ness and abomination that he had committed. 2 Sam. xiii. xiv. xv. xvi. xvii. xviii. xix. xx.

Now consider and weigh, as it were in a true balance, the righteousness which God requireth of us on the one side, and again, the whole trade of our life on the other side. If the generation of mankind had been conformable unto the law of God, and had not swerved from the same, it had been altogether thoroughly happy and blessed evermore, and should Wisd. ii. 23. never have rotted and dried away like the fruit and flowers of the field.

Gen. iii.

But it swerved and fell away at the first, even from the beginning. Our first parents and progenitors did neglect and despise God's commandments; and so we through their fall are corrupt and infected, our reason, senses, and understanding blinded, and our will poisoned. We feel and find in us wicked lusts and affections; we seek in the world lust and pleasure, even against the holy word of God. And like as if an ass were trimmed and decked in a lion's skin, and would needs be a lion, yet his long ears, being always upwards, should easily descry and bewray him; even so if we adorn, garnish, and set forth ourselves with certain glorious, beautiful works never so much, so that no man can say but that we are utterly innocent and inculpable in divers and many points; yet, notwithstanding, we have filthy, unclean, and wicked hearts, full of security and neglect of God, altogether given to the love of ourselves, and to all manner of dissolute

ness.

Now therefore, if we be assaulted and visited with sickness, poverty, war, sedition, we ought not to ascribe these things, one to the magistrate, another to the preacher and minister of God's word, or to the faith and religion itself, and the third to the elements and stars, or to God in heaven himself, as though any of these were the occasion of such plagues.

Like as no man ought to accuse and blame the physician, as though he were the only occasion of the corrupt humours within the body, notwithstanding that he hath brought and driven them out, that a man may evidently see and perceive them; but the misbehaviour and intemperate diet of the man himself is the very right occasion, and the only root thereof: even so we ought not to ascribe any blame or fault unto God,

if he send unto us heaviness, pain, and trouble, but to think that it is a medicine and remedy meet for our sins, and every man to ascribe the very cause and occasion thereof unto himself and his own sins, and to refer the blame to nothing else.

And this example did the holy men, our godly forefathers, in old times shew, declare, and leave unto us, ascribing always the cause and occasion of the cross, and of such heavy afflictions as did happen in their time, even unto their own sins. As Daniel saith, chap. ix.: "By reason of our sins, Dan. ix. 5. and of the wickedness of our fathers, is Jerusalem and thy people destroyed, even of those that dwell about us." For the which cause we ought rather to lament and bewail, yea, Jon. iii. and to cry out, Alas! alas! out, out upon our sins and wickedness! than either upon any infirmity, sickness, or upon any other affliction or tribulation, which we suffer by reason of our sins.

For if we should wail and be heavy without reason or measure, when God doth nothing but executeth justice and righteousness upon his enemies, what were it else but to mislike the righteousness of God, and even to love that thing which God hateth? And what is this else, but only the very righteousness and goodness of God, when he punisheth, martyreth, and utterly subdueth and destroyeth in us, here in this world, his and our greatest enemies, that is to say, our

sins?

Therefore, to sorrow and mourn without measure in the midst of affliction and trouble, is nothing else but to shew thyself a friend unto sin, which is thine and God's highest enemy. Wherefore we should rather laud God, and highly rejoice, not specially because of the misery and affliction, but in the righteous and gracious will of God: righteous, I say, because he punisheth sin; and again, gracious and merciful, forasmuch as he doth punish it much more easily than we have justly deserved.

CHAPTER III.

ALL MANNER OF TROUBLES AND AFFLICTIONS, WHATSOEVER
THEY BE, ARE ALWAYS MUCH LESS AND LIGHTER THAN
ARE OUR SINS.

WHENSOEVER a man doth give a small and light punishment unto him that hath deserved much greater, it is reason that he receive and take it patiently: as one that hath slain and murdered a man, if he be but beaten and whipped out of a city or town, he taketh it in good part, because he knoweth well enough that he hath deserved to be hanged.

The holy woman Judith thinketh, that all these transitory punishments are much less, and far inferior unto our sins and Judith viii. wickednesses. (Jud. viii.) Wherefore, if thou suffer poverty,

27.

Job ii. 10.

sickness, or any other adversity, consider and think with thyself after this manner: Well, thy manifold sins have deserved a thousand thousand times more grievous punishment, more heavy sickness, more horrible war, and more intolerable imprisonment.

And if all the miseries of the world should come together upon one heap unto thee, yet thou hast deserved much worse; for thou hast well deserved the full power and tyranny of the devil and eternal damnation, which notwithstanding God hath kept and taken from thee of his mere mercy, only for Jesus Christ's sake. Item, he that hath received alway good and prosperous things, ought not to marvel and wonder, if sometime he receive also some misfortune and adversity. Even the children of the world can say, that there is never a good hour, but hath also deserved an evil.

