Leaven, to the Sea water which is salt, and to Vinegar, a corrupted
Wine, and other sorts of Leavens Fires against nature. And the
Celestiall to the Altar to pure and unleavened Past, to sweet water
fit to drinke, to _Aqua vitæ_, without Vinegar, representing the state
of innocence in our first fathers, before their transgression, and the
simplicitie of their knowledge, infused into them by the Creator. But
when they were once tempted afterwards with ambition, to know more
then they should, they would by humane discourse become more subtill
and sage, in tasting the fruit of knowledge of good and evill; their
Past without Leaven began to swell, to bee proud with the Leaven
themselves introduced, which perverted and spoyled it, appropriating
it to corporall and sensible things, for the bread which wee eate is
leavened, but that which wee use in the Church must not be so, and
not without cause, for unleavened bread will bee kept six moneths
without molding or corrupting; that leavened bread will not keep so
many weekes. It is therefore that the Apostle said, a little Leaven
corrupts the whole Masse: Because that one propriety of the Leaven
is to convert into their corruption all that is adjoyning of their
nature, as Vinegar doth Wine, and Leaven pure Past, also Rennet which
is in the number of Leavens. And when they have no Leaven, they make
some, corrupting the Past with Vinegar, Lees of Beere, Egges, and
like substances, who by their corruption acquire to themselves the
propertie of strange fire which is able to convert into its nature,
that where it can bite, as wee may see in a Feaver against naturall
heate, so that hee turnes it selfe into all things, and all into it
selfe, according to _Heraclitus_, who set it downe for the Principall,
yet after _Zoroastres_, who thought all things were begotten of Fire
after it was extinguished, for being living it begets nothing, no more
doth Salt, nor the Sea which _Homer_ calls ἀτρὺγετος unfruitfull, which
doth nothing but consume and destroy: An immense and wicked portion of
things (saith _Pliny_) and wherein it is doubtfull whether it consume
or bring forth more things. Leaven then is a strange fire, and is
indeed caustique or burning, for applyed to naked flesh, it engenders
therein little _cloches_, which shewes its fierynesse, (also it doth
not so without Salt) called for this reason in Latine _fermentum_,
Leaven which increaseth by bring warme: and in Greek ζύμη Leaven from
ζέω to boile. The Chymicks call it the interior fire, fire within the
vessell, for wee see by experience, that bread, if the Past be not
leavened, what boyling soever you give it, shall never be but of a hard
and uneasy digestion, greatly oppressing the stomach, if the Leaven
which they joyne thereunto make it boyle within; whence then it comes
that _Moses_ so knowing a man, and so illustrated with the Divine
Spirit, so rejecteth a thing so profitable and necessary, and banisheth
so expresly the Leaven of the Sacrifices, which is so great an aide and
succor in our principall aliment, Bread. _You shall burne no Leaven nor
Honey in the Lords Sacrifice_, _Levit._ 2.11. And _Exod._ 12.15, hee
condemneth to death those who in the dayes of unleavened bread should
eate leavened bread, or should have ever so little in his house. Is it
not because Idolaters use Leaven? but hee doth not forbid it in all and
throughout all; for in the 23 of _Levit._ 17. he commands them to offer
two leaven loaves. Moreover Idolaters imploy also in their Sacrifices
Salt and Incense, and many other things that are not forbidden. It
must then bee that some mystery lies hidden hereunder. _Origen_ in his
5. _Homil._ upon _Levit._ interpreteth Leaven for arrogance, that wee
conceive of a vaine worldly doctrine, which blowes us up as leaven doth
Past, and makes us proud, thinking that wee know more then wee doe.
