Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, Devotion 4
7. Socios sibi iungier instat. The Phisician desires to hauehave others ioyned with him.
7. MEDITATION.
THere is more feare, therefore more cause. If the Phisician desire help, the burden grows great: There is a grouth of the Disease then; But …here must bee an Au…umne to; But whether an Autumne of the disease or mee, it is not my pa… to choose: but if it bee of me, it is of both; My disease cannot suruiu… mee, I may ouer liue i… Howsoeuer, his desiring of others, argues his ca…dor, and his ingenuitie; … the danger be great, he… iustifies his proceeding… & he disguises nothing that calls in witnesses … And if the danger be not great, hee is not a…bitious, that is so read… to diuide the thankes and the honour of th… work, which he beg… alone, with others. It diminishes not the dignitie of a Monarch, that hee deriue part of his care vponupon others; God hath not made many Suns, but he hath made many bodies, that receiue, and giuegive light. The Romanes began with one King; they came to two Consuls; they returned in extremities, to one Dictator … whether in one, or many, the soueraigntie is the same, in all States, and the danger is not the more, and the prouidence is the more, whe… there are more Phisicians; as the State is the happier, where businesses are carried by more counsels, then can be in one breast, how large soeuer, Dise…ses themselues hold Consultations, and conspire how they may multiply, and ioyn with one another, & exalt one anothers force so; and shal we not cal… Phisicians, to consultations? Death is in an old mans dore, he appeare… and tels him so, & dea… is at a yong mans backe, and saies nothing… Age is a sicknesse, and Youth is an ambush, and we need so many Phisicians, as may make vp a Watch, and spie eueryevery inconuenience. There is scarce any thing, that hath not killed some body; a haire, a feather hath done it… Nay, that which is our best Antidote against it, hath donn it; the best Cordiall hath bene deadly poyson; Men hauehave dyed of Ioy, and allmost forbidden their friends to weep for thē, whē they hauehave seen thē dye laughing. Euen that Tiran Dy…nisius (I thinke the same… that suffered so much a…ter) who could not d… of that sorrow, of tha… high fal, from a King t… a wretched priuate ma… … dyed of so poore a Ioy, as to be declard by the peo…ple at a Theater, that he… was a good Poet. We sa… oftē th…t a Man may li… of a litle; but, alas, o… how much lesse may a Man dye? And therfore the more assistants, th… better; who comes to a day of hearing, in a caus of any importāce, with one Aduocate? In our Funerals, we our selfs hauehave no interest; there wee cannot aduise, we cannot direct: And though some Nations, (the Egiptians in particular) built thēselues better Tombs, then houses, because they were to dwell longer in them; yet, amongst our selues, the greatest Man of Stile, whom we hane had, The Conqueror, was lest, as soone as his soule left him, not only without persons to assist at his graue, but without a graue. Who will keepe vsus then, we know not… As long as we can, l…t vsus admit as much helpe as wee can; Another, and another Phisician, is not another, and another Indication, and Symptom of death, but an other… and another Assistant, and Proctor of life: No… doe they so much feed the imagination with apprehension of danger, as the vnderstanding with comfort; Let not one bring Learning, another Diligence, another Religion, but eueryevery one bring all, and, as many Ingredients enter into a Receit, so may many men make the Receit. But why doe I exercise my Meditation so long vponupon this, of hauing plentifull helpe in time of need? Is not my Meditation rather to be enclined another way, to condole, and commiserate their distresse, who hauehave none? How many are sicker (perchance) then I, and laid in their wofull straw at home (if that co…ner be a home) and hauehave no more hope of helpe, though they die, then of preferment, though they liue? Nor doe no more expect to see a Phisician then, then to bee an Officer after; of whome, the first that takes knowledge, is th… Sexten that buries them… who buries them in obliuio… too? For the… doe but fill vp the number of the dead in the Bill, but we shall neuer heare their Names, till wee reade them in the Booke of life, with our owne. How many are sicker (perchance) then I, and thrown into Hospitals, where, (as a fish left vponupon the Sand, must stay the tide) they must stay the Phisicians houre of visiting, and then can bee but visited? How many are sicker (perchaunce) then all we, and hauehave not this Hospitall to couer them, not this straw, to lie in, to die in, but hauehave thei… Graue-stone vnderunder them and breathe out thei… soules in the eares, and in the eies of passengers, harder then their bed, the flint of the stre…t… That taste of no part of our Phisick, but a sparing dyet; to whom ordinary porridge would bee Iulip enough, the refuse of our seruants, Bezar enough, and the off scou…ing of our Kitchin tables, Cordiall enough. O my soule, when thou art not enough awake, to blesse thy God enough for his plentifull mercy, in affoording thee many Helpers, rememb…r how many lacke them, and helpe them to them, or to those other things, which they lacke as much as them.
