LXXVI. I come now unto that function which undertaketh the public ministry of holy things according to the laws of Christian religion. And because the nature of things consisting, as this doth, in action is known by the object whereabout they are conversant, and by the end or scope whereunto they are referred, we must know that the object of this function is both God and men; God in that he is publicly worshipped of his Church, and men in that they are capable of happiness by means which Christian discipline appointeth. So that the sum of our whole labour in this kind is to honour God and to save men.
For whether we severally take and consider men one by one, or else gather them into one society and body, as it hath been before declared1 that every man’s religion is in him the well-spring of all other sound and sincere virtues, from whence both here in some sort and hereafter more abundantly their full joy and felicity ariseth, because while they live they are blessed of God and when they die their works follow them: so at this present we must again call to mind how the very worldly peace and prosperity, the secular happiness, the temporal and natural good estate both of all men and of all dominions hangeth chiefly upon religion, and doth evermore give plain testimony that as well in this as in other considerations the priest is a pillar of that commonwealth wherein he faithfully serveth God. For if these assertions be true, first that nothing can be enjoyed in this present world against his will which hath made all things; secondly that albeit God doth sometime permit the impious to have, yet impiety permitteth them not to enjoy no not temporal blessings on earth; thirdly that God hath appointed those blessings to attend as handmaids upon religion; and fourthly that without the work of the ministry religion by no means can possibly continue, the use and benefit of that sacred function even towards all men’s worldly happiness must needs be granted.
Now the first being a theorem both understood and confessed of all2, to labour in proof thereof were superfluous.
The second perhaps may be called in question except it be perfectly understood. By good things temporal therefore we mean length of days, health of body, store of friends and well-willers, quietness, prosperous success of those things we take in hand, riches with fit opportunities to use them during life, reputation following us both alive and dead, children or such as instead of children we wish to leave successors and partakers of our happiness. These things are naturally every man’s desire, because they are good. And on whom God bestoweth the same3, them we confess he graciously blesseth.
Of earthly blessings the meanest is wealth, reputation the chiefest. For which cause we esteem the gain of honour an ample recompense for the loss of all other worldly benefits.
But forasmuch as in all this there is no certain perpetuity of goodness, nature hath taught to affect these things not for their own sake but with reference and relation to somewhat independently good, as is the exercise of virtue and speculation of truth. None whose desires are rightly ordered would wish to live, to breathe and move, without performance of those actions which are beseeming man’s excellency. Wherefore having not how to employ it we wax weary even of life itself. Health is precious because sickness doth breed that pain which disableth action. Again why do men delight so much in the multitude of friends, but for that the actions of life being many do need many helping hands to further them? Between troublesome and quiet days we should make no difference if the one did not hinder and interrupt, the other uphold, our liberty of action. Furthermore if those things we do, succeed, it rejoiceth us not so much for the benefit we thereby reap as in that it probably argueth our actions to have been orderly and well guided4. As for riches, to him which hath and doth nothing with them they are a contumely. Honour is commonly presumed a sign of more than ordinary virtue and merit, by means whereof when ambitious minds thirst after it, their endeavours are testimonies how much it is in the eye of nature to possess that body the very shadow whereof is set at so high a rate. Finally such is the pleasure and comfort which we take in doing, that when life forsaketh us, still our desires to continue action and to work though not by ourselves yet by them whom we leave behind us, causeth us providently to resign into other men’s hands the helps we have gathered for that purpose, devising also the best we can to make them perpetual. It appeareth therefore how all the parts of temporal felicity are only good in relation to that which useth them as instruments, and that they are no such good as wherein a right desire doth ever stay or rest itself.
