word of Light But of all these former objects of mans Delight because they are amongst Salomons Catalogue of things under the Sunne none are here without vexation and vanities For to let passe the lightning of an idle mirth which indeed is madnesse and not Ioy. For Seneca telleth us that true Ioy is a serious and severe thing and not to meddle with riches and other secular Delights which have wings to fly from us and thornes to prick us even that highest naturall Delight of the Mind Knowledge and the heavenly eloquence of the Tongues of Angels which a man would think were above the Sunne and therfore not obnoxious to Salomons vanity would be in man without the right corrective thereof but a tinkling noise yeelding rather a windy Pleasure than a true Delight The properties whereof is not to puffe up but to replenish And therefore it is the prayer of Saint Paul The God of Peace fill you with all Ioy. True heavenly Ioy is a filling a satiating Ioy a Ioy unspeakeable with Saint Peter a Peace past understanding with Saint Paul Nor doth this property of overflowing and swallowing the Mind add any degrees of offence or anxiety therunto for it is not the weaknesse of the soule as it is of the body to receive hurt from the excellency of that which it delighteth in nor doth the mind desire to subdue or conquer but onely to be united with its object And here the onely corruption of our Delight is the deficiency and imperfections of it For though this blessed Light leaves not any man in the shadow of death yet it takes him not quite out of the shadow of sinne by the darknesse wherof hee is without much of that lustre and glory which he shall then have when the righteous shal shine like the Sunne in the Firmament Yet at the least our endeavours must be that though our Ioyes cannot be here a Replâ—…nishing Ioy yet it may be an Operative Ioy and so worke out the measure of its own fullnesse I have done with the severall Objects of mans delight Corporall Morall Intellectuall and Divine CHAP. XX. Of the Causes of Ioy. The union of the Object to the Faculty by Contemplation Hope Fruition Changes by accident a cause of Delight I Now proceed to speak of the more particular causes and effects of this Passion Touching the former not to meddle with those which are unnaturall belluine and morbid which the Philosopher hath given some instances of The generall cause is the naturall goodnesse of the Object and the particulars under that Any thing which hath a power to unite and make present the Object with the Faculty And that is done to speake onely of intellectuall Powers three manner of wayes by Contemplation by Confidence and by Fruition by thinking of it in the Minde by expecting of it in the Heart and by enjoying it in the whole Man Contemplation addes unto the Soule a double Delight First from it's owne property it being the proper and naturall agitation of mans minde insomuch that those things which wee abhorre to know experimentally our curlous and contemplative nature desires to know speculatively And therefore the Devils first temptation was drawne from the knowledge as well of evill as good for he knew that the minde of Man would receive content in the understanding of that which in it's owne nature had no perfection in it But then secondly in the Object of true Delight Contemplation ministreth a farther Ioy in that it doth in some sort pre-unite our Soules and our Blessednesse together and this is partly the reason why Aristotle so much advanceth his Contemplative before his practique Felicity For though this in regard of it's immediate reference unto Communion be of a more spreading and diffusive Nature yet certainly in that sweetnesse of content that serenity of Soule that exaltation of thoughts which we receive from those noble motions of the higher Mind the other doth farre in pleasure and satisfaction surpasse all active happinesse And hence we see in the parts of Mans Body those which are if I may so speake more contemplative have precedence to those that are more practique The parts of Vision are before the parts of Action the right eye is preferred before the right hand Thus we may observe in God himselfe notwithstanding in him there can bee neither accession nor intermission of Delight yet by way of expression to us ward he did not in the creation of the World so much ioy in his fiat as in his vidit not so much when he gave his creatures their Nature as when he saw their Goodnesse Nature being the Object of Power but Goodnes the Object of Delight and therefore the day of his rest was more holy than the dayes of his working that being appointed for the Contemplation as these were for the production of his creatures And as Contemplation by way of Prescience when it looketh forward on good things hoped So also by way of Memory when it looketh backward and receiveth evill things escaped doth minister matter of renewed Ioy. No Man looketh on the Sea with more comfort than he who hath escaped a shipwracke And therefore when Israell saw the Egyptians dead on the Sea shore the fear of whom had so much affrighted them before they then sang a Song of Triumph Past troubles doe season and as it were ballace present Comforts as the Snow in Winter increaseth the beauty of the Spring But in this particular of Contemplation notwithstanding the excellency of it there may be Corruption in the Excesse For in those matters of Delight except they be such as are disproportioned to our corrupt Nature I meane divine things wee seldome erre in the other extreme And that is when wee doe not divide our selves between our parts and let every one execute his proper function so to attend upon meere mentall notions as to neglect the practicall part of our Life and withdraw our selves from the fellowship and regard of humane society is as wicked in Religion as it would be in Nature monstrous to see a fire burne without light or shine without heate aberrations from the supreme Law being in divine things impious as they are in naturall prodigious And therefore that vowed sequestration and voluntary banishment of Hermits and Votaries from humane society under pretence of devoting themselves to Contemplation and a fore-enjoying of the Light of God is towards him as unâ—… pleasing as it is in it selfe uncomfortable for their very patterne which they pretend in such cases to imitate was not only a burning lamp by the heate of his owne Contemplations but a shining lamp too by the diffusing of his owne Comforts to the refreshing of others A second cause of Delight is the sure Confidence of the Mind Whereby upon strong and unâ—…ring grounds it waiteth for the accomplishment of it's desires so that what ever doth incourage our Hope doth therewithall strengthen and inlarge our
great Booke of Nature without perusing those ordinarie Characters wherein is exprest the greatest power of the Worker and excellencie of the Worke fixing our Admiration onely on those Pictures and unusuall Novelties which though for their rarenesse they are more strange yet for their na ture are lesse worthy Every Comet or burning Meteor strikes more wonder into the beholder than those glorious Lampes of Nature with their admirable Motions and Order in which the Heathen have acknowledged a Divinenesse Let a Child be borne but with six fingers or have a part more than usuall wee rather wonder at One supersâ—…uous than at All naturall Sol spectatorem nisi cum desicit non habet nemo observat Lunam nisi laborantem adeò naturale est magis nova quà m magna mirari None looketh with wondeâ—… on the Sunne but in an Eclipse no eye gazeth on the Moone but in her Travell so naturall it is with men to admire rather things Nâ—…w than Common Whereas indeed things are fit for studie and observation though never so common in regard of the perfection of their nature and usefulnesse of their knowledge In which respect the plaine Counsell of the Oracle was one of the wiâ—…est which was ever given to man To studie and to know himselfe because by reason of his owne neerenesse to himselfe hee is usually of himselfe most unknowne and neglected And yet if wee consider how in him it hath pleased God to stampe a more notable Character of his owne Image and to make him amongst all his Workes one of the most perfect Models of created excellencie wee cannot but acknowledge him to be one though of the least yet of the fittest Volumes in this great varietie of Nature to be acquainted withall Intending therefore according to my weakenesse to take some view of the inside and more noble Characters of this Booke it will not be needfull for me to gaze upon the Cover to insist on the materials or sensitive conditions of the humane nature or to commend him in his Anatomie though even in that respect the Psalmist tells us that he is fearefully and wonderfully made for wee commonly see that as most kind of Plants or Trees exceed us in vegetation and fertilitie so many sorts of beasts have a greater activitie and exquisitenesse in their senses than wee And the reason hereof is because Nature aiming at a superiour and more excellent end is in those lower faculties lesse intent and elaborate It shall suffice therefore onely to lay a ground-worke in these lower faculties for the better notice of mans greater perfections which have ever some connexion and dependance on them For whereas the principall acts of mans Soule are either of Reason and Discourse proceeding from his Vnderstanding or of Action and Moralitie from his Will both these in the present condition of mans estate have their dependance on the Organs and faculties of the Body which in the one precede in the other follow To the one they are as Porters to let in and convey to the other as Messengers to performe and execute To the one the whole Body is as an Eye through which it seeth to the other a Hand by which it worketh Concerning the ministrie therefore of the Body unto the Soule wee shall thus resolve That the Reasonable part of Man in that condition of subsistence which now it hath depends in all its ordinarie and naturall operations upon the happie or disordered temperature of those vitall Qualities out of whose apt and regular commixion the good estate of the Body is framed and composed For though these Ministeriall parts have not any over-ruling yet they have a disturbing power to hurt and hinder the operations of the Soule Whence wee finde that sundry diseases of the Body doe oftentimes weaken yea sometimes quite extirpate the deepest impression and most fixed habits of the minde For as wheresoever there is a locomotive facultie though there be the principall cause of all motion and activitie yet if the subordinate instruments the bones and sinewes be dis-jointed shrunke or any other wayes indisposed for the exercise of that power there can be no actuall motion Or as in the Body Politique the Prince whom Seneca calleth the Soule of the Common-wealth receiveth either true or false intelligence from abroad according as is the fidelitie or negligence of those instruments whom Xenophon tearmeth the Eyes and Eares of Kings In like manner the Soule of man being not an absolute independant worker but receiving all her objects by conveyance from these bodily instruments which Cicero calleth the Messengers to the Soule if they out of any indisposition shall be weakened the Soule must continue like a Rasa Tabula without any acquired or introduced habits The Soule hath not immediately from it selfe that strange weakenesse which is observed in many men but onely as it is disabled by Earthie and sluggish Organs which being out of order are more burthensome than serviceable thereunto There are observable in the Soules of men considered in themselves and in reference one to another two defects an imperfection and an inequalitie of operation the former of these I doe not so ascribe to that bodily weakenesse whereby the Soule is any way opprest as if I conceived no internall darknesse in the faculties themselves since the fall of man working in him a generall corruption did amongst the rest infatuate the Mind and as it were smother the Soule with ignorance so that the outward ineptitude of bodily instruments is onely a furtherance and improvement of that Native imperfection But for the inequalitie and difference of mens understandings in their severall operations notwithstanding it be questioned in the Schooles Whether the Soules of men have not originally in their Nature degrees of perfection and weakenesse whence these severall degrees of operation may proceed yet neverthelesse that being granted I suppose that principally it proceeds from the varietie tempers and dispositions in the instrumentall faculties of the Body by the helpe whereof the Soule in this estate worketh for I cannot perceive it possible that there should have beene if man had continued in his Innocencie wherein our Bodies should have had an exact constitution free from those distempers to which now by sinne they are lyable such remarkable differences betweene mens apprehensions as wee now see there are for there should have beene in all men a great facilitie to apprehend the mysteries of Nature and to acquire knowledge as wee see in Adam which now wee finde in a large measure granted to some and to others quite denyed And yet in that perfect estate according to the opinion of those who now maintaine it there would have beene found a substantiall and internall inequalitie amongst the Soules of men and therefore principally this varietie comes from the sundry constitutions of mens bodies in some yeelding enablement for quicknesse of Apprehension in others prâ—…ssing downe and intangling the Vnderstanding in
than that which is betweene the Body and the Soule we may well ground some good presumption of similitude in the qualities of the Soule with those lovely impressions of Nature which we find in the Body and may by the same reason collect a mutuall discoverie by which we acknowledge a mutuall sympathie betweene them And therefore it was no ill counsell though not alwayes to be heeded Cave tibi ab iis quos natura signavit to take heed of such who like Cain have any marke of notorious deformitie set upon them by Nature And therefore Homer speaking of the garrulous impudent envious and reviling qualities of Thersites fits him with a Body answerable to such a Mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The most ill-shapen man that to Troy came With eye distorted and in each foot laine His shoulders crooked to his brest shrunke downe A sharpe wrye head here and there patcht with downe But yet herein though it be injurious for a man out of too much austeritie of Mind to reject the judgement of sense and to quarrell with this naturall instinct yet it is fit that in this case considering the deceitfulnesse of things and what a divers habit Education or Hypocrisie hath wrought in many betweene the out and inside of their Natures that we should I say bring a fearefull judgement like love of Bâ—…as the Philosopher which may easily upon good warrant and assurance alter it selfe otherwise when a thing is throughly knowne to be lovely our hearts may boldly quiet and repose themselves in it But here likewise we must observe that proportion of Nature That if our affection cannot stand in private towards one particular without dammage and inconvenience to the publique Body Politique or Ecclesiasticall whereof we are members the generall must ever be esteemed more deare and precious A scandall to the Body and a Schisme from the whole is more dangerous and unnaturall than any private Divisions for if there be a wound or swelling in one part of the Body the parts adjoyning will be content to submit themselves unto paine for the recoverie of that and rather than it shall perish 〈◊〉 any â—…ble which may conduce to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this is the Love of fellow-members amongst themselves But then if any part be so farre corrupted as that it doth more easier derive its contagion upon others than admit of any succour from them so that by the continuance thereof in the Body the whole is endangered or if the whole Body be readie to perish by Famine then doth the Sense of Communitie so swallow up that other more private respect as that the members will be even cruell amongst themselves to the cutting and devouring each of other that thereby the safetie of the whole may be procured And therefore the Fable of the Faction betweene the Belly and the Members was wisely applyed by Menenius Agrippa in a Rebellion amongst the people of Rome to shew how unnaturall a thing it is and how pernicious to the parts themselves to nourish their owne private Discontents when the Weale publique is together therewithall endangered CHAP. X. Of the Rule of true Love the Love of God and our selves similitude to these the cause of Love in other things of Love of Concupiscence how Love begetteth Love and how presence with and absence from the object doth upon different respects exercise and encrease Love FRom this generall and fundamentall cause of Love proceed some others speciall and particular whereof the first and principall is a similitude and resemblance betweene the thing loved and that which is the Naturall Rule of Love Now the Rule of all Love is by Divine Truth prescribed to be God and a Mans selfe so that what beareth similitude to these is the proper and right Object of our Affection To speake therefore a word or two of these The Master-Wheele or first Mover in all the Regular Motions of this Passion is the Love of God grounded on the right knowledge of Him whereby the Soule being ravished with the apprehension of his infinite Goodnesse is earnestly drawne and called out as it were to desire an Vnion Vision and participation of his Glory and Presence yeelding up it selfe unto Him for by Love a man giveth himselfe to the thing which he loves and conforming all its Affections and Actions to his Will And this Love is then Regular when it takes up all the kinds of Love and all the degrees of Love For we love God Amore amicitiae for the Goodnesse and Excellencie which is in himselfe as being most lovely and Amore desiderii with a desire of being united unto him as the Fountaine of all our blessednesse and Amore complacentiae with a love of joy and delight in him when the Soule goes to God like Noahs Dove to the Arke and with infinite sweetnesse and securitie reposeth it selfe in him and lastly Amore Benevolentiae with an endeavour so farre as a poore Creature can to an infinite Creator for our Good extendeth not unto him to bring all praise service and honour unto him And thus we are to love him above all things first Appretiativè setting an higher price upon his Glory and Command than upon any other thing besides all Dung in comparison Secondly Intensivè with the greatest force and intention of our Spirit setting no bounds or measure to our Love of him thirdly Adaequatè as the compleat perfect and adaequate object of all our Love in whom it must begin and in whom it must end And therefore the Wise-man speaking of the Love and Feare of God tells us that it is Totum Hominis the Whole of Man Other Objects are severally fitted unto severall Faculties Beautie to the Eye Musick to the Eare Meat to the Palate Learning to the Mind none of these can satisfie the Facultie unto which it belongs not And even to their proper Faculties they bring Vanitie and Vexation with them Vanitie because they are emptie and doe deceive and because they are mortall and will decay Vexation in the Getting for that is with Labour in the Keeping for that is with Feare in the Multiplying for that is with Care in the enjoying for if we but taste we are vexed with desiring it if we surfet we are vexed with loathing it God onely is Totum Hominis fitted to all the wants of an immortall Soule Fulnesse to make us perfectly happie Immortalitie to make us perpetually happie after whom we hunger with desire and are not griped on whom we feast with delight and are not cloyed He therefore is to be loved not with a divided but a whole Heart To love any Creature either without God or above God is Cupiditas Lust which is the formale of every sinne whereby we turne from God to other things but to love the Creatures under God in their right order and for God to their right end for he made all things for himselfe this is Charitas true and regular Love Now the
