Ch. lxv. 6.

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Use of Imagination in aiding virtuous Shame : BOOK V. of common life honour the ceremony of the cross might be for that they lived with infidels. But that which they did in the sacrament of baptism was for the selfsame good of believers which is thereby intended still. The Cross is for us an admonition no less necessary than for them to glory in the service of Jesus Christ, and not to hang down our heads as men ashamed thereof although it procure us reproach and obloquy at the hands of this wretched world.

Shame is a kind of fear to incur disgrace and ignominy. Now whereas some things are worthy of reproach, some things ignominious only through a false opinion which men have conceived of them, nature that generally feareth opprobrious reprehension must by reason and religion be taught what it should be ashamed of and what not 52. But be we never so well instructed what our duty is in this behalf, without some present admonition at the very instant of practice, what we know is many times not called to mind till that be done whereupon our just confusion ensueth. To supply the absence of such as that way might do us good when they see us in danger of sliding, there are judicious and wise men which think we may greatly relieve ourselves by a bare imagined presence of some, whose authority we fear and would be loth

mongst them an open profession of "Christ crucified, although it be to be "commended, yet is not this means

as

For they might otherwise "have kept it and with less danger "than by this use of crossing. And it was brought in upon no good ground, so the Lord left a mark "of his curse of it, and whereby it "might be perceived to come out of "the forge of man's brain, in that it began forthwith while it was yet "in the swaddling clouts to be superstitiously abused. The Chris"tians had such a superstition in it "that they would do nothing with"out crossing. But if it were "granted that upon this considera"tion which I have before-men

Application of the Sign of the Cross to that Purpose. 323

to offend, if indeed they were present with us 53.

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"Wit- BOOK V.

nesses at hand are a bridle unto many offences. Let the "mind have always some whom it feareth, some whose "authority may keep even secret thoughts under awe. Take "Cato, or if he be too harsh and rugged, choose some other "of a softer mettle, whose gravity of life and speech thou "lovest, his mind and countenance carry with thee, set him always before thine eyes either as a watch or as a pattern. "That which is crooked we cannot straighten but by some "such level."

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If men of so good experience and insight in the maims of our weak flesh, have thought these fancied remembrances available to awaken shamefacedness, that so the boldness of sin may be stayed ere it look abroad, surely the wisdom of the Church of Christ which hath to that use converted the ceremony of the cross in baptism it is no Christian man's part to despise, especially seeing that by this mean where nature doth earnestly implore aid, religion yieldeth her that ready assistance than which there can be no help more forcible serving only to relieve memory, and to bring to our cogitation that which should most make ashamed of sin.

[7] The mind while we are in this present life, whether it contemplate 54, meditate, deliberate, or howsoever exercise itself, worketh nothing without continual recourse unto imagination, the only storehouse of wit and peculiar chair of memory. On this anvil it ceaseth not day and night to strike, by means whereof as the pulse declareth how the heart doth work, so the very thoughts 55 and cogitations of man's mind be they good or bad do no where sooner bewray themselves, than

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53 Sen. Epist. lib. i. Ep. 11. ["Magna pars peccatorum tollitur, si peccaturis testis adsistat. Aliquem habeat animus, quem vere"atur, cujus auctoritate etiam se"cretum suum sanctius faciat... "Elige itaque Catonem si hic “ videtur tibi nimis rigidus, elige "remissioris animi virum, Lælium; “ elige eum, cujus tibi placuit et “ vita et oratio, et ipsius animum "ante te ferens et vultus, illum "semper tibi ostende, vel custodem "vel exemplum. . . Nisi ad regu"lam, prava non corriges."]

54 Τὸ νοεῖν ἢ φαντασία τις ἢ οὐκ avev pavraoías. Arist. de Anim. lib. i. cap. 1. [§. 18.] 'H pèv aioθητικὴ φαντασία καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἀλόγοις ζώοις ὑπάρχει ἡ δὲ βουλευτικὴ ἐν τοῖς λογιστικοῖς. lib. iii, cap. 11. [§. 13.] Tà μèv ovv eïồn tò voηTIKÒV Év τοῖς φαντάσμασι νοεῖ, καὶ ὡς ἐν ἐκείνοις ώρισται αὐτῷ τὸ διωκτὸν καὶ φευκτόν, καὶ ἐκτὸς τῆς αἰσθήσεως ὂν, ὅταν ἐπὶ τῶν φαντασμάτων ᾖ, κινεῖTa. lib. iii. cap. 8. [§. 8.]

55" Frons hominis tristitiæ, hila"ritatis, clementiæ, severitatis in"dex est." Plin. lib. xi. [c. 37.]

Ch. lxv. 7.

