The Life of Faith, Chapter 13
CHAP. XIII. An Epistle to the Reader pressing the vse of Faith.
NOw Reader, for so I chuse to call thee in a Postcript, whē thou hast reade the Booke, rather then in a Preface, when thou maist there leaue as many do. GiueGive me now leaue to grapple with thee, and minister to thee an Iutergatory or two.
How many doest thou knowe within thy conscience, liue this life of Faith? Many thou seest liue by their Lands, by their wits, by their shifts: but how many by their Faith? For the want of this vse of Faith, Doe not many poore christians thinke, and say of it, as a poore labouring countrey-man sayd to his neighbour in serious priuate talke, That he neuer beleeued there was any such summe as a thousand pounds of money, but that onelyonly rich men gaue it out so, in boasting, or pollicy to excite others to labour: so saith the common Protestant, out of doubt there is no such sweetnesse in the life of Faith: for wee see not beleeuers so cheerefull and contented aboue other men. If Attists and Trades-men did no more dayly and duely follow their worke, then most Christians doe practise their Faith, would they not be starke beggars? But to aske thee a more profitable question, Leaue iudgeing of others, and answer mee in good serious sooth between God and thy soule, Hast, and doest thou thy selfe liue by thy Faith? Let mee a little put thee to it, prooue and examine thy selfe, and take for instance this present weeke or day past wherein thou readest this little Manuell. How hast thou and vsually doest thou spend the day? what thought diddest thou awake withall? what was thy morning draught for thy soule next thy heart? what hath cheered and made thee merry in priuate and in company? whether thy sports and meales, more then thy heauenly ejaculations? Deale plainely, not with me and this booke (which yet shall witnesse against thee, if thou refuse to practise it when thou hast read it) but with thy selfe. Hast thou, or hast thou not challenged some time more or lesse, halfe, or quarter of houre at the least, for this exercise of thy Faith; hast thou not troubled thy selfe about the many things, that this one onelyonly needefull hath beene forgotten (that which only should be called worke and businesse) hast thou not melted the day, yea, it may bee the weeke, or monethmonth past, and made thy soule wholly to fast and pine for want of these refeshings: if so, as I most iustly feare it in most of my Readers, how much more in such as are vsually no readers? why then let thy heart smite thee for thy folly, smite thou thy selfe vponupon the thigh, and say, how hauehave I liued, or rather not liued, but consumed precious dayes in time-eating Vanities? How comes it about that the greatest part of my life is the least part wherein I hauehave liued.
Oh then recouer and recollect thy selfe before thou goe hence, and be no more. Wilt thou dy before thou hast liued, as Boyes slubber out Bookes before they learne their lesson. Oh learne to liue this life, It is neuer too late, it is neuer, I am sure, too soone; it is no shame to learne it what age or condition soeuer thou bee of. Bee thou Prince, Potentate, Nobleman or Gentleman, though few such Readers I looke for: remembring well what Bradford tels the Earle of Bedford, and Augustine tels Romanian, whiles hee was in the mouthes of all men, most honorable, most munificent, most fortunate, in the full of his prosperitie, in the source of pleasures in the toppe of greatnesse, &c. who durst lispe a word of a better life, of true happinesse, or what boote was it for any man to make mention of any such matter. Yet if any such God will perswade to make tryall of this life, thou which saist, what is a Gentleman but his pleasure? shalt then tell mee, as Salomon of his youth such gentry is but vanity; true pleasure there is none but in this life. What is a Christian but his Faith? and what is his life but the vse of his Faith? Beest thou a Scholler, a Prophet, or Sonne of the Prophets, what is thy worke? what is thy scope? or what should it bee in thy selfe and others, but this life of Faith? What is Paul or Apolloes but such as by whom you hauehave beleeued?1. Cor. 3. What euer you teach, before you hauehave taught this you were as good Preache to the stooles and stones of your Churches? What are your Auditors but dead bones, and skulles, till they, beleeue, and till Christ be formed in them. Get first an hold whereon you may fasten your Engines to drawe them to vertues and good workes. You which would doe that in soules which Elisha did in bodies, raise them from their graues: Interpretors one of a thousand get the tongue of the learned to declare their righteousnesse vntounto them, the righteousnesse I say of Faith: shew your selues skilfull workemen, such as hauehave been brought vp not onelyonly in moralls of the heathen, subtilties of Scholemen, sentences and conceipts of Postilers, rosaries, destructories, Anthologies, but in the wholesome word of Faith, which are the Arme and power of God to the saluation of eueryevery beleeuer. Aboue all let it be our wisedome to liue our selues by that which we teach others to liue by; wee that hauehave, or might, or should hauehave more Faith then common Christians, is it not a shame if we liue not more happily, and cheerefully then priuate Christians? not by our Liuings wherein the Laity hath now gotten the start of vsus for the most part, but by our Faith, wherein wee hauehave the aduantage of them, or else shame be it to vsus.