disâ—…retion of their owners 6 Give not an easie Eare to Reports nor an Easie entertainement to suspicioâ—…s bee not greedy to know who or wherein another hath wrong'd thee That which wee are desirous to know or apt to beleeve wee shall be the more ready to revenge Curiosity and â—…dulity are the Handmaides unto Passion Alexander would not see the woman after â—…hom he might have Lusted Nor Casar search Pompeyes Cabinet lâ—…st he should find new matters of Revenge He chose rather to make a Fire of them on his Hearth then in his Heart Injuâ—…ies unknowne doe many times the lesse hurt when I have found them I then begin to feele them and suffer more from mine owne discovery then from mine enemies attempt 7 Bee Candid in Interpreting the thingâ—… wherein thou sufferest Many times the glasse through which I looke makes that seeme formidable and the wave that crooked which in it selfe was beautifull and straight Haply thou art Angry with that which could not intend to hurt thee Thy Booke thy Penne the stone at which thou stumblest the winde or raine that beates upon thee bee Angry gaine but with thy selfe who art either so bold as to be Angry with GOD or so foolish as to be Angry with nothing Thou art displeased at a Childish or an Ignorant miscarriage Call it not Injury but Imprudence and then pitty it Thou art Angry with Counsell Reproofe Discipline why doest thou not as well breake the Glasse in which thy Physitian Ministreth a potion unto thee Bee Angry with thy sinne and thou wilt love him that takes it from thee Is hee that adviseth thee thy Superiour Thine Anger is undutifull is hee thy friend thine Anger is ungratefull 8 Give Injuries a New Name and that will worke a new Affection In blinde Agents call it Chance in weake Persons Infirmity In simple Ignorance in wise Counsell in Superiours Discipline In equals Familiarity ' in Inferious Confidence where there is no other construction to be made doe as Ioseph and David did call it Providence and see what God sayes to thee by it Get a minde conversant with high and noble things the more heavenly the lesse Tempestuous 9 Be not Idle Sluggish Luxurious wee are never more apt to bee Angry then when we are sleepy or greedy Weake resolutions and strong Desires are sensible of the least exaâ—…peration as an empty ship of the smallest Tempest Againe be not â—…ver-busie neither That man can hardly bee master of his Passion that is not master of his imployments A minde ever burdened like a Bow alwayes bent must needes grow impotent and weary the fittest preparations to this distemper When a mans businesse doth not poise but presse him there will ever bee something either undone or ill-done and so still matter of Vexation And therefore our Mindes as our Vessels must bee unloaded if they would not have a Tempest hurt them Lastly wrastle not with that which pincheth thee If it bee strong it will hurt if cunning it will hamper and entangle thee Hee that strives with his burden makes it heavier That Tempest breakes not the stalkes of Corne which rends asunder the armes of an Oake the one yeelds the other withstands it An humble weaknesse is safer from injury then a stubborne strength I have now done with the Passions of the Minde And briefly proceede to those Honours and Dignities of the Soule of Man which belong unto it in a more abstracted Consideration CHAP. XXXII Of the Originall of the Reasonable Soule whether it be immediatly Created and Infused or derived by Seminall Traduction from the Parents Of the Derivation of Originall sinne THe dignity of Man in respect of his Soule alone may be gathered from a consideration either of the whole or of the parâ—…s therof CoÌ„cerning the whole we shall consider two things It s Originall and its Nature Concerning the Originall of the Soule divers men have diversly thought for to let passe the Opinion of Seleucus who affirmed that it was educed out of the Earth and that of Origin and the Platoâ—…ists who say that the Soules of men were long agoe created and after detruded into the Body as into a Prison There are three Opinions touching this question The first of those who affirm the Traduction of the Soule by generaâ—… some of which so affirm because they judged 〈◊〉 a Corporeall substance as did Tertullian Others because they beleeved that one spirit might as easily proceed from another as one fire or light be kindled by another as Apollinarius Nemesiâ—… and divers in the Westerne Churches as St. Hierome witnesseth The second of those who deby the naturall Traduction and say that the Soule is 〈◊〉 â—…ion infused into Bodies organiz'd and praedisposed to receive them of which Opinion among the Ancients were St. Hierom Hilarie Ambrose Lactantius Theodoret. Aeneas Gazâ—…us and of the moderne Writers the major part The third is of those who doe haesitare stick betweene both and dare affirme nothing certaine on either side which is the moderation of St. Augustine and Gregory the great who affirme that this is a question incomprehensible and unsolvable in this life Now the only reason which caused St. Austin herein to haesitate seemeth to have been the difficulty of traducing Originall sinne from the Parents to the Children For saith he writing unto St. Hierome touching the Creation of the Soule If this Opinion doe not oppugne that most fundamentall faith of Originall sinne let it then be mine but if it doe oppugne it let it not be thine Now since that Opinion which denieth the Traduction seemeth most agreeable to the spirituall substance of the soule I shall here produce some few reasons for the Creation and solve an argument or two alledg'd for the Traduction of the Soule reserving notwithstanding unto my selfe and others the liberty and modesty of St. Austins haesitation which also I finde allowed by the Holy Ghost himselfe Two things there are of certainty in this point 1. That the soule is not any corporeall Masse or substance measurable by quantity or capable of substantiall augmentation 2. That the Traduction of one thing out of another doth connotate these two things That the thing traduced doth derive Being from the other as from its original principle that this derivation be not any other manner of way but Ratione semiâ—…ali per modum decisionis by a seminall way and the decision seperation or effluxion of substance from the other which things being laid The Arguments against Traduction are these First the testimonies of Holy Scripture calling God the Father of spirits as our naturall Parent the Father of our bodies Iob 33. 4. Eccles. 12. 7. Esa 57. 16. Num. 16. 22. 27. 16. Heb. 12. 9. Zach. 12. 1. which though they doe not according to the judgement of St. Aug. conclude the point by infallible consequence yet doe they much favour the probability
receive and derive this Nature Nature I say first fallen for unto Nature Innocent belonged Originall Righteousnesse and not Originall sinne 2. Nature derived by ordinary generation as the fruit of the loynes and of the womb For though Christ had our Nature yet hee had not our sinne 3. Nature whole and entire For neither part as some conceive is the Totall spring and fountain of this sinne For it is improbable that any staine should be transfused from the Body to the Soul as from the foule vessell to the cleane water put into it The Body it selfe being not Soly and alone in it selfe corrupt and sinfull else all Abortions and miscarrying conceptions should be subject to damnation Nothing is the seat of sin which cannot be the seat of Death the wages of sinne Originall sinne therefore most probably seemeth to arise by Emanation partiall in the parts totall in the whole from Mans Nature as guilty forsaken and accursed by God for the sinne of Adam And from the parts not considered absolutely in themselves but by vertue of their concurrence and Vnion whereby both make up one compounded Nature Though then the Soule be a partiall subject or seat of Originall sinne yet wee have not our sinne and our soule from one Author because sinne followes not the part but the Nature whole and entire And though we have not from our Parents Totum naturae yet we have totam naturam wee have our whole nature though not every part of our nature Even as whole Christ was the Son of Mary who therefore by vertue of the Communication of properties in Christ is justly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Mother of God against the Nestorians in the Councell of Chalcedon Though in regard of his divine Nature he was without beginning the reason is because the integrity of Nature ariseth from the Vnion of the two parts together which is perfected by Generation so then wee say that Adam is the Originall and meritorious cause Our next Parents the instrumentall and immediate cause of this sinne in us not by way of Physicall Emission or Transmigration of sinne from them to us but by secret contagion as S. Augustine speaks For having in the Manner aforesaid from Adam by our Parents received a nature most justly forsaken by God and lying under the Guilt and Curse of the first praevarication from this Nature thus derived as guilty and accursed doth immediately and intimately flow Habituall pollution So then Habituall Concupiscence is from Adam alone meritoriously by reason of his first praevarication From Adam by the mediation of our Parents seminally by naturall generation And from Nature generated not as Nature but as in Adam guilty forsaken and accursed by secret and ineffable Resultancy and Emanation This is that which I conceive of this Great difficulty not unmindfull in the meane time of that speech of S. Augustine That there is nothing more certaine to be knowne and yet nothing more secret to be understood than Originall sinne For other Arguments to prove the Traduction of the Soul they are not of such moment And therefore I passe them by and proceed to the consideration of the Soule in its Nature CHAP. XXXIII Of the Image of God in the Reasonable soule in regard of its simplicity and spirituality COncerning the dignity of the soule in its nature and essence Reason hath adventured thus farre to confesse that the soule of man is in some sort a spark and beame of divine brightnesse And a greater and more infallible Oracle hath warranted that it was breathed into him by God himselfe and was made after his Image and likenesse not substantially as if there were a Real Emanation and Traduction of the Soule out of God which were blasphemous and impious to conceive but only by way of Resemblance and imitation of God properties in mans originall created nature which is more notable in him than in the otheâ—… parts of the world there is indeed in all God works some kind of image and lineaments anâ—… footsteps of his glory Deum namque ire per omnes Terrasque Tractusque maris Coelumque profundum c. For all the tracts of Earth of Sea and Sky Are filled with divine immensity The whole world is a great book wherein we read the praise glory power and infinitenesse of him that made it but man is after a more peculiar manner called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the image and glory of God the greater world is only Gods workmanship wherein is represented the wisdom and power of God as in a building the Art and cunning of the workman but man in the originall purity of nature is besides that as wax wherein was more notably impressed by that divine spirit whose work it is to seale a spirituall resemblance of his owne goodnesse and sanctity Againe the greater world was never other than an Orator to set forth the power and praises of God but he made the soule of man in the beginning as it were his Oracle wherein he fastned a perfect knowledge of his law and will from the very glimpses and corrupted Reliques of which Knowledge of his Law some have beene bold to call men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the kindred of God And Senec. Liber Animus Diis cognatus which is the same with that of Aratus cited by S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for wee are his off-spring yea Euripides as Tully in his * Tusculans observes was bold to call the soule of man by the name of God and Seneca will venture so farre too Quid aliud vocas animum quà m deum in humano corpore hospitantem But to forbeare such boldnesse as it may be one of the Originals of heathen Idolatry Certaine it is that there are as Tully many times divinely observes sundry similitudes betweene God and the minde of man There are indeed some Attributes of God not only incommunicable but absolutely inimitable and unshadowable by any excellency in mans soule as immensity infinitenesse omnipotency omniscience immutability impassibility and the like but whatsoever spirituall and Rationall perfections the power bounty of God conferr'd upon the soule in its first Creation are all of them so many shadowes and representations of the like but most infinite perfections in him The Properties then and Attributes of God wherein this Image chiefely consists are first these three Spirituality with the two immediate consequents thereof Simplicity and Immortality in which the soule hath partaked without any after corruption or depravation Concerning the former it were vast and needlesse to confute those sundry opinions of ancient Philosophers concerning the substance of the soule many where of Tully in the first of his Tusculans hath reported And Aristotle confuted in his first de Anima Some conceived it to be blood others the braine some fire others ayre some that it consists in Harmony and Number and the Philosopher
Dicaearchus that it was nothing at all but the body disposed and fitted for the works of life But to let these passe as unworthy of refutation and to proceed to the truth of the first property There are sundry naturall reasons to prove the Spirituality of the soule as first the manner of its working which is immateriall by conceiving objects as universall or otherwise purified from all grosnesse of matter by the Abstraction of the Active understanding whereby they are made in some sort proportionall to the nature of the Intellect Passive into which the species are impressed Secondly it s in dependance on the body in that manner of working for though the operations of the soule require the concurrence of the commonsense and imagination yet that is by way only of conveyance from the object not by way of assistance to the elicite and immediate act They only present the species they doe not qualifie the perception Phantasmata are only objecta operation is the objects they are not instrumenta operandi the instruments of the soules working The Act of understanding is immediatly from the soule without any the least concurrences of the body there unto although the things whereon that act is fixed and conversant require in this estate bodily organs to represent them unto the soule as light doth not at all concurre to the act of seeing which solely and totally floweth from the visive faculty but only serves as an extrinsecall assistance for qualification of the Medium and object that must be seene And this reason Aristotle hath used to prove that the understanding which is principally true of the whole soule is not mixt with any body but hath a nature altogether divers there-from because it hath no bodily organ as all bodily powers have by which it is enabled to the proper acts that belong unto it And hereon is grounded another reason of his to prove the Soule immateriall because it depends not on the body in its operations but educeth them immediately from within it selfe as is more manifest in the Reflexion of the soule upon its owne nature being an operation as hee expresly speaketh seperable there-from the soule being not only actus informans a forme informing for the actuating of a body and constitution of a compound substance but actus subsistens too a forme subsisting And that per se without any necessary dependance upon matter It is an act which worketh as well in the body as whereby the body worketh Another reason of Aristotle in the same place is the difference betweene Materiall and Immateriall powers For saith he all bodily cognoscitive faculties doe suffer offence and dammage from the too great excellency of their objects as the eye from the brightnesse of the Sunne the eare from the violence of a sound the touch from extremity of heat or cold and the likâ—… But the understanding on the contrary side is perfected by the worthiest contemplations and the better enabled for lower enquiries And therefore Aristotle in his Ethicks placeth the most compleat happinesse of man in those heavenly intuitions of the minde which are fastned on the divinest and most remote objects which in Religion is nothing else but a fruition of that beatificall vision which as farre as Nature goes is call'd the contemplation of the first cause and an eternall satiating the soule with beholding the Nature Essence and glory of God Another reason may be drawn from the condition of the Vnderstandings Objects which have so much the greater conformity to the soule by how much the more they are divine and abstracted Hoc habet animus argumentum suae divinitatis saith Seneca quòd illum divina delectam This argument of its divinenesse hath the minde of man that it is delighted with divine things for if the soule were corporeal it could not possibly reach to the knowledge of any but materiall substances and those that were of its owne Nature otherwise we might as well see Angels with our eyes as understand any thing of them in our minds And the ground of this reason is that axiome in Philosophy that all reception is ad modum recipientis according to the proportion and capacity of the receiver And that the objects which are spirituall and divine have greatest proportion to the soule of man is evident in his Understanding and his will both which are in regard of truth or good unsatisfiable by any materiall or worldly objects the one never resting in enquiry till it attaine the perfect knowledge the other never replenished in desire till it be admitted unto the perfect possession of the most divine and spirituall good to wit of him who is the first of Causes and the last of Ends. From this Attribute of Spirituality flowes immediatly that next of Simplicity Vnity or Actuality for Matter is the root of all perfect composition every Compound consisting of two Essentiall parts matter and forme I exclude not from the Soule all manner of composition for it is proper to God only to be absolutely and perfectly simple But I exclude all Essentiall composition in respect whereof the Soule is meerely Actuall And so I understand that of Tully Nihil est Animus admixtum nihil concretum nihil copulatum nihil coagmentatum nihil duplex CHAP. XXXIV Of the Soules immortality proved by its simplicity independance agreement of Nations in acknowledging God and duties due unto him dignity above other Creatures power of understanding things immortall unsatiablenesse by objects Mortall freenesse from all causes of corruption ANd from this Simplicity followes by a necessary unavoydable consequence the third property spoken of Immortality it being absolutely impossible as Tully excellently observes it is the argument of Iul. Scaliger on this very occasion for any simple and uncompounded Nature to be subject to death and corruption For saith Tully Interitus est discessus secretio ac direptus earum partium quae conjunctione â—…liqua tenebantur It is a separation and as it were a divulsion of parts before united each to other so that where there is no Union there can be no separation and by consequence no death nor mortality Another reason may be the same which was alledged for the spirituality of the soule namely independance in operation and therefore consequently in Being upon the body And that Independance is manifest First because the acts of the soule are educ'd immediately in it selfe without the Intercedence of any organ whereby sensitive faculties work Secondly because the soule can perceive and have the knowledge of truth of universals of it selfe of Angels of God can assent discourse abstract censure invent contrive and the like none of which actions could any wayes be produced by the Intrinsecall concurrence of any materiall faculty Thirdly because in Raptures and Extasies the soule is as it were drawne up above and from the body though not from informing it yet certainely from borrowing from it any assistance
