240 SELECTIONS FROM DR. BARROW. vex or trouble our neighbour. It engageth us to prefer the public good before any private convenience, before our own opinion or humour, our credit or fame, our profit or advantage, our ease or pleasure; rather discarding a less good from ourselves, than depriving others of a greater. Now who can number or estimate the benefits that spring from the practice of these duties, either to the man that observes them, or to all men in common? O divinest christian charity! what tongue can worthily describe thy most heavenly beauty, thy incomparable sweetness, thy more than royal clemency and bounty? how nobly dost thou enlarge our mind beyond the narrow sphere of self and private regard into a universal care and complacence, making every man ourself and all concernments to be ours? * Would we learn then from Christ himself in what the will of our Maker consists, let us contemplate it in the whole tenour of his instructive and wonderful life. Did he fulfil that will by pompous and formal displays of superior wisdoın, by austere and arrogant pretensions to superior righteousness, by solicitude for ritual observances, by dogmatism upon abstruse speculation, by a supercilious contempt of ignoranee, or a ferocious intolerance of error? No. But the will of God, such at least as was that which he exemplified, is to be found in lessons of virtue attractive from their simplicity, impressive from their earnestness, and authoritative from the miraculous evidence which accompanied them: in habits of humility without meanness, and of meekness without pusillanimity; in unwearied endeavours to console the afflicted, to soften the prejudiced, and to encourage the sincere; in unshaken firmness to strip the mask from pharisaical hypocrites, and to quell the insolence of dictatorial and deceitful 241 SECTION VII. DR. FULLER. KNOW, next religion, there is nothing accomplisheth a man more than learning. Learning in a lord is as a diamond in gold. Dedication to the Holy War. MISCELLANEOUS.* He must rise early, yea, not at all go to bed, who will have every one's good word. He needs strong arms who is to swim against the stream. guides: in kindness to his followers, in forgiveness to his persecutors, in works of the most unfeigned and unbounded charity to man, and in a spirit of the purest and most sublime piety to his Father and his God.-DR. PARR. "It See Bishop Taylor's Cares of Conscience, chap. 4. is a doctrine perfective of human nature, that teaches us to love God and to love one another, to hurt no man, and to do good to every man, it propines to us the noblest, the highest, and the bravest pleasures of the world; the joys of charity, the rest of innocence, the peace of quiet spirits, the wealth of beneficence, and forbids us only to be beasts, and to be devils; it allows all that God and nature intended, and only restrains the excrescences of nature, and forbids us to take pleasure in that which is the only entertainment of devils, in murders and revenges, malice and spiteful words and actions; it permits corporal pleasures where they can * From the Holy War. R He that falls into sin is a man; that grieves at it may be a saint; that boasteth of it is a devil. It is hard for one of base parentage to personate a king without over-acting his part. Charity's eyes should be open as well as her hands. Surely King Edward the Sixth was as truly charitable in granting Bridewell for the punishment of sturdy rogues, as in giving St. Thomas's Hospital for the relief of the poor. The Pope knows he can catch no fish if the waters are clear. best minister to health and societies, to conversation of families, and honour of communities, it teaches men to keep their words, that themselves may be secured in all their just interests, and to do good to others that good may be done to them; it forbids biting one another, that we may not be devoured by one another; and commands obedience to superiors, that we may not be ruined in confusions; it combines governments, and confirms all good laws and makes peace, and opposes and prevents wars where they are not just, and where they are not necessary. It is a religion that is life and spirit, not consisting in ceremonies and external amusements, but in the services of the heart, and the real fruits of lips, and hands, that is, of good words and good deeds, and hath in it both heat and light, and is not more effectual than it is beauteous; it promises every thing that we can desire, and yet promises nothing but what it does effect; it proclaims war against all vices, and generally does command every virtue ; it teaches us with ease to mortify those affections which reason durst scarce reprove, because she hath not strength enough to conquer, and it does create in us those virtues which reason of herself never knew, and after they are known could never approve sufficiently; it is a doctrine in which nothing is superfluous or burdensome, nor yet is there any thing wanting which can procure happiness to mankind, or by which God can be glorified. The Cardinals' eyes in the court of Rome were old and dim; and therefore the glass, wherein they see any thing, must be well silvered. Many wish that the tree may be felled, who hope to gather chips by the fall. The Holy Ghost came down, not in the shape of a vulture, but in the form of a dove. THE SKELETON. A naked cage of bone, From whence the winged soul long since is flown. WISDOM IN ITS OWN CONCEIT. HUMILITY is every where preached, and pride practised; they persuade others to labour for heaven, and fall out about earth themselves; their lives are contrary to their doctrines, and their doctrines one to another. THE RELIGION OF MAHOMET. Ir may justly seem admirable how that senseless religion should gain so much ground on Christianity; especially having neither real substance in her doctrine, nor winning behaviour in her ceremonies to allure professors. For what is it but the scum of Judaism and Paganism sod together, and here and there strewed over with a spice of Christianity? As Mahomet's tomb, so many sentences in his Alcoran seem to hang by some secret loadstone, which draweth together their gaping independences with a mystical coherence, or otherwise they are flat nonsense. Yet this wonder of the spreading of this leprosy is lessened, if we consider that besides the general causes of the growing of all errors (namely, the gangrene-like nature of evil, and the justice of God to deliver them over to believe lies who will not obey the truth) Mahometanism hath raised itself to this height by some peculiar advantages; first, by permitting much carnal liberty to the professors (as having many wives) and no wonder if they get fish enough that use that bait; secondly, by promising a paradise of sensual pleasure hereafter, wherewith flesh and blood is more affected (as falling under her experience) than with hope of any spiritual delights; thirdly, by prohibiting of disputes, and suppressing of all learning; and thus Mahomet made his shop dark on purpose, that he might vend any wares : lastly, this religion had never made her own passage so fast and so far, if the sword had not cut the way before her, as commonly the conquered follow for the most part the religion of the conquerors. By this means that cursed doctrine hath so improved itself, that it may outvie with professors the church of Rome, which boasteth so much of her latitude and extent; though from thence to infer that her faith is the best, is falsely |