Now so merciful is God, that he suffereth no man upon earth unrewarded with one benefit or other as well before trouble as after, yea, and also in the very time thereof, he giveth him many high and excellent gifts and benefits, as well bodily as ghostly, corporal as spiritual.

As for his benefits before trouble and affliction, we have a notable example set before our eyes in Job, which saith (chap. ii.): "Seeing we have received much goodness of

God, why should we not be content also to receive the evil?" Likewise Pliny the second, being an heathen man, as he would comfort a friend of his, whose dear spouse and wife was departed out of the world, among other things he wrote after this manner: "This ought to be a singular comfort unto thee, that thou hast had and enjoyed such a precious jewel so long a time. For forty-four years did she live with thee, and there was never any strife, brawling, nor contention between you, nor never one of you once displeased the other. Yea, but now thou wilt say, so much the more loath and unwilling am I to forbear and to be without her, seeing I lived so long a time so quietly with her. For we forget soon such pleasures and commodities as we have proved and tasted but a little time only. But to answer to this, take thou heed that thou be not found unthankful, if thou wilt only weigh and consider what thou hast lost, and not remember how long thou didst enjoy her1."

And again, in the very time and midst of affliction and tribulation, God giveth us grace to consider other good and prosperous things, which we have and enjoy still, that through the remembrance and consideration of them our smart and pain may be eased, mollified, and mitigated.

As for an example: thou art a weak, impotent, and a diseased man in thy body; but yet hath God given thee reasonable and convenient goods and possessions to sustain thee with; or else, if thou hast scarceness and lack of goods and riches, yet thou hast no lack of bodily health.

Now if we will not set and weigh the one against the

[The letter alluded to appears to be that of Pliny to Geminus, in which he mentions the affliction which his friend Macrinus had sustained in the loss of his wife. But in this, as also in other instances, the author appears to have quoted from memory: for although there are several letters from Pliny to Macrinus himself, in none of them does he make any allusion to his loss. PLINIUS GEMINO SUO S. Grave vulnus Macrinus noster accepit. Omisit uxorem singularis exempli, etiam si olim fuisset. Vixit cum hac 39. annis sine jurgio, sine offensa. **** Habet quidem Macrinus grande solatium, quod tantum bonum tamdiu tenuit: sed hoc magis exacerbatur, quod amisit: nam fruendis voluptatibus crescit carendi dolor. Ero ergo suspensus pro homine amicissimo, dum admittere avocamenta et cicatricem pati possit; quam nihil æque ac necessitas ipsa, et dies longa, et satietas doloris inducit. -Lib. vi. Ep. 5.]

other, then are we like unto little children, which, if any man happen a little to disturb or hinder their play or game, or to take any manner of thing from them, they will by and by cast away all the rest also, and will fall on weeping. Even so were it possible enough for us to do likewise, whensoever any misfortune should happen unto us, to wax angry and displeased; and to have no manner of lust nor desire to use nor to enjoy that good that still remaineth and is left behind.

Be it in case that thou wert deprived of all manner of bodily comfort: yet in thy breast and heart thou hast the knowledge of Jesus Christ, which hath redeemed thee out of hell and damnation, that was due unto thee; in respect of the which damnation all plagues upon earth are to be esteemed as one little drop of water against the whole sea. Rom. v. 1. (Rom. v. 1 Cor. v. Col. i. 1 Pet. iii. Heb. ix. &c.)

1 Cor. v. 7.

Col. i. 14.

1 Pet. iii. 18.

15.

Besides this, also through faith thou feelest a confidence Heb. ix. 12- and assurance of everlasting and eternal joy. As St Paul doth write of the same, saying: "I suppose the afflictions of this world are not worthy of the glory that shall be revealed Rom. viii. 18. unto us." (Rom. viii.) An example have we set before our eyes in the prodigal and desperate son, which did so humble and submit himself, that he desired no more to be taken for a son, but to be put to labour as a day-labourer and an hired servant, so that he might but only remain in his father's Luke xv. 19. house. (Luke xv.) Even so, whatsoever God sendeth ought we to take patiently, so that we may but only dwell in the house of God in heaven with him everlastingly.

Now if any man should think thus, 'God doth not punish others, which have committed much more heinous sins, with so great and grievous plagues and diseases as he doth us;' that were unreverently and unchristianly imagined of God. For what if thou thyself be more wicked than any other? But be it so, that others do live more wickedly and licentiously than thou, what wottest thou how God doth punish them? The greatest and most grievous pains and punishments are the inward sorrows and secret punishments of the mind, which are not seen with the outward eye.

And although they have no special sorrow nor singular grief that appeareth unto thee, and thou knowest not what God meaneth thereby, yet oughtest thou, as a child unto the