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poorer than himself. Greater yet: St. Paulinus sold himself to slavery to redeem a young man, for whose captivity his mother wept sadly: and it is said, that St. Katharine sucked the envenomed wounds of a villain, who had injured her most impudently. And I shall tell you of a greater charity than all these put together: Christ gave himself to shame and death to redeem his enemies from bondage, and death, and hell.

3. Learn of the frugal man, and only avoid sordid actions, and turn good husband, and change your arts of getting into providence for the poor, and we shall soon become rich in good works and why should we not do as much for charity, as for covetousness; for heaven, as for the fading world; for God and the holy Jesus, as for the needless superfluities of back and belly?

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14. In giving alms to beggars and persons of that low rank, it is better to give little to each; that we may give to the more; so extending our alms to many persons: but in charities of religion, as building hospitals, colleges, and houses for devotion, and supplying the accidental wants of decayed persons, fallen from great plenty to great necessity, it is better to unite our alms, than to disperse them; to make a noble relief or maintenance to one, and to restore him to comfort, than to support only his natural needs, and keep him alive only, unrescued from sad discomforts.

15. The precept of alms or charity binds not indefinitely to all the instances and kinds of charity : for he, that delights to feed the poor, and spends all his portion that way, is not bound to enter into prisons and redeem captives: but we are obliged, by the presence of circumstances, and the special disposition of Providence, and the pitiableness of an object, to this or that particular act of charity. The eye is the sense of mercy; and the bowels are its organ; and that enkindles pity, and pity produces alms: when the eye sees, what it never saw, the heart will think, what it never thought: but, when we have an object present to our eye, then we must pity; for there the providence of God hath fitted our charity with circumstances. He, that is in thy sight or in thy neighbourhood, is fallen into the lot of thy charity.

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16. If thou hast no money, yet thou must have mercy; and art bound to pity the poor, and pray for them, and throw ¶ Luke, xii. 2. Acts, iii. 6. Chi ti da un ossa, non ti verrebbe morto.

thy holy desires and devotions into the treasure of the church: and if thou dost, what thou art able, be it little or great, corporal or spiritual, the charity of alms or the charity of prayers, a cup of wine or a cup of water, if it be but love to the brethren, or a desire to help all or any of Christ's poor, it shall be accepted according to that a man hath, not according to that he hath nots. For love is all this, and all the other commandments: and it will express itself, where it can; and where it cannot, yet it is love still; and it is also sorrow, that it cannot.

Motives to Charity.

The motives to this duty are such, as Holy Scripture hath propounded to us by way of consideration and proposition of its excellences and consequent reward. 1. There is no one duty, which our blessed Saviour did recommend to his disciples with so repeated an injunction, as this of charity and alms t. To which add the words spoken by our Lord, "It is better to give than to receive." And when we consider, how great a blessing it is, that we beg not from door to door, it is a ready instance of our thankfulness to God, for his sake to relieve them that do. 2. This duty is that alone, whereby the future day of judgment shall be transacted. For nothing but charity and alms is that, whereby Christ shall declare the justice and mercy of the eternal sentence. Martyrdom itself is not there expressed, and no otherwise involved, but as it is the greatest charity. 3. Christ made himself the greatest and daily example of alms or charity. He went up and down doing good, preaching the gospel, and healing all diseases: and God the Father is imitable by use in nothing, but in purity and mercy. 4. Alms, given to the poor, redound to the emolument of the giver, both temporal and eternal". 5. They are instrumental to the remission of sins. Our forgiveness and mercy to others being made the very rule and proportion of our confidence, and hope, and our prayer, to be forgiven ourselves. 6. It is a treasure in heaven; it procures friends, when we die. It

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is reckoned as done to Christ, whatsoever we do to our poor brother and, therefore, when a poor man begs for Christ's sake, if he have reason to ask for Christ's sake, give it him, if thou canst. Now every man hath title to ask for Christ's sake, whose need is great, and himself unable to cure it, and if the man be a Christian. Whatsoever charity Christ will reward, all that is given for Christ's sake, and therefore it may be asked in his name: but every man, that uses that sacred name for an endearment, hath not a title to it, neither he, nor his need. 7. It is one of the wings of prayer, by which it flies to the throne of grace. 8. It crowns all the works of piety". 9. It causes thanksgiving to God on our behalf: 10. And the bowels of the poor bless us, and they pray for us. 11. And that portion of our estate, out of which a tenth, or a fifth, or a twentieth, or some offering to God for religion and the poor goes forth, certainly returns with a great blessing upon all the rest. It is like the effusion of oil by the Sidonian woman; as long as she pours into empty vessels, it could never cease running or like the widow's barrel of meal; it consumed not, as long as she fed the prophet. 12. The sum of all is contained in the words of our blessed Saviour: "Give alms of such things as you have, and behold all things are clean unto you." 13. To which may be added, that charity, or mercy, is the peculiar character of God's elect, and a sign of predestination; which advantage we are taught by St. Paul: "Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercy, kindness, &c. Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any *." The result of all which we may read in the words of St. Chrysostom: "To know the art of alms is greater than to be crowned with the diadem of kings. And yet to convert one soul is greater than to pour out ten thousand talents into the baskets of the poor."

