2-4. Great Bounty ill-requited. Summum Jus. One instance of many: Vast was the liberality of the lords Berkeley to St. Austin's in Bristol, leaving themselves in that their large estate not one rectory to which they might present a chaplain; all the benefices in their numerous manors being appropriated to this and other monasteries. Now see the requital :

Maurice, (the first of that name,) lord Berkeley, having occasion to make the ditch about his castle the broader, for the better fortifying thereof took in some few feet of ground out of Berkeley church-yard; which church, with the tithes thereof, his ancestors had conferred on the aforesaid monastery. The abbot, beholding this as a great trespass, or rather, as a little sacrilege, so prosecuted the aforesaid lord with church-censures, that he made him, in a manner, cast the dirt of the ditch in his own face, enforcing him to a public confession of his fault, and to give five shillings rent for ever, with some tithes, and pasture for as many oxen as would till a plough-land, by the words of his will, pro emendatione culpæ meæ de fossato quod feci de cœmeterio de Berkeley circa castellum meum.

I know it will be pleaded for the abbot, that there is as much right in an inch as in an ell; that he was a fiduciary, entrusted to defend the rights of his convent; that founders' heirs are not privileged to do injuries; yea, they of all persons most improper to take back what their ancestors have given. However, the lord's encroachment on the church-yard, being in a manner done in his own defence, the thing in itself so small, and the merit of his ancestors so great to that abbey, might have met with that meekness which should be in the breasts of all spiritual persons, to abate his rigorous prosecution against him.

5. Another Instance of Ingratitude.

Thomas, the first lord Berkeley of that name, found little better usage from the abbot of St. Austin's. Though he had formerly, beside confirmation of many lands, conferred on that convent pasture for twenty-four oxen; discharging also their lands (lying within certain of his manors) from all services and earthly demands, only to remember him and his in their prayers; yet did that abbot and convent implead him before the pope's delegates for tithes of pannage of his woods, for tithes of his fishing and of his mills. The lord removed the suit to common-law, as challenging the sole power to regulate modum decimandi. And now, when all was ready for a trial before the judge itinerant at Gloucester, it was compounded by friends on such terms as the abbot, in effect, gained his desire.

6-9. A Cause of their Ruin. An over-wise Conceit easily confuted. Strong Faith to believe so much of King Henry's Charity.

Indeed, so odious and obvious was the unthankfulness of some convents, that it is reputed by some the most meritorious cause of their Dissolution; and their doing things without and against the will of their founders, is instanced in the statute* as a main motive to take them away.

Some, who pretend to a Prometheus-wit, fondly conceive that the founders of abbeys might politicly have prevented their Dissolution, had they inserted a provision in their foundations, that in case abbey-lands should be alienated to other uses against or beside the owner's intents, then such lands should revert to the true heirs of the said founders, if then in being.

But such consider not, that such a reservation would have savoured more of wildness than wisdom in that age. As well might one have sought to secure himself with a shelter against the falling of the skies, as equally probable as the diverting of abbey-lands to other intentions. Besides, such a jealous clause might be interpreted heretical to put into people's fancies a feasibility of such alterations. Yea, I have heard it questioned by the learned in the law, whether such a conditional settlement, with such a clause, were legal or no: many maintaining, that such donations must be absolute. But suppose such a clause in their foundations, it had not much befriended them at this time, seeing cables are as easily cut off as twine-threads, by power of parliament, when disposed to make such a Dissolution.

Now, some conceived it just abbey-lands should have been restored to the heirs of their founders; but, seeing the most and greatest abbeys were built and endowed before the Conquest, it was hard to find out their heirs, if extant. Besides, this would minister matter of much litigiousness, equally to share them amongst their many benefactors. Wherefore the king, the founder-general of them all, mediately or immediately in himself or in his subjects, as who in his person or ancestors confirmed, consented, or at least connived at their foundations, may charitably be presumed to seize them all into his own hands; so to cut off the occasion of dangerous division amongst his subjects about the partition of those

SECTION IV.

TO THE RIGHT HON. THE LADY ELIZABETH POWLET, OF ST. GEORGE HIΝΤΟΝ.

MADAM,

THERE be three degrees of gratitude, according to men's several abilities. The first is to requite-the second, to deserve the third, to confess-a benefit received. He is a happy man that can do the first, no honest man that would not do the second, a dishonest man who doeth not the third.

I must be content, in reference to your favours on me, to sit down in the last form of thankfulness; it being better to be a lag in that school, than a truant, not at all appearing therein. Yea, according to our Saviour's counsel and comfort, the lowest place is no hinderance to a higher, when the master of the household shall be pleased to call him up, Luke xiv. 10. When this is done, and God shall ever enable me with more might, my gratitude shall wait on your ladyship in a greater proportion.

Mean time, this present, having otherwise little of worth, may plead something of properness therein, seeing Somersetshire is the chief subject of this Section, the same county which receiveth honour from you by your birth, and returneth it to you by your barony, therein. God bless you in all your relations; and make your afflictions, which are briers and thistles in themselves, become sweet-brier and holy-thistle, by sanctifying them unto you!

