A Counterpoison, Religious treatise · Chapter 38
CHAP. XXXVIII.
That Christ and all the Saints are our Partners, and partakers with us in the Crosse; yea, our sufferings are nothing in comparison of theirs.
4. WE shall beare the crosse with more patience and comfort, if wee consider that Christ and all the Saints are our partners, and partakers therein; yea, thy sufferings are nothing in comparison of what others have suffered before thee. Looke upon righteous Abel, thou shall see his elder brother Cain had dominion and rule over him by Gods appointment, Gen. 4. 7. Yea, in the next Verse thou shal… see him slaine by his brother: After him looke upon Noah, a most calamitous person as ever lived, as the Chronologer computes him: as for L…t, he had his righteous soule vexed from day to day. Looke upon Job, thou shalt see that miseries doe not stay for a mannerly succession to each other, but in a rude importunity throng in at once, to take away his children, substance, friends, credit, health, peace of conscience, &c. leaving him nothing but his Wife, whom the Devill spared on purpose to vex him, as the Fathers thinke: so that in his owne apprehension, God was his mortall enemy; as heare how in the bitternesse of his soule he complaynes of his Maker, saying, He teareth me in his wrath, he hateth me, and gnasheth upon me with his teeth, he hath broken me asunder, taken me by the necke, and shaken me to peeces, and set me up for his marke: his Archers compasse me round about, hee cleaveth …y raines asunder, and doth not spare to powre out my gall upon the ground; he breaketh me with breach upon breach, and runneth upon me like a Gyant: Job 16. Now, when so much was uttered, even by a non-such for his patience; what may we thinke hee did feele, and indure? Looke upon Abraham, thou shalt see him forced to forsake his Countrey, and Fathers house, to goe to a place he knew not; to men that knew not him; and after his many removes, hee meets with a famine, and so is forced into Aegypt, which indeed gave reliefe to him▪ when Canaan could not; shewing, that in outward things, Gods enemies may fare better than his friends: yet hee goes not without great feare of his life, which made it but a deare purchase; then hee is forced to part from his brother Lot, by reason of strife and debate among their Heardsmen: after that, Lot is taken prisoner, and he is constrained to wage w…rre with foure Kings at once, to rescue his Brother; then Sarah his wife is barren, and he must goe childl…sse, untill (in reason) he is past hope: when he hath a Sonne, it must not onelyonly dye, but himselfe must slay him. Now if that bosome wherein we all look to rest, was assaulted with so many sore tryals, and so divers difficulties, is it likely we should escape? Looke upon Jaoob, you shall see Esau strive with him in the wombe, that no time might be lost; after that you shall see him fly for his life, from a cruell Brother, to a cruell Unkle; with a staffe goes he over Jordan, alone, doubtfull, and comfortlesse; not like the sonne of Isaac. In the way he hath no bed but the cold earth; no pillow, but the hard stones; no shect, but the moist aire; no Canopie, but the wide Heaven: at last he is come far to finde out an hard friend, and of a Nephew becomes a servant; after the service of an hard Apprentiship, hath earned her whom he loved; his Wife is changed, and he is not onelyonly disappointed of his hopes, but forced to marry another against his will: and now hee must begin another Apprentiship, and a new hope, where hee made account of fruition: all which fourteene yeares he was consumed with beat in the day▪ with frost in the night; when hee hath her whom he loves, she is bar…en: at last being growne rich, chiefly in wives and children, accounting his charge his wealth, hee returnes to his Fathers house, but with what comfort? Behold Laban followes him with one troope, Esau meets him with another, both with hostile intentions: not long after, Rachel, the comfort of his life dyeth; his children, the slaffe of his age, wound his soule to death: Reuben proves incestuous, Judah adulterous, Dina is ravished, Simeon and Levi are murtherous, Er and Onan are stricken dead, Joseph is lost, Simeon imprisoned, Benjamin (his right hand) endangered, Himselfe driven by famine in his old age, to dye among the Aegyptians; a people that held it abomination to eate with him: And yet before he was borne, it was, J…cob have I loved; and before any of this befell him, God said unto him, Be not afraid, I am with thee, and will doe thee good: Genesis 28. 15. And he did so, even by these crosses; for thats my good (saith the Proverbe) that doth m… good. Now, what Sonne of Israel can hope for any good dayes, when hee heares his Fathers were so evill? It is enough for us, if when we are dead, we can rest with him in the Land of Promise. Againe, heare what David saith of himselfe, Thy Arrowes sticke fast in mee, and thy hand presseth me sore: Psal. 38. 