But, because giving alms is an act of the virtue of mercifulness, our endeavour must be, by proper arts, to mortify the parents of unmercifulness, which are, 1. Envy; 2. Anger; 3. Covetousness: in which we may be helped by the following rules or instruments.

Nunquam memini me legisse malâ morte mortuum, qui libenter opera charitatis exercuit.-S. Hieron. ep. ad Nepot.

x Coloss. iii. 12.

Remedies against Unmercifulness and Uncharitableness

1. Against Envy, by way of consideration.

Against envy I shall use the same argument, I would use to persuade a man from the fever or the dropsy. 1. Because it is a disease; it is so far from having pleasure in it, or a temptation to it, that it is full of pain, a great instrument of vexation: it eats the flesh, and dries up the marrow, and makes hollow eyes, and lean cheeks, and a pale face. 2. It is nothing but a direct resolution never to enter into heaven by the way of noble pleasure, taken in the good of others. 3. It is most contrary to God. 4. And a just contrary state to the felicities and actions of heaven, where every star increases the light of the other, and the multitude of guests, at the supper of the Lamb, makes the eternal meal more festival. 5. It is, perfectly, the state of hell, and the passion of devils : for they do nothing but despair in themselves, and envy others' quiet or safety, and yet cannot rejoice either in their good or in their evil, although they endeavour to hinder that, and procure this, with all the devices and arts of malice and of a great understanding. 6. Envy can serve no end in the world: it cannot please any thing, nor do any thing, nor hinder any thing, but the content and felicity of him that hath. 7. Envy can never pretend to justice, as hatred and uncharitableness sometimes may for there may be causes of hatred; and I may have wrong done me; and then hatred hath some pretence, though no just argument. But no man is unjust or injurious, for being prosperous or wise. 8. And therefore many men profess to hate another, but no man owns envy, as being an enmity and displeasure for no cause, but goodness or felicity: envious men, being like cantharides and caterpillars, that delight most to devour ripe and most excellent fruits. It is of all crimes, the basest: for malice and anger are appeased with benefits, but envy is exasperated, as envying to fortunate persons both their power and their will to do good; and never leaves murmuring, till the envied person be levelled, and then only the vulture

Nemo alienæ virtuti invidet, qui satis confidit suæ.Cic. contra M. Anton. z Homerus, Thersitis malos mores describens, malitiæ summam apposuit, Pelidæ imprimis erat atque inimicus Ulyssi.

leaves to eat the liver. For if his neighbour be made miserable, the envious man is apt to be troubled : like him, that is so long unbuilding the turrets, till all the roof is low or flat, or that the stones fall upon the lower buildings, and do a mischief, that the man repents of.

2. Remedies against Anger, by way of Exercise.

The next enemy to mercifulness and the grace of alms is anger; against which there are proper instruments both in prudence and religion.

1. Prayer is the great remedy against anger: for it must suppose it, in some degree removed, before we pray; and then it is the more likely, it will be finished, when the prayer is done. We must lay aside the act of anger, as a preparatory to prayer; and the curing the habit will be the effect and blessing of prayer: so that, if a man, to cure his anger, resolves to address himself to God by prayer, it is first necessary, that by his own observation and diligence, he lay the anger aside, before his prayer can be fit to be presented: and when we so pray, and so endeavour, we have all the blessings of prayer, which God hath promised to it, to be our security for success.

2. If anger arises in thy breast, instantly seal up thy lips, and let it not go forth: for, like fire, when it wants vent, it will suppress itself. It is good, in a fever, to have a tender and a smooth tongue; but it is better, that it be so in anger: for, if it be rough and distempered, there it is an ill sign, but here it is an ill cause. Angry passion is a fire, and angry words are like breath to fan them together; they are like steel and flint, sending out fire by mutual collision. Some men will discourse themselves into passion; and, if their neighbour be enkindled too, together they flame with rage and violence.

3. Humility is the most excellent natural cure for anger, in the world; for he, that by daily considering his own infirmities and failings, makes the error of his neighbour or

a Ira cùm pectus rapida occupavit,
Futiles linguæ jubeo cavere

Vana latratus jaculantis.. Sappho.

Turbatus sum, et non sum locutus. — Psal. xxxix.

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