7. EXPOSTVLATION.
MY God, my God, thy blessed Seruant Augustine begg'd of thee, that Moses might come and tell him what he… meant by some place of Genesis: May I ha… leaue to aske of th… Spirit, that writ th… Booke, why when D…uid expected newes fi… Ioabs armie,2 Sam. 18 25. and that th… Watchman tolde him that hee sawe a man ru…ning alone, Dauid conclu…ded out of that circumstance,So al, but our Translation takes it. Euen Burcdorf. & Schindler. That if hee ca… alone, hee brought … newes? I see the Gra…mar, the word signifie so, and is so euer accep…ted, Good newes; but I see not the Logique, nor the Rhetorique, how Dauid would prooue, or perswade that his newes was good, because hee was alone, except a greater cōpany might hauehave made great impressions of danger, by imploring, and importuning present supplies. Howsoeuer that bee, I am sure, that that which thy Apostle sayes to Timothy, 2.4.11.OnelyOnly Luke is with me, Luke, and no body but Luke … hath a taste of cōplaint, & sorrow in it… Though Luke want no testimony of abilitie, o… forwardnes, of constancie, & perseuerance, in assisting that great building which S. Paul laboured in, yet S. Paul is affected with that, that ther was none but Luke, to assist… We take S. Luke to hauehave bin a Phisician, & it admits the application the better, that in the presence of one good Phisician, we may bee glad of more. It was not only a ciuill spirit of policy, or order that moued Moses father in law, to perswade him to diuide …he burden of Gouernmēt,Exod. 18 13. & Iudicature, with others, & take others to his assistance, but it was …lso thy immediat spirit O my God, that mou'd Moses to present vntounto …hee 70 of the Elders of Israel, Num. 11 16.to receiue of that spirit, which was vponupon Moses onelyonly before, such … portion as might ease …im in the gouernmēt of that people; though Moses alone had indowments aboue all thou gauest him othe… assistants. I consider th… plentifull goodnesse, … my God, in employing Angels, more then on… in so many of thy remarkable workes. O… thy Sonne, thou saist,Heb. 1.6 I… all the Angels of God w…ship him; If that bee i… Heauen, vponupon Earth, h… sayes that hee could co…maund twelue legions … Angels; Mat. 26.53.And when H…uen, and Earth shall b… all one, at the last day… Thy Sonne, O God, the S… of Man, Mat. 25.31.shall come in his glory, and all the holy Angels with him. The Angels that celebrated his birth to the Shepheards, Luc. 21.15.the Angels that celebrated his second birth, his Resurrection to the Maries, were in the plurall, Io. 20.12.Angells associated with Angels. Gen. 28.12.In Iacobs ladder, they which ascended and descended, & maintain'd the trade between Heauen and Earth, between thee and vsus, they who hauehave the Commission,Psa. 91.13. and charge to guide vsus in all our wayes, they wh… hastned Lot, Gen. 19.15.and in him… vsus, from places of danger, and tentation, the… who are appoynted to instruct & gouerne vsus in th… Church heere, Apo. 1.20.they who are sent to punish the disobedient and refractar…, Apo. 8.2.they that are to be the Mowers, Mat. 13.39.and haruest me…, after we are growne …p in one field, the church, … the day of Iudgmēt, they that are to carrie o… soules whither they ca…ed Lazarus, Luc. 16.22.they who attend at the seueral gate… of the new Ierusalem, Apoc. 21.12.to admit vsus there; all these, who administer to thy seruants, from the first, to their last, are Angels, Angels in the plurall, in eueryevery seruice, Angels associated with Angells. The power of a single Angell wee see in that one, who in one night destroyed almost 200. thousand in Sennacheribs army,1. Reg. 19.35. yet thou often imployest many; as we know the power of saluation is abundantly in any one Euangelist, and yet thou hast afforded vsus foure. Luc. 4.18.Thy Sonne pro…claimes of himselfe, th… thy Spirit, hath annoynte… him to preach the Gospel… … yet he hath giuen othe…s for the perfiting of the S. in the worke of the Mi…stery. Eph. 4.11.Thou hast made him Bishop of our soules, 1. Pet 2.25.but there are others Bi…shops too. Hee gaue the holy Ghost, Io. 20.22.