to the produceing of its operation All which prove that the soule is separable from the body in its Nature and therefore that it is not corrupt and mortall as the body Another reason may be taken from the Universall agreement of all Nations in the Earth in Religion and the worship of some Deity which cannot but be raised out of a hope and secret Resolution that that God whom they worshipped would reward their piety if not here yet in another life Nulla gens adeo extra leges est projectâ—… ut non aliquos deos credat saith Seneca whence those fictious of the Poets touching Elyzium and fields of happinesse for men of honest and well ordered lives and places of Torment for those that doe any way neglect the bonds of their Religion Ergo exercentur poenis veterumque malorum Supplicia expendunt Therefore they exercised are with paine And punishments of former crimes sustaine For in this life it is many times in all places seene that those which have given themselves most liberty in contempt of Gods Lawes and have suffered themselves to be carried by the swinge of their owne rebellious Passions unto all injurious ambitious unruly Practises have commonly raised themselves and their fortunes more than others who out of tendernesse and feare have followed no courses but those which are allowed them And yet these men who suffer so many indignities out of regard to Religion doe still observe their duties and in the midst of all contempt and reproach fly into the bosome of their God And as Lucretius himselfe that Arch-Atheist confesseth of them Multò in rebus acerbis Acriâ—…s advertunt animos ad religionem Their hearts in greatest bitternesse of minde Unto Religion are the more enclinde Their very terrors and troubles make them more zealous in acknowledging some Deity and in the worship of it Hic Pietatis hâ—…s would not this easily have melted their Religion into nothing and quite diverted their minds from so fruitlesse a severity had they not had a strong and indeleble perswasion fastned in their soules that a state would come where in both their Patience should be rewarded and the insolencie of their Adversaries repayed with the just Vengeance they had deserved As for that Atheisticall conceit that Religion is only grounded on Policie and maintained by Princes for the better Tranquillity and Setlednesse of their States making it to be only Imperiorum Vinculum a Bond of Government that the Common-weale might not suffer from the fury of minds secure from all Religion it is a fancie no lesse absurd than it is impious For that which hath not only beene observed and honour'd by those who have scarce had any forme of a civill Regiment amongst them but even generally assented unto by the opinions and practice of the whole world is not a Law of Policie and civill Institution but an inbred and secret Law of Nature dictated by the consciences of men and assented unto without and above any humane imposition Nor else is it possible for Legall institutions and the closest and most intricate conveyances of Humane Policy so much to entangle the hearts of men of themselves enclinable to liberty nor to fetter their consciences as thereby only to bring them to a regular conformity unto all government for feare of such a God to whose Infinitnesse Power and Majestie they Assent by none but a civill Tradition It must be a visible character of a Deitie acknowledged in the Soule an irresistible Principle in Nature and the secret witnesse of the heart of man that must constraine it unto those sundry religious ceremonies observed among all Nations wherein even in places of Idolatry were some so irksome and repugnant to Nature and others so voyd of Reason as that nothing but a firme and deepe Assurance of a Divine Judgement and of their owne Immortality could ever have impos'd them upon their consciences And besides this consent of men unto Religion in generall we finde it also unto this one part hereof touching the Soules immortality All the wisest and best reputed Philosophes for Learning and stayednesse of life and besides them even Barbarians Infidels and savage people have discerned it Adeò nescio quo modâ—… inhaeret in menibus quasi seculorum quoddam augurium futurorum saith Tully The Soule hath a kinde of presage of a future world And therefore he saith that it is in mans Body a Tenant tanquam in dome alâ—…enâ as in anothers house And is only in Heaven as a Lord tanquam in domo suâ as in its owne Though in the former of these the ignorance of the Resurrection made him erre touching the future condition of the Body wherein indeed consists a maine dignity of Man above other creatures And this Opinion it is which he saith was the ground of all that care men had for posterity to sow and plant Common-wealths to ordaine Lawes to establish formes of Government to erect Foundations and Societies to hazard their Blood for the good of their Country all which could not have beene done with such freedome of Spirit and prodigality of life unlesse there were withall a conceit that the good thereof would some way or other redound to the contentment of the Authors themselves after this life for it was a speech savouring of infinite Atheisme 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When I am dead and in mine Vâ—…ne What care I though the World burns Now although against this present Reason drawne from the consent of men which yet Heathens themselves have used It may be alledged that there hath beene a consent likewise of some That the Soule is nothing else but the Eucrasie or good Temperature of the Body and that it is therefore subject to those Maladies Distempers Age Sicknesse and at last Death which the Body is as amongst the rest Lucretius takes much paines to prove yet the Truth is that is Votum magic quà m Iudicium never any firme opinion grounded on Judgement and Reason but rather a desire of the heart and a perswasion of the Will inticing the Understanding so to determine For the conscience of lewd Epicures and sensuall minds being sometimes frighted with the flashes and apprehensions of Immortality which often times pursues them and obtrudes it selfe upon them against their wills shining like lightning through the chinks crevises as I may so speak of their Soules which are of set purpose closed against all such light sets the Reason on work to invent arguments for the contrary side that sâ—… their staggering and fearefull impiety may bâ—… something emboldned and the Eye of their conscience blinded and the Mouth mustled from breathing forth those secret clamors and shrikes of feare The Deniall then of the Immortality of the Soule is rather a Wish than an Opinion a corruption of the Heart and Will than any Naturall Assertion of the understanding which cannot but out of the footsteps and reliques of those first sacred Impressions acknowledge a
than that other the Retaining of his wounds which was only for our sakes that our Faith touching the Truth of his Body might not be without these visible and inferiour Witnesses by which he was pleased to make his very Glorified flesh a proportioned Object to our fraile sense and faith that so wee might thence learne confidently to rely for our selves as well on the Benefit of his Exaltation as of his Humility Or it was done as St. Augustine speaks Non ex Necessitate sed ex Potestate as the Sunne is said to draw and suck up standing waters Non Pabuli Egestate sed Virtutis Magniâ—…adine Not to Nourish but to Manifest its vertue Thirdly the Body shall be a strong and beautifull Body throughly able to minister unto the Soule any service wherein it shall imploy it and shall be no longer as it is now the clogge and luggage thereof It shall likewise be free from all blemish and deformity which ever ariseth out of the distemper discord of the Elements as it is by good probability conjectured reduced unto a full comely and convenient stature even in those who were in their Death contemptible Infants lame dismembred or any other way dishonoured with the miseries of corruption Naturae non injuriae reddimur we shall be restored to our Nature but not to our shame the Dust shall still retaine and bury our dishonour and it shall be one part of our Glory to be made fit for it The last quality of our Bodies which I shall observe is a perfect subtilty and agility best befitting their service for the Soule in all speedy motion which surely shall be there so much the more requisite than here on earth by how much Heaven is a more ample and spacious Country And thus while the Body is made an attendant on the Soules glory it is likewise a partaker of it Unto these adde the sweet Harmony of the Affections the exact and exquisite Operation of the senses the Bodily communion and fellowship of the Saints and above all the Eternall Corporeall vision of that most sacred Body whence all ours derive their degrees of Honour whose presence were truly and without any Hyperbole able to make Hell it selfe a Place of Glory how much more that Country and those Mansions where the Soule likewise shall be swallowed up with the immediate vision and fruition of Divine Glory Our Soules are not here noble enough to conceive what our Bodies shall be there CHAP. XXXVI Of that part of Gods Image in the Soule which answereth to his Power Wisedome Knowledge Holines Of Mans Dominion over other Creatures Of his Love to Knowledge What remainders we retaine of Originall Iustice. THe other Properties or Attributes of God of which Mans Soule beareth an Image dark resemblance are those which according to our Apprehension seeme not so Intrinsecall and Essentiall as the former And they are such as may be either generally collected from the Manifestation of his Works or more particularly from his Word These which referre unto his Works are his Power in Making and Ruling them his Wisedom in Ordering and Preserving them his Knowledge in the Contemplation of them and of these it pleaseth him at the first to bestow some few degrees upon mans Soule Concerning the Attribute of Power most certaine it is that those great parts of Gods workmanship Creation and Redemption are incommunicably belonging unto him as his owne Prerogative Royall Insomuch that it were desperate blasphemy to assume unto our selves the least resemblance of them Yet in many other proceedings of Gods works there is some Analogie and Resemblance in the Works of Men. For first what are all the motions and courses of Nature but the Ordinary works of God All formes and intrinsecall Motive Principles are indeed but his Instruments for by him we live and move and have our being And of all other works mans only imitate Nature as Aristotle observes of the Works of Art which peculiarly belong unto Man all other Creatures being carried by that naturall instinct which is Intrinsecally belonging to their condition without any manner of Art or variety The Resemblances of Nature in the Works of Art are chiefly seene in these two Proportions First as Nature doth nothing in Vaine but in all her Works aymes at some End the Perfection or the Ornament or the Conservation of the Universe for those are the three ends of Nature subordinate to the Maine which is the Glory of the Maker so likewise are the works of Art all directed by the Understanding to some one of those ends either to the perfection of Men such are all those which informe the Vnderstanding and governe the life or to his Conservation as those directed to the furthering of his welfare and repairing the decayes or sheltering the weaknesses of Nature or lastly to his Ornament such as are those Elegancies of Art and Curiosities of Invention which though not necessary to his Being yet are speciall instruments of his delight either Sensitive or Intellectuall The second Resemblance is betweene the Manner and Progresse of their Workes for as the Method of nature is to proceed ab imperfectioribus ad Perfectiora and per determinata Media ad 〈◊〉 Finem So Art likewise as is plaine in those which are Manuall by certain fixed rules which alter not proceeds to the producing of a more perfect effect from more tough and unformed beginnings by the help of Instruments appropriated to particular services But this because â—…t limits Mans dignity as well as commends it I for beare to speake of Though even herein also we doe seeme to imitate God who in his great worke of Creation did proceed both by successiâ—… of Time and degrees of Perfection only it is Necessity in us which was in him his Will To come therefore nearer it is observable that in the first Act of Gods power in the Making and Framing of the World there was No thing here below created properly immediatly and totally but the Chaos and Masse or the Earth without forme and voide out of the Obedience whereof his Power did farther educe and extract those Wonderfull Vaâ—…ious and Beauti full Formes which doe evidently set forth unto the Soule of Man the Glory and Majestie of him that made them By a small Resemblance of this manner of Working Man also in those Workes of Art peculiar to him from other Creatures doth ex Potentia Obedientiall as the Schooles call it out of the Obedience and Subjection of any proposed Masse produce Non per Naturam sed per Imperium not out of the Nature of the Subject but by the command of Reason sundry formes of Art full of Decency and Beauty And for Government I meane Subordinate and by Derivation or Indulgence it is manifest that all Creatures inhabiting the World with him were subdued unto Man and next unto the Glory of the great Maker were ordained for his service and benefit * And therefore when ever
wee finde any of them hurtfull and Rebellious wee cannot but remember that the occasion thereof was our owne disloyalty they doe but Revenge their great Masters wrong and out of a Faithfull care and jealousie to Preserve his Honour Renounce their Fidelity and Obedience to a Traitom * And indeed how can we looke to have our Dominion intire over Beasts and inferiour Creatures when by continuall Enormities we make our selves as one of them Continued by the Generall Providence of God whereby hee is pleased to preserve things in that course of Subordination wherein first hee made them and like a gracious Prince to continue unto Man the use of his Creatures even then when hee is a prisoner unto his Justice Renewed by the Promise and Grant made againe unto Noah And there is a Double Promise under which wee may enjoy the Creatures the one a Morall Promise made unto Industry as The Diligent hand maketh Rich and hee that Ploweth his Land shall have Plenty of Corne the other an Evangelicall Promise made unto Piety and Faith in Christ whereby is given unto Christian men both a freer use of the Creatures than the Iews had and a purer use than the wicked have For unto the Cleane all things are Cleane And this Grant of God doth sometimes shew it selfe extraordinarily as in the Obedience of the Crowes to Eliah the Viper to Paul the Lyons to Daniel the Whale to Ionah the Fire to the three Children and the trembling and feare of wilde Beasts towards many of the Martyrs Alwayes Ordinarily in ordering and dispensing the course of Nature so as that Humane Society may be preserved both by power in subduing the Creatures which hee must use and by wisedome in escaping the Creatures which hee doth feare Now for the second Attribute Wisedome there is also a remainder of the Image thereof in Man for albeit the fall and corruption of Nature hath darkned his eyes so that hee is enclined to worke Confusedly or to walk as in a Maze without Method or Order as in a Storme the Guide of a Vessell is oftentimes to seek of his Art and forced to yeeld to the windes and waves yet certaine it is that in the minde of Man there still remaines a Pilot or Light of Nature many Principles of Practicall prudence whereby though for their faintings a man do's often miscarry and walke awry the course of our Actions may be directed with successe and issue unto Civill and Honest ends And this is evident not only by the continuall practise of Grave and Wise men in all States Times and Nations but also by those sundry learned and judicious Precepts which Historians Politicians and Philosophers have by their naturall Reason and Observation framed for the compassing of a Mans just ends and also for Prevention and disappointment of such inconveniences as may hinder them Lastly for the Attribute of Knowledge It was doubtlesse after a most eminent manner at first infused into the Heart of Man when hee was able by Intuition of the Creatures to give unto them all Names according to their severall Properties and Natures and in them to shew himselfe as well a Philosopher as a Lord. Heâ—… filled them sayth Siracides with the Knowledge of Vnderstanding And herein if wee will beleeve Aristotle the Soule is most neerely like unto God whose infinite Delight is the Eternall Knowledge and Contemplation of himselfe and his Works Hereby saith hee the Soule of man is made most Beloved of God and his minde which is Allied unto God is it selfe Divine and of all other parts of Man most Divine And this made the Serpent use that Insinuation only as most likely to prevaile for compassing that Cursed and miserable project of Mans ruine By meanes of which Fall though Man blinded his understanding and â—…obd himselfe of this as of all other blessed habits I meane of those excellent Degrees thereof which he then enjoyed yet still the Desire remaines Vast and impatient and the pursuit so violent that it proves often praejudiciall to the estate both of the Body and Minde So that it is as true now as eyer that Man is by Nature a Curious and inquiring Creature of an Active and restlesse Spirit which is never quiet except in Motion winding it selfe into all the Pathes of Nature and continually traversing the World of Knowledge There are two maine Desires naturally stamped in each Creature a Desire of Perfecting and a Desire of Perpetuating himselfe Of these Aristotle attributeth in the highest degree the latter unto each living Creature when he saith that of all the works of living Creatures the most naturall is to Generate the like and his Reason is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because hereby that Immortality the Principall end as hee there supposeth of all naturall Agents which in their owne Individuals they cannot obtaine they procure by deriving their Nature unto a continued off-spring and succession But though in regard of life it hold true of all Man notwithstanding is to be exempted from the universality of this Assertion And of himselfe that other desire of Perfection which is principally the desire of Knowledge for that is one of the principall advancements of the Soule should not only in a Positive sense as Aristotle hath determined in the Entrance to his Metaphysicks but in a Superlative degree be verified that He is by nature desirous of Knowledge This being the Principall thing to use Aristotle his owne reason whereby Man doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Partake of Divinity as I observed before out of Aristotle himselfe And the reason of the difference betweene Man and other Creatures in this particular is First Because Man hath not such necessary use of that former desire as others have in regard of his owne Immortality which takes away the Necessity of Propagation to sustaine his Nature And secondly because Knowledge the Perfection of the Soule is to Man as I may so speake a kinde of generation being of sufficiencie to exempt the Person endued therewith from all injurie of Time and making him to survive and out-live his owne Mortality So that when the Body hath surrendred unto each Region of the World those Elements and Principles whereof it was compos'd and hath not so much as Dust and Cinders left to testifie that Being which once it had then doth the Name lie wrapped in the Monuments of Knowledge beyond the reach of Fate and Corruption The Attributes of God which are manifested more especially in his Word though sundry yet as farre forth as they had ever any Image in Man may be comprized in this more Generall one of Holinesse Whereby I understand that Absolute and Infinite Goodnesse of his Nature which is in him most Perfect Pure and Eternall Of which though Man according to that measure as it was unto him communicated was in his great Fall utterly rob'd and spoyl'd as not being able in any thing to resemble it
some disposing the Minde unto one object in some unto another according as the impetus and force of their naturall affections carrieth them And therefore Aristotle in his Politiques ascribeth the inequalitie which hee observes betweene the Asiatique and European Wits unto the severall Climates and temperature of the Regions in which they lived according whereunto the Complexions and Constitutions of their Bodies onely could be alter'd the Soule being in it selfe according to the same Philosopher impassible from any corporeall Agent And to the same purpose againe he saith That if an old man had a young mans eye his sight would be as sharpe and as distinct as a young mans is implying 〈◊〉 diversitie of Perception to be grounded onâ—…ly on the diversitie of bodily instruments by which it is exercised And therefore he elsewhere observes I shall not trouble my selfe to examine upon what ground that men of soft and tender skins have greatest quicknesse of wit and on the contrarie Duri Carne ineptiâ—…mente thereby intimating that there is no more significant and lively expression of a vigorous or heavie Soule than a happie or ill-ordered Body wherein wee may sundry times reade the abilities of the Minde and the inclinations of the Will So then it is manifest that this weakenesse of apprehension in the Soules of men doth not come from any immediate and proper darknesse belonging unto them but onely from the coexistence which they have with a Body ill-disposed for assistance and information For hee who is carried in a Coach as the Body is vehiculum animae though he be of himselfe more nimble and active must yet receive such motion as that affoords and Water which is conveyed through Pipes and Aqueducts though its motion by it selfe would have beene otherwise must yet then be limitted by the posture and proportion of the Vessels through which it passeth CHAP. II. In what Cases the dependance of the Soule on the Body is lessened by Faith Custome Education Occasion BVt yet this dependance on the Body is not so necessarie and immutable but that it may admit of variation and the Soule be in some cases vindicated from the impression of the Body And this first in extraordinarie and next in more common actions In actions extraordinarie as those pious and religious operations of the Soule Assent Faith Invocation and many others wherein the Soule is carried beyond the Sphere of Sense and transported unto more raysed operations For to beleeve and know that there are layd up for pious and holy endeavours those joyes which eye hath not seene nor care heard and to have some glimpses and fore-taste of them which Saint Paul calleth the Earnest and first fruits of the Spirit What is this but to leave sense behind us and to out-run our Bodies And therefore it is that Religion I meane chiefely the Principles Foundations Articles and Mysteries Evangelicall were alwayes not to be urged by Disputes of Secular Learning but to be sacredly and secretly infused not so much perswading to the knowledge of apparent Truths as drawing to the beleese of true Mysteries Divine Truths doe as much transcend the Reason as Divine Goodnesse doth the Will of Man That One Nature should be in Three Persons and Two Natures in One Person That the invisible God should be manifested in the flesh and a pure Virgin bring forth a Sonne That Death should be conquered by dying and not be able to digest and consume the Body which it had devoured That dead bones should live and they who dwell in the dust awake and sing These are Mysteries not onely above the reach of Humane but even of Evangelicall disquisition in somuch that even unto Principalities and Powers they were not otherwise made knowne but by Divine Revelation delivered unto the Church Sarah laughed when Abraham beleeved and the Philosophers mocked when Paul disputed and Reason expected that the Apostle should have fallen downe dead when contrarily Faith shooke the Viper into the fire There is a great difference betweene the manner of yeelding our assent unto God and Nature For in Philosophie we never resigne our beleese nor suffer our judgements to be wholly carried to any Conclusion till there be a demonstrative Argument grounded on Induction from the Sense for the enforcement thereof But Divinitie on the other side wheâ—… God speakes unto us worketh Science by Faith making us so much the more assured of thosâ—… Truths which it averreth than of any Naturalâ—… Conclusions notwithstanding they may seemâ—… sometimes to beare opposition to humane Reason by how much Divine Authoritie is more absolute and certaine than any Naturall demonstration And this freedome from bodily restraint have according to the Schoole-men those Raptures and Extasies which rayse and ravish the Soule with the sweetnesse of extraordinarie Contemplations And yet even Religion it selfe hath so much condiscended to the senses of men as to give them manner of roome and service in this great Mysterie And therefore generally the Doctrine of Christ is set forth in Parables and Similitudes and the Faith in Christ confirmed by Sacraments things most agreeable to the perception and capacitie of the Senses Now for the exemption of the more ordinarie actions of the Soule from any predominancie of the Body it is chiefely wrought by these three meanes Education Custome and Occasion For the Rule of Aristotle though in Agents purely Naturall and peremptorie which are not directed by any degree of knowledge inherent it held true yet in Man it is not universall That any thing which comes from Nature is unalterable by Custome For we commonly observe that the Culture of the Minde as of the Earth doth many times deliver it from the barrennesse of its owne Nature Exercetque frequens tellurem atque imperat arvis As frequent Husbandry commands The emptiest and most barren Lands Education then and Custome doe as it were revenge Nature insomuch that though the outward Humours and Complexions doe worke the Mind unto an unhappie temper yet by a continuall grapling with these difficulties it getteth at the last some victorie though not without much reluctancie And for Occasion that alters the naturall inclination of the Will and Affections rather than of the Vnderstanding for so wee see that the byas and force of mens desires are oftentimes turned by reason of some sudden emergent occurrences contrarie to the standing temper and complexion of the Body Thus wee reade some times of men in Warre who notwithstanding of themselves timerous and sluggish yet when the disadvantage of the place had taken away all possibilitie of flight and the crueltie of the Adversarie all hope of mercie if they should be conquered have strangely gayned by their owne despaires and gotten great and prosperous Victories by a forc'd and unnaturall fortitude Vna salus victis nullam sperare salutem The onely weapon which did win the day Was their despaire that they were cast away An example whereof wee have in the