Is it not a shame to see an honor of a thousand pound a yeere liue as meanely as a poore Farmer, a Master and professor of an Art, as a meane practisioner. Yet this I must say euen to the meanest tradsmen and poorest people, this life belongs not to such onelyonly that are booke learned, but is equally obuious and open (as the Kings high way) to all sortes of Trauailers to Heauen. Honourable liues, Pompous liues, voluptuous liues, poore folkes hauehave small hope to atteyne vntounto: but a true happy life they may and doe liue as well as the learnedest Cleakes and greatest Princes, if they get the gift to practise that, which, such for the most part doe but study and talke of. To conclude, what euer thou art, or who euer that desirest to mend thy condition, to better thine estate, to multiply thy life, to change thy few and euill daies of thy pilgrimage, into good and many: behold here is the Art of liuing well and liuing long. Life is not to bee numbred by the houres, but measured by cheerfulnesse, as moneyes not by tale but value. A little peece of gold conteynes a great many peeces of siluer. Manhood consists not in the bulke of the bones, but in the mettall and spirits. Is not one weeke of an healthy man, better, then a yeere of a crasie; one Sunshine houre, then a gloomy day? I hauehave often mused how a man might come neerest to that life which Adam lost, and recompence in this latter age of the World, (wherein the liues of men are so contracted) the longaeuity of those that liued before the Floud. And this is the best helpe I finde: To liue well is to liue twise. A good man doubles and amplifies his dayes: one may speake as much in few words as another in many. Persius wrote more in a few leaues then Marsus in large volumes. One day led by the rules of Faith is better then an immortalitie of vanity. A man may liue to as good content to himselfe and others, in a short space, as others in a long life; some are old in yeeres tediously drawne out, others in howers cheerfully spent, some hauehave been long, and others hauehave liued long, and they onelyonly are such as hauehave liued this life; of whom I conclude as doth the story of the Kings, Ieremiahs Prophecie, touching Zedekiah vponupon his aduancement by the King of Babell, His portion was a continuall portion, a Kingly portion, eueryevery day a certayne all the dayes of his life, such I say it is, or might be, if Christians might be perswaded not to content themselues to professe or thinke they hauehave Faith, but to liue by their Faith:A needfull Caueat. onelyonly before I part with thee, take from me one Caueat, one aduise, one request, and so an end.
First, take heede thou mistakest me not in all this, as if I had spoken of an absolute perfection in this life equall to vision & fruition in the life to come, confounded Heauen with earth, as if I thought my selfe, or any other to hauehave comprehended. If any man thinkes hee beleeues any thing, hee beleeues nothing yet as hee ought to beleeue, but all things in part, and imperfectly. Wee cannot by all our assiduousnesse in Reading, Prayer, and Meditation hauehave Gods Spirit at an absolute command, no more then Mariners the winde, or Husbandmen the showers, so as the most obseruant beleeuer hath his turbida interualla, his buffetings, lest hee bee too much exalted, his desertions wherein his beloued will hide himselfe behinde the grates, not to bee found of him for a while, that hee seeke him more eagerly, and prise his presence more thankefully, more heedefully keepe him when hee hath him, and be wholly dependant on his grace; yet so as this remaines most sure and certaine, that the constant and dayly Practiser of his faith shall constantly, and congruously bee seconded with the gusts and gales of his spirit, the onelyonly true Zephirus and Fauonius, shall hauehave Satan tyed vp from long and frequent molesting him, shall not hauehave such tedious absences of the Spirit, such vncertaine fits and moodes of his ioy and comfort, as the negligent and loose beleeuer, but a more stedfast frame and tenor of ioy, then any other kinde of man in the world that takes not this course.