Now temporal blessings are enjoyed of those which have them, know them, esteem them according to that they are in their own nature. Wherefore of the wicked whom God doth hate his usual and ordinary speeches are, that “blood-thirsty and deceitful men shall not live out half their days5;” that God shall cause “a pestilence to cleave6” unto the wicked, and shall strike them with consuming grief, with fevers, burning diseases, and sores which are past cure; that when the impious are fallen, all men shall tread them down and none shew countenance of love towards them as much as by pitying them in their misery; that the sins of the ungodly shall bereave them of peace; that all counsels, complots, and practices against God shall come to nothing; that the lot and inheritance of the unjust is beggary; that the name of unrighteous persons shall putrefy7, and the posterity of robbers starve. If any think that iniquity and peace, sin and prosperity can dwell together, they err, because they distinguish not aright between the matter, and that which giveth it the form of happiness, between possession and fruition, between the having and the enjoying of good things. The impious cannot enjoy that they have, partly because they receive it not as at God’s hands, which only consideration maketh temporal blessings comfortable, and partly because through error placing it above things of far more price and worth they turn that to poison which might be food, they make their prosperity their own snare, in the nest of their highest growth they lay foolishly those eggs out of which their woful overthrow is afterwards hatched. Hereby it cometh to pass that wise and judicious men observing the vain behaviours of such as are risen to unwonted greatness have thereby been able to prognosticate their ruin. So that in very truth no impious or wicked man doth prosper on earth but either sooner or later the world may perceive easily how at such time as others thought them most fortunate they had but only the good estate which fat oxen have above lean, when they appeared to grow their climbing was towards ruin8.
The gross and bestial conceit of them which want understanding is only that the fullest bellies are happiest9. Therefore the greatest felicity they wish to the commonwealth wherein they live is that it may but abound and stand, that they which are riotous may have to pour out without stint, that the poor may sleep and the rich feed them, that nothing unpleasant may be commanded, nothing forbidden men which themselves have a lust to follow, that kings may provide for the ease of their subjects and not be too curious about their manners, that wantonness, excess, and lewdness of life may be left free, and that no fault may be capital besides dislike of things settled in so good terms. But be it far from the just to dwell either in or near to the tents of these so miserable felicities.
Now whereas we thirdly affirm that religion and the fear of God as well induceth secular prosperity as everlasting bliss in the world to come, this also is true. For otherwise godliness could not be said to have the promises of both lives, to be that ample revenue wherein there is always sufficiency, and to carry with it a general discharge of want, even so general that David himself should protest he “never saw the just forsaken10.”
Howbeit to this we must add certain special limitations; as first that we do not forget how crazed and diseased minds (whereof our heavenly Physician must judge) receive oftentimes most benefit by being deprived of those things which are to others beneficially given, as appeareth in that which the wise man hath noted concerning them whose lives God mercifully doth abridge lest wickedness should alter their understanding11; again that the measure of our outward prosperity be taken by proportion with that which every man’s estate in this present life requireth. External abilities are instruments of action. It contenteth wise artificers to have their instruments proportionable to their work, rather fit for use than huge and goodly to please the eye. Seeing then the actions of a servant do not need that which may be necessary for men of calling and place in the world, neither men of inferior condition many things which greater personages can hardly want, surely they are blessed in worldly respects that have wherewith to perform sufficiently what their station and place asketh, though they have no more12. For by reason of man’s imbecility and proneness to elation of mind, too high a flow of prosperity is dangerous13; too low an ebb again as dangerous, for that the virtue of patience is rare, and the hand of necessity stronger than ordinary virtue is able to withstand. Salomon’s discreet and moderate desire we all know, “Give me O Lord neither riches nor penury14.” Men over high exalted either in honour or in power or in nobility or in wealth; they likewise that are as much on the contrary hand sunk either with beggary or through dejection or by baseness do not easily give ear to reason, but the one exceeding apt unto outrages and the other unto petty mischiefs15. For greatness delighteth to show itself by effects of power, and baseness to help itself with shifts of malice. For which cause a moderate indifferent temper between fulness of bread and emptiness hath been evermore thought and found (all circumstances duly considered) the safest and happiest for all estates, even for kings and princes themselves.
