Holy Living
Jeremy Taylor
and of little profit: but he that hath a chaste mind shall find his body apt enough to take laws; and let it do its worst, it cannot make a sin, and in its greatest violence can but produce a little natural uneasiness, not so much trouble as a severe fasting-day, or a hard night’s lodging upon boards. If a man be hungry he must eat; and if he be thirsty he must drink in some convenient time, or else he dies; but if the body be rebellious, so the mind be chaste, let it do its worst, if you resolve perfectly not to satisfy it, you can receive no great evil by it. Therefore the proper cure is by application to the spirit and securities of the mind, which can no way so well be secured as by frequent and fervent prayers, and sober resolutions, and severe discourses. Therefore, 9. Hither bring in succor from consideration of the Divine presence and of his holy angels, mediation of death, and the passions of Christ upon the cross, imitation of his purities, and of the Virgin Mary, his unspotted and holy mother, and of such eminent saints, who, in their generations, were burning and shining lights, unmingled with such uncleannesses, which defile the soul, and who now follow the Lamb, withersoever he goes. 10. These remedies are of universal efficacy, in all cases extraordinary and violent; but in ordinary and common, the remedy which God hath provided, that is, honourable marriage,111 hath a natural efficacy, besides a virtue by Divine blessing, to cure the inconveniences which otherwise might afflict persons temperate and sober.
SECTION IV. Of Humility. Humility is the great ornament and jewel of Christian religion; that whereby it is distinguished from all the wisdom of the world; it not having been taught by the wise men of the Gentiles, but first put into a discipline, and made part of a religion, by our Lord Jesus Christ, who propounded himself imitable by his disciples so signally in nothing as in the twin sisters of meekness and humility. ‘Learn of me, for I am meek and humble; and ye shall find rest unto your souls.’ For all the world, all that we are, and all that we have, our bodies and our souls, our actions and our sufferings, our conditions at home, our accidents abroad, our many sins, and our seldom virtues, are as so many arguments to make our souls dwell low in the deep valleys of humility.
Arguments against Pride, by way of consideration.
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Danda est opera at matrimonio devincianur, quod est tutissimum juventutis vinculum.—Plut. de Educ. Lib.
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