief out of the candle, the eye leaves watering, the heel rankling, and the candle smoking: let us cast our refractory Jonasses out of the Church, achan's out of the camp, Achitophel's out of the Court, Sinon's and Heretical Simon Magusses out of our Cities, self-seekers, finger-lickers, pence-spongers, state-caterpillars, corrupt Officers out of place and grace, both in City and Country, chief every man hue every Agag in pieces at home, mortify his own lusts, put the sacrificing knife of the word and spirit to his bosomed Delilah, his own bewitching domineering sin that most reigns in him, or as an entertained spirit is his familiar; and so all remoras & obstructions removed, the chamber of our hearts furnished for Christ's cohabitation, Joh. 14.23. Rev. 3.20. as he lodged with Zachous, Luke 19 then he that is the Lord of our Castles will be sure to keep them, the strong armed man being thrown out, Luk. 11.22. we need no more than fear foes spiritual or corporal, foreign or domestic, than one, of the sons of Anak, or a Briarcus fears a pygmy, than Ajax or Ashilles feared babbling Thersites: will men both cominus and eminus, in offensive and defensive wars, fight for their own rights, and possessions: and will not the Lord of Hosts hold his own in us? will a Spaniard keep a Hold or Fort with tenacity, that he once possesseth? and as Jepthah told the King of Ammon, Jud. 11.24. will every man hold his own, and keep that which God hath given him, and will not God hold his own? if we be his, will he suffer men to swallow us up quick, as the great Whale did jonas? if God command us not to forsake our friend and our father's friend, Prov. 27. he that hath been a friend to our father Abraham, and to David, and delivered them out of all their troubles, Psal. 139.1. if we insist in Abraham's steps, Rom. 4 12. and be of the spiritual House and heart of David, Zach. 12.10. he will also deliver us as he did them, according to his purpose and promise, Psa. 34.18.19. he will not fail thee nor forsake thee, more than he did joshua, cap. 1.5. Heb. 13.5. he will lift up himself, and his strength against thine enemies, Psal. 7.6. he shall turn them backward, Psa. 9.3. and break the arms of then power, Psa. 10.15. they shall fall into the pit that they have digged, and into the snare they have set for thee, as Faux, Garnet, Digby, and our Jesuited powder Traitors were catcht in their own snares, Psa. 9.10, 11. he will keep thee as the apple of his eye, and hid thee under the shadow of his wings, from the wicked that intreacheth thee, Ps. 17.9.10. though he come upon thee like a Lion greedy of his prey, v. 11.12. If God once arise, and be present with thee, thy enemies shall be scattered as the dust and chasse before the wind, they shall vanish as smoke, and melt as the wax before the fire, Psa. 68.1.2. though they come about thee like Bees, or like Thorns, they are but a blaze, they shall be extinct.  
Call thou upon God in the day of thy trouble, that's thy duty; he will deliver thee, that's thy dignity, Psal. 50.15. Will the Regal Lion lose life, but he will rescue his Whelps if he hear them yell? and will not the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, to whom vengeance belongs, Psal. 94.1. avenge the cause of his little ones, who cry night and day unto him? Did not the Romans, the Athenians, and all the Pagans fight to the death pro focis, for their wives and children, as well as pro Aris, for their Paenates, their house Gods! Oh! if the Greeks were so encouraged in their Ajax and Achilles, the Trojans in their Hector and Troilus, the Philistines in their Goliath? and most Nations in the Colyphonians (though mercenary, like our Swissers) if they could get them to stand for them? Shall not he that is armed cap a pe, with the shield and buckler of faith, be confident of a Trophy over every malignant enemy, external, internal and infernal, that fights under the banners of Jehovah Elohim, the great Commander and disposer of all created powers and natures, Angelical, humane and belluine, from the Lion to the Worm, and the wretched Wren who can do a thousand times more for his friends and favourites, than ever Achilles for his Patrocius, whose death he so revenged; or Hercules for his Theseus, or Pirotheus, not being able to save himself from the plots of Nessus the Centaur, no more than Samson (the Jewish Hercules) from the complotings of his Harlot and the Philistines against his life and liberty, jud. 16.20. so unhappy is all humane power and strength (as all may see in these two broken glasses) if God once leave it, as the Germane Phoenix Melancthon hath well observed: so happy are all those true Israelites, truehearted nathanael's, patrizing with Abraham, to whom God hath made a promise, that he will bless those who bless them, and curse those who curse them, Gen. 12.3. there being as it were a covenanted