2. and see what cause he had so to say; what what were these Arrow…s? to let passe those many that Saul shot at him, which were sharpe and keene enough: and those other of Doeg, when hee slew fourescore and five of the Priests; and the whole City of Nob, both man and woman, child and suckling, for shewing him kindnesse: Likewise Shimeis carr…age towards him, also his distresse at Ziglag, and those seventy thousand which perished by the Pestilence, upon his numbring the people; and the like. First, Nathan tels him from the Lord, that The sword should never depart from h… ho…se; and that he would raise up evill against him, out of his owne loynes▪ here were as many Arrowes as words. Againe, the Childe which he had by Bathsheba, was no sooner borne, but it dyed; there was another Arrow: Tamar his daughter being marriageable, was deslowred by his owne Sonne Amnon; there was two more: Amnon himselfe being in drinke, was kil'd by Absolom at a Feast; there was another: This Absalom proves rebellious, and riseth in Armes against his owne Father, and makes him fly beyond Jordan; there was one more: He lyeth with his Fathers Concubines, in the sight of all Israel; there was another: And how much doe you thinke, did these Arrowes wound the Kings heart, and pierce his very soule? Lastly, looke upon Lazarus, though Christs bosome friend, John 11. thou shalt see him labour under a mortall disease, &c. though many soules were gained to the Gospell, and cured by his being sicke: Si amatur, (saith Saint Austin) quomodo inflrmatur?
Thus it were easie to shew the like of Joseph, Jeremy, Daniel, John Baptist, Peter, Paul, and all the generation of Gods children, and servants: For as the Apostle giveth a generall testimony of all the Saints in the Old Testament; saying, That some endured the violence of the fire, some were rackt, others were tryed by mockings and scourgings, bonds and imprisonments; some stoned, some hew…e in sunder, some slaine with the sword, some wandred up and downe in Sheep-skins, and Goat-skins, b…ing destitute, afflicted, and formented; some forced to wand…r in Wildernesses, and Mountaines, and hide themselves in Dens, and Caves of the earth; being such as the wor…d was not worthy of: Hebr. 11. So Ecclesiasticall History gives the like generall testimony of all the Saints in the New Testament, and succeeding ages; for we reade, that of all the Apostles, none dyed a naturall death save onelyonly Saint John, and he also was banished by Domi…an to Pathmos▪ and at anoth…r time thrust into a Tunne of seething O… at Rome: as Tertullian, and Saint Jerome doe report. As for other beleevers, there was such a mul…itude of them suffe…ed Ma…tyrdome for professing the Gospell; whereof some were stoned, some crucified, some beheaded, some thrust through with speares, some burnt with fire, and the like; (for we reade of twenty nine severall deaths they were put unto) that Ecclesiasticall History makes mention of two thousand which suffered the same day with Nicanor. And after that, in the time of the Ten Persecutions, were such an innumerable company of innocent Christians put to death, and tormented; that Saint Jerome in his Epistle to Chromatius, and Heliodorus, saith, There was not one day in the whole yeare, unto which the number of five thousand Martyrs might not bee ascribed; ecxept onelyonly the first day of January: who were put to the most exquisite deaths, and torments, that ever the wit or malice, of Men or Devils could invent to inflict upon them. Since which time, the Turke and the Pope have acted their patts, in shedding the blood of the Saints, as well as the Jewes and Roman Emperours, as appeares in the Booke of Acts and Monuments, and Revela. 17. where the Holy Ghost hath foretold, that the Whore of Babylon should fight with the Lambe, and they that are on his side, called, and chosen, and faithfull, untill shee were even drunke with the blood of the Saints, and with the blood of the Martyrs of Jesus; which in part was fulfilled in England, under the Raigne of Queene Mary: when in one yeare a Hundred seventy six persons of quality were burnt for Religion, with many of the common sort; and in France, where before these late bloudy M…ssacres, there were two Hundred Thousand which suffered Martyrdome about Transubstantiation. And it is well knowne, that our Saviour Christs whole life, even from his Cradle to his Grave, was nothing else but a continued act of sussering; yea, he was the person, upon whom as upon one Center all our sorrowes met: He that had all, possessed nothing, except the punishment due to our sinnes, which l…y so heavy▪ upon him for satisfaction, that it pressed his soule as it were to the nethermost Hell, and made him cry out in the anguish of his spirit, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? So that there is nothing befils us, but hath befalne our betters before us: and to be free from crosses and afflictions, is the priviledge onelyonly of the Church triumphant. For, qui non est Crucianus, non est Christianus, saith Luther: there is not a Christian, that carries not his Crosse.