Prouided that thou take this aduise,A profitable aduice. that for the better and stronger vse of this Faith, thou seele vp thy senses and chaine vp thy reason. Walking by sight, and walking by Faith are opposite things: and therefore as men fortifie the visuall beames of one eye by closing the other; so must thou winke and close vp the eye of thy soule to all worldly things, that thou mayest by the prospectiue of Faith fixe thy spirituall eye vponupon heauenly delights: not that thou needest goe out of this world and sequester thy selfe like an Eremite into Dennes and Caues, retired from all societie, but euen in the middest of all glistering obiects see them as if thou sawest them not; that is without being deepely affected with them. So looked Paul from off the things that are seene euen in the middest of Rome, and looked vponupon things which were not seene: and Moses in Pharaohs Court saw him that was inuisible.
A right beleeuer goes through the world, as a man whose minde is in a deepe study: or as one that hath speciall haste of some weighty businesse, goes through a street; that gazeth on nothing, heares nothing, mindes nothing that is in the way, but onelyonly that which his head is taken vp withall: Our conuersation is in heauen, our treasure is in heauen. Oh! that all our thoughts were there, so as no earthly obiect might detaine, or distract them, no more then must needes bee in our callings, so that the maine bent and intention of all that is within vsus might be set vponupon the dayly nourishing of our Faith.
For which purpose I make this parting and farewell suite vntounto thee,An earnest request. as thou meanest to receiue any good by this Booke. That thou wouldest euen from this very houre wherein thou endest the reading of it, determine and couenant, betwixt God and thy soule, neuer whilest thou liuest on the face of this earth to omit one day (God enabling thee by his Spirit) wherein thou wilt not vindicate and redeeme, at the least, one halfe or quarter of an hower, either twise or once in the day, at the least: Wherein all other affaires layd aside, thou mayest withdraw thy selfe apart from all company, and occasions, with a non obstante, to practise the exercise formerly prescribed. That is, by Prayer, Reading, and Meditation, to put some strength and life into thy Faith, till thou hast cheered, and reuiued, and warmed thy soule therewithall. This if thou shalt inuiolably obserue, the strength, the feeling, the comfort, and the fruites of thy Faith will by little and little insensibly, and in a little while, most sensibly thriue and growe till thou commest to the ripenesse of age in Christ.
What hurt can it bee to thee if thou shouldest binde thy selfe by vow hereunto, or if thou fearest thy strength, yet by full purpose thus to doe all and eueryevery day of thy life: that so in the Lees and Dregs of time, whiles fleshly Protestants are raysing contention about matters of Faith, or making Sects and Schismes in the Church about needelesse trifles, thou maist edifie thy selfe in thy most holy Faith and whilest thou liuest in the darke wombe of this world, liue by the Nauell of Faith till thou come to hauehave thy mouth satiate with fulnesse of all good things at the right hand of God. When, as Elizabeth Folk said, Faith shal cease to be Faith and be turned into fruition, and wee receiue the ende of our Faith, the saluation of our soules.
These things hauehave I written that your ioy may be full.
The Iust shall liue by his Faith.
According to thy Faith so be it to thee.
Lord increase our Faith.
The Bookeseller to the Reader.
GEntle Reader, I pray thee take Notis that Master Ward, hath lately published a most Remarkable Monument, of the Inuincible Nauie of 88. & the vnmatchable Powder Treason 1605. Necessary to be had in the House of eueryevery good Christian, to shew Gods louing and wonderfull prouidence, ouer this Kingdome, when the Papists twise sought their vtter ruine & subvertion. These Monuments are to be sold where these Bookes are sould in Saint Dunstones Churchyard, and Pauls-Ally. Vale. 24 of Ianuary. 1621.
FINIS.
End of the text · Samuel Ward, The Life of Faith (1621)