League (as now betwixt two Nations, and oft betwixt the Romans and their Confederates) betwixt Christ and his Church, mutually to aid one another in all essays and assaults. Oh! if the Saints be blessed who offer themselves willingly to help the Lord, judg. 5.9.23. it's no question of the other auxiliary; God will never be wanting to help them, secundum necessitatem, non voluntatem, according to their necessity, when God will, not according to their own will, (which is now the case of our English Zion) forbeggers must be no choosers: Novit Medicus, non agrotus, our Physician knows better than we, poor impatient Patients, how and when to balm our long Phlebotomized bleeding times from our regnant crimes: we must not indent nor articulate with the King of Kings, nor limit the Almighty by our prescriptions, as did the Bethulians, judith 7.30, 31. and that wicked Iehoram, 2 King 6.33. it is enough that he will not always be ploughing, and that the rod of the wicked shall not always be upon the godly, but at last be burned, when his peccant children are scourged and humbled, upon his promises of deliverance, tandem aliquando, at his good leisure and pleasure, not at ours: In the interim, let every perplexed spirit work upon this meditation, (even parallelling parvis magna, the strong God with the weak arm of flesh:) that if the Romans put such successful confidence in their Manlius, the defender of their Capitol; in their Camillus, languishing Rome's restorer; in their Marcellus, Rome's sword; in their Fabius, Rome's Atlas against Hannibal, the Greeks in their Themistocles, the prop and pillar: in their eloquent and thundering Orators Demosthenes and Pericles, and of latter times the French in their Huon of Bourdeaux, their great Virago Jean de Pucill, but chief in their Charles the son of Pipin, called the Hammer of their enemies; as the Germans in their Otho the fourth, called for his victories, Mundi miraculum, the wonder of the world; as the Hungarians once in their Hunniades and Mathias, with others, whose Martial exploits are famoused in Plutark, Livy, A. Gellius, 
a Lib. 2, cap. 11.  Sabellicus, 
b Lib. 6. Aeneid. c. 13  Aventinus, 
c Lib. 3. annal.  Pontanus, 
d De Fortitudine.  Fulgosus, Alex. ab Alexandro, lib 2. c. 11. and others, yea if our English were sometimes so confident in the glories of our Nation, our Bevis of Hampton, our Prince Arthur and his Knights, our Edmond son of Etheldred, called Iron sides, our Guy of Warwick the Conqueror of Corinaeus, and other subduers of men and monsters, yea, if we that were lately stormed and distressed in the Land of Ire by the numerous Rebels, were so happy in the ever successful valour and Heroic resolves of that undaunted Sir Charles Coot, the scourge Kerne as his Anagram bears it, and the terror to the Rebels, as Richard the first once to the Turks, and our Talbot to the French, whose very name put them into a panic fear, and made them fly as tripping Does and Rascals before our Martial Beagles into Tyrones old Forts of Woods and Bogs.  
I say, if there have been such helps, such hopes in all Ages, in arms of flesh, in frail men, whose breaths were in their nostrils when God pleased to animate them, as Organs of doing good, or preventing evils in some States and Commonwealths, than rousing our hearts a little higher, how much more hope and affiance ought we to place in the fountain of strength, then in the streams? in the root and strong bowl, then in the weak and broken branches? in the primitive power, then in the derivative? in him that both in the Abstract and Concrete is both powerful and power itself, both mighty and might itself, even omnipotent as well as omniscious, and omnipresent, who as by speaking but a word he made the heavens, Gen. 1.15. calmed the Seas, turned the red Sea backward, Exod. 14.22. stayed the raging of the waves and winds, Mat. 8.26. cast out Devils, Mark 1.26. cured the Lepers, Mark 1.40. raised the dead, Joh. 11.43, 44. recovered the Centurion's servant, Mat. 8.8. healed all diseases, Mat. 9.2.29. so if he speak but the word he can sheathe the sword, it shall not drink a drop of blood more: if we could but turn to him as we are enjoined, with rend hearts and broken, as corn in a Mill, and pepper in a Mortar, Joel 2.12. Psa. 51.17. we should by turning our mirth into mourning, Jam. 4.9. so turn his frowns into favours, his judgements into mercies, that in a trice his ear being not heavy to hear, Esa. 59.2. more than in the like cases with ours, 1 Sam. 7.6, 7, Judg. 2.5, 6, 7. & cap. 20.26. with one word he would turn our storms into calms, our wars into peace, our sighs into songs of deliverance; yea our Swords into Scythes, our Iron Helmets into Bee Hives, our instruments of cruelty into instruments of mercies, our Mars into Minerva, our Martial Guns into Gowns: were but we turned as once Saul to Paul, Act. 