I have read of one Parthenius, an homicide, treasurer to Theodobert king of France, who, having traitorously slain an especial friend of his called Ausonius, with his wife Papianillae, when no man suspected or accused him thereof, he detected and accused himself after this strange
' See Glossary for other examples of this peculiar use of 'amuse:' common to con- temporary literature. — G.
Mat. VI. 6.] the pbivy key of heaven. 289
manner : as he slept in his bed, suddenly he roared out most pitifully, crying for help, or else he perished ; and being demanded what he ailed, he, half asleep, answered, ' That his friend Ausonius and his wife, whom he had slain long ago, summoned him to judgment before God.' Upon which confession he was apprehended ; and, after due examination, stoned to death.' Thus the terrors and. horrors of his own conscience discovers that secret wickedness which none could prove against him.
I have read^ how that Mahomet the great Turk had with great rewards procured two Turks to undertake to kill Scanderbeg. These traitors came to Scanderbeg, making such a shx)w of the detestation both of Mahomet's tyrannical government and vain superstition, that they were both by Scanderbeg and others reputed to be indeed the men they de- sired to be accounted ; and so after they had learned the principles of the Christian religion, they were both, by their own desire, baptized. Soon after, by a providence, it so fell out that these two traitors fell at variance betwixt themselves, by which means the plot came to be dis- covered ; and after due examination and confession of the fact, they were presently condemned and executed.
Conscience is God's spy in the bosom.^ Conscience, as a scribe, a register, sits in the closet of your hearts, with pen in hand, and makes a diurnal of all your secret ways and secret crimes, which are above the cognizance of men. Conscience sets down the time when, the place where, the manner how, and the persons with whom such and such secret wickednesses have been committed ; and that so clear and evi- dent, that, go where you will, and do what you can, the characters of them shall never be cancelled or razed out till God appear in judgment. Let a man sin in the closest retirement that human policy can contrive, let him take all the ways he can to hide his sins, to cloak and cover his sin, as Adam did, yet conscience will so play the judge, that it will bring in the evidence, produce the law, urge the penalty, and pass the sen- tence of condemnation upon him. There is many a man, who makes a fair profession, and who hath a great name in the world, who yet is auTOTiarax^iTog, self-condemned, for those secret sins which are not obvious to the eyes of man, nor punishable by the hands of men ; yea, many times in this life God raiseth such a hell of horror and terror in many men's consciences, by reason of their secret sins, that they can have no rest nor quiet, neither at bed nor at board, neither lying down nor rising up. Fain would they conceal their sins, unwilling they are that the world should know how vile they have been in secret ; but conscience being upon the rack, and still a-gnawing, accusing, and condemning of them, they can hold no longer. Now all must out ; and now those sins that were most secret and concealed, come to be published upon the house-top.
Some that have been under anguish of conscience, others that have been smitten with a frenzy, and many in their very sleep, have been
* Beard's ' Theatre of God's Judgments :' Wanley, as before, lib. ii. cap, x. — G.
« [Knolles'] Turk. Hist. fol. 400.
3 Conscience, saith Philo, is the little consistory of the soul. Conscience is mille testeg, a thousand witnesses, for or against a man. Conscience is a court of record, and whatso- ever it sees it writes down ; and conscience is always as quick in writing as the sinner can be in sinning. The very heathen could say that conscience was a god to every man. VOL. II. T
290 THE PRIVY KEY OF HEAVEN. [MaT. VI. 6.
often the blazers and proclaimers of their own secret filthiness and wickedness. In those cases God hath made many a secret sinner ciy out with the leper, ' Unclean, unclean,* Lev. xiii. 45 ; and with Judas, before all present, ' I have sinned, I have sinned,' Mat. xxvii. 4. Many times in this life God doth very strangely and wonderfully discover those secret works of darkness in which persons have lived long un- discovered.
A Pythagorean bought a pair of shoes upon trust ; the shoemaker dies, he is glad, thinks them gained ; but a while after his conscience flies upon him, and becomes a continual chider and tormentor of him. He hereupon repairs to the house of the dead, casts in his money with these words, * There, take thy due ; thou livest to me, though dead to all besides.' But,
[4.] Fourthly^ Consider that secret sins are in some respects more dangerous than open sins. Many a man bleeds to death inwardly, and no man perceives it. The more inward and secret the disease is, the more the man is in danger to lose his life. There are no fevers so dangerous as those that prey upon the spirits and inward parts ; so there are no sins so dangerous and pernicious to the souls of men as those that are most inward and secret. Secret sins often reign in the souls of men most powerfully when least apparently.
First, Consider that he that sins secretly deprives himself of those helps an/l remedies which, by a divine blessing, might arm him against sin, yea, make him victorious over sin; to wit, the prayers, counsels, reproofs, examples, and encouragements of friends, relations, &c. A man's house may be on fire, but whilst it is all inward, help comes not in ; but when the fire flames out, when it catcheth the out- side of the house, then help runs in, then help on all hands is ready. He that sins in secret debars himself of all public remedy, and takes great pains to damn his soul in a comer, and to go to hell in the dark. But,
Secondly, Secret sins will make way for public sins. He that makes no conscience of sinning in the secret chamber, will ere long, with Ab- salom, be ready to spread a tent upon the top of the house, and to go in to his concubines in the sight of all Israel, 2 Sam. xii. 11. Such as have made no conscience of stealing a few pins or pence or a few shil- lings in private, have in time come to be so bold as to take a purse on the road at high noon. The cockatrice must be crushed in the egg, else it will soon become a serpent. The very thought of sin, if not* thought on, will break forth into action, action into custom, custom into habit, and then both body and soul are irrecoverably lost to all eternity.