a mediocritie to incline bend them towards the other extreame as Husbandmen use to doe those Trees which are crooked or as dim and weak eyes doe see the light best when it is broken in a shadow or else it is done by scattering and distracting of them and that not onely by the power of Reason but sometimes also by a cautelous admixture of Passions amongst themselves thereby interrupting their free current For as usually the Affections of the Mind are bred one of another as the Powder in the Pan of a Gun will quickly set on fire that in the Barrell as Greefe by Anger Circumspexit 〈◊〉 cum 〈◊〉 â condolescens He looked on them with Anger being grieved and Feare by Love Res est solliciti plena Timoriâ—… Amor The things to which our heart Love beares Are objects of our carefull Feares and Desire by Feare as in him of whom Tacitus speakes â—…ingebat mâ—…m quò mag is concupisceret That to justifie his Desires he pretended his Feares So likewise are some Passions stopt or at least bridled moderated by others Amor sorà s mittit timorem Perfect Love casteth out Feare It â—…aring in this as Plutarch hath noted in the hunting of Beasts that they are then easiest taken when they who hunt them put on the skins of Beasts As we see the light and heat of the Sun shining upon fire is apt to discourage it to put it out And this was that which made Saul when he was possessed with those strong sits of Melancholy working in him Furie Griefe and Horror to have recourse unto such a Remedie as is most forcible for the producing of other Passions of a lighter nature and so by consequence for expelling those Thus as we see in the Body Militarie as Tacitus hath observed Vnus tumultus est alterius remedium That one tumult is the cure of another and in the Body Naturall some Diseases are expelled by others so likewise in the Mind Passions as they mutually generate so they mutually weaken each other It often falleth out that the voluntarie admission of one losse is the prevention of a greater as when a Merchant casteth out his ware to prevent a shipwrack and in a publike Fire men pull down some houses untoucht to prevent the spreading of the flame Thus is it in the Passions of the Mind when any of them are excessive the way to remit them is by admitting of some further perturbation from others and so distracting the forces of the former Whether the Passions we admit be contrarie as when a dead Palsie is cured with a burning Feaver and Souldiers suppresse the feare of Death by the shame of Basenesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O fearefull Grecians in your minds recount To what great shame this basenesse will amount and the hatred of their Generall by the love of their Countrey as Vlysses perswaded Achilles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Though Agamemnon and his gifts you hate Yet looke with pittie on the dolefull state Of all the other Grecians in the Campe Who on your Name will divine honour stampe When you this glory shall to them afford To save them from the rage of Hectors Sword Or whether they be Passions of a different but not of a repugnant nature and then the effect is wrought by revoking some of the spirits which were otherwise all imployed in the service of one Passion to attend on them and by that meanes also by diverting the intention of the Mind from one deep Channell into many crosse and broken Streames as men are wont to stop one flux of bloud by making of another and to use frictions to the feet to call away and divert the humours which paine the head Which dissipation and scattering of Passion as it is wrought principally by this mutuall confounding of them amongst themselves so in some particular cases likewise two other wayes namely by communion in diverse subjects and extension on diverse objects For the first we see in matter of Griefe the Mind doth receive as it were some lightnesse and comfort when it finds it selfe generative unto others and produces sympathie in them For hereby it is as it were disburthened and cannot but find that easier to the sustaining whereof it hath the assistance of anothers shoulders And therefore they were good though common observations Curâ—… leves loquâ—…ntur ingentes stupent And Ille dolet vere qui sine teste dolet Our tongues can lighter Cares repeat When silence swallowes up the great He grieves indeed who on his friend Vntestified teares doth spend That Griefe commonly is the most heavie which hath fewest vents by which to diffuse it selfe which I take it will be one occasion of the heavinesse of infernall torment because there Griefe shall not be any whit transient to work commiseration in any spectator but altogether immanent and reflexive upon it selfe Thus likewise we see to instance in that other particular branch of diffusing the Passions upon diverse objects how the multitude of these if they be Hererogeneall and unsubordinate doth oftentimes remit a Passion for example in Love I take it that that man who hath a more generall Love hath a lesse vehement Love and the spreading of Affection is the weakening of it I mean still in things not absolute subordinate for a man may love a Wife more with Children than without them because they are the Seales and Pledges of that Love as a River when it is cut into many lesser streames runs weaker shallower And this I conceive is the reason why Salomon when he commendeth a strong Love giveth it but a single object There is a friend neerer than a Brother one in whom the rayes of this affection like the Sun-beames in a glasse being more united might withall be the more servent I remember not that I ever read of wonderfull Love amongst men which went beyond Couples which also Aristotle and Plutarch have observed And therefore we see in that state there is or should be greater affection wherein is the least communitie Conjugall Love as it is most single so it is usually the strongest and in the Issues and Blessings thereof there is scarce any more powerfull Epithite to win Love than Vnigenitus an onely Sonne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He lov'd me as one loves the onely Sonne Of 's old age borne to great Possession Insomuch that even in God himselfe to whom these Passions are but by an Anthropopathy attributed that more generall Love of his Providence and Preservation which is common to all his Creatures is if I may so speake of a lower degree though not in respect of any intention or remission in his Will but onely the effects thereof towards the things themselves than that more speciall Love of Adoption which he extendeth only to those whom he vouchsafeth to make One in him
divers according to the particular nature of the Passions sometimes too sudden and violent sometimes too heavie oppression of the heart the other sudden perturbation of the spirits Thus old Ely dyed with sudden griefe Diodorsu with shame Sophocles Chilo the Lacedemonian and others with joy Nature being not able to beare that great and sudden immutation which these Passions made in the Body The causes and manner of which cogitation I reserre as being inquiries not so directly pertinent to the present purpose unto Naturall Philosophers and Physicians And from the generalitie of Passions I proceed unto the consideration of some particulars according to the order of their former division In all which I shall forbeare this long Method of the Antecedents Concomitants and Consequents of their Acts many particulars whereof being of the same nature in all Passions will require to be observed onely in one or two and so proportionally conceived in the rest and shall insist principally in those particulars which I handle on the causes and effects of them as being Considerations wherein commonly they are most serviceable or prejudiciall to our Nature CHAP. IX Of the affection of Love of Love naturall of generall communion of Love rationall the object and generall cause thereof NOw the two first and fundamentall Passions of all the rest are Love and Hatred Concerning the Passion of Love we will therein consider first its object and its causes both which being of a like nature for every morall object is a cause thougâ—… not every cause an object will fall into one Love then consists in a kind of expansion oâ—… egresse of the heat and spirits to the object loved or to that whereby it is drawne and attracted whatsoever therefore hath such an attractive power is in that respect the object and generalâ—… cause of Love Now as in Nature so in the Affections likewise we may observe from their objects a double attraction The first is thaâ—… naturall or impressed sympathie of things wherâ—… by one doth inwardly incline an union with the other by reason of some secret vertues and occâ—… qualities disposing either subject to that 〈◊〉 all friendship as betweene Iron and the Loaâ—… stone The other is that common and moâ—… discernable attraction which every thing receivâ—… from those natures or places whereon they 〈◊〉 ordained and directed by the Wisedome anâ—… Providence of the first Cause to depend both in respect of the perfection and conservation of their being For as God in his Temple the Church so is He in his Pallace if I may so call it the World a God of Order disposing every thing in Number Weight and Measure so sweetly as that all is harmonious from which harmonie the Philosophers have concluded a Divine Providence and so powerfully as that all things depend on his Government without violence breach or variation And this Order and Wisdome is seene chiefely in that sweet subordination of things each to other and happie inclination of all to their particular ends till all be reduced finally unto Him who is the Fountaine whence issue all their streames of their limited being and the fulnesse of which all his creatures have received Which the Poet though something too Poetically seemeth to have express'd Principio Coelum ac Terras camposque liquentes Lucentemque globum Lunae Titaniaque Astra Spiritus intus alâ—… â—…otamque infusa per Artus Mens agitat molem magno se corpore miscet Heaven Earth and Seas with all those glorious Lights Which beautifie the Day and rule the Nights A Divine inward Vigour like a Soule Diffus'd through ev'ry joint of this great Whole Doth vegetate and with a constant force Guideth each Nature through its fixed course And such is the naturall motion of each thing to its owne Sphere and Center where is both the most proper place of its consisting and withall the greatest freedome from sorraine injurie or violence But we must here withall take notice of the generall care of the Creator whereby he hath fastned on all creatures not onely his private desire to satisfie the demands of their owne nature but hath also stamp'd upon them a generall charitie and feeling of Communion as they are sociable parts of the Vniverse or common Body wherein cannot possible be admitted by reason of that necessarie mutuall connexion betweenâ—… the parts thereof any confusion or divulsion without immediate danger to all the members And therefore God hath inclin'd the nature of these necessarie agents so to worke of their discords the perfect harmonie of the whole that iâ—… by any casualtie it fall out that the Body of Nature be like to suffer any rupture deformitie oâ—… any other contumely though haply occasioned by the uniforme and naturall motions of thâ—… particulars they then must prevent such damagâ—… and reproach by a relinquishing and forgetting of their owne natures and by acquainting themselves with motions whereunto considered iâ—… their owne determinate qualities they have aâ—… essentiall reluctancie Which propertie and sense of Nature in common the Apostle hath excellently set downe in 1 Cor. 12. where he renders this reason of all that there might be 〈◊〉 Schisme in the Body which likewise he divinely applyeth in the mysticall sense that all the severall gifts of the Spirit to the Church should drive to one common end as they were all derived from one common Fountaine and should never be used without that knitting qualitie of Love to which he elsewhere properly ascribeth the building continuation and perfecting of the Saints Now as it hath pleased the infinite Wisdome of God to guide and moderate by his owne immediate direction the motions of necessarie agents after the manner declared to their particular or to the generall end which motion may therefore as I before observed be called the naturall Passion of things so hath it given unto Man a reasonable Soule to be as it were his Vice-gerent in all the motions of Mans little World To apply then these proportions in Nature to the affection of Love in Man we shall finde first a Secret which I will call Naturall and next a Manifest which I call a Morall and more discursive attraction The first of these is that naturall sympathie wrought betweene the affection and the objâ—…ct in the first meeting of them without any suspension of the person â—…ll farther inquirie after the disposition of the object which comes immediately from the outward naturall and sensitive Vertues thereof whether in shape feature beautie motion 〈◊〉 behaviour all which comming under the spheare of Sense I include under the name of Iudiciarie Physiognomie Which is not a bare delight in the outward qualities but a farther presumption of the Iudgement concluding thence a lovely disposition of that Soule which animateth and quickneth those outward Graces And indeed if it be true which Aristotle in his Ethicks tels us That similitude is the ground of Love and if there be no naturall Love stronger
Hence none are sayd to love God but those that are some way united unto him And therefore as Gods first love to man was in making man like himselfe so his second great love was in making himselfe like man Hence we reade so often of that mysticall inhabitation of Christ in his Church of that more peculiar Vnion and presence with his people of a Spirituall Implantation unto him by Faith of those neere relations of Filiation and Fraternitie of mutuall interest each in other I am my beloveds and my beloved is mine importing an inseparable Vnion of the Church to Christ. And this may be the reason of that order in Saint Pauls solemne Benediction The Grace of Christ the Love of God and the Communion of the Spirit for as the Grace of Christ onely taketh away that enmitie which was betweene sinners and God and is the onely meanes of our reconciliation unto him so the Love of God is the onely Bond of that Communion which we have with him and his holy Spirit Vnion is of diverse sorts One such whereby diverse things are made simply one either by the conversion of one into the other or by the composition or constitution of a third out of the things united as of mixt bodies out of united Elements or of the whole substance out of the essentiall parts Another such whereby things united are made one after a sort either by an accidentall aggregation as diverse stones make one heape or by an orderly and artificiall distribution as diverse materialls make one house Or by either a naturall or morall inclination and sympathy which one thing beareth unto another And of this sort is that union which ariseth out of love tending first unto a mutuall similitude and conformity in the same desires and next unto a mutuall possession fruition and proprietie whereby the minde loving longeth to be seised of the thing which it loveth and cannot enduâ—…e to bee deprived of it So Moses praied I beseech thee shew me thy glory for the vision of God is the possession of him and so David My soule thirsteth for God when shall I come and appeare before him And this is the foundation of all sorrow when the soule is dispossessed of that which it loved and wherein it rested And this desire of Possession is so great that Love contenteth it selfe not with the Presence but even then putteth out its endeavours â—…nto a neerer and more reall union as if it would become really One with the thing which it loveth which is seene in embracings kisses in the exiliency and egresse of the spirits in the expansion of the heart in the simplicity and naturâ—…lnesse of all mutuall carriages as if a present friend were not yet present enough Which kind of expressions of love are thus elegantly described by Homer when Eumaeus saw Telemachus safely returned home from Sea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eumaeus all amaz'd sprung to the dore The pots of wine which his hands mixt before Did both fall from them he ranne on to meet And with full wellcomes his young master greet He kist his head hands eyes and his teares kept Time with his kisses as he kist he wept The like elegant description wee have of the love of Penelope when Vlisses after his returne was perfectly knowne unto her 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 She wept and ran straight on her hands she spread And claps'd about his neck and kist his head Love hath in morall and divine things the same effect which fire hath in naturall to congregate homogeneall or things of the same kinde and to separate heterogeneall or things differing as we see in the Love of God the deeper that is the more is the spirituall part of man collected together and raysed from the earth And therefore in heaven where love shall bee perfect all things shall be harmonious and homogeneal not in regard of naturall properties but in a pure and unmixed spiritualnesse of affections in a perfect unity of minds and motions From the union of love proceeds another secret effect namely a resting of the mind in the thing loved In which respect the Philosopher calleth knowledge the rest of the understanding And this can onely be totall and perfect in the Vnion of the Soule with God the chiefest good thereof Whence some have made the threefold Appetite in man Concupiscible Rationall and Irascible to have their finall perfection and quiet by a distinct union to the Three Persons in the Trinity for the Concupiscible power is carried ad bonum to good which they say is the Attribute of the holy Spirit the Rationall adverum to that which is true which is the Attribute of the Sonne and the Irascible ad Ardâ—…um to Power which is the Attribute of the Father But to let that passe for a spiders web curious but thin certaine it is that God onely is that end who can fully accomplish the perfection and terminate the desires of those creatures whom hee made after a peculiar manner to know and enjoy him But proportionably there ariseth from the Vnion unto any other Object of Love a satiating and quieting of the Facultie which in a word is then onely in Objects of inferiour order and goodnesse regular when the Object is naturall and the Action limited Disproportion and Enormitie are the two Corruptions in this particular A third Effect which I shall observe of Love is Stay and immoration of the Mind upon the Object loved and a diverting of it from all others as we observed in Eumaeus when he saw Telemachus he threw away the Businesse which he was about before And the Woman of Samaria being transported with the love of Christ left her Pitcher which she had brought to the Well that she might goe and call others unto his Doctrine And Mary left the thoughts of entertaining Christ at the Table out of an extraordinarie desire to entertaine him in her heart And this effect the Poet hath excellently expressed in Dido who having shewed before a marvellous Princely wisdome and sedulitie in fortifying her new Kingdome and viewing the Workes her selfe as he had before described as soone as she was once transported by the love of Aeneas then all stood still on a sudden Non capta assurgunt turres non arma juventuâ—… Exercet portusvè aut propugnacula bello Tuta parant pendent opera interrupta The Towers long since begun rose up no more And Armes did rust which ere while brave youth wore No Ports no Sconces no defence went on But all their works hung broken and halfe done Thus as Plutarch hath observed the Images of things in the fancies of other men are like words written in water which suddenly vanish but the Impressions which love makes arâ—… as it were written with an hot iron which leaveth fixed and abiding prints in the memory Love and Knowledge have mutuall sharpening and causality each on other for as Knowledge doth generate Love so Love doth