9.6. from Wolves to Lambs, from Goats to Sheep, from Newtralls and Laodiceans too anchored Zealists, yea from Lions and rearing Tigers, to Kids, living and loving together in a peace, inseparably married unto grace, Esa. 11.6, 7, 8. Oh! could we with the old year cast away the old man, which is corrupt, and old fashions and deceivable abominable lusts, Col. 3.9. Eph. 4.22. Rom. 12.2. and with the new year put on Christ the new man, and be renewed in the inner man, Rom. 13.14. Eph. 4.23, 24. as the Serpent casts off his old slough, the Stag his old head, the Colt his old hair, the Lobsters their old shells, the Eagle her old bill, whereby her age reneweth, and some men, women and children their old teeth, (rather than their old tongues) could we thus cast off our abominations, Ezek. 18.31. our lying vanities, Jon. 2.8. our heart Idols, Esa. 31.7. our works of darkness, Rom. 13.12. with hatred and indignation, in loathing and leaving every sin, the true signal of saving repentance, 2 Cor. 7.10.11. how soon then would God cast all our transgressions into the grave of his son, into the midst of the Sea as a millstone, Micah 7.19. how soon would he make an act of oblivion, Ezek, 18.22. of all our former Delinquencies, how soon (contrary to the nature of Foes, but superficially reconciled) would he write our enmity in dust, our repentance in brass? were we but once cast in a new mould, as old metals broke melted and renewed, to ring better peals of prayers, and praises, how soon should we be cast into the arms of his mercies, that by a justifying faith having peace with him, Rom. 5.1. by our grand peacemaker, Eph. 2.14. we should soon have peace one with another, though as yet there is no peace to the wicked, saith my God, Esa. 57, 21. neither let us ever expect it, or delusively dream of it, so long as the Whoredoms and Witchcrafts of so many Jezabels continue, 2 King. 9.22. of he and she, false Prophets, Rev. 2.20. as by such old Heresies new conjured up from hell, and such new phantasms and fopperies as Angels and men fierce ever heard before, the souls of so many millions are so poisoned, their minds so distracted, and their intestine hatreds so inflamed one against another, more than ever the Samaritans against the Jews, Joh 4.9. that Timpler, Althusius, Arnisaeus, Tholosanus, Bodin the Frenchman, our English Case, and all Politicians within the sphere of my reading, should be deceived, if Schisma Ecclesiasticum an Ecclesiastical Schism, as it is now the mother, so it do not continue as in all States where it kindles her wildfires) the Nurse seminary and fuellizer of Schisma Politicum, of perpetuated factions, fractions, distractions, and (Germany tells us) destructions also in our Commonwealths, and for my part I wish my predictions might prove as false, as they will be slighted, though as true as those of Laomedon, Chalcas and Cassandra, which were not believed, till supine secure and incredulous Troy were fired, that the Toleration of many Religions in one Kingdom, which some would thrust in upon us by head and shoulders, invita Minerva, without one breathing of the Spirit from the word, or the least glimpse of Conscience grounded on Science, Conscientia cordis scientia, taking light from the unerring Scriptures, as the Moon from the Sun, without which it is but like a Papal Purgatory, a Triton, a Chimaera, an opinion at best, or a phantasm, that such a Toleration of Liberty as the Libertines in Belgia once pleaded, and planted at last in blood, in the Rustic war, will bring any more peace amongst us, then betwixt Menclaus and Paris, striving for one Helena; or betwixt the true Mother and the false in Solomon's time, contesting for one Child; or betwixt Caesar and Pompey, bandying bloody blows for one Supreme Power; or betwixt the seven Cities that contested for one Homer; or then was in Rome Papal, when three Anti-popes', siring the whole Christian world, run at Tilt for one Triple Mitre; or then was betwixt Henry Monmouth, the right Heir to an Albion Crown, and Richard the Usurper, when the sword decided the undivided Sceptre in Bosworth field: yea, no more probable peace amongst many Religions, or indeed many painted errors, vanities, and gross Heresies, if not such blasphemies as in the Jewish Thalmud, or Turkish Alcoran, which (as our late powder Treason, the Irish Rebellion, Absaloms' conspiracy, Ahabs assasinating of Naboth, 
Read instances in Tholosanus de rep. lib. 13. pag. 878. c. 7. pag. 909. c. 8.903, 904, 905. Bodin de rep. lib. 7. c. 7. pag. 547. Eusebius lib. 2. c. 13. Scorates lib. 5. hist. c. 16.  Herod's intensive butchering of the Bethlehem Babe, and the most pestilent plots and designs for vile and sinister ends, ever amongst Jews, Turks, Christians and Pagans, have ever been palliated and cloaked and vailed in the habit of Religion, and in the helmet of holiness and honesty.  