Again we are not to look that these things should always concur, no not in them which are accounted happy, neither that the course of men’s lives or of public affairs should continually be drawn out as an even thread (for that the nature of things will not suffer) but a just survey being made, as those particular men are worthily reputed good whose virtues be great and their faults tolerable, so him we may register for a man fortunate, and that for a prosperous or happy state, which having flourished doth not afterwards feel any tragical alteration such as might cause them to be a spectacle of misery to others.
Besides whereas true felicity consisteth in the highest operations of that nobler part of man which showeth sometime greatest perfection not in using the benefits which delight nature but in suffering what nature can hardliest endure, there is no cause why either the loss of good if it tend to the purchase of better, or why any misery the issue whereof is their greater praise and honour that have sustained it, should be thought to impeach that temporal happiness wherewith religion we say is accompanied, but yet in such measure, as the several degrees of men may require by a competent estimation, and unless the contrary do more advance, as it hath done those most heroical saints whom afflictions have made glorious. In a word not to whom no calamity falleth, but whom neither misery nor prosperity is able to move from a right mind, them we may truly pronounce fortunate, and whatsoever doth outwardly happen without that precedent improbity for which it appeareth in the eyes of sound and unpartial judges to have proceeded from divine revenge, it passeth in the number of human casualties whereunto we are all alike subject. No misery is reckoned more than common or human, if God so dispose that we pass through it and come safe to shore, even as contrariwise men do not use to think those flourishing days happy which do end with tears.
It standeth therefore with these cautions firm and true, yea ratified by all men’s unfeigned confessions drawn from the very heart of experience, that whether we compare men of note in the world with others of like degree and state, or else the same men with themselves; whether we confer one dominion with another or else the different times of one and the same dominion, the manifest odds between their very outward condition as long as they steadfastly were observed to honour God and their success being fallen from him, are remonstrances more than sufficient how all our welfare even on earth dependeth wholly upon our religion.
Heathens were ignorant of true religion. Yet such as that little was which they knew, it much impaired or bettered always their worldly affairs, as their love and zeal towards it did wane or grow.
Of the Jews did not even their most malicious and mortal adversaries all acknowledge, that to strive against them it was in vain as long as their amity with God continued, that nothing could weaken them but apostasy? In the whole course of their own proceedings did they ever find it otherwise, but that during their faith and fidelity towards God every man of them was in war as a thousand strong, and as much as a grand Senate for counsel in peaceable deliberations, contrariwise that if they swerved, as they often did, their wonted courage and magnanimity forsook them utterly, their soldiers and military men trembled at the sight of the naked sword; when they entered into mutual conference, and sate in council for their own good, that which children might have seen their gravest Senators could not discern, their Prophets saw darkness instead of visions, the wise and prudent were as men bewitched, even that which they knew (being such as might stand them in stead) they had not the grace to utter, or if any thing were well proposed it took no place, it entered not into the minds of the rest to approve and follow it, but as men confounded with strange and unusual amazements of spirit they attempted tumultuously they saw not what; and by the issues of all tempts they found no certain conclusion but this, “God and heaven are strong against us in all we do.” The cause whereof was secret fear which took heart and courage from them, and the cause of their fear an inward guiltiness that they all had offered God such apparent wrongs as were not pardonable.
But it may be the case is now altogether changed, and that in Christian religion there is not the like force towards temporal felicity. Search the ancient records of time, look what hath happened by the space of these sixteen hundred years, see if all things to this effect be not luculent and clear, yea all things so manifest that for evidence and proof herein we need not by uncertain dark conjectures surmise any to have been plagued of God for contempt, or blest in the course of faithful obedience towards true religion, more than only them whom we find in that respect on the one side guilty by their own confessions, and happy on the other side by all men’s acknowledgment, who beholding the prosperous estate of such as are good and virtuous impute boldly the same to God’s most especial favour, but cannot in like manner pronounce that whom he afflicteth above others with them he hath cause to be more offended. For virtue is always plain to be seen, rareness causeth it to be observed, and goodness to be honoured with admiration. As for iniquity and sin it lieth many times hid, and because we be all offenders it becometh us not to incline towards hard and severe sentences touching others, unless their notorious wickedness did sensibly before proclaim that which afterwards came to pass.