So that wee quit the expresse and direct Word of God, to retaine our
selves within our phantastique traditions, as our Saviour reproacheth
it to the Pharisees, _Mark._ 7. Truely _Esay_ prophecied very well of
you Hypocrites, when hee saith, _This people honoreth me with their
lips, but their heart is farre from me, howbeit in vaine doe they
worship me, teaching for Doctrines the Commandements of men_, _Mark._
7.6,7. And therefore admonisheth us to beware of this Leaven. And upon
_Numbers_, it is not to beleeve said the said _Origen_, that God would
punish with death those who during the solennitie of unleavened bread
had eaten leavened bread, or that had leaven found in their houses,
but by leaven is understood malignitie, envie, rancor, concupiscence,
and the like vices that inflame our soules, and make them boile with
wicked and pernicious desires, corrupting, altering, and perverting all
that which might bee good, following what the Apostle said, _a little
Leaven corrupts the whole masse_. Therefore wee may not undervalue any
little sinne, for after the manner of Leaven it will very soone produce
others; undervalue not, saith St. _Augustine_, the machinations and
ambushes of a few men; for as a sparkle of fire is a small thing, and
which can hardly bee discerned if it meet with food and nourishment, it
will in a short time set on fire great Townes and Cities, Forrests, and
whole Countries. Leaven is the same, for how little soever you put in
your Past or Dough, it will alter it in short space and convert it to
its owne nature. Perverse Doctrine is of the very same, which gaineth
Countries by little and little, as a Canker doth in the whole body.
And in his third Book against _Parmenian_ to glorifie himselfe, not in
his sinnes, but in those of others, as the _Pharisee_ said, _Luk._ 18.
11. _I give thee thanks O Lord God, that I am not as other men are,
Extortioners, Unjust, Adulterers, &c. I fast twice in the weeke &c._
comparing his owne innocence to the defaults of others, this is but a
little leaven, but to boast himself in iniquities, and trespasses, is
a great one; Furthermore, Leaven is taken in good part, as well as in
bad part, in holy Writ; which relates to the two fires. The first hath
been touched heretofore for pride, and naughtinesse, that corrupts
the soule. Touching the good, in the 7. of _Levit._ 12, 13. there are
loaves of leavened bread, which they offer for peace offerings, with
oblation of thanksgiving, and in the 23. 17. of every family two loaves
of the first eares of wheat at Pentecost; and in St. _Matthew_, and the
23 of St. _Luke_ Jesus Christ compared the Kingdome of God to leaven
that a woman had put into three measures of dough, till it was all
leavened; for there it is taken for the fervent zeale of ardent faith;
and it is the fire wherewith we must be salted: for as the fire boyles
our meats, and the salt seasons them, also leaven is the cause that the
past bakes the better, and prepares thereby to make more wholesome,
and of lighter digestion, more savoury, and of better tast: In which
case leaven relates to the Evangelicall Law, as Saint _Augustine_
saith, and old leaven to the Mosaicall, which the Jewes tooke by the
barke, and by the hairs. By reason whereof the Apostle admonisheth
us, to cast it farre from us: that is to say, all superstition, and
malice; _Cast off the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, as ye
are unleavened, for even Christ our Passeover is sacrificed for you_.
Therefore let us keep the Feast not with old leaven, neither with the
_leaven of malice and wickednesse_, but with the _unleavened bread
of sincerity and truth_, which leaven is without doubt this strange
fire, that devoures and consumes us within; that is to say, our soul,
to swallow us up, and make us goe downe living into Hell. And the
Fire of the Altar, the celestiall fire of charity, faith, hope, it
is that which we must desire of God to kindle in our hearts, and to
season our thoughts and our desires, that no corruption be begotten
there; as it doth here below in things corruptible and corporall; the
prompt Minister, and executor of that, which the divine goodnesse will
please to give of comforts and commodities in this temporall life. What
obligations then do wee owe thee, thou excellent portion of Nature,
without which we should live in so great misery? thou doest lighten in
darknesse, thou dost make us rejoyce in obscurity, bringing us another
day. Thou doest chase away from about us, hurtfull powers, feares,