I say all these Hydra-headed errors, different from truth, and from themselves, will no more gain or retain any peace, with one true Orthodox and Uniform Religion, than there was peace amongst the diversified lustful Lovers of one Penelope, all hating Ulysses her legal husband, as well as one another; or than peace betwixt Agamemnon and Achilles, about Briseis; Troilus and Diomedes about one Cressida; Turnus and Aeneas about one Lavinia: alas such Peace, (as any may foresee a storm, that sees the pendent pitchy Cloud,) as hath been ever among the Turkish Ottomans, when he that prevailed in the Throne, whether justly or unjustly, ever either imprisoned, exoculated, or executed all the rest of the Blood-royal, as Abimelech the bramble, dealt with all his Brethren, the sons of Gideon, Judg. 9.5. and Jehu with all the sons of Ahab, 2 Kings 10.17. or such Peace between Heresy and Truth as will set all on fire, Luk. 12.47. as would be between 6 or 7 Cocks of the game in one Pit, where they will either be all victors, or all die, though upon no other quarrel then Ambition, which domineers in Beasts and men, but most in men metamorphosed to Beasts, by being brutized either by lusts in their life and conversation, or drunk with errors and strange opinions, as a Crow with Nux vomica; even to reeling, and staggering, and occasioning or causing a whole Kingdom to reel, stagger, and totter with them to probable ruination, quod omen avertat Deus: which to prevent, let us halt no more betwixt two opinions, nay betwixt more opinions than colours in the Rainbow, if not then Argus eyes in the Peacock's train: if every Babylon and every Baal, every reared Dagon, be God or for God, or from God, adhere to it, 1 Kin. 18.21. but if God be God, and there be but one God, ipsissima veritas, as one essential soul, saving truth, and but one true way of worshipping this God, in spirit and truth, John 4.23, 24. as there is but one soul and spirit in man to be saved by this right worship, without will worships, Papistical, Pharisaical, or Schismatical, and if this God will admit no corrivals in a Church or state (as was told the Roman Senate, that Christ would have no copartnership with their Paganish Gods,) yea if this God hate all ploughing with an Ox and a Horse, all sowing with miscellanian seeds, all linsey-woolsey weavings; all compounded, interwoven, intermixed Worships in a hotchpotch, and a galleymawfrey Religion, as he is a pure and simple Spirit, no more mixing with false Spirits of lies and errors, than fire with water, oil (which ever swims above) with any poisoned liquids: if it be thus with God, then let my pen, as well as tongue, in press, pew, and Pulpit, preach to all John-indifferents, all Sceptics, all Seekers for any new Religion, as if they went yearly or monthly to Poland, or Amsterdam, or Holland, to seek a new one, or were white paper, fit to take any print or blot, or wax for any seal, new vessels for any seasoning, sweet or sour, with wine or vinegar: let me say to such, even what Christ preached to Satan himself, who is a liar in the tongues of Heretics, as well as a murderer in the swords of Tyrants, John 8.44. do thou worship the Lord thy God, and him only do thou serve, Mat. 4.10. so shalt thou gain such figs from thistles, such fruits from foes, both to thy body and soul, goods, goodness and good name, that though the Land should be dark like Egypt, yet thou shalt find a lightsome Goshen in thine own soul, Exod. 10.23. thy fleece should be wet like gideon's, with the dews of grace, though the whole Kingdom should be as dry and barren as the sands of afric: thou shouldst be as a cube or square, undique quadratus, to fall right and strait, which way soever the many headed multitude moved, right or wrong; thou shouldst be fixed as the two poles, the Axhurried as in a rattling Coaeltrees of Heaven, which way soever the scopperill and whirligig times did volve and roll, thou shouldest cast the Anchor of truth in our tempestuous seas, in the high swollen waves of all windblown-opinions, ruffling in such fierce and furious opposition; yea if thy ways do please the Lord, thy enemies shall be at peace with thee: Let these curative cordials, be as words spoken to the weary in dueseason, let them be as apples of gold, with pictures of silver to refresh him who saith with Gideon, if the Lord be with me, why then is all this evil befallen me? Judg. 6.13. why go I thus heavily oppressed with my