Wherefore the sum of every Christian man’s duty is to labour by all means towards that which other men seeing in us may justify, and what we ourselves must accuse, if we fall into it, that by all means we can to avoid, considering especially that as hitherto upon the Church there never yet fell tempestuous storm the vapours whereof were not first noted to rise from coldness in affection and from backwardness in duties of service towards God, so if that which the tears of antiquity have uttered concerning this point should be here set down, it were assuredly enough to soften and to mollify an heart of steel. On the contrary part although we confess with St. Augustine16 most willingly, that the chiefest happiness for which we have some Christian kings in so great admiration above the rest is not because of their long reign, their calm and quiet departure out of this present life, the settled establishment of their own flesh and blood succeeding them in royalty and power, the glorious overthrow of foreign enemies, or the wise prevention of inward dangers and of secret attempts at home; all which solaces and comforts of this our unquiet life it pleaseth God oftentimes to bestow on them which have no society or part in the joys of heaven, giving thereby to understand that these in comparison are toys and trifles far under the value and price of that which is to be looked for at his hands; but in truth the reason wherefore we mostly extol their felicity is if so be they have virtuously reigned, if honour have not filled their hearts with pride, if the exercise of their power have been service and attendance upon the majesty of the Most High, if they have feared him as their own inferiors and subjects have feared them, if they have loved neither pomp nor pleasure more than heaven, if revenge have slowly proceeded from them and mercy willingly offered itself, if so they have tempered rigour with lenity that neither extreme severity might utterly cut them off in whom there was manifest hope of amendment, nor yet the easiness of pardoning offences embolden offenders, if knowing that whatsoever they do their potency may bear it out, they have been so much the more careful not to do any thing but that which is commendable in the best rather than usual with greatest personages, if the true knowledge of themselves have humbled them in God’s sight no less than God in the eyes of men hath raised them up; I say albeit we reckon such to be the happiest of them that are mightiest in the world, and albeit those things alone are happiness, nevertheless considering what force there is even in outward blessings to comfort the minds of the best disposed, and to give them the greater joy when religion and peace, heavenly and earthly happiness are wreathed in one crown, as to the worthiest of Christian princes it hath by the providence of the Almighty hitherto befallen: let it not seem to any man a needless and superfluous waste of labour that there hath been thus much spoken to declare how in them especially it hath been so observed, and withal universally noted even from the highest to the very meanest, how this peculiar benefit, this singular grace and preeminence religion hath, that either it guardeth as an heavenly shield from all calamities, or else conducteth us safe through them, and permitteth them not to be miseries; it either giveth honours, promotions, and wealth, or else more benefit by wanting them than if we had them at will; it either filleth our houses with plenty of all good things, or maketh a sallet17 of green herbs more sweet than all the sacrifices of the ungodly.
Our fourth proposition before set down was that religion without the help of spiritual ministry is unable to plant itself, the fruits thereof not possible to grow of their own accord. Which last assertion is herein as the first, that it needeth no farther confirmation. If it did I could easily declare how all things which are of God he hath by wonderful art and wisdom sodered as it were together with the glue of mutual assistance, appointing the lowest to receive from the nearest to themselves what the influence of the highest yieldeth. And therefore the Church being the most absolute of all his works was in reason to be also ordered with like harmony, that what he worketh might no less in grace than in nature be effected by hands and instruments duly subordinated unto the power of his own Spirit. A thing both needful for the humiliation of man which would not willingly be debtor to any but to himself, and of no small effect to nourish that divine love which now maketh each embrace other not as men but as angels of God.
Ministerial actions tending immediately unto God’s honour and man’s happiness are either as contemplation, which helpeth forward the principal work of the ministry; or else they are parts of that principal work of administration itself, which work consisteth in doing the service of God’ house18 and in applying unto men the sovereign medicines of grace, already spoken of the more largely, to the end it might thereby appear that we owe to the guides of our souls19 even as much as our souls are worth, although the debt of our temporal blessings should be stricken off.