and nocturnall illusions; thou doest warm us being cold, thou doest
redry us being wet; thou bakest our viands; thou art the soveraigne
Artizan of all arts and manufactures which have been revealed unto
us, to serve as a rampard against our naturall Imbecillities, that
make us in regard of our bodies the feeble and infirm animall of all
others. All this by reason of thy Divine beneficence, thou doest
communicate to all mortals. And thou, O cleare luminous Sunne, the
visible image of the invisible God, the light whereof, doth rebate it
selfe in thee, as within a fair manifold multiplying glasse, rendring
thy selfe overflowing with all sorts of happinesses, which afterwards
thou communicatest to all thy sensible Creatures, being so fair and so
desireable a liberall benefactor, thou arisest most resplendent, with
luminous beams, which thou doest spread abroad into all parts of the
world, and by the vertue of thy spirit, and breath, by thy vivifying
vigour, thou governest and maintainest this little All. Thou the
illustrious Torch of Heaven, thou the light of all things; cause and
secondary Author of all that groweth here below, which by the faculty
and power, which the Soveraigne dispensator of all goodnesse hath
given thee, obligeth all nature to thy selfe; which with an unwearied
course, doest dayly run through the foure corners of the Universe. Thy
beauty, thy light, thou doest lend unto our senses by thy unknowne
and imperceptible Divinity, and impartest it with a liberall largess;
without any vaile or covverture that come to enterpose betwixt them
to the Church, thy deare spouse, to break open to us here below,
the effects illightning by the same meane of thy inextinguible and
inexhaustible Torch, all the celestiall fires. Looke upon us then with
a benigne and favourable eye, and by the excellent beauty which shewes
it selfe in thee, elevate our understanding to the contemplation of
this other more great, that no mortall eie can behold, nor spirit
apprehend, but by a profound and pious thought, for as much as it will
please him to gratifie it.
But thou Soveraigne Father of this intellectual fire and light, what
can wee bring thee here, but devout supplications and prayers? that
it will please thee to burne with the fire of thy Holy Spirit, the
wills and courages of us thy most humble Creatures, that wee may serve
thee with a chast body, and to agree with thee by a pure and neat
conscience: to the honour and glory of thy holy name, and salvation of
our soules: through our Lord Jesus Christ, thy deare Sonne, who liveth
and raigneth with thee, God coeternall, forever and ever, AMEN.
[Illustration]
_The second Part of the Lord_
BLAISE _his Treatise
touching_ FIRE _and_
SALT.
_Every man shall be salted with Fire and every Sacrifice shall be
salted with Salt_, _Mark._ 9. 49. Wee have already spoken of Fire,
Salt remaineth, of which there is no lesse to say. But it is strange
that the Ceremonies of _Paganisme_, should be found in this respect,
and many other in Mosaicall Traditions; Fire shall alwayes burne on
the Altar; _Lev._ 6. 12, 13, _The Priest shall burne wood thereon
every morning, &c._ And in the 2. 13. _Thou shalt season with salt
all the Oblations of thy Sacrifices; and thou shalt not forget to put
the salt of Gods Covenant under them; with all thy Offerings thou
shalt offer Salt_, which Salt _Numb._ 18 19. called the everlasting
Covenant before God to _Aaron_ and his sonnes. And _Pythagoras_ in his
Symboles, ordaines not to speak of God without light, and to apply Salt
in all Sacrifices and Oblations. And not onely _Pythagoras_, but also
_Numa_, which most part of men, hold to have been 100 years before
_Pythagoras_, instituted the same according to the Doctrine of the
Hetrurians. It is not beleeveable that _Moses_ so deare and welbeloved
of God, and so illustrated with his inspirations, whence proceeded all
the documents that he left, and so hot a persecutor of Idolatries and
Ethnique superstitions, that hee would borrow any thing from them. But
more likely that the Devils instigations who makes himselfe alwayes
as his Creators ape, to make himselfe to idolize, was willing to
divert those sacred mysteries to their abusive impieties, according
to which _Josephus_ against _Appion_, and Saint _Jerome_ against
_Vigilantius_, doe very well sute: so that as in the Judaicall Law
they used no Sacrifices and oblations in Paganisme, but they used Salt
as _Pliny_ witnesseth in 31. Book 7. Chap. Especially in holy things
the authoritie of Salt is understood, when none were made without a