foe? as Hannah was provoked by her adversary, to make her fret, 1 Sam 1.6. how long shall mine enemy be exalted over me, Psa. 13.2. how long shall my false familiar friend, my Junior Achitophel plot mischief against me? yea, being unequallly yoked with a Zipporah, or a Xantippe, my uxor, my vexer, how do I wear a straight pinching shoe, yet unless I go barefoot and wear upon the hoof, I cannot put it off, no more than the horse in the Fable could put out of his mouth the kerbing bit, or throw off the saddle of servitude which man his rider and derider put upon him, when he was once as free as the wild Stag and Buck upon the wide mountains, ere he foolishly vassalized himself, like an infranchized freeman made a slave? Oh how long shall I hold a Wolf by the ears, if I hold him he bites, if I let him go and resist him, he worries? how long shall I be hurried as in a rattling Coach, or tossed ship, which way I would not: yet if I leap out, I break my leg or neck by land, or drown by sea? quo me vertam nescio, do what I can, I fail betwixt Scylla and Charybdis, I split on one rock or other: my proposed salves will be as ill as my sores, like Androdus the Roman: I am fed as in the Lion's Den; all the ways I project to help myself, seem to me as desperate as to him who cut off his great Toes to cure the Gout, yea, leaping as it were out of the frying-pan into the fire, like to the Flounder, a malo ad pejus, from evil to worse; for escaping (with such difficulty and danger, as the Hare from the Hounds) from the Irish Cannibals and Nimrodians, thinking here to swat & tapez safely, I have in two or three places sheltered myself as the sheep under brambles and briers with some torn fleece, if not flesh; and at this instant I and my poor perishing Children, roasting as at a lingering sire, and dying and consuming by degrees, as Lamps go out wanting Oil; we cry for bread as hungry Birds to their Dams, and children to dry nurses, yea as Prisoners in Ludgate to Adder's ears: while the corn (saith vox populi) to feed us reaped in a silver Harvest in Holland and in England, is either (as is vox loculi) put into private poakes, from whence like the prey in the Lion's paw, there is reductio perimpossibile, or elf diverted another way, as if Peter should be robbed to pay Paul; and further this is my misery, that though venture non habet aures, the belly hath no ears, and those that grieve must groan; yet if hunger the worst of all plagues as Homer calls it, find but a complaining tongue, it's probable to get me a bolted heel: if I do but vent my mind, my wind, like the Whale and the Otter in the water, and the Moal above the Earth, I may be struck with the sharp spear of construction or correction. Oh is there any hope in Israel for these harms? any balm in Gilead for these griefs? any Mithridate for these maladies, miseries? any Roses from these pricks, cries Pierce Penniless) Oh yes: for if we believe Dioscorides Dodoneus, & Sir F. B. Centuries, Roses grow best and smell sweetest, near unto strong scented Onions and Garlic, yea we see amongst Nettles and Thorns: and it is observed by Herbalists, that those Roses that are without pricks, as your wild Cop-roses in corns, and Canker-roses in hedges, are ill scented and good for nought, base (as excellent Emblems of prosperity and adversity) in respect of those with pricks, excellent in colour, odoriferous in smell, which though they oft grow low, and amongst thorns, yet exceed your canker-roses high bloomed in hedges, as much as a scale weighed down with gold is above a scale filled with feathers and fuzballs, which flurts up like some light heads, from low barns, chairs and tubs, as high as Ezra's pulpit, Nehem. 8.4.  
O it is a comfortable truth, which is affirmed and confirmed from many examples in all ages by the best Belgic Divines, 
a Melancthon in postillis part. 4. pag. 4.37. & in locis, fol. 466.  Luther 
b Pag. 241.  in his Colloquies; Strigellius in his Chronicles 
c Part. 1. pag. 351. part. 2. p. 51  Sigfridus Saccus in his Postils 
d Part. 1. pag. 126. , with others; that as Roses grow the best with pricks and among thorns, Onions best and biggest in storms and tempests 
e Pezelius de Margaritis c. 3.  the Palm tree (according to Pliny) in terra salsa & nitrosa, in a salt earth, and when it is most pressed with weight, according to the old verse,  
Nititur in pondus palma, & consurgit in altum,  
Quo magis & premitur, hoc mage tollit onus.  