← Of the rites of Burial. · Contents · Of power given unto men to execute that heav →
Footnotes
-
[See above c. i. § 2-5.] ↩
-
“Si creatura Dei merito et dispensatio Dei sumus. Quis enim magis diligit quam ille qui fecit? Quis autem ordinatius regit quam is qui et fecit et diligit? Quis vero sapientius et fortius ordinare et regere facta potest quam qui et facienda providit, et provisa perfecit? Quapropter omnem potestatem a Deo esse omnemque ordinationem et qui non legerunt sentiunt, et qui legerunt cognoscunt.” Paul Oros. (Fifth century a friend of S. Aug.) Hist. advers Pagan. lib. ii. [c. 1.] ↩
-
Οὔτοι τὰ χρήματ’ ἴδια κέκτηνται βροτοὶ, Τὰ τω̑ν θεω̑ν δ’ ἔχοντες ἐπιμελούμεθα. Eurip. Phœniss. 555. ↩
-
— οἰόμεσθα γὰρ Τὸν εὐτυχου̑ντα πάντ’ ἐπίστασθαι καλω̑ς. Eurip. Herac. [741.] ↩
-
Psalm lv. 23. ↩
-
Deut. xxviii. 21, 22, 27. ↩
-
Prov. x. 7. ↩
-
“Ante ruinam elatio.” Prov. xvi. 18. Φιλέει ὁ θεὸς τὰ ὑπερέχοντα πάντα κολούειν· οὐ γὰρ ἐᾳ̑ ϕρονέειν μέγα ὁ θεὸς ἄλλον ἢ ἑωυτόν. Herod. lib. vii. [c. 10, 5.] ↩
-
[S. Aug. de Civ. Dei, ii. 20. “Tales cultores et dilectores Deorum istorum, quorum etiam imitatores in sceleribus et flagitiis se esse lætantur, nullo modo curant pessimam ac flagitiosissimam non esse remp. Tantum stet, inquiunt, tantum floreat copiis referta, victoriis gloriosa; vel quod est felicius, pace secura sit. Et quid ad nos? immo id ad nos magis pertinet, si divitias quisque semper augeat, quæ quotidianis effusionibus suppetant, per quas sibi etiam infirmiores subdat quisque potentior. Obsequantur divitibus pauperes causa saturitatis, atque ut eorum patrociniis quieta inertia perfruantur, divites pauperibus ad clientelas et ad ministerium sui fastus abutantur. Populi plaudant, non consultoribus utilitatum suarum, sed largitoribus voluptatum. Non jubeantur dura, non prohibeantur impura. Reges non curent quam bonis sed quam subditis regnent. Provinciæ regibus non tanquam rectoribus morum, sed tanquam rerum dominatoribus et deliciarum suarum provisoribus serviant: eosque non sinceriter honorent, sed nequiter ac serviliter timeant. Quid alienæ viti potius, quam quid suæ vitæ quisque noceat, legibus advertatur. Nullus ducatur ad judices, nisi qui alienæ rei, domui, saluti, vel cuiquam invito fuerit importunus aut noxius: cæterum de suis, vel cum suis, vel cum quibusque volentibus faciat quisque quod libet. Abundent publica scorta, vel propter omnes quibus frui placuerit, vel propter eos maxime, qui privata habere non possunt. Exstruantur amplissimæ atque ornatissimæ domus, opipara convivia frequententur, ubi cuique libuerit et potuerit die noctuque ludatur, bibatur, vomatur, diffluatur. Saltationes undique concrepent, theatra inhonestæ lætitiæ vocibus, atque omni genere sive crudelissimæ sive turpissimæ voluptatis exæstuent. Ille sit publicus inimicus, cui hæc felicitas displicet: quisquis eam mutare vel auferre tentaverit, eum libera multitudo avertat ab auribus, evertat e sedibus, auferat a viventibus. Illi habeantur dii veri, qui hanc adipiscendam populis procuraverint adeptamque servaverint. Colantur ut voluerint, ludos exposcant quales voluerint, quos cum suis vel de suis possint habere cultoribus: tantum efficiant, ut tali felicitati nihil ab hoste, nihil a peste, nihil ab ulla clade timeatur.”] ↩