nourish and exercise Knowledge The reason whereof is that unseparable union which is in all things between the Truth and Good of them for it being the property of Truth to unite and apply Goodnesse nothing being apprehended as Good unlesse that Goodnesse be apprehended as true the more Appetite enjoyeth of this the deeper inquiry doth it make and the more compleat union doth it seeke with that the Heart and the Treasure can seldome be severed the Eagles will alwayes resort to the body Davids Love gave length and perpetuity to his meditation even all the day And herein methinkes may consist another proportion betweene the strength of Love and Death for as in Death nature doth collect and draw in those spirits which before lay scattered in the outward parts to guard and arme the heart in its greatest conflict uniting all those languishing forces which are left to testifie the naturall love which each living creature beareth to its owne conservation so doth Love draw and unite those Spirits which administer either to the Fancie or Appetite to serve onely for the nourishing of that Affection and for gazing upon that treasure whereunto the Heart is wholly attracted Which Spirits being of a limited power and influence doe therefore with the same force whereby they carry the mind to the consideration of one thing withdraw it from all other that are heterogeneall no determined power of the Soule being able to impart a sufficient activity unto diverse independing operations when the force of it is exhausted by one so strong and there being a sympathy and as it were a league between the faculties of the Soule all covenanting not to obscure or hinder the Predominant Impressions of one another And therefore as in Rome when a Dictatour was created all other Authority was or that time suspended so when any strong Love hath taken possession of the Soule it gives a Supersedeas and stop unto all other imployments It is therefore prescribed as a Remedy against inordinate Love Pabula Amoris Absterrere sibi atque aliò convertere mentem To draw away the â—…ewell from this fire And turne the minde upon some new desire For Love is Otiosorum Negotium as Diogenes spake the businesse oftentimes of men that want imployments Another effect of Love is Iealousie or Zeale Whereby is not meant that suspicious inquisitive quick-sighted quality of finding out the â—…lemishes and discovering the imperfections of one another for it is the property of true Love â—…o thinke none evill but onely a provident and solicitous feare least some or other evill should either disturbe the peace or violate the purity of what we love like that of Iob towards his sons â—…nd of the Apostle towards his Corinthians I am jealous over you with a godly jealousie So Penâ—… lope in the Poet was jealous of the safety of Vlisses In tâ—… singebam violentos Troas ituros Nomine in Hectoreo pallida semper eram How oft my decre Vlisses did I see In my sad thoughts proud Trojans rush on thee And when great Hectors name but touch'd mine-ears My cheeks drew palenes froÌ„ my paler fears Zeale is a compounded affection or a mixture of Love and Anger so that it ever putteth forth it selfe to remove any thing which is contrary to the thing we love as we see in Christ whose zeale or holy anger whipped away the buyers and sellers out of the Temple In which respect it iâ—… said that the zeale of Gods house did consume him As water when it boyleth from which metaphoâ—… the word zeale is borrowed doth in the boyling consume or as the candle wasteth It selfe with burning In which respect likewise it is said that much water cannot quench Love It is like Lime the more water you cast upon it the hotter it growes And therefore the sinne of Laodieeâ—… which was contrary unto zeale is compared unto lukâ—…warme water which doth not boyle and so cannot worke out the scumme or corruption which is in it And from hence it is that Love makes Weake things strong and turneth Cowardice into Valouâ—… and Meekenesse into Anger and Shame into Boldnesse and will not conceive any thing too hard to undertake The fearefull Heâ—… which hath nothing but flight to defend her selfe from the Dogge or the Serpent will venter with courage against the strongest creatures to defend her little chickens Thus Zeale and Love of God made Moses forget his meekenesse and his Anger was so strong that it brake the Tables oâ—… the Law and made the people drink the Idol which they had made And this is wiâ—…lly expressed by Seneca that Magnus dolor iratus amor est a great griefe is nothing else but Love displeased and made angrie It transporteth Nature beyond its bounds or abilities putteth such a force and vigour into it as that it will adventure on any difficulties as Mary Magdalen would in the strength of her Love undertake to carry away the dead body of Christ as she conceived of him not considering the weight of that or her owne weakenesse It hath a constraining vertue in it and makes a man do that which is beyond his power as the Corinthians when they were poore in estate were yet rich in Liberality It makes a man impatient to be unacquainted with the estate of an absent friend whom wee therefore suspect not sufficiently guarded from danger because destitute of the helpe which our presence might afford him In one word it makes the wounds and staines of the thing loved to redound to the grief and trouble of him that loveth it He that is not jealous for the credit security and honour of what hee pretendeth affection to loves nothing but himselfe in those pretenses Another Effect of Love is Condescension to things below us that wee may please or profit those whom we love It teacheth a man to deny his owne judgement and to doe that which a looker on might happily esteeme Weaknesse oâ—… Indecencie out of a fervent desire to expresse affection to the thing beloved Thus Davids great Love to the Arke of Gods presence did transport him to leaping and dancing and other such familiar expressions of joy for which Michall out of pride despised him in her heart and was contented by that which she esteemed basenesse to honour God herein expressing the love of him unto Mankind who was both his Lord and his Sonne who emptied and humbled and denied himselfe for our sakes not considering his owne worthinesse but our want nor what was honourable for him to doe but what was necessary for us to be done Quicquid Deo indignum mihi expedit what ever was unworthy of him was expedient for us Thus Parents out of Love to their children doe lispe and play and fit their speeches and dalliances to the Age and Infirmities of their children Therefore Themistocles being found playing and riding on a reed with his little boy
other strong sented Herbes because these draw away unto them any fetid or noxious nourishment so the eye and nearenesse of an enemy serveth by exciting Caution and diligence to make a mans life more fruitfull and orderly then otherwise it would have beene that we may take away occasion from them that would speake reproachfully And thus Hector sharpely reproving the Cowardice of his brother Paris who had beene the onely cause of the Warre and calamity when he fled from Menelaus draweth his rebuke from hence and telleth him that he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. To Father City People losse and blame Ioy to his foes and to himselfe a shame Secondly Hatred worketh Confidence and some Presumption and good assurance of our owne or some assisting strength against evils Which ariseth first out of the former for Cauâ—…lousnesse or Furniture against the onset of evil cannot but make the mind more resolute in its owne defence than if it were left naked without Assistance Againe of all others this is one of the most confident Passions because it moves not out of sudden perturbations but is usually seconded and backt with Reason as the Philosopher observes and ever the more Counsell the more Confidence Besides being a deepe and severe Passion it proportionably calleth out the more strength to execute its purposes There is no Passion that intendeth so much evil to another as Hatred An-ger would onely bring Trouble but Hatred Mischiefe Anger would onely Punish and Retaliate but Hatred would Destroy for as the Philosopheâ—… notes it seeketh the not being of what it Hates A man may be Angry with his friend but hee hates none but an enemy and no man can will so much hurt to his friend as to his enemy Now the more hurt a passion doth intend the more strength it must call out to execute that intention and ever the more strength the more Confidence Thirdly it worketh some manner of Victory over the evill hated for Odium semper sequitur 〈◊〉 animi elatione as Scaliger out of Aristotle hath observed It ever ariseth out of pride and height of mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Injury ever comes from some strength and is a kind of Victory For so farre forth as one is able to hurt another he is above him And this effect holds principally true in morall and practick courses wherein I think it is a generall Rule Hee in some measure loves an evill who is overcome by it for conquest in this nature is on the Will which never chooseth an object till it love it There onely we can have perfect conquest of sinne where will be a perfect hatred of it Here in the best there is but an incompleat restauration of Gods Image the body of nature and the body of finne are borne and must die together Fourthly it hath a good effect in regard of the evill hated in reasonable Creatures namely the Reformation of the person in whom that evill was For as countenance and incouragement is the fosterer so Hatred and contempt serveth sometimes as Phisick to purge out an evill And the reason is because a great part of that goodnesse which is apprehended to be in sinne by those that pursue it is other mens approbation Opinion puts valew upon many uncurrent Coynes which passe rather because they are receiued than because they are warrantable And therefore if a man naturally desirous of credit see his courses generally disliked he can hardly so unnature himselfe as still to to feed on those vanities which hee seeth doe prouoke others unto loathing though I confesse it is not a perswasions of mens but of Gods hatred of sinne which doth worke a genuine and thorow Resormation I now proceed to observe those Effects which are corrupt and hurtfull and here wee may observe First the rule of Aristotle whose maxime it is that Hatred is alwaies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against the whole kinde of its object so then all the actions and effects of this Passion are corrupt which are not Generall but admit of private Reservations and Indulgences For since tho nature and extent of the passion is ever considered with reference to its object there must needs bee irregularity in that affection when it is conversant about an uniforme nature with a various and differing motion And this is manifestly true in that which I made the principall object of a right hatred Sin In which though there is no man which finds not himselfe more obnoxious and open to one kind than another it being the long experienced policie of the Devill to observe the diverse conditions of mens natures constitutions callings and imployments and from them to proportion the quality of his insinuations upon the will insomuch that a man may here in happily deceive himselfe with an opinion of loathing some evils with which either his other occasions suffer him not to take acquaintance or the difficulty in compassing disgrace in practising or other prejudices perswade to a casuall dislike thereof yet I say it is certaine that if a mans Hatred of Sinne be not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Vniversall and transcendent Hatred against all sinne even those which his personall relations make more proper unto him if hee doth still retaine some privy exceptions some reserved and covered delights be his pretences to others or his perswasions to himselfe what they will this is rather a personated than a true hatred a meteor of the braine than an affection of the Soule For as in the good so in the ill of things notwithstanding there seeme to be many contrarieties and dissimilitudes as Seneca saith Scelera dissident that sinnes do disagree yet indeed there is in that very contrariety such an agreement against God as in Herod and Pilate against Christ as admits not of any in order unto God but a gathered and united passion And hence is that of Saint Iames Hee that offendeth in one is guilty of all because in that one hee contemneth that Originall Authority which forbad all There are no tearmes of consistence betweene love and hatred divided upon the same uniforme Object It is not the materiall and blind performance of some good worke or a servile and constrained obedience to the more bright and convicting parts of the Law that can any more argue either our true love to the Precept or our hatred to the Sinne than a voluntary patience under the hand of a Chirurgion can prove either that we delight in our owne paine oâ—… Abhorre our owne flesh It is not Gods Witnesse within us but his Word without us not the Tyrannie of Conscience but the goodnesse of the Law that doth kindly and genuinely restraine the violence and stop the Eruptions of our defiled nature Or though perhaps Feare may prevent the exercise and sproutings nothing but Love can pluck up the root of sinne A Lacedemonian endeavouring to make a dead carcasse stand upright as formerly it had done
debate One Towne did worship what the next did hate Another dangerous effect of Hatred is Envy and Malignitie at the sight of anothers happines and therefore Envy is called an Evill Eye because all the diseases of the Eye make it offended with any thing that is light and shineth as Vermine doe ever devoure the purest Corne and Moaths eat into the finest Cloath and the Cantharides blast the sweetest Floures So doth Envy ever gnaw that which is most beautifull in another whom it hateth and as the Vulture draweth sicknesse from a perfume For such is the condition of a rankorous Nature as of a raw and angry wound which feeles as great paine in the good of a Chirurgions as in the ill offices of an Enemies hand it can equally draw nourishment unto this Passion from the good and ill of whom it hates yea and commonly greater too from the good than from the ill For Odiorum 〈◊〉 causa quandâ—… iniquae When Hatred is built upon a bad foundation it commonly raiseth it self the higher And the reason is because in Passions of this Nature the lesse we have from the Object the more we have from our selves and what is defective to make up our malice in the demerit of him whom wee hate is supplyed by the rising of our owne stomacke as we see in the body that thin and empty nourishment will more often swell it than that which is substantiall And therefore I thinke there are not any Examples of more implacable Hatred than those that are by Envy grounded on Merit As Tacitus observes between the passages of Domitian and Agricola that nothing did so much strengthen the Emperours hatred against that worthy Man as the generall report of his honourable behaviour and actions in those military services wherein hee had been imployed And the same likewise he intimates in the affections of Tiberius and Piso towards Germanicus It is wisely therefore observed by the Historian That men of vast and various imployments have usually the unhappinesse of Envy attending them which therefore they have sometimes declined by retyring and withdrawing themselves from continuall addresses as a wise mariner who as he spake doth aliquantulum remittere Clavum 〈◊〉 magnam fluctus vim And thus we finde the honour which Davids merits procured him which was the foundation of that implacable Hatred of Saul towards him For as in naturall motions that which comes from the faithest extreme is most swift and violentiso in the motions of the Minde the further off wee fetch the reason of our Hatred the more venomous and implacable it is And here we may observe the mutuall and interchangable services which corrupt affections exercise amongst themselves For as Philosophy observes in the generation of those cold Meteors which are drawne to the middle region of the Aire they are first by the coldnesse of the place congealed and afterward doe by the like impressions fortify and intend the same quality in the Region so here Hatred first generates Envy and this againe doth reciprocally increase Hatred and both ioyne in mischiefe So much the more hurtfull to the Soule wherein they are than to the Enemy whom they respect by how much they are more neer and inward thereunto for certainly a malignant humour doth most hurt where it harboureth From this followeth another evill Effect which I will but name being of the same Nature with Envy and it is that which Philosophers call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a rejoycing at the calamity of him whom wee hate a quality like that of those who are reported to have been nourished with poyson For as in Love there is a mutuall partaking of the same loyes and Sorrowes for where the will and affections are one the senses are in some sort likewise so Hatred ever worketh contrarietie of affections That which worketh Griefe unto the one doth worke Ioy unto the other And therefore Thales being asked how a Man might bee cheerfull and beare up in afflictions answered If hee can see his enemies in worse case than himselfe The Poet hath given us the Character of such kinde of Men Pectora selle virent Lingua est suffâ—…sa veâ—…eno Risus abest nisi quem visi fecere Dolâ—…res Their breasts with gall their tongues with venome flow They laugh not till they see men brought to woe And therefore they are elegantly compared by the Philosopher unto Cupping Glasses which draw onely the vitious humours of the body unto them and unto Flies that are overcome with the spirits of Wine but nourished with the froth Like those Wormes which receive their Life from the corruption of the Dead And surely the Prince of Devils may well have his Name given him from Flies because hee taketh most pleasure in the ulcers and wounds of Men as Flies ever resort unto Sores Another corrupt Effect of Hatred is a sinister and crooked suspition whereby with an envious and criticall Eye we search into the actions and purposes of another and according as is the sharpnesse of our owne wits or the course of our owne behaviour and practices we attribute unto them such ends as were haply never framed but in the forge of our owne braines Evill men being herein like Vultures which can receive none but a foule Sent. It is attributed amongst one of the noble Attributes of Love that it Thinketh none Evill and certainly there is not a fouler quality against Brotherly Love than that which for the satisfying of it selfe in but the Imaginary Evill of him whom it disliketh will venture to finde out in every action some close impiety and pierce into the reserved and hidden passages of the heart like him in the Philosopher who thought where ever hee went that hee saw his owne Picture walke before him And there fore we see how Agrippina when she would not discover any shew of Feare or Hatred towards her Sonne Nerâ—… who had at the first plotted her death on the Sea and that fayling sent the second time Anicaetus the Centurion to make sure worke did in both these practices decline all shew of suspition and not acknowledge either the Engine or the Murther to be directed by him Solum Insidiarâ—…m remedium aspiciens si non intelligerentur Supposing the onely remedies of these plots to bee if shee seemed not to understand them For ill meanings doe not love to be found out As the same Historian telleth us of Tiberius Acrius accepit recludi quae premeret Hee hated that man who would venture to dive into his thoughts And certainly there is not any crooked Suspition which is not rooted in Hatred For as to thinke the worst of our owne Actions is a signe of Hatred to our sinnes for I thinke no man loves his sinnes who dares search them so contrâ—…riwise to have an humour of casting the worst glosses upon the Actions of another Man where there is not palpable dissimulation argues as great a want of
