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Title: The Arraignment
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Eleanor, Lady"The Arraignment"THEArraignment.By Lady Eleanor.Mark 9.And he said unto them, verily I say unto you, that therebe some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death till they see the Kingdom of God come with power.Printed in the year, 1650.MARK 9.And whosoever shall offend one of these little ONES that believe in me &c.And so who should be greatest, or bear the sway; this Lesson appointed for the present, occasioned upon that dispute:  Also to whom it points about a Thing, of no little weight doubtless, where declared, A milstone better hanged about his neck,  be he whosoever, standing no better on his guard, (the safe-guard of no few) on whose behavior or vigilancy depends, to whose lot the Milstone falls as follows, even the Military or Sword Sword profession, their judgement here called to hold up their hand at the Bar; behold as this seals it a free passage:  Verse,  And if thy hand offend thee cut it off, it is better for thee to enter into life maimed;   likewise of the foot, Better to enter halt into life, &c.   VVhere by the natural Body, reports the case concerning the politique, to slight the least or lowest degree, coming in his name how perilous.So here anatomiz'd whose Father discern I pray:  Then lose a foot, suffered his whole body to perish,  who thought little of the thrid or term cut off so of his days:  By means of a festred Toe, a Corn, turned to a Gangren  dyed, falling into a violent Feaver, that very Ignis non extinguitur,  or VVilde-fire, his doughty doughty heart leaving it to his heir how paterizaring, of late far and near not unknown misled or overmasterd when put on his tryal, what metel or salt in him:  Better much had been without assistants such hands, eyes, or feet, unless more command over himself had, whether friends, wife or followers. From the Omnipotent General, Lord of Hosts when as sent unto, dreading neither sacred watch words these or Alarm:  These thunderings vouchsafed not so much as to see the party, the like unparaleld in Divine presidents or other, of such greatness stood upon or manhood notwithstanding, Quisquis scandalizaverit unum ex his,   be he never so eminent, his doom in the bottom of the Sea better better to have taken his quarters:  To whom had some great thing been commanded, To have departed his native soil, or half his goods have parted among the poor,   how much rather, but when to lend an ear required:  Even cowardize in the highest degree, or weakness, who keeps his distance with such, thereafter from his presence excluded as far (as much to say) Write their Epitaph on the sand, reward them with a cup filled double, a portion let them be for fishes, all as deaf and mute like themselves, no burier, &c. And for such Saints, so much suffices; as his name, THOMAS DYDIMOUS, &c.  and for them also whose voyce the mountains obey, or Monarchs confined them to the ocean, Trees no small ones pluckplucks up by the roots, whose estate blest when hated and cursed, in poverty rich, their cottage Heaven. Against whom, all their Enemies can alledge, for silencing the Holy Ghost thus; or to cloak their arrogancy, is because, former times as it were barren signs and token discontinued, therefore abolished, That may affirm as well, or maintain Hell shall prevail against Heaven, as that ordinary spirits shall unseal the Books of Prophets, or that other Book (so stiled) Revel.20. And I saw another book opened, &c.   to be explained ever by them, The word of the Lord induring for ever having spoken it,   Isa. 40. Whatsoever is crooked, shall be made strait, and the rough be made plain fields,  the voyce of deserts accompanying it asthose  those waste parts at this day, though depopulated, again to be ploughed as in days of old; proclaiming the Spririt of Prophesie opposed, though shall prevail, The first and the last,   in the mean time that begets these distractions to destroy themselves:  The Bottomless Pit witness, as they term it (or Abyss) even when heaven opened; the other is poysonous Fogs as free (Apoc.  9.) That Assemblies description. Latine habens nomen exterminans. VVhere lastly, after that ample admonition (of health compared to Heaven, and languishing sickness to Hell) by way of Terror, expressing the last general day of judgement, at hand, with ambition how seasonable; as his WIVES looking back to Sodom, vers.  as here bidden, To havehave salt in themselves,   the spirit judgement, without which never expect to have other rest, or to be found in peace at his coming, even to try the spirits, &c. each thing in its season, salt the life being of all things, quintessence of the elements, both the good spirit resembles and the bad, the best of all things and the worst, for the dunghil not profitable, otherwise nothing so pure, to have a discerning spirit the sum of all. VVhere touching the perpetuity of the aforesaid fire and worm:  The old explaining the other; herewith to go forward a Lesson proper for the age: And the men that have transgressedsed  (Isaiah the last) for their worm shall not dye; neither shall their fire be quenched; as much to say, the latter or last day approached: No more dry bones henceforth, whose worm shall continue or remain in them; as moreover, They shall be an abhorring to all flesh, (to wit) their intollerable stink able to poyson man and beast, &c.   also of Calenders out of date; but from new Moon to new Moon, from Sabbath to Sabbath, like weekly Bills of mortality. And so much for this Habeas Corpus,  or moderating the severity of such places, concerning their enlargement one word; where serves both for the grave and hell, supposed to be without redemption, as from this place such another Abys, saying, Descidite Maledecti,  aluding to the different seasons,thethe life and death of the creature, when the Sun enters into Aries, the reviving Spring, and in Capricorn  VVinters tedious nights Decembers, preparing fuel, &c.   Mat. 25. shadowed under the sheep on the one hand, the goats on the other,   lest surprised unawares as the old world by the deluge, to have oyl in their lamps all, &c. when some taken up in the air, changed in a moment, after the Trumpets loud alarm, others swallowed up by the sea and land. So again, for his shewing afterward Every sacrifice shall be seasoned with salt,  bidden to have Salt and peace, &c.   refers to another passage in the Levitical Law, their Peace-Offerings, The Priests laying his hand on the head of the Oblation,   as it were at the bar holds up his hand, in behalf of him- himself and the people, under a gross cloud  of ignorance, acknowledging guilty of that creatures sufferings, shadowing forth what they liable unto. Also for setting at large the ful meaning of these, without needless Apology, by way of what tedious objection might require, farther to shew the depth and plenitude of this place of Scripture, like the fiery pillars light side, and dark toward others, even of its descending to Humane Sciences, Divinities Handmayds: a word more from the VVhale to the VVorm, from the Milstone to the peble, nothing to be despised,   as commodious and useful the least as the greatest, even so points to our everlasting arms, that of material salt, or sulpherous Barrels of powder to provided that way; also the  the endless worm to have match in like readiness:  And that fire unquenchable, the flint for another, as before shewd, supposing to quench the Spirit by way of retaliation, our Capernaums  alarm, or caveat entered disesteemed other, themselves to be abased as low next door to his doom, Good for that man had he been unborn, to exalt themselves like those rebels,   gain-saying CORE  and his fifties rewarded. And thus in his name, concluding by vertue of his all-sufficent Arm, that fasted forty days, I charge thee thou deaf and dumb foul spirit, wherewith possest from his infancy, &c. thou melancholick spirit, come forth of him, and enter no more into him. Jubile Lent. F I N I S.