BY

THE HYPOCRITE.

Y hypocrite we understand such a one as doth (Isaiah xxxii. 6) "practise hypocrisy,' make a trade or work of dissembling; for, otherwise, hypocriseorum macula carere, aut paucorum est, aut nullorum: The best of God's children have a smack of hypocrisy.

A hypocrite is himself both the archer and the mark, in all actions shooting at his own praise or profit. And therefore he doth all things that they may be seen;- what with others is held a principal point in law is his main maxim in divinity,

to have good witEven fasting itself is meat and drink to him whilst others behold it.

ness.

In the outside of religion he outshines a sincere Christian. Gilt cups glitter more than those of massy gold, which are seldom burnished. Yea, well may the hypocrite afford gaudy facing who cares not for any lining; brave it in the shop that hath nothing in the warehouse. Nor is it a wonder if in outward service he outstrips God's servants, who outdoeth God's command by will-worship, giving God more than he requires, though not what most he requires, I mean his heart.

His vizard is commonly plucked off in this world. Sincerity is an entire thing in itself;

hypocrisy consists of several pieces cunningly closed together; and sometimes the hypocrite is smote (as Ahab with an arrow, 1 Kings xxii. 34) betwixt the joints of his armor, and so is mortally wounded in his reputation. Now by these shrewd signs a dissembler is often discovered: first, heavy censuring of others for light faults; secondly, boasting of his own goodness; thirdly, the unequal beating of his pulse in matters of piety, — hard, strong, and quick in public actions, weak, soft, and dull in private matters; fourthly, shrinking in persecution, for painted faces cannot abide to come nigh the fire.

Yet sometimes he goes to the grave neither detected nor suspected: if masters in their art, and living in peaceable times, wherein piety and prosperity do not fall out, but agree well together. Maud, mother to King Henry the Second, being besieged in Winchester castle, counterfeited herself to be dead, and so was carried out in a coffin, whereby she escaped. Another time, being besieged at Oxford in a cold winter, with wearing white apparel she got away in the snow undiscovered. Thus some hypocrites, by dissembling mortification, that they are dead to the world, and by professing a snow-like purity in their conversations, escape all their lifetime undiscerned by mortal eyes.

By long dissembling piety, he deceives himself at last; yea, he may grow so infatuated as to conceive himself no dissembler, but a sincere saint. A scholar was so possessed with his lively personating of King Richard the Third in a college-comedy, that ever after he was transported with a royal humor in his large expenses, which brought him to beggary, though he had great preferment. Thus the hypocrite, by long acting the part of piety, at last believes himself really to be such a one whom at first he did but counterfeit.

God here knows, and hereafter will make hypocrites known to the whole world. Ottocar, King of Bohemia, refused to do homage to Rodolphus the First, Emperor, till at last, chastised with war, he was content to do him homage privately in a tent; which tent was so contrived by the Emperor's servants, that, by drawing one cord, it was all taken away, and so Ottocar presented on his knees doing his homage to the view of three armies in presence. Thus God at last shall uncase the closest dissembler to the sight of men, angels, and devils, having removed all veils and pretences of piety; no goat in a sheepskin shall steal on his right hand at the last day of judgment.

IT

THE HERETIC.

T is very difficult accurately to define him. Amongst the heathen, atheist was, and amongst Christians, heretic is, the disgraceful word of course always cast upon those who dissent from the predominant current of the time. Thus those who, in matters of opinion, varied from the Pope's copy the least hair-stroke, are condemned for heretics. Yea, Virgilius, Bishop of Saltzburg, was branded with that censure, for maintaining that there were antipodes opposite to the then known world. It may be, as Alexander, hearing the philosophers dispute of more worlds, wept that he had conquered no part of them; so it grieved the Pope that these antipodes were not subject to his jurisdiction, which much incensed his Holiness against that strange opinion. We will branch the description of a heretic into these three parts.

1. He is one that formerly hath been of the true Church: " They went out from us, but they were not of us. These afterwards prove more offensive to the Church than very Pagans; as the English-Irish, descended anciently of English parentage, (be it spoken with the more shame to them, and sorrow to us,) turning wild, become worse enemies to our nation than the native Irish themselves.

2. Maintaining a fundamental error. Every scratch in the hand is not a stab to the heart; nor doth every false opinion make a heretic.

3. With obstinacy; which is the dead flesh, making the green wound of an error fester into the old sore of a heresy.

It matters not much what manner of person he hath if beautiful, perchance the more attractive of feminine followers; if deformed, so that his body is as odd as his opinions, he is the more properly entitled to the reputation of crooked saint.

His natural parts are quick and able. Yet he that shall ride on a winged horse to tell him thereof, shall but come too late to bring him stale news of what he knew too well before.

Learning is necessary in himself, if he trades in a critical error; but if he only broaches dregs, and deals in some dull, sottish opinion, a trowel will serve as well as a pencil to daub on such thick, coarse colors. Yea, in some heresies, deep studying is so useless, that the first thing they learn is to inveigh against all learning.

However, some smattering in the original tongues will do well. On occasion he will let fly whole volleys of Greek and Hebrew words, whereby he not only amazeth his ignorant auditors, but also in conferences daunteth many of his opposers, who (though in all other learning