it For our flesh is to be subdued to reason not to infirmities that it may be a servant to the Soule but not a burden But if we let Wine bee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Heathen called it to take a freedome against us like Cham to mocke us and discover our nakednesse and make us servants unto it If we doe not only eate Hony but surfet on it If wee must have meat like Israel in the Wildernesse not only for our Need but for our Lust If we eat and drinke so long that we are good for nothing but either to lye downe and sleep or to rise up and play to live to day and to dye tomorrow If we make our belly the grave of our Soule and the dungeon of our Reason and let our Intestina as well morally as naturally farre exceed the length of the whole Man besides This is in the Apostles phrase to be lovers of pleasure rather then lovers of God and it is an intemperate excesse against natural desires which will ever end in pain It was a witty speech of Aâ—…acharsis the Philosopher that the Vine beareth three sorts of Grapes The first of Delight The second of Excesse The third of Sorrow If wee let our Delight steale us into Excesse and become a mocker our Excesse will quickly betray us unto Sorrow as Dalilah did Sampson to the Philistins and let us know that after Wine hath mocked it can rage too Like the head of the Polypus which is sweet to the Palate but after causeth troublesome sleeps and frightfull dreames Secondly there are brutish and unnaturall Desires which the Philosopher calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ferine and inhumane instancing in those barbarous Countries where they use to eat mens flesh and raw meat and in the Woman who â—…ipped up Women with childe that shee might eat their young ones Vnto which head I refer those which the Apostle cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vile and dishonorable Affections and Passions of Lust wherein forsaking the guidance of Nature they dishonored their bodies amongst themselves and gave themselves over as S. Iude speaketh unto strange flesh also incestuous and promiscuous Lusts going with naked and painted Bodies as the antient Britâ—…aines offering of men and children in sacrifices eating of the bodies of Friends that dyed burning of the living with the dead and other like savage and barbarous practices wherein wee finde how farre naturall corruption improved with ignorance and want of Education or Religion can imbrace the Manners of Men. Lastly there are morbid Desires growing out of some distemper of Mind or Body called by the Philosopher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as those of children which eate coâ—…les or dirt and the strange and depraved longings of women with child called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Piâ—…a from the Bird of that name because the inconstant and various appetences of nature so misguided by vitious humours is well resembled by the strange mixture of white and black feathers in that Bird. Having considered the severall kinds both of Regular and corrupt Desires I shall content my selfe with a very briefe inquiry into the causes and effects of this Passion The causes moving it are Externall ex parte objecti in the object or â—…ternall ex parte subjecti in the minde The Object is any thing apprehended sub ratione Boni Iucundi as good and pleasant For upon those inducements did Satan first stirre the desire of Eve towards the forbidden fruit She saw that it was good for food and pleasant to the eye Now the Qualification of these to distinguish the formall reason of their being objects to our desires from that wherein they are Objects of our love is first that they bee Possible For Desire being the motion and indeavour of the Soule towards that good which it loveth and wherein it seeketh to delight take away the possibility of such delight and this would bee motus in Vacâ—… like that of Noahs Dove that found no place for her feet to rest on Hope is the whetstone and wheele of industry if that saile how ever a man may waste and pine away his thoughts in empty Velleities and imaginary wishes he caâ—… ever put forth nor addresse his endeavours towards an impossible good Though an old man may wish himselfe young againe yet no man was ever so besotted as to endeavour it And this distinction betweene vanishing wishes and serious desires is of great consequence to be attended in all thâ—… motions of the Soule morall or sacred in as much as those Desires onely which are Active and Industrious purposely addressing themselves to the prosecution of that which they apprehend as acquirable doe commend the Soule from whence they issue for vertuous and pious Secondly the object of the Desires quatale is apprehended as Absent and distant in as much as presence worketh delight rather than desire The things we have we enjoy wee doe not covet wee rest in them we doe not move towards them Yet not alwaies Absent quoad tâ—…m but quoad gradus not in the whole but in the parts and degrees of it for the presence of a good thing doth in some sort quicken the Desires towards the same thing so farre forth as it is capable of improvement and augmentation As we see in externall riches of the body none desire them more eagerly than those that possesse them and the more vertuous the Soule of man is the more is the heart enlarged in the Appetition of a greater measure as the putting in of some water into a Pump doth draw forth more No man is so importunate in praying Lord help mine unbeliefe as hee that can say Lord I beleeve Thus even present things may be desired in order to improvement and further degrees of them as many times a man hath a better stomacke to his meat after he hath begun to eat than when he first sate downe unto it Againe things present may be the Object of our Desires unto continuance as hee that delighteth in a good which he hath desireth the continuance of that Delight And therefore Life even while it is possessed it is desired because the possession of it doth not cause the Appetite to nauseate or surfet upon it Few men there are who desire not old Age not as it is old Age and importeth decay decrepidnesse and defects of Nature For a young man doth not desire to bee old now but as it implyeth the longer and fuller possession of Life For a man being conscious to himselfe first of his owne insufficiency to make himselfe happy from and within himselfe and next of the immortality of his Nature as upon the former reason he is busied in sending abroad his Desires as the Purveyors and Caterers of the Soule to bring in such things as may promote perfection so those very Desires having succeeded doe farther endeavour the satisfaction of
your melancholy searchers after the Philosophes Stone that never dote so much upon their project as then when it hath deluded them and never flatter themselves with stronger hopes to be enriched by their Art then when it hath brought them unto beggary Lastly from hence it comes to passe that these kindes of Desires are Base and diject the minde unto â—…ordid and ignoble Resolutions For 〈◊〉 nihil satis nihil â—…urpe He that hath never enough will count nothing base whereby he may geâ—… more As the Historian saith of Otho that he diâ—… Adorare vulgus jacere oscula omnia serviliter 〈◊〉 Imperio Adore the people dispence and scatteâ—… abroad his curtesies crouch unto any servilâ—… expressions to advance his Ambitious designes Like Antaus in the Poets fall to the earth 〈◊〉 hee may grow the stronger by it As 〈◊〉 and Pisistratus who wounded mangled deformed themselves that they might thereby insinuate and gaine their ends As the Scripture noteth of Absolom and the Historian of Iulian that out of affectation of popularity they stouped and delighted to converse with the lowest of the people Which cunning humility or rather sordidnesse of Ambition Meâ—…elous in the Tragedian hath thus elegantly objected in a contentious debate unto Agameâ—…non 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 You know how you the Rule o're Grecians got In shew declining what in truth you soughâ—… How low how plausible you apprehended The hands of meanest men How then you bended To all you met How your gates open flew And spake large welcome to the pop'lar Crew What sweetned words you gave even unto those Who did decline and hate to see you gloze Hoâ—… thus with Serpentine and guilefull Arts You screw'd and wound your selfe into the hearts O'th'vulgar And thus bought the power which now Makes you forget how then you us'd to bow CHAP. XVIII Rules touching our Desires Desires of lower Objects must not be either hastie or unbounded such are unnaturall turbid unfruitfull unthankfull Desires of heavenly Objects fixed permanent industrious Connexion of vertues sluggish Desires VNto the things already delivered touching this affection I shall here add two or three Rules pertaining to the morall use and managing of it And they are First concerning Objects of an Inferiour and Transitory nature that our Desires be neither Hastie and precipitate nor Vaste and unlimited And in matters more High and Noble that they be not either wavering and interrupted Desires or Lazie and negligent Desires 1 For the first of these we have a rule in Solomon concerning Riches which will hold in all other Objects of an immoderate desire He that maketh haste to be rich shall not be without sinne I may add Not without cares neither for we know the nature of all Earthly things they have something of the Serpent in them to Deceive The way of riches and profit is a thorny way the way of Honour and Ambition a slippery and giddy way the way of carnall Pleasures a deep and a fowle way the way of learning it selfe the noblest of all sublunary things an involved and intricate way And certainely he had need have better eyes then a blinde Passion who in so ill ground will make good haste and good speed together In labyrintho properantes ipsa velocitas implicat He is the likeliest man to get first out of a Maze who runnes fastest An over nimble Desire is like the stomacke of a sicke man newly recovered more greedy then strong and fuller of Appetitâ—… then Digestion Whence arise immature and unconcocted counsels blinde and ungoverned Resolutions like those monstrous people which Plinie speakes of whose feet goe backeward and behinde their eyes For when the minde of man is once possessed with conceit of Contentment to be found in worldly glories when the insinuations and sweet inchantments of Honour Profit Pleasure Power and Satans Hac omnia hath once crept upon the affection and lulled reason asleep it is then sufficient that we know the end which we desire we have not the patience to inquire after the right way unto it because it is the suspition of our greedy Desires that the true means are commonly the most tedious and that honesty for the most part goes the faâ—…thest way about And hence withall it usually commeth to passe that these hasty and preproperous Appetitions do hinder ends and intercept Advantages which slownesse with maturity might have made use of As the Romane Souldiers by their greedinesse on their prey missed of taking Mithridates who otherwise could not have escaped them And therefore it was wise counsell of Nestâ—…r in the Poet. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let none goe lingring after spoyle and stay To load himselfe with a too hasty prey But first let 's kill W' are sure after such fight Carcasses being risled cannot bite 2 The next Rule to keepe this Passion in order with reference unto inferiour Objects is that it be not an infinite and unlimited Desire Appetite should answere our power to procure and our strength to beare and to digest Wee should not goe about to swallow a Camell when a Gâ—…at doth make us straine Immoderate Desires can neither be satisfied nor concocted And this unboundednesse of Desires we are to take heed off for these reasons 1 First for the unnaturalnesse of it for all unnaturall and unnecessary Desires are infinite as the Philosopher hath observed As he that is out of his way may wander infinitely An unlimited Desire is onely there requisite where the Object thereof is Infinite and ordained to perfect Mans Nature but not where it is onely a means appointed for his benefit and comfort Wherein he ought therefore then to enjoy his Contentment when it is sufficient not to fill his Minde which is immortall and therefore not able to bee replenished with any perishing happinesse nor to outreach the vastnesse of his opinion which which being Erronious is likewise Infinite For Omnis Error immensus as Seneca speaks but then only when it affords such conveniences as wherewithall the seasonable and vertuous imploiments of Nature may with content be exercised It is then a corrupt Desire which proceeds not from our Want but from our Vice As that is not a naturall thirst but a disease and distemper of the Body which can never be satisfied Now the miseries of unnaturall Desires are first that they corrupt and expell those which are Naturall as multitudes of strangers in a City doe eat out the Natives thus in luxurious Men strange Love doth extinguish that which is Conjugall Secondly they ever bring vexation to the minde with them As immoderate laughter so immoderate Lusts are never without paine and convulsions of Nature Morbid desires of the Mind are
crying to Hercules when his Wuine fluck in the mud to helpe it out without stretching out his owne hands to touch it are first unnaturall desires it being the formall property of this Passion to put the Soule upon some motion or other And therefore wee see wheresoever Nature hath given it she hath given likewise some manner of motion or other to serve it And secondly they are by consequence undutifull and disobedient Desires in that they submit not themselves unto that Law which requireth that wee manifest the life and strength of our Love by the quicknesse and operation of it in our Desires And lastly such Desires are unusefull and fruitlesse for how can an object which standeth in a fixed distance from the Nature which it should perfect be procured by idle and standing affections The desires of the sluggard saith Salomon slay him because his hands refuse to labour These affections must have life in them which bring life after them Dead desires are deadly desires CHAP. XIX Of the Affection of â—…y Delight The severall Objects thereof Corporall Morall Intellectuall Divine THe next Passions in order belonging to the Concupiscible Faculty are those two which are wrought by the Presence of and Vnion to an Object and that is when either wee by our desires have reached the Object which worketh Ioy and Delight or when in our flight the Object hath overtaken us which worketh Griefe and Sorrow And these two do beare the most inward relation unto and influence upon all our actions Whereupon Aristotle in his Ethicks hath made them the foundation of our vertues and rules of our working And the reason is naturall because the end of our motion is to attaine rest and avoid perturbation Now Delight is nothing else but the Sabbath of our thoughts and that sweet tranquility of mind which we receive from the Presence and Fruition of that good wherunto our Desires have carried us And therefore the Philosopher in one place call it a motion of the Soule with a sensible and felt instauration of Nature yet elsewhere hee as truly telleth us that it standeth rather in rest than motion as on the other side Griefe is the streightning and anguish of our minds wrought out of the sense and burden of some present Evill oppressing our Nature Now these Passions are diverse according to the diversity of the Objects which are either Sensitive and Bodily and then Delight is called Voluptas Pleasure being a medicine and supply against bodily indigence and defects or Intellectuall and Divine and then it is called Gaudium Ioy being a sweet and delightfull tranquillity of minde resting in the fruition and possession of a good So also is the other Passion of Sadnesse considered which in respect of the Body is called a Sense of Paine in respect of the Soule a Sense of Griefe First then for the Object of our Delight it is onely that which can yeeld some manner of satisfaction unto our nature not as it is a corrupt and erring but as it is an Empty and perfectible nature Whatsoever then is either Medicinall for the Repairing or Naturall for the Conserving or any way helpefull for the advancing of a Creature is the onely true and allowable object of its Delight Other pleasures which eat out and undermine Nature as water which by little little insensibly consumeth the bank against which it beateth or as â—…vie which seemeth to adorn the Tree unto which it cleaveth but indeed sucketh out and stealeth away the sap therof may haply yield some measure of vanishing content to mindes which tast every thing with a corrupted palate but certainely such sophisticall premises can never inferre in the conclusion any other than a perfunctory and tottering content And therefore Seneca is bold to find an impropriety in Virgils Epithite Mala Gaudia Ioyes which issue from a polluted fountaine as not having in them that inseparable attribute of absolute Delight which is to be unvariable For how can a mind unlesse blinded with its owne impostures and intangled in the errours of a mis led affection receive any nourishing and solid content in that which is in it selfe vanishing and unto its Subject destructive Whatsoever then may bee delighted in must have some one of the forenamed conditions tending either to the Restitution of decayed nature to the preservation of entire nature or to the Perfection of Empty nature And to the former and â—…mperfecter sort of tâ—…ese Aristotle referreth all â—…orporeall and sensitive Pleasures unto which he â—…herefore granteth a secondary and accidentall goodnesse which hee calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Mediâ—…ines of an indigent nature whereby the defects â—…hereof are made up and it selfe disburdened of â—…hose cares which for the most part use to follow â—…he want of them Herein then I observe a double corruption an â—…nnaturall and unlimited Delight Vnnaturall I â—…eane those accursed pleasures which were exerâ—…ised by men given over to vile affections and 〈◊〉 in the pursuing of lusts whose very names abhorre the light Vnlimited Delights are those which exceed the bounds of Nature and the prime Institution of lawfull and indifferent things For such is the condition of those that if they repaire not and strengthen nature they weaken and disinable it as in the body Luxury breeds diseases and in the mind Curiosity breeds Errours Other Objects there are of a wider nature than those which concerne the Body and they are both the Morall and Contemplative Actions of the Mind To both which Aristotle hath attributed principally this passion but more specially to the latter whose object is more pure and whose Acts lesse laborious as residing in that part of the Soule which is most elevate from sense and therefore most of all capable of the purest simplest and unmixed Delights Now every thing is the more free cleare independant spirituall by how much it is the more unmixed And these are the choisest perfections whereby the Soule may be filled with joy It is true indeed that oftentimes the contemplations of the mind have annexed unto them both Griefe and Anxiety but this is never naturall to the act of Knowledg which is alwaies in its owne vertue an impression of Pleasure But it ariseth either out of the sublimity of the Object which dazleth the power or out of the weaknesse and doubtings of the Vnderstanding which hath not a cleare light thereof or out of the admixtion and sleeping them in the Humours of the Affections whereby men minister unto themselves desperate thoughts or weake feares or guilty griefes or unlimited Desires according as is the property of the Object joyned with their own private distempers Thus we see the Intuition of Divine Truth in minds of defiled affections worketh not that sweet effect which is naturall unto it to produce but Doubtings Terrours and Disquietings of Conscience it being the propertie of the workes of Darknesse to be afraid of the