Yea as it is green like the Laurel in winter as well as in Summer, and buds again succisa & emortua, when cut, and seemingly dead, with many other rarities in it, described by Camerarius 
g Cap. 84. pag. 472.  in his Centuries: so the Church of Christ, and every true Christian is and hath been ever more glorious under the Cross, under Tyrants, Sophisters and Heretics, (the three great pests and plagues of the Church now) as they have been ever, (if we believe Hemingius 
h In his Postils fol. 264.269.  Gualther 
i In Mat. cap. 23.  Strigellius 
k In Argum. Psal. 28. & 83. fol. 79.  and Melancthon 
l In his Postils part. 4. p. 585. ) then when it had most rest and peace, it increasing more, and budding more under Nero, Domitian, Decius, julian, Maximinus, Gensericus, Theodorick and other Pagan and Arrian persecutors, when it was watered and grew by the blood of the Martyrs, as both Tertullian 
m Plures efficimur quoties metimur. , and Eusebius 
n Lib. hist. 9 , yea experience have observed, then when it had most rest and peace under Constantine, and other Halcyon days of tranquillity, when Heresies were hatched like Summer Gnats in heats and Sunshines: and at last the Antichristian Pope, from ambition of Prelates and Patriarches for superiority 
o See Morney de progressu Papatus. , when Religion begot riches, and the daughter viperlike devoured the mother: when prosperity (like the Sun which caused the Traveller in Plutarch to cast off his cloak) made men cast off the true worship of God, and adversity (like the rain, which made him 
f Hist. lib. 13. c. 4.  buckle his cloak to him) caused men to cleave closer towards God, even as jacob was more glorious in his vision of Angels when he lay in the open fields with a stone under his head, then when he possessed Canaan, Gen. 28.11, 12. Noah more glorious penned a whole year in the Ark, preserved among wild beasts, then when he planted vines and was drunk, Gen. 7.1. c. 8.1. cap. 9.20, 21. so Joseph was most glorious in prison, where God revealed dreams unto him, Gen. 39 john in his exile in Pathmos, where he received Revelations, Rev. 1. The children of Israel in the red Sea, where they had their preservation, Exod. 14. In the wilderness, where Manna from heaven was their meat, and the rock gave them drink, Exod. 16. The captived Jews in Babylon, where God stirred them up such excellent Prophets, as Daniel, Ezekiel, Zachary, Haggai, and propagated his worship by them to Kings and Kingdoms. And as Christ himself was more glorious on the Cross, then when the Jews entertained him with their Hosannas, John 12.14. for then the Centurion, Luke 23.47. pilate's wife, Mat. 27.15. the darkness of the earth, Mark 15.33. the eclipsed Sun, Mat. 27.15. the earthquake, the opened graves, the veil of the Temple, and the rocks rend, vers. 51, 52. testified his innocency, as also judas his betrayer, Mat. 27.4. and the thief that was crucified and converted, Mat. 27.43. so if thou be a true disciple of this Master, a living member of this mystical Head, and not as a wooden leg, and a glassy eye, liveless and senseless: the more thy enemies seek to cloud thee, the more thou shalt shine, like stars in a dark night: the hotter the furnace of their wrath, the more shall the gold of thy Faith be purified: the more the winds blow, the more Oak like shalt thou be fixed and rooted in thy holy resolutions, 2 Sam. 6.20, 21. as David by the mocks of Michal: the more thy foes rub thee like a Pomander, yea pounce thee in the mortar of their malice, the spices of thy graces smell the sweeter: the more that Satan and his Organs winnow thee, the less chaff they leave in thee; the more thy Kitchin-sculs scum thee and scour thee as a vessel of Honour, the brighter they make thee: the tongues of these Dogs, these Cerberized whelps, do but medicinably lick the sores of thy sins, as once the ulcers of Lazarus; their Gall and Aloes doth but embitter the dugs of the world to thee, that Christ may be more sweet; these bugbears do but make thee cry and fly into the arms of thy Father, & faelix crux quae ducit ad Christum, it is a happy Cross which drives thee, yea draws thee nearer unto Christ; it is no matter how fierce and rough the winds be, that drive the loaden ship sooner and safer into her Haven, the Port of Peace.  
The conclusion of all is to prevent confusion, we may be wronged by others, hurt only by ourselves, others may plunder our goods, but so long as the flesh is sound the silver feathers may grow again, as in Jobs case, Job 42.10. the Devil himself could not hurt Job, nor his cursed wife, though called the Devil's Dam, Naomi that is empty may be full again, Ruth 1.21. however, thou runnest thy race never worse to heaven, though thou wantest thy trappings and golden Bosses, and though thou be'st in as great exigents as once David, 1 Sam. 21.3. & ca 25.8. and as Elias, 1 King. 17.12, 13. to beg thy bread of some Nabal, some poor Widow, yea as poor as Job on the dunghill, or as once Christ thy Master, Luk. 9.58. yet in all this not forsaken, Psa. 37.21. the Lord forsakes not his Saints, V 28. though the Lion's lack and suffer hunger, yet they shall not want, Psal. 34.10. though they gather but a little Manna it sufficeth, Exod. 16.18.20. godliness with contentation is enough, 1 Tim. 6.8. God can bless to them a little meal, a little oil in a cruse as to two poor Widows, 1 King. 17.13. 2 King. 4.2. a little pulse to Daniel, cap. 1.12.13. as sometimes a few Turnops and Potatoes, when we were besieged in Ireland as well as a stalled Ox. There is one Pearl even for a Prince which cannot be plundered, it adorns a Crown though beset with Thorns, and this Pearl is patience, a great possession unto all, as Christ calls it, Luke 21.19. a rich dowry to a Widow as poor as Ruth, a possession out of which the Devil himself could not dispossess Job, c. 1.22. withal, thou mayest be wronged in thy name, a Joseph may be falsely accused, a Cato, a Scipio, an Abner, a Themistocles, a Photion, a Socrates, yea the best Patriots and Patricians may be questioned, an Athanasius, an Eugenius, a Narcissus may be scandalised in life and Doctrine by the Arrians, as was Calvin, Beza, Luther, our best Belgic Divines, by Cocleus, Bolsecus, Scurrilous Kellison, Endemon, (Cacodaemon,) and other Romish Rabshakehs: but what of this? is an Eagle hurt by the chartering of a Crow? or a Lion by the yelps of a Cur? doth the Moon shine less though the Dogs of Egypt bark at it? can earthly or lunatic interpositions long eclipse the Sunshine of the Saints? we have heard of a Grandee which wished his man to call him Knave, and then shaked the lap of his Gown, and what was he worse for it? words are but wind, they break no bones, quid male feci, what evil have I done may any Plato say, that a bad man speaks well of me, de me male dicunt ast mali, God will do David good, even eo nomine, because Shimei reviles him, 2 Sam. 16.12.  