1. OF MIRACLES IN GENERAL, TO WHICH MONASTERIES DID MUCH PRETEND.

1. A true Miracle described.

RIGHT is the rule of what is so, and what is otherwise. We will therefore premise the description of a true miracle:- A miracle is a work of God, passing the power of nature, done for the confirmation of faith, on the mission generally of a new ministry.

(1.) Work of God" Who only doth wondrous things," Psalm lxxii. 18. For though he sometimes useth men as moral instruments whereby, yet never as natural causes, to effect miracles.

(2.) Passing the power of nature-Hence it is that it is not done by leisure, but presently; not by degrees, but perfectly. God's cures are never subject to relapse; once healed and ever healed, except the party run on the score of a new guilt: "Thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing befall thee," John v. 14.

(3.) Done for the confirmation of faith-God will not make his works cheap, by prostituting them merely for the satisfaction of man's curiosity.

(4.) On the mission generally of a new ministry-For, although some sprinkling of miracles on other occasions, yet their main body was done by Moses, a new lawgiver to the Jews; by Elias and Elisha, two grand restorers (adequate almost to a giver) of the law, in a general-visible defection to idolatry; by Christ and his apostles, as the first preachers of the gospel.

In this our description, no mention of the rarity of miracles, because the same resulteth from the premisses, frequency abating from the due wonder thereof.

2-4. Miracles long since ceased, by St. Augustine's Confession [as well as Bishop Fisher's].

Now, that such miracles long since are ceased, appears by the confession of ancient fathers and most ingenuous Romanists: St. Chrysostom, in his Homily xxiii. on St. John, thus expresseth himself, Καὶ γὰρ νῦν εἰσὶν οἱ ζητῶντες καὶ λέγοντες, Διατὶ μὴ καὶ νῦν σημεῖα γένονται; Εἰ γὰρ πιστὸς εἶ, ὡς εἶναι χρὴ, καὶ φιλεῖς τὸν Χριστὸν, ὡς φιλεῖν δεῖ, ἐ χρείαν ἐχεὶς σημείων. Ταῦτα γὰρ τοῖς ἀπίστοις διδοταί. "For even now there be seekers and sayers, Wherefore also now are not miracles done? For if thou beest a believer as thou oughtest to be, and dost love Christ as thou oughtest to love him, thou hast no need of miracles. For miracles are given to unbelievers."

St. Augustine, passing his censure on the miracles of his age, had so low an opinion of their truth that he ranked them under two heads: * (1.) Figmenta mendacium hominum, "forgeries of lying men." (2.) Portenta fallacium spirituum, "prodigies of deceitful devils."

Bishop Fisher himself, writing against Luther, and occasionally treating of the power of miracles, cujus effectum nunc nullum cernimus, "of which," saith he, "we now see no effect;" which

addeth to the wonder, that so wise a man should engage in the foolish wonder of the Holy Maid of Kent.

5, 6. Why Miracles ceased. The Magazine of Protestant Miracles. The true cause of the ceasing of miracles is not any want of divine power to effect them; (as if that infiniteness could ever, like Naomi, be superannuated and effete, to have no more true wonders in the womb thereof;) but because miracles are the swaddlingclothes of infant-churches. And when doctrines are once established and received in a church, miracles are impertinent. Yea, it is no better than a tempting of God, after such assurance given long since to the truth, still to expect a miraculous confirmation thereof.

Wherefore when the importunity of papists presseth us to produce miracles to attest our religion, we return unto them, that ours is an old faith founded long since on the scriptures; and we may justly lay claim to all the miracles in the New Testament to be ours, because done in demonstration of that doctrine which we at this day do defend, and are the seals of that instrument the writing wherein we desire and endeavour to maintain and practise.

7-9. Counterfeiting Miracles, a heinous Offence. The Forgers' Plea confuted.

Such forgery must needs be a high and heinous offence. If the counterfeiting of the mark, tokens, and letters of others, so as to gain any money into their hands thereby, be punishable by pillory, imprisonment, or any other corporal penalty under death, at the discretion of the judge; * yea, if it be treason for any to forge the king's sign manual, privy signet, or privy seal; † how great a guilt do they contract who falsify the signature of the high God of heaven! miracles being of that nature whereby he immediately impresseth his own power and presence on that which is so supernaturally brought to pass.

I know what such forgers plead for themselves; namely, that they "have a good intent therein to beget, continue, or increase a reverence to religion, and veneration to the saints and servants of God; so to raise up vulgar fancies to the highest pitch of piety." Wherefore, as Lycurgus made a law, not that theft should be death, but death to be caught in their thieving so these conclude counterfeiting miracles (to be) no fault, but when done so bunglingly that it is detected; conceiving, otherwise, the glory accrueth to God by their hypocrisy.

But what saith the Holy Spirit ? "Will you speak wickedly