Many are proud of their fair Necks and Skins,1 so proud as they grow extreme wanton by reason of it,2 they must lay open therefore their fair necks that others may see them, see how white they are,3 what fair Skins they have, and put black Patches likewise to set out their beauty and the whiteness of their fair Skins, and if that will not serve, even laying over a paint to make it fair if it be not otherwise so;4 nothing but Ease, and Delicacy, and pleasure is for them, as if they came into the world for no other end but to live bravely and be looked upon, as if man-kind and all creatures must work and suffer to provide for these nice and delicate wantons, who yet are of no use at all in the world, certainly, God never gave any great estates in the ⟨p. 434⟩world for no other use but only to be brave withal, and keep their Skin white. Whatsoever estates men and women have,5 yet except they endeavour to be useful in the world in a proportionable way unto those estates that they have they can have little true comfort of what they do enjoy, the comfort of the lives of rational creatures certainly it's not in a fair Skin, in a white Skin, their comfort is in being useful in the places where God hath set them,6 their good consists in that. Man is born to labour, and there must be labour one way or other, every one is bound to labour;7 these fair white Skins, and fair Necks, Oh! what foul souls many of them have, their beauty is but Skin-deep. Oh! filthy and abominable in the eyes of God, and in the eyes of those that know the corruptions of their hearts. How would these fair necks be able to bear Iron chains for Christ? to be nailed to the stake, to have such a Neckkercher put upon them as Alice Driver had?8 You have it in the story of the Book of Martyrs, when they put the chain about her neck to nail her to the stake,9 she gloried in it, and blest God for it: I but this Alice Driver was wont to plough, (for so she saith a little before in the story) her father did bring her up to plough,10 she was not brought up so delicately as others were, and she could endure an iron chain upon her neck for Christ. It follows:
Many are proud of their fair Necks and Skins,1 so proud as they grow extream wanton by reason of it,2 they must lay open therefore their fair necks that others may see them, see how white they are,3 what fair Skins they have, and put black Patches likewise to set out their beauty and the whiteness of their fair Skins, and if that will not serve, even laying over a paint to make it fair if it be not otherwise so;4 nothing but Ease, and Delicacy, and pleasure is for them, as if they came into the world for no other end but to live bravely and be look'd upon, as if man-kind and all creatures must work and suffer to provide for these nice and delicate wantons, who yet are of no use at all in the world, certainly, God never gave any great estates in the ⟨p. 434⟩world for no other use but only to be brave withal, and keep their Skin white. Whatsoever estates men and women have,5 yet except they endeavor to be useful in the world in a proportionable way unto those estates that they have they can have little true comfort of what they do enjoy, the comfort of the lives of rational creatures certainly it's not in a fair Skin, in a white Skin, their comfort is in being useful in the places where God hath set them,6 their good consists in that. Man is born to labor, and there must be labor one way or other, every one is bound to labor;7 these fair white Skins, and fair Necks, Oh! what foul souls many of them have, their beauty is but Skin-deep. Oh! filthy and abominable in the eyes of God, and in the eyes of those that know the corruptions of their hearts. How would these fair necks be able to bear Iron chains for Christ? to be naild to the stake, to have such a Neckkercher put upon them as Alice Driver had?8 You have it in the story of the Book of Martyrs, when they put the chain about her neck to nail her to the stake,9
- 1Obs.
- 2The evil of Bare necks and breasts▪
- 3Black Patches▪
- 4And painted faces.
- 5Great Estates ill used.
- 6Every one bound to labour.Every one bound to labor.
- 7Fair Skins foul Souls ofttimes.Fair Skins foul Souls oftimes.
- 8Alice Drivers Neckkercher.
- 9Act. and Monum.
- 10Hard breeding fittest for Christian suffering.