& others gaue it also. Thy way, O m… God, (and, O my God, tho… louest to walk in thine own waies, for they are large) thy way from th… beginning, is multiplication of thy helps; and therfore it were a degree of ingratitude, not to accept this mercy of affording me many helpes for my bodily health, as a type and earnest of thy gracious purpose now, and euer, to affoord mee the same assistances. That for thy great Helpe, thy Word, I may seeke that, not frō corners, nor Conuenticles, nor schismatical singularities, but frō the assotiation, & communion of thy Catholique Church, and those persons, whom thou has… alwayes furnished th… Church withall: And that I may associate th… Word, with thy Sacr…ment, thy Seale with thy Patent; and in that S…cramēt associate the sig… with the thing signified, the Bread with the Bod… of thy Sonne, so, as I ma… be sure to hauehave receiu… both, and to bee ma… thereby, (as thy blesse… seruant Augustine sayes) the Arke, and the Mon…ment, & the Tombe of th… most blessed Sonne, that hee, and all the merits of his death, may, by that receiuing, bee buried in me, to my quickning in thi… world, and my immortall establishing in the next.
7. PRAYER.
O Eternall, and most gracious God, who gauest to thy seruants in the wildernes, thy Man…a, bread so conditiond, qualified so, as that, to eueryevery man, Manna tasted like that, which that man liked best, I humbly beseech thee, to make this correction, which I acknowledg to be part of my daily bread, to tast so to me, not as I would, but as thou wouldest hauehave it taste, and to conform my tast, and make it agreeable to thy will… Thou wouldst hauehave th… corrections tast of hum…liation, but thou wouldest hauehave them tast … consolation too; taste o… danger, but tast of ass…rance too. As therefore thou hast imprinted in all thine Elements, of which our bodies consist, two manifest qualities, so that, as thy fire dries, so it heats too; and as thy water moysts, so it cooles too, so, O Lord, in these corrections, which are the elements of our regeneration, by which our soules are made thine, imprint thy two qualities, those two operations, that as they scourge vsus, they may scourge vsus into the way to thee: that when they hauehave shewed vsus, that we are nothing in our selues, they may also shew vsus, that thou art all things vntounto vsus. When therfore in this particular circū stance, O Lord (but none of thy iudgements are circumstances; they are all of the substance of thy good purpose vponupon vsus… whē in this particular, that he, whō thou has… sent to assist me, desires assistants to him, thou hast let mee see, in how few houres thou cans… throw me beyond the helpe of man, let me by the same light see, that no vehimence of sicknes, no tentation of Satan, no guiltines of sin, no prison of death, not this first, this sicke bed, not the other prison, the close and dark graue, can remooue me from the determined, and good purpose, which tho… sealed concerning mee. Let me think no degree of this thy correction, casuall, or without signification; but yet when I hauehave read it in that language, as it is a correction, let me translate it into another, and read it as a mercy; and which of these is the Originall, and which is the Translation, whether thy Mercy, or thy Correction, wer… thy primary, and original intētion in this sicknes, I cannot conclude, though death conclud… me; for as it must necessarily appeare to bee … correction, so I can hau… no greater argument o… thy mercy, then to die i… thee, and by that death, to bee vnited to him, who died for me.