-
[Ps. xxxvii. 25.] ↩
-
[See Wisd. iv. 11.] ↩
-
Ἐπεὶ τά γ’ ἀρκου̑νθ’ ἱκανὰ τοι̑ς γε σώϕροσιν. Eurip. Phœniss. [554.] ↩
-
Ταπεινοτέρων ὁ λογισμὸς ἴσως, ἀλλ’ οὐ̑ν ἀσϕαλεστέρων, ἰ̑σον ἀπέχειν καὶ ὕψους καὶ πτώματος. Greg. Nazian. Apol. 3. [t. i. p. 134 D.] “They may seem haply to be the most deject, but they are the wisest for their own safety which fear climbing no less than falling.” ↩
-
[Prov. xxx. 8.] ↩
-
Arist. Polit. lib. iv. cap. 11. [Ὑπέρκαλον, ἢ ὑπερίσχυρον, ἢ ὑπερευγενη̑, ἢ ὑπερπλούσιον· ἢ τἀναντία τούτοις, ὑπέρπτωχον, ἢ ὑπερασθενη̑, καὶ σϕόδρα ἄτιμον, χαλεπὸν τῳ̑ λόγῳ ἀκολουθει̑ν. γίγνονται γὰρ οἱ μὲν ὑβρισταὶ καὶ μεγαλοπόνηροι μα̑λλον· οἱ δὲ κακου̑ργοι καὶ μικροπόνηροι λίαν.] ↩
-
[De Civit. Dei, v. 24. “Neque enim nos Christianos quosdam imperatores ideo felices dicimus, quia vel diutius imperarunt, vel imperantes filios morte placida reliquerunt, vel hostes reipubl. domuerunt, vel inimicos cives adversus se insurgentes et cavere et opprimere potuerunt. Hæc et alia vitæ hujus ærumnosæ vel munera vel solatia quidam etiam cultores dæmonum accipere meruerunt, qui non pertinent ad regnum Dei, quo pertinent isti: et hoc ipsius misericordia factum est, ne ab illo ista, qui in eum crederent, velut summa bona desiderarent. Sed felices eos dicimus, si juste imperant, si inter linguas sublimiter honorantium et obsequia nimis humiliter salutantium non extolluntur, sed se homines esse meminerunt; si suam potestatem, ad Dei cultum maxime dilatandum, majestati ejus famulam faciunt; si Deum timent, diligunt, colunt; si plus amant illud regnum, ubi non timent habere consortes; si tardius vindicant, facile ignoscunt; si eandem vindictam pro necessitate regendæ tuendæque reip. non pro saturandis inimicitiarum odiis exserunt; si eandem veniam non ad impunitatem iniquitatis, sed ad spem correctionis indulgent; si quod aspere coguntur plerumque decernere, misericordiæ lenitate et beneficiorum largitate compensant; si luxuria tanto eis est castigatior, quanto posset esse liberior; si malunt cupiditatibus pravis, quam quibuslibet gentibus imperare; et si hæc omnia faciunt, non propter ardorem inanis gloriæ, sed propter caritatem felicitatis æternæ; si pro suis peccatis, humilitatis et miserationis et orationis sacrificium Deo suo vero immolare non negligunt. Tales Christianos imperatores dicimus esse felices interim spe, postea reipsa futuros, cum id quod expectamus advenerit.” t. vii. p. 141.] ↩
-
[So Bodl. MS., 1st ed. and 1616, 1622. “Salad” 1676, K.] 1887. ↩
-
Luke xii. 42; 1 Cor. iv. 1; Tit. i. 7; 1 Pet. iv. 10; Ephes. iii. 2. ↩
-
Καὶ σεαυτόν μοι προσοϕείλεις. Epist. ad Philem. [ver. 19.] ↩