Salt Mill. _Plato_ to _Timæus_, when in the medly and commixtion of
the elements, the composed is destitute of much water, and of the more
subtill parts of the earth, water resting therein comes to bee halfe
congealed, saltnesse is there brought in which hardens it the more, and
so there is procreated a body of Salt, communicated to the use of our
life, for as much toucheth the body and senses, accommodated by the
same meanes according to the tenor of the Law; on that which depends
the service of God, as being sacred and agreeable to God, wherefrom hee
called it a body beloved of God, for which _Homer_ called it Divine,
whereof _Plutarque_ in his 5. Booke of his _Symposiaques_ 10. question
renders many reasons, and among others, for that it symbolizeth with
the soule that is of Divine nature, and as long as it resides in the
body, keepes it from putrefaction, as Salt doth dead flesh, where it
is brought in in stead of a soule that keepeth it from corruption,
whence some of the Stoicks would say, that Hogs flesh of it selfe was
dead, and that a soule which was sowed therein in a manner of salt to
conserve it longer exempt from putrefaction, to which a soule was given
for Salt. Our _Theologians_ say that the ceremony of putting Salt into
water when they hallow it, came from that which _Elisha_ did, 2 _Kings_
2. 22, 23. to sweeten the waters of _Jericho_, by casting Salt upon
the Spring. And that notes the people which is designed by water (many
waters are many Nations) were sanctified, must teach us by the Word
of God, what Salt signifies, with the bitternesse and repentance that
men should have for offending God, as water also doth the confession
as well of faith as of sinnes. Of the commixtion of these two, salt
and water, proceeds a double fruit to separate from ill doing, and
convert to good workes. And for that repentance for sinne ought to
precede auricular confession, which repentance is denoted by the
bitternesse of salt, they blesse it also before water: It is also taken
for wisedome, _You are the salt of the earth, and have salt in your
selves_. And because that in all their ancient Sacrifices they used
salt, from thence it came that in Baptisme they put salt in the mouth
of the Creature before it is baptized with water, for that it cannot
yet actually have the mystery of salt applyed for the present.
On fire then and on salt depend great and secret mysteries, comprized
under two principal colours, red and white, for (as _Zohar_ hath it)
all things are white, and red, but there is a great space betwixt
the one and the other. God dieth our sinnes which are red, for
concupiscence comes from the blood, and from the sensualitie of the
flesh besprinkled with blood, and we doe die his whitenesse in red or
rigour of Justice, by the fire which inflameth our carnall desires, and
purchaseth their judgement, which is throughout where there is fire,
if it bee not mortified with saving water. And when the perverse doe
prevaile in the world, as ordinarily they doe, rednesse and judgement
extend themselves therein, and all whitenesse covers it self, which is
rather changed into rednesse then rednesse into whitenesse; which if it
have domination, all on the contrary growes resplendent therewith. To
these two colours also the ancient and the Evangelicall Law, the rigour
of justice and mercy; the pillar of fire in the nights darkenesse, and
the white cloud by day, wine and bread, blood and fat, which were not
lawfull to eate. _You shall not eate flesh with the blood_, _Gen._ 9.
4. And in _Levit._ 3. 16, 17. _All the fat is the Lords, it shall bee a
perpetuall Statute for your generations throughout all your dwellings,
that yee eate neither fat nor blood_; where it is yet more particularly
repeated in the 17. and 14. where the reason is rendred, for that _the
soule_, that is to say, the life of the flesh, is in _the blood_, which
mystically represents that of Messiah, wherein consisted eternall
life; so that it was not lawfull to use any other before his comming.
Of the same fat was reserved for God as well that which the Hebrewes
call _cheleb_, that covereth the inwards, and is separated from the
flesh, as the other called _schumen_, which is thereunto annexed; but
metaphorically the fat is taken for the most exquisite substance,
as in _Numb._ 18. the tenths the best of the fruits are called the
fat of them, which manner of speech wee also use when wee say, make
the portion to be very fat of any thing that there is. And in the 81.