before they have at all tasted any of it so the long gazing upon that which we Desire by Expectation doth as it were deflowre the Delight of it before fruition Whereas on the other side as the Poet expresseth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 No joy in greatnesse can compare with that Which doth our Hopes and thoughts anticipate So strong and violent hath been the immutation which sudden joy hath wrought in the Body that many as I have formerly noted have beene quite overwhelmed by it and beene made pertakers of Augustus his wish to enjoy an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to dye pleasantly And for this Reason it is that new things and such as we admire and were not before acquainted withall doe usually Delight us because they surprize us representing a kinde of strangenesse unto the minde whereby it is enlarged and enriched For strange and New things have ever the greatest price set upon them As I noted before of the Romane Luxury That it gloryed in no Delicates but those which were brought out of strange Countries and did first pose Nature before either feed or adorne it 2 Strength of Desire doth on the other side enlarge the pleasure of fruition because Nature ever delighteth most in those things which cost us dearest and strong desires are ever painfull When Darius in his flight drank muddy water Ptolomie did eate dry bread they both professed that they never felt greater pleasure strength of Appetite marveilously encreasing the Delight in that which satisfied it For want and Difficulty are great Preparations to a more feeling fruition as Bees gather excellent Honey out of the bitterest Herbes And as we say Nulla sunt firmiora quà m quae ex dubijs facta sunt certa Those evidences are surest which were made cleare out of doubtfull So those pleasures are sweetest Quâ—…suaves fiunt ex tristibus which have had wants and feares and Difficulties to provide a welcome for them And therefore Wrestlers and Fencers and such like Masters of Game were wont to use their hands unto heavie weights that when in their Games they were to use them empty and naked they might doe it with the more expeditenesse and pleasure 3 Imagination and fancy either in our selves or other Men is many times the foundation of Delight Diogines his sullen and Melancholly fancy tooke as much pleasure in his Tubbe and Staffe and water as other men in their Palaces and ampliest provisions And he in the Poet. Qui se credebat miros aâ—…dire Tragados In vacuo latus sessor Plausorquè Theatrâ—… Cum redit adsese pol. me occidist is Amici Non servastis ait cui sic extorta voluptas Et demptus per vim mentis gratissimus error Who thought he heard rare Tragedies of wit And in an empty Theater did sit And give Applauses but being heal'd complains Friends I 'm not sav'd by this your love but slain Robb'd of that sweet Delight I then did finde In the so gratefull errour of my Minde Hence likewise it is that Men are delighted with Mythologies and Poâ—…icall Fables with Elegancies Iests Vrbanity and Flowers of wit with Pageants pompes Triumphes and publick Celebrities because all these and other the like are either the fruit or food of the Imagination 4 Vpon the same Reason we are marveilously Delighted with lively Imitation as with those Arts which doe curiously expresse the workes and lineaments of Nature Insomuch that the similitudes of those things doe wonderfully content us whose naturall Deformities we abhorre We are well pleas'd with Homers Description of Thirsites and with Sophocles his expression of the Vlcer of Philoctetes with Parmeno his Imitation of the grunting of a Hog and Theodorâ—…u his of the ratling of wheeles with Plautus his discription of a chargeable Wise and Horace his of a garrulous companion though the things themselves we should willingly decline 5 Those things Delight every man which are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Philosopher speakes Sutable fitted and accommodated to his Genius and frame of Nature as in the same Plant the Bee seedeth on the flower the Bird on the Seed the Sheepe on the Blade the Swine on the Roote So in the same Author one man observeth the Rationall another the Historicall a third the Elegant and more Rhetoricall passages with speciall Delight according as they are best accommodated unto the Complexion of each Minde And I finde it observed out of Hipocrates that even in the Body many times that kinde of meat which Nature receiveth with Complacency and with a more particular Delight though in it selfe it may be â—…orse yet proveth better nourishment unto that Body than such as though better in it selfe findeth yet a reluctancy and backwardnesse of Nature to close or correspond with it The same seeds are not proper for the sand and for the clay nor the same imploiments of Minde for Men of various and different Constitutions Nor is there I beleeve any thing which would more conduce to the generall advancement of Arts and Learning than if every Mans Abilities were fixed and limited to that proper course which his naturall sufficiences did more particularly lead him unto For hereupon would grow a double Delight and by consequence improvement for every thing growes most when it is best pleased The one from Nature the other from Custome and acquaintance which conquereth and digesteth the difficulties of every thing we set about and maketh them yet more naturall unto us And therefore the Philosopher reckoning up many things that are pleasant to the minde putteth these two in the first place Those things that are Naturall and those that we are accustomed unto wherein there is least violence offered unto the inclinations and impressions of Nature Touching the Effects of this Passion I shall name but these few First the effects of Corporall Delights are only as I observed oâ—…t of Aristotle medicinall for repayring the breaches and ruines of our decayed Natures for animating and refreshing our languishing spirits for preserving our selves in a good ability to execute Offices of a higher Nature for furnishing the World with a succession of men which otherwise the greedines of mortality would in short time devoure These are true and intended ends of those Delights and when they once transgresse these bounds they begin to oppresse Nature weaken and distempeâ—… the Body clog the mind and fill the whole man with satiety and loathing which is the reason as was even now noted why men too violently carried away with them are presently overâ—…loyed with one kind and must have variety to keep out loathing which Tacitus observes in that monster of women Messalina facilitate adulterorum in fastidiuâ—… versa ad incognit as libidinâ—…s prâ—…stuebat that loathing more easy and common sinnes shee betooke hâ—… selfe to unnaturall lusts and I verily think is particularly intended by S. Paul
Rom. 1. 26. A second effect of Ioy is Opening and Dilâ—…tion of the heart and countenance expressing the serenity of the mind whence it hath the name 〈◊〉 Latitia as it were a broad and spreading Passioâ—… Now the reason of this motion occasioned 〈◊〉 Ioy is the naturall desire which man hath to 〈◊〉 united to the thing wherein he delights to make way and passage for its entrance into him And hence wee find in this Passion an exultation and egresse of the spirits discovering a kind of loosenesse of Nature in her security doing many things not out of resolution but instinct and power transporting both mind and body to sudden and unpremeditated expressions of its owne content For of all Passions Ioy can be the least dissembled or suppressed nam gaâ—…dio Cogendi vis inest saith Pliny it exerciseth a kind of welcome violence and tyranny upon a man as we see in Davids dancing before the Arke and the lame Mans walking and leaping and praising God after hee had been cured of his lamenesse And this diffusion of the spirits sheweth both the haste and forwardnesse of Nature in striving as it were to meet her Object and make large roome for its entertainment as also to dispell and scatter all adverse humours that would hinder the ingresse of it and lastly to send forth newes as it were through the whole province of nature that all the parts might beare a share in the common Comfort Thirdly those noble Delights which arise from heavenly causes doe withall cause a sweet thirst and longing in the Soule after more as some colours do both delight the sight and strengthen it For while God is the Object there cannot bee either the satiety to cloy the Soul nor such a full comprehension as will leave no roome for more Thus they who delight in the fruition of God by Grace doe desire a more plentifull fruition of him in glory and they that delight in the sight of Gods Glory doe still desire to be forever so delighted So that their Desire is without Anxiety because they are sâ—…tiated with the thing which they doâ—… desire â—… and their 〈◊〉 is without loâ—… thing because still they desire the thing wherwith they are sâ—…tiated they desire without Griefe because they are replenished and they are replenished without wearinesse because they desire still they see God and still they desire to see him they enjoy God and still they desire for ever to enjoy him they love and prayse God and make it their immortall businesse still to love and prayse him Et quem semper habent semper haberevolunt Whom they for ever have with love yet higher To have for ever they do still desire Divine Ioy is like the water of Aesculapius his Well which they say is notcapable of putâ—…ifaction Fourthly Delight whettoth and intendeth the actions of the Soule towards the thing wherein it delighteth it putteth forth more force and more exactnesse in the doing of them because it 〈◊〉 the mind of all those dulling Indispositionâ—… which unfitted it for Action And for this reason hâ—…ppily it iâ—… that the 〈◊〉 used Musicke in their Warres to refresh and delight Nature For Ioy is in stead of recreation to the Soule it wonderfully disposeth for busines And those Actions which Nature hath made neâ—… it hath put pleasure in them that thereby Men might be quickned â—…nd excited unto them and therefore Wisemen have told us that pleasure is Sal 〈◊〉 vitâ—… The Sawce which seasoneth the Actions of men Lastly because the Nature of man is usually more acquainted with sorrowes then with pleasures therefore whither out of Conscience of guilt which deserves no joy or out of experience which useth to finde but little joy in the world or out of feare of our owne aptnesse to mistake or out of a provident care not to close or feed upon a Delight till we are fully assured of our Possession of it and because usually the Minde after shaking is more setled whether for these or any other reasons we see it usually come to passe that vehement joy doth breed a kinde of jealousie and unbeliefe that sure â—…he thing we have is too good to be true 〈◊〉 and that then when our eyes tell us that they see it they doe but 〈◊〉 and deceive us as Quod nimiâ—… volumuâ—…â—…aud facile credimus The things which we desire should be We scarse beleeve when we doe see So Iâ—…cob when he heard that his sonne Ioseph was alive fainted being astonished at so good newes and could not beleeve it And when God restored the Iewes out of captivity they could thinke no otherwise of it then aâ—… a dreame And Peter when he was by the Angel delivered out of prison tooke it for a vision only and an apparition and not for a truth And lastly of the Disciples after Christs resurrection when he manifested himselfe to them it is said That for very joy they beleeved not their feares keeping backe as it were and questioning the truth of their joyes Omnia tuta timens not suffering them too hastily to beleeve what their eies did see As in the Sea when a storme is over there remaines still an inward working and volutation which the Poet thus expresseth Vt si quando ruit debell at asque reliquit Eurus aquas pax ipsa tumet pontumque jacentem Exanimis jam voluit hyemâ—… As when a mighty tempest doth now cease To tosse the roaring Billowes even that peace Doth swell and murmurre and the dying Wind On the calm'd Sea leaves his owne prints behind Even so in the Minde of man when it's feares are blowne over and there is a calme upon it there is still á motus trepidationis and a kinde of sollicitous jealousie of what it enjoyes And this unbeleefe of joy is admirably sâ—…t forth in the Carriages of Penelope when her Nurse and her sonne endevoured to assure her of the truth of Vlysses his returne after so many yeares absence by the Poet in which doubting she stil persisted till by certaine signes Vlysses himselfe made it appeare unto her whereupon she exâ—…used it after this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My deare Vlysses let it not offend That when I saw you first I did suspend My love with my beliefe since my faint brest When first with those glad tidings it was blest Trembled with doubts lest by such forged lies Some crafty false pretender might devise To have ensnaâ—…'d me and with these false sounds Defiel'd my love and multiplied my wounds CHAP. XXII Of the Affection of Sorrow the Object of it evill sensitive Intellectuall as present in it sâ—…lfe or to the mind by memory or suspition particular causes effects of it Feare Care Experience Erudition Irresolution Despaire Execration Distempers of Body THe opposite Passion to this of Delight is Griefe and Sorrow which is nothing but a perturbation and nnquietnesse wrought by the prâ—…ssure of some
present â—…vill which the mind in vaine strugleth with as finding it selfe alone too impotent for the conflict Evill I say either formally as in sinne or paine present or feared or privatively such as is any good thing which we have lost or whereof we doe despaire or have beene disappointed And this is in respect of its object as the former Passion either Sensitive or Intellectuall Sensitive is that anguish and distresse of Nature which lyetâ—… upon the body A Passion in this sense little conducing to the advancement of Nature being allwaies joyned with some measure of its decay but onely as it serves sometimes for the better fortifying it against the same or greater evils it being the condition as of corporeall delights by custome to grow burdensome and distastefull so of paines to become easie and familiar The other and greater Griefe is Intellectuall which in Solomâ—…us phraise is A wounded spirit so much certainely the more quicke and piercing by how much a spirit is more vitall then a body besides the anguish of the soule findes alwayes or workes the same sympathy in the body but outward sorrowes reach not ever so farre as the spirituall and higher part of the soule And therefore we see many men out of a mistake that the distresse of their soules hath beene wrought by a union to their bodies have voluntarily spoiled this to deliver and quiet that The causes of this Passion are as in the former whatsoever hath in it power to disturbe the mind by it's union thereunto There are then two Conditions in respect of the Object that it be Evill and Present Evill first and that not onely formally in it selfe but apprehensively to the understanding And therefore wee see that many things which are in their Nature Evill yet out of the particular distemper of the Mind and deceitfulnesse in them may prove pleasant thereunto And this is the chiefe Corruption of this Passion I meane the misplacing or the undue suspending of it For although strictly in its owne property it be not an advancement of Nature nor addes any perfection but rather weakens it yet in regard of the reference which it beares either to a superior Law as testifying our Love unto the Obedience by our griefe for the breach thereof or to our consequent Carriage and Actions as governing them with greater Wisedome and Providence it may bee said to adde much perfection to the mind of man because it serves as an inducement to more cautelous living The next Condition in respect of the Object is that it be Present which may fall out either by Memory and then our Griefe is called Repentance or Fancy and Suspition and so it may be called Anxâ—… of Mind or by Sense and present union which is the principall kind and so I call it Anguish For the first nothing can properly and truly worke Griefe by ministry of Memory when the Object or Evill is long since past but those things which doe withall staine our Nature and worke impressions of permanent deformity For as it falleth out that many things in their exercise pleasant prove after in their operations offensive and burden some so on the other side many things which for the time of their continuance are irkesome and heavy prove yet after occasions of greater Ioy. Whether they be means used for the procuring of further good Per varios casus per tot discrimina rerum 〈◊〉 in Latium sedes ubi c. Through various great mishaps dangers store We hasten to our home and wished 〈◊〉 Where fates do promise rest where Troy revives Only reserve your selves for better lives Or whether they bâ—… Evils which by our Wisedome we have broken thâ—…ough and avoided sed 〈◊〉 olim 〈◊〉 iâ—…vabit When we are arrived at ease Remembrance of a strome doth please The Objects then of Repentance are not our passive but our active Evils not the Evils of suffering but the Evils of doing for the memory of afflictions past representâ—… unto us Nature loosed and delivered and should so much the more increase our Ioy by how much redemption is for the most part a more felt blessing than Immunity but the memory of sinnes past represents Nature obliged guilty and imprisoned And so leaves a double ground for Griefe â—…he staine or pollution and the guilt or malediction a deformity to the Law and a curse from it It would be improper here to wander into a digression touching Repentance only in a word it is then a Godly Sorrow when it proceeds from the memory of Evill not so much in respect of the punishment as of the staine When we grieve more because our sin hath made us unholy then because it hath made us unhappy and not only because we are runne into the danger of the Law but because we are run out of the way of the Law When it teacheth us to cry not only with Pharaoh take away this Plague but with Israel in the Prophet take away Iniquity Concerning Griefe of Preoccupation arising out of a suspitious Feare and expectation of Evill I know not what worth it can have in it unlesse haply thus that by fore-accustoming the Mind to Evill it is the better strengthned to stand under it For Evils by praemeditation are either prevented or mitigated the Mind gathering strength and wisedome together to meet it And therefore it is prudent advise of Plutarch that wee should have a prepared Minde which when any Evill falleth out might not be surprised by it To say as Anaxagoras did when he heard of the death of his Sonne sciome genuisse mortalem I know that I be gat a mortall Sonne I know that my riches had wings and that my comforts were mutable Preparednesse composeth the Minde to patience Vlysses wept when he saw his Dogge which he did not when he saw his Wife he came prepared for the one but was surprised by the other Hunc ego si potui tantum sperare dolorem Et perferre soror potero Had I foreseene this Griefe or could but feare it I then should have compos'd my selfe to beare it Which is the reason why Philosophers prescribe the whole course of a Mans Life to be only a meditation upon Death because that being so great an Evill in it selfe and so sure to us it ought to be so expected as that it may not come sudden and find us unprepared to meet the King of Terrour For it is in the property of custome and acquaintance not only to alleviate and asswage evils to which purpose Seneca speakes perdidisti tot mala si nondum misera esse didicisti thou hast lost thy afflictions if they have not yet taught thee to be miserable but further as Aristotle notes to work some manner of delight in things at first troublesome and tedious and therefore hee reckoneth mourning amongst pleasant things and teares are by Nature made the witnesses as well of Ioy as of Griefe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