324 The Sign of the Cross, a Guard against Apostasy :

BOOK V. through the crevices of that wall wherewith nature hath com

Ch. lxv. 8. passed the cells and closets of fancy. In the forehead nothing

more plain to be seen than the fear of contumely and disgrace. For which cause the Scripture (as with great probability it may be thought) describeth them 56 marked of God in the forehead, whom his mercy hath undertaken to keep from final confusion and shame. Not that God doth set any corporal mark on his chosen, but to note that he giveth his elect security of preservation from reproach, the fear whereof doth use to shew itself in that part 57. Shall I say, that the sign of the Cross (as we use it) is in some sort a mean to work our preservation from reproach 58? Surely the mind which as yet hath not hardened itself in sin is seldom provoked thereunto in any gross and grievous manner, but nature's secret suggestion objecteth against it ignominy as a bar. Which conceit being entered into that palace of man's fancy, the gates whereof hath imprinted in them that holy sign which bringeth forthwith to mind whatsoever Christ hath wrought and we vowed against sin, it cometh hereby to pass that Christian men never want a most effectual though a silent teacher to avoid whatsoever may deservedly procure shame. So that in things which we should be ashamed of we are by the Cross admonished faithfully of our duty at the very moment when admonition doth most need.

[8.] Other things there are which deserve honour and yet do purchase many times our disgrace in this present world, as of old the very truth of religion itself, till God by his own outstretched arm made the glory thereof to shine over all the earth. Whereupon St. Cyprian exhorting to martyrdom in times of heathenish persecution and cruelty, thought it not vain to allege unto them with other arguments the very ceremony of that Cross whereof we speak 59. Never let that hand offer sacrifice

and appealed to accordingly by St. Cyprian. 325

Ch. lxv. 9.

to idols which hath already received the Body of our Saviour BOOK V. Christ, and shall hereafter the crown of his glory; "Arm

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your foreheads" unto all boldness, that the "Sign of God" may be kept safe.

Again, when it pleased God that the fury of their enemies being bridled the Church had some little rest and quietness (if so small a liberty but only to breathe between troubles may be termed quietness and rest,) to such as fell not away from Christ through former persecutions, he giveth due and deserved praise in the selfsame manner. 60 You that were

"ready to endure imprisonment, and were resolute to suffer “death; you that have courageously withstood the world, ye "have made yourselves both a glorious spectacle for God to “behold, and a worthy example for the rest of your brethren "to follow. Those mouths which had sanctified themselves "with food coming down from heaven loathed after Christ's 66 own Body and Blood to taste the poisoned and contagious "scraps of idols; those foreheads which the Sign of God had purified kept themselves to be crowned by him, the touch "of the garlands of Satan they abhorred 61 ̧” Thus was the memory of that sign which they had in baptism a kind of bar or prevention to keep them even from apostasy, whereinto the frailty of flesh and blood overmuch fearing to endure shame, might peradventure the more easily otherwise have drawn them.

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[9] We have not now through the gracious goodness of Almighty God, those extreme conflicts which our fathers had with blasphemous contumelies every where offered to the name of Christ, by such as professed themselves infidels and unbelievers. Howbeit, unless we be strangers to the age wherein we live, or else in some partial respect dissemblers

BOOK V.

Ch. lxv. 10.

326 The Sign of the Cross, a Support under Contempt:

of that we hourly both hear and see, there is not the simplest of us but knoweth with what disdain and scorn Christ is honoured far and wide. Is there any burden in the world more heavy to bear than contempt ? Is there any contempt that grieveth as theirs doth whose quality no way making them less worthy than others are of reputation, only the service which they do to Christ in the daily exercise of religion treadeth them down? Doth any contumely which we sustain for religion's sake pierce so deeply as that which would seem even of mere conscience religiously spiteful? When they that honour God are despised; when the chiefest service of honour that man can do unto him, is the cause why they are despised; when they which pretend to honour him and that with greatest sincerity, do with more than heathenish petulancy trample under foot almost whatsoever either we or the whole Church of God by the space of so many ages have been accustomed unto, for the comelier and better exercise of our religion according to the soundest rules that wisdom directed by the word of God, and by long experience confirmed, hath been able with common advice, with much deliberation and exceeding great diligence, to comprehend; when no man fighting under Christ's banner can be always exempted from seeing or sustaining those indignities, the sting whereof not to feel, or feeling, not to be moved thereat, is a thing impossible to flesh and blood: if this be any object for patience to work on, the strictest bond that thereunto tieth us is our vowed obedience to Christ; the solemnest vow that we ever made to obey Christ and to suffer willingly all reproaches for his sake was made in baptism; and amongst other memorials to keep us mindful of that vow we cannot think that the sign which our new baptized foreheads did there receive is either unfit or unforcible, the reasons hitherto alleged being weighed with indifferent balance.

[10.] It is not (you will say) the cross in our foreheads, but in our hearts the faith of Christ that armeth us with

patience, constancy, and courage. Which as we grant to be most true, so neither dare we despise no not the meanest helps that serve though it be but in the very lowest degree of furtherance towards the highest services that God doth require