_Psal._ 16. _Hee fed them with the fat of Wheate._ It may bee also that
_Moses_ well knowing that these two substances, blood and fat, are of
ill tast and nourishment, and quickly corrupted out of their vessells,
hee forebad them the use thereof. Or if wee would enter into a certaine
mystery, for that the vitall spirits consist in the blood, which are of
a fiery nature, and that fat is very susceptible of flame, and proper
to make lights, which are a representation of the soule. But Oile is
also for Lamps, which was not forbidden to bee eaten, and wee doe not
see that in Divine service wee use Tallow Candles; yet these two, fire
and salt, doe signifie Wine and Milke, _I have drunke Wine with my
Milke_, _Cant._ 5. 1. By Wine is designed the tree of knowledge of good
and evill, namely vaine curiosities of worldly things, and by Milke,
that of life, whereof _Adam_ was deprived, being desirous to tast of
that other, which was humane prudence. Before _Adam_ had transgressed
(said _Zohar_) hee was made participant of the sapience of superiour
light, being not yet separated from the tree of life, but when hee
would distract himselfe after the knowledge of base things, this
curiositie ceased not till hee had wholly cast off life to incorporate
himselfe to death. _Jacob_ and _Esau_, the two principall Potentates on
earth which are descended therefrom, Item the Rose and the Lilly, whose
water extracted mounts by the fires heat that elevates it and becomes
white, although the Roses bee red, as is the fume exhaled from blood
and fat which they burne to God, to send it on high as a vapour, to
imply (saith the same _Zohar_) that wee must offer him nothing but what
is cleane and candid; for rednesse represents sinne, and punishment
that followes it, and the white, sinceritie, with mercy and the finall
recompence that doth accompany it. What is it (saith _Zohar_) which is
designed by the red Roses, and the white Lillies? It is the odour of
the oblation proceeding from red blood, and from fat which is white,
which God reserveth for his owne portion, which fatnesse relates to
the sacrifice, or animall mar, who is nourished with this fat, as
the vitall spirits with blood; wherefore it is said, when we fast to
extenuate and macerate the pricks of the flesh and concupiscence,
that we offer unto God fatnesse, who will have from his Creature the
soul, which is fire and bloud; and the body, namely fat, wherewith it
is nourished, but the one and the other incontaminate, pure and neat,
without corruption, as if they were to passe through the fire and
salted; Therefore he would that they should be burned to him, that they
may ascend in a white fume and an odour of suavity before him; for fume
is more spiritual then matter, which the fire by subtiliation raiseth
it, after the manner of Incense. And indeed all this world here, is but
an odour that mounts unto God, sometimes good and agreeable, sometimes
wicked and hurtfull. The forme of the thing which consisteth in its
colour, and figure, remains incorporeall in the matter, where the eye
goes to apprehend it, and associates with it. The tast also, remains
attached to it, as the spittle moistens it, and communicates it to the
tast: But odor or smell, separates them, and comes from farre by an
unperceivable vapor, to the sense of the nose and braine. Wherefore the
Scripture doth particularize in the rose and in the lillies, the Red
and White; whose smell doth not vanish. And yet though the roses be
red, yet the water of them distilled, and the fume if you burne them,
are white, as those of incense, whereof it is spoken in _Psal._ 41.
2. _Let my prayer be directed as incense, in thy sight_: by prayers
are understood not only prayers, but all our desires, thoughts and
comportmens, and thereupon _Rabbi Eliezer_, sonne of _Rabbi Simeon_,
the author of _Zohar_, making his prayer, doth thus paraphrase. _This
is well knowne, and manifest before thee O Lord my God, God of our
prayers, that I have offered unto thee my fat, and my blood: I have
offered them in an odor of Suavity, with firme faith and beleefe,
macerating, chastising the sensuality of my flesh: That it will please
thee then Lord, that the odor of my prayer, proceeding from my mouth,
may be presently addressed before thy face, as an odor of a burnt
offering, which they burne unto thee, upon the altar of propitiation,
and that thou wilt accept it as agreeable._ He said that because that
after the comming of our Saviour, & the destruction of the second
Temple by the _Romans_, the _Jewish_ sacrifices were converted into
prayers, the bloudy sacrifices signified by the red roses, and colour
of bloud, and those without bloud, as the minchad & other the like, of
meal, by the white lillies, following that which was said _Cant. Chap._
5. & 6. _My beloved is white and ruddy, he feedeth among the lillies._