Besides thou art imprisoned, yea Paul and Silas may be so far wronged as whipped in prison, Act. 16. yet not hurt, these blessed Birds sing sweeter tones in their cages, v. 25. then ever the birds of Hanno or Sappho; thou mayest be also so fare wronged, as to be banished thy Country, and bandied, and racketed from post to pillar, and find no rest like Noah's Dove, to the sole of thy foot, yet not hurt, so long as thou findest rest in Christ, so long as the Spirit doth visit thee in thy Pathmos, Rev. 1.10, 11. omne solum forti Patria, the Sun shines every where, and God is found in every Country, indeed could thy foes banish God from thee, as thy sins do, thy worst foes, than thy case were lamentable, as once saul's, 1 Sam. 16.14. & cap. 28.15, 16.  
Lastly, thy foes may take away thy life, yet they hurt thee not, only sin hurts thee, that deprives thee of the life of grace and of the life of glory, that deads' thy soul here, Ephes. 2.1. Luk. 6.60. and damns it hereafter, Rom. 6.23. it is only sin the sting of death which hurts thee, 1 Cor. 15.55, 56. which sting being taken away by Christ, thou mayst put this stingless Bee in thy bosom, v. 57 death is to thee a sweet sleep, Esay 57.2. a blessed rest, Rev. 14.13. in Abraham's bosom, Luk. 16.22. in these and whatever else is obnoxious to humane nature, the Saints are Conquerors, Rom. 8.37. now did Conquests ever hurt a Caesar, a Pompey, a Lucullus, a Fabius? do all things health, wealth, poverty, sickness, life, death, friends, foes, work together for the good of the Elect, Rom. 8.28. as all the Physical Simples in a compound for the good of a Patient? all the Stars and Planets by their influence, for the good of these sublunary bodies? and can that which works for our good do us hurt, unless we hurt ourselves? as indeed we do, bringing the worst foes we have from home with us, yea carrying them about with us as Snakes in our bosoms to sting us, our sins our darling regnant unmortified sins bred in our souls, these and only these being the achan's in our Camps to disturb us, the Sinon's in our Cities, chiefly in our Troynovant, yea the Quoy-ducks, the dalilah's in our Families, our Chambers, our Closets, to betray us, the vipers which breed within our bowels, the worms within our entrails, the Flesh Wolves within our flesh which corrode us, yea kill us, the Cantharideses in our ointments to soil us, to spoil us, the Moths in our Garments to fret us, the Midianites amongst us to vex us, the Canaanites in our borders, as pricks in our sides and thorns in our eyes, Judg. 2.31. to torture us, to torment us: that of Chrisostome being to me oraculous, truer than from Delphos, that nemo laeditur nisi à seipso, hone is hurt but by himself, by his own sins, as Noah was drunk with his own wine, Gen. 9.22. Cambyses slain with his own sword, Marlowe stabbed with his own Dagger, so we are slain by our own lusts which fight against our souls, 1 Pet. 2.11. and vassallize us as they did Hercules, Samson, Alexander, Caesar, Hannibal, Achilles, and the greatest Conquerors, who were slaves to their own unlimited luxuries, as I could largely Historify them and Parallel our very postures and pressures with that fond horse in the Fable, bred near the smokes and fogs of some thick air, not on the pure airy Mountains with the wily Stag, who suffering man to ride him, being as free as the Buck, was so vassallized by man his rider and derider, that he could never yet for all his fretting at his own folly, put the kerbing bit out of his mouth, nor shake the saddle of subjection from his back.  