Now the way not to repine at those above us, is to looke at those below us; we seldome or never see any man served with simple favours. It is not for every one, to have his▪ soule …kt out of his mouth with a kisse, as the Jewes tell of Moses.
It is a great word that Zozomen speakes of Apollonius, That hee never asked any thing of God in all his life, that he obtained not. This is not our Pa…adise, but our Purgatory; not a place of pleasure, but a Pilgrimage; not a Triumph, but a Warfare: Wee cannot say of this World as Tully reports of Si…acuse in S…cily, and others of Rhodes, that not one day passeth in which the Sunne shines not clearely on them. Yea, we thinke he speeds well, that lives, as it were, under a perpetuall Equin…ct…all, having night and day equ…ll, go…d and ill successe in the same measure: for these compositions make both our crosses tolerable, and our blessings wholesome. Wee that know not the afflictions of others, call our owne the heavi…st; every small current is a torrent; every Brooke a River; every River a Sea: we make our selves more miserable than we need, than we should, by looking upon our miseries in a multiplying glasse; we measure the length of time, by the sha…pnesse of our afflictions, and so make minutes seeme bowres, and dayes moneths. If we be sicke, and the Physitian promises to visit us to morrow with his best reliefe, with what a tedious longing doe we expect his presence? Our imagination makes every day of our sorrow appeare like Josuahs day, when the Sun stood still in Gibeon. The Summer of our delights is too short: but the Winter of our affliction goes slowly off; we are so sensible of a present distresse, and so ingratefull for favours past, that we remember not many yeares health so much, as one dayes sicknesse: it is true, former meales doe not relieve our present hunger, but this cottage of ours ruins straight, if it bee not new daubed every day, new repair…d. What then? shall to dayes Ague, make us forget yesterdayes health, and all Gods former favours? if he doe not answer us in everything, shall we take pleasure in nothing? Shall wee slight all his blessings, because in one thing hee crosseth us, whereas his least mercy is beyond our best▪ merit? but if we thinke of our deliverance from the fire of Hell, this is cause enough to make us both patient and thank…full; though the trifles we delight in be taken from us. Lord take away what thou pleasest for thy glory and my good, so long as thou savest me from the fire of Hell, and thy everlasting wr…th. Neither is there a better remedy for impati…nc…, then to cast up our r…ceipts, and to compare them with our deservings. If thou looke upon thy sufferings, thou shalt finde them farre easier than thy sinnes have deserved; nothing to what thy … S…s, and Christ thy elder brother hath suffered … thee: at a Lyon… den▪ or a fiery f…rnace not to turne tail…, were a commendation worthy a Crowne: doe but compare thy owne estate with theirs, and thou shalt find cause to be thankefull that thou ar… above any, rather than of envy or malice, that any is above thee, to domineere and insult over thee; yea, compare thine owne estate with thine enemies, thou shalt see yet greater cause to be thankefull; for if these temporary dolors which God afflicts his people with, are so grievous to th…e, how shall thine and Gods enemi…s (though they suggest to themselves that God is all mercy, as if hee wanted the other hand of his justice) endure that devouring fire, that everl…sting burning? Isaiah 33. Vers. 14. Psalm. 68. 21. Doth hee make bloody wayles on the backes of his Children, and shall Bastards escape? doth he deale thus with his Sonnes, what will he doe with his Slaves? cannot all the obedience of his beloved ones beare out one sin against God, as we see in Moses, David, Zachary, &c. Where will they appeare that doe evill, onelyonly evill, and that continually? The meditation whereof may bee of some use to thee, Thales being asked how adversity might best be borne, answered by seeing our Enemies in worse estate than our selves.