Oh! we are slaves to our lusts, as that great Alcides to his Dianira, to him Deiira, these are the Lord-Danes which rule us as by armed Law, either we cannot or will not resist them; these are to us like Traitors bred in the breasts and bosoms of Kings, yea as Favourites growing up by their Kings, as Ivies by strong Oaks, and Elder Trees in and by walls, yet bringing them down by whom they grew, and every way as fatal to them as jeroboam once to Solomon and his house, Cleander Phrix to Comodus, Philip Arabs to Gordianus, Calippus to Dion, Phocus to Mauritius, Gyges' to Candaulus, and our Court Ganymede Gaveston once to Edward the second, with many more recorded by Tholosanus in his Commonwealth, l. 22. p. 1403, 1409. Guicciardine in his Politikes, part 2. p. 94. and the French Bodin in his republic lib. 6. c. 5. p. 1154. with others, whose fates and falls to prevent, since a volumn might be multiplied, what States and Potentates such sins have ruinated, as are regnant at this instant both in our Church, State, Countries, and Cities; let us crush them as Cockatrices in their shells, and Serpents in their heads; let us put the sacrificing knife of the Word to their throats, and mortify them by the Spirit, Rom. 8.13. so killing these vipers that will otherwise kill us, we shall gain, and retain Grace and Peace with God, with man, and with ourselves, even Peace external, internal, eternal: chief let us close hastily, hearty with Christ our Peace, Eph. 2.14. with Simeon let us clasp him in the arms of an applying faith, Luke 2.28. than we shall be sure to find Sunshine in our Rains, songs in our sighs, calms after storms, peace after wars: in this Sun we shall have all light, in this Manna all meat, in this fountain all refreshing waters of life, John 4.10. in our dead times, Deus meus & omnia, said a Martyr) my God and all things, my Rock, Refuge, Sanctuary, and Salvation, Psal. 18.1. jesus esto mihi jesus, O Saviour be to me a Saviour, AMEN, AMEN.  
FINIS.   

Jan. 29. 1647.  
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Postscript to the candid Reader.  
THough the Authors eye is said to perfect the Press, as the Master's eye to fat the horse, yet some Erratas may scape the eyes of an Argus, as pag. 15. lin. 25. effects for affects, in such venials thou art desired to wink at small faults: as also, p. 32. and p. 37. the Fable of the saddled Horse, and the wily unsubjected Stag, are by our oversight twice reflexed upon, perhaps useful to some that read the Riddle right, though decies repetita, though to a too critical Carp-fish, bis repetita sordent. Others liking (as our Irish their Rainbow Butter above Venison) ought slubbered in Press or Pulpit in a Luxate stile, savouring of Gregory Nonsense better than aught relishing of Demosthenes' Lamp-oil, Lipsius his Multa paucis, or Chrisostomes' and Chrisologus golden tongues, or polished by Christ's own Scribe, prescribed to bring out of his treasure things old and new: before whom in this antipodized age, where light heels go up, and grave heads down, every green blads, though died black or block, is preferred, if but Lettuce for Schismatical lips. And to speak where the shoe pincheth, as just (or unjustly) now I comment what I writ Fruits of, and from Foes, though as the Swan and Peacock I am so conscientious to my black feet, that I am not proud of real or imaginary fair feathers, of too much reading History and eloquence, of which factious Hotspurs falsely would cry me so guilty, that as though store were a sore, for this they frisk from me, perhaps to some Doctor Dulman in a grey coat with a gross note, and on such frivolous pretexts go about to divorce me once more from my Brides, to whom I offer to demonstrate against all disputes, that above all Ministers I have as lawful a call as Collatine to his Lucrece, though any young Tarquin who had need stay at Jericho till his beard and brain be grown, should offer to ravish her from me, whose heart I have ten to one above any intruder, yea though his factious Favourites (like the fatal sons of Brutus) should arm his usurpations by a misinformed Parliamentary power, against my life or Doctrine, in causa inaudita, in defect of such a Justice as Nicodemus taxed in the Jews, and Paul found in Felix, Festus, and Agrippa, though Pagans, to be condemned ere I speak, yet once heard I here pawn that very blood which I have ventured for them more than any Preacher in three Climes, that I deserve more grateful regard and reward then by unjust divorcing me from my Ministerial marriage, to be exposed to scorn, impoverishing and persecutions verbal and real, yea to fly for means, without cause shown why, in the winter of the year, and of my years; If this be not summum jus, & dare veniam corvis, vexat censura columbos, I am like my successor Ignoramus: to say no more: yet jacta est alea, pejora tuli, majora meliora spiro spero. Hercules invidiam supremo fine domavit. Ah si fas dicere, sed fas— in utramque paratus,  
Resolute Hierom against the dissolute times.