Object that is understood Because as the Wax after it is stamped is in some sort the very Seale it selfe that stamp'd it namely Representative by way of Image and resemblance so the Soule in receiving the species of any Object is made the picture and image of the thing it selfe Now the understanding being able to apprehend immortality yea indeed apprehending every corporeall substance as if it were immortall I meane by purging it from all grosse materiall and corruptible qualities must therefore needs of it selfe be of an immortall Nature And from the latter of those two Principles which I spake of namely that the quality of the Being may be gathered from the Nature of the Operation Aristotle inferres the separability and independance of the understanding on the Body in the third de Animâ afore-named For the Soule being able to work without the concurrence of any bodily Organ to the very act it selfe as was before shewed must needs also be able to subsist by its owne nature without the concurrence of any matter to sustaine it And therefore hee saith in the same place that the understanding is separable uncompounded impassible all arguments of immortality Other reasons are produced for the proofe hereof taken from the causes of corruption which is wrought either by Contraries working and eating out Nature or by Defect of the Preserving cause as light is decayed by absence of the Sunne or thirdly by corruption of the subject whereon it depends None whereof can be verified in the Soule For first how can any thing be contrary to the Soule which receiveth perfection from all things for Intellectus omnia intelligit saith Aristotle yea wherein all Contraries are reconciled and put off their Opposition For as a great man excellently speaketh those things which destroy one another in the World maintaine and perfect one another in the Minde one being a meanes for the clearer apprehension of the other Secondly God who is the only Efficient of the Soule being else in it selfe simple and indivisible and therefore not capable of death but only of Annihilation doth never faile and hath himselfe promised never to bring it unto nothing And lastly the Soule depends not as doe other Formes either in Operation or Being on the Body being not only Actus informans but subsistens too by its owne absolute vertue CHAP. XXXV Of the Honour of Humane Bodies by Creation by Resurrection of the Endowments of Glorified Bodies ANd now that this particular of immortality may farther redound both to the Honour and comfort of Man I must fall upon a short digression touching mans Body wherein I intend not to meddle with the Question How mans Body may be said to be made after the Image of God which sure is not any otherwise than as it is a sanctified and shall be a Blessed Vessell but not as some have conceited as if it were in Creation Imago Christi futuri nec Dei opus tantum sed Pignus As if Christ had beene the patterne of our Honour and not wee of his Infirmity since the Scripture saith Hee was made like unto us in all things and that he Assumed our Nature but never that we were but that we shall be like unto him not I say to meddle with this I will only briefly consider the Dignity thereof in the particular of immortality both in the first structure and in the last Resurrection of it The Creation of our Bodies and the Redemption of our Bodies as the Apostle calls it What Immunity was at first given and what Honour shall at last be restored to it In which latter sense it shall certainly be Secundum Imaginem after his Image who was Primitiae the First fruits of them that rise That as in his Humility his Glory was hid in our Mortality so in our Exaltation our Mortality shall be swallowed up of his Glory And for the first estate of Mans Body we conclude in a word that it was partly Mortall and partly Immortall Mortall in regard of possibility of Dying because it was affected with the mutuall Action and Passion of corruptible elements for which reason it stood in need of reparation and recovery of it selfe by food as being still Corpus Animale and not Spirituale as St. Paul distinguisheth a Naturall but not a Spirituall Body But it was Immortall that is Exempted from the Law of Death and Dissolution of the Elements in vertue of Gods Covenant with man upon condition of his Obedience It was Mortall Conditione Corporis by the Condition of a Body but immortall Beneficio Conditoris by the Benefit of its Creation else God had planted in the Soule such naturall desires of a Body wherein to work as could not be naturally attained For the Soule did naturally desire to remaine still in the body In the naturall Body of Adam there was no sin and therefore no death which is the wages of sinne I come now to the Redemption of our Bodies already performed in Pignore in Primiâ—…its In our Head in some few of his Members Enoch Ellas and as is probable in those dead Bodies which arose to testifie the Divine power of our crucified Saviour and shall be totally accomplished at that day of Redemption as the same Apostle calls the Last day that day of a full and finall Redemption when Death the last enemy shall be overcome And well may it be called a day of Redemption not only in regard of the Creature which yet groaneth under the Malediction and Tyrannie of sinfull Man nor yet only in respect of Mans Soule which though it be before admitted unto the purchased Possession of the Glorifying Vision and lives no more by Faith alone but by sight shall yet then receive a more abundant fulnesse thereof as being the day of the Manifestation and plenary discovery both of the Punishing Glory of God in the Wicked and of his Merciful and Admirable Glory in the Saints but also and as I think most especially in respect of the Body For there is by vertue of that Omnipotent Sacrifice a double kinde of Redemption wrought for us The one Vindicative giving us Immunity from all spirituall dangers delivering us from the Tyrannie of our Enemies from the Severity Justice and Curse of the Law which is commonly in the New Testament called simply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Deliverance from evill The other Purchasing or Munificent by not only freeing us from our own wretchednesse but farther conferring upon us a Positive and a Glorious Honour which St. Iohn calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Power Priviledge Prerogative and Title unto all the Glorious Promises of Immortality which like wise St. Paul calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Redemption of a purchased Possession and a Redemption unto the Adoption of Sonnes Now then the Last day is not Totally and Perfectly a day of Redemption unto our Soules in either
of these senses since they are in this life delivered from the Malediction of the Law from the Wrath of the Judge from the Tyrannie of the Enemie from the Raigne of Sinne and by Death freed not only from the Dominion but from the Possession or Assault of the Enemie not only from the Kingdome but from the Body of Sinne and is withall in good part possessed of that Blisse which it shall more fully enjoy at last But our Bodies though before that Great day they partake much of the benefits of Redemption as being here sanctified vessells freed from the Authority and Power of the Devill World Flesh and from the Curse of Death too wherein they part not only with life but with sinne yet after all this doe they want some part of either Redemption as namely to be raised and delivered from that dishonour and corruption which the last Enemie hath brought upon them and to be Admitted into those Mansions and invested with that Glory whereby they shall be Totally possessed of their Redemption In a word the Soule is in its separation fully delivered from all Enemies which is the first and in a great measure enjoyeth the Vision of God which is the second part or degree of mans Redemption But the Body is not till its Resurrection either quite freed from its Enemie or at all possessed of its Glory I meane in its selfe though it be in its Head who is Primitiae P◅gnus Resurrectionis the first fruits and earnest of our Conquest over Death Touching the Dignity of our Bodies though there be more comfort to be had in the Expectation than Curiosity in the enquirie after it yet what is usually granted I shall briefly set down And first it shall be Raised a whole entire and perfect Body with all the parts best fitted to be Receptacles of Glory freed from all either the Usherers in or Attendants and followers on the Grave Age Infirmity Sicknesse Corruption Ignominie and Dishonour And shall rise a true whole strong and honourable Body For though every part of the Body shall not have those peculiar uses which here they have since they neither eat nor drink marry nor are given in marriage but are as the Angels of God yet shall not any part be lost Licet enim officiis liberentur judiciis re◅inentur Though they are freed from their Temporall service for which they were here ordained yet must they be reserved for receiving their judgment whether it be unto Glory or unto Dishonour The second Dignity is that Change and Alteration of our Body from a Naturall to a Spirituall Body whereby is not meant any Transubstantiation from a Corporeall to a Spirituall substance For our Bodies shall after the Resurrection be conformable unto Christs body which though glorious was not yet a Spirit but had flesh and bone as we have Nor is it to be understood of a thinne Aereall Invisible Body as some have collected since Christ saith of his Body after he was risen Videte Palpate Wheresoever it is it hath both its quantity and all sensible qualities of a Body Glorified with it It is a strong Argument that it is not there where it is not sensible And therefore the Doctrines of Vbiquity and Transubstantiation as they give Christ more thā he is pleased to owne an Immensity of Body so doe they spoyle him of that which hee hath beene pleased for our sakes to assume Extension Compacture Massinesse Visibility and other the like sensible Properties which cannot stand with that pretended miracle whereby they make Christs Body even now a Creature and like unto ours in substance though not in qualities of Corruptibility Infirmity Ignominie Animality to be truly invested with the very immediate properties of the Deity True indeed it is that the Body of Christ hath an efficacie and operation in all parts of the world it worketh in Heaven with God the Father by Intercession amongst the blessed Angels by Confirmation in Earth and that in all ages and in all places amongst Men by Justification and Comfort in Hell amongst the Devils and Damned by the Tremblings and Feares of a condemning and convicting Faith But Operation requireth only a presence of Vertue not of Substance For doth not the Sunne work wonderfull effects in the bowels of the Earth it selfe notwithstanding being a fixed Planet in the Heaven And why should not the Sunne of Righteousnesse work as much at the like distance as the Sunne of Nature Why should he not be as Powerfull Absent as he was Hoped Or why should the Not presence of his Body make that uneffectuall now which the Not existing could not before his Incarnation Why should we mistrust the Eyes of Stephen that saw him in Heaven at such a Distance of place when Abraham could see him in his own bowels through so great a Distance of Time That Speech then that the Body shall be a Spirituall Body is not to be understood in either of those former senses but it is to be understood first of the more immediate Union and full Inhabitation of the vertue and vigour of Gods Spirit in our Bodies quickning and for ever sustaining them without any Assistance of Naturall or Animall qualities for the repairing and augmenting of them in recompence of that which by labour and infirmity and the naturall opposition of the Elements is daily diminished Secondly it shall be so called in regard of its Obedience Totall Subjection to the Spirit of God without any manner of Reluctance and dislike Thirdly in respect of those Spirituall qualities those Prerogatives of the Flesh with which it shall be adorned which are First a Shining and Glorious Light wherewithall it shall be cloathed as with a Garment for the Iust shall shine as the Sunne in the Firmament Now this shal be wrought first by vertue of that Communion which wee have with Christ our Head whose Body even in its Mortality did shine like the Sunne and had his cloathes white as light And secondly by diffusion and Redundancie from our Soule upon our Body which by the Beatificall Vision filled with a Spirituall and unconceiveable brightnesse shall work upon the Body as on a Subject made throughly Obedient to its Power unto the Production of alike qualities The second Spirituall Property shall be Impassibility not in respect of Perfective but in respect of annoying disquieting or destructive Passion There shall not be any Warre in the members any fighting and mutuall languishing of the Elements but they shall all be sustained in their full strength by vertue of Christs Communion of the Inhabitation of the Spirit of the Dominion of the Glorified Soule There shall be no need of rest or sleepe or meat all which are here requisite for the supply of our Infirmities and daily defects and are only the Comforts of Pilgrimage not the Blessednesse of Possession For although Christ after his Resurrection did eat before his Disciples yet this was none otherwise done
Solidity of Iudgement to try and weigh the particulars which wee apprehend That out of them wee may sever for our use the pretious from the vile for Knowledge lies in Things as Gold in a Mine or as Corne in the Straw when by diligent inquiry after it wee have digged it up and thresh'd it out wee must then bring it to the fire and fanne to give it us purified from drosse and levity And this in Speculation answereth unto the generall vertue of practicall prudence in Morality whereby wee weigh the severall Mediums unto the true Ends of life and accordingly select and prosecute the Best Thirdly Fidelity of Retention for hee is not likely to grow Rich who puts up his Treasure as the Prophet speaks into a bag with holes For as Nature hath given to the Bodies of men for the furtherance of corporeall strength and nutriment a Retentive power to clasp and hold fast that which preserveth it untill a through concoction be wrought so proportionably is the Faculty of Memory given to Reason as a meanes to consolidate and enrich it And fluxes as in the Body so in the Minde too are ever Arguments and Authors of Weaknesse Whence it comes to passe that in matter of Learning many of us are faine to be Day-labourers and to live from hand to mouth being not able to lay up any thing And therefore in the choice of fit persons to breed up unto Learning wee should take a like course as wise Architects doe in choice of fit timber for Building They choose first the straitest and that which hath fewest knots and flawes in it which in the mind answereth unto clearenesse and evennesse of Apprehension For a cleare minde like strait and smooth timber will work easiest Next they take the heart and strongest substance and cut out the sap because that is best able to beare the weight that shall be laid upon it And this answers unto Maturity and firmnesse of Judgement Lastly they doe not take Sally or Willow or Birch and such other Materialls as are quickly apt to putrifie and weare away but such Timber as is lasting and Retentive of its Nature as Oake and Elme which may make the Superstruction of the nature of the Foundation strong and lasting and this answereth to that excellent Faculty of the Minde a Rationall memory from which one particular I think more than any other doe arise those vast differences of felicity and infelicity in the mindes of men addicted to the search of Knowledge Strange was the unhappinesse of Calvisius Sabinus in Seneca who being at vast charges in matter of learning was not yet able to retaine fast the Names of Achilles or Vlysses But as his Parasite was wont deridingly to advise him wanted a Grammaticall Attendant to gather up the fragments which his Memory let fall And Curio the Orator in Tully was wont when hee had proposed three things in an Oration to forget some one or other of them or to add a fourth yea Messala Corvinus forgat his owne name as Pliny telleth us And as wonderfull on the other side hath beene the felicity of some others Seneca the father could repeat two thousand words together in their Order Cyrus and Themistocles could call all their Souldiers by their Names by which one Art of Curtesie Otho aspired unto the Empire Adrian could read a Book which hee never saw before and after recite it by memory and of the Emperour Iulian it is said that hee had drunk Totum memoriae dolium the whole vessell of memory To say nothing of Simonides and Apollonius Tyanlus who in their old age the one at 80 the other at a 100 yeeres old were very famous for the exquisitenesse of their memories nor of Cyneas Charmidas Portius Latro and divers others who have beene admired for this happy Quality Now unto this Felicity doth conduce a Methodicall and orderly Disposition of minde to digest and lay up things in their proper places It was easier for Cyrus to remember men in an Army than in a Throng And hence hath proceeded the Art of Memory invented as Pliny tells us by Simonides and perfected by Meâ—…rodorus Sceptius consisting in the committing of severall Heads of matter unto distinct places whereof Quintilian discourseth in his Oratory Institutions Of Knowledge there are severall sorts according to severall considerations with respect to the Ends of it Some is Speculative for the improving of the Minde as Physicall Metaphysicall and Mathematicall Knowledge Others Practicall for fashioning and guiding of the manners and conditions of Men as Ethicall Politicall Historicall Military Knowledge Some mixt of both as Theologicall Knowledge consisting in the speculation of Divine Verities and in the direction of Divine Duties Some Iustrumentall being only subservient unto others as Grammaticall Rhetoricall Dialecticall learning In regard of Order some Superiour others Subalternate as Musick to Arithmetick Opticks to Geometry In regard of their Originall some Ingrafted as the supreame Principles of Verity and implanted notions of Morality which is called the Law of Nature and written in the Heart of all men Rom. 2. 14. 15. Other Acquired and by search and industry laboured out of those Principles and the others which are taught us Other Revealed and Divinely manifested to the Faith of Men whereof the supreame Principles are these two 1. That God in his Authority is infallible who neither can be deceived nor can deceive 2. That the things delivered in Holy Scriptures are the Dictates and Truths which that infallible Authority hath delivered unto the Church to be beleeved and therefore that every supernaturall Truth there plainely set downe in terminiâ—… is an unquestionable Principle and every thing by evident consequence and deduction from thence derived is therefore an undoubted Conclusion in Theologicall and Divine Knowledge In regard of the manner of Acquiring some is Experimentall A Knowledge of Particulars and some Habituall a generall knowledge growing out of the reason of Particulars And those Acquired either by Invention from a mans Industry or by Aâ—…scultation and Attendance unto those that teach us In regard of Objects some supreâ—…me as the Knowledge of Principles and Prime Verities which have their light in themselves and are knowne by evidence of their owne Tearmes Others derived and deduced by argumentation from those Principles which is the Knowledge of Conclusions In regard of Perfection Intuitive Knowledge as that of Angels whereby they know things by the View and Discursive as that of Men whereby wee know things by Ratiocination In regard of Order and Method Syntheticall when wee proceed in Knowledge by a way of Composition from the Causes to the Effects and Analyticall when wee rise up from Effects unto their Causes in a Way of Resolution With this noble Endowment of Knowledge was the Humane Nature greatly adorned in its first Creation So farre forth as the Necessity of a happy and honourable life of
well be called the Pride and the Wantonnesse of Knowledge because it looketh after high things that are above us and after hidden things that are denied us And I may well put these two together Pride and Luxurie of Learning For I beleeve wee shall seldome finde the Pride of Knowledge more praedominant than there where it ariseth out of the curious and conjectural enquiries of Wit and not out of scientificall and demonstrative Grounds And I finde the Apostle joyning them together when hee telleth us of some who intruded themselves into Things which they had not seene and were Vainely puff'd up by a fleshly Minde And hee himselfe complaineth of Others who were Proud and languished about needlesse Questions as it is ever a signe of a sick and ill-affected stomack to quarrell with usuall and wholsome meat and to long for and linger after Delicacies which wee cannot reach too When Manna will not goe downe without Quailes you may be sure the Stomack is cloyed and wants Physick to Purge it I will not here add more of this point having lately touched it on a fitter Occasion A third Corruption of this Faculty in regard of Knowledge is in the Fluctuation wavering and uncertainty of Assents when the Understanding is left floating and as it were in Aequilibrio that it cannot tell which way to encline or what Resolutions to grow unto and this is that which in Opposition to Science is called Opinion For Science is ever cum certitudine with Evidence and Unquestionable Consequence of Conclusions from necessary Principles but Opinion is cum Formidine Oppositi with a feare least the contrary of what wee assent unto should be true And so it importeth a Tender Doubtfull and Infirme Conclusion The Causes of Opinion I conceive to be principally two The first is a Disproportion betweene the Understanding and the Object when the Object is either too bright and excellent or too dark and base the one dazles the Power the other Affects it not Things too Divine and Abstracted are to the Understanding Tanquam lumen ad Vespertilionem as light unto a Batt which rather astonish than informe and things too Material and Immerst are like a Mist unto the Eyes which rather hinder than affect it And therefore though whatsoever hath Truth in it be the Object of the Understanding yet the Coexistence of the Soule with the Body in this present Estate restraines and Limits the Latitude of the Object and requires in it not onely the bare Nature and Truth but such a Qualification thereof as may make it fit for representation and Impression by the conveyance of the Sense So that as in the True perception of the Eye especially of those Vespertiliones to which Aristotle hath compared the Understanding in this estate of subsistence with the Body there is required a mixture of Contraries in the Ayre it must not bee too light lest it weaken and too much disgregate or spread the sense nor yet too dark lest it contract and lock it up But there must bee a kinde of middle Temper cleerenesse of the Medium for conveyance and yet some degrees of Darknesse for qualification of the Object Even so also the Objects of mans Vnderstanding must participate of the two contrâ—…ries Abstraction and Materiality Abstraction first in proportion to the 〈◊〉 of the Vnderstanding which is Spirituall And Materiality too in respect of the Sense on which the Vnderstanding depends in this estate as on the Medium of Conveyance and that is Corporall So that where ever there is Difficulty and Vncertainty of Operation in the Vnderstanding there is a double defect and disproportion first in the Power whose Operations are restrained and limited for the most by the Body and then in the Object which hath not a sufficient mixture of those two qualities which should proportion it to the Power This is plaine by a familiar similitude an Aged man is not able to read a small Print without the Assistance of Spectacles to make the Letters by a refraction seeme greater Where first wee may descry an Imperfection in the Organ for if his Eyes were as cleare and well-dispos'd as a young mans hee would be able by his Naturall Power without Art to receive the Species of small Letters And next there is an Imperfection and deficiencie in the Letters for if they had the same Magnitude and fitnesse in themselves which they seeme to have by Refraction through the Glasse the weaknesse of his power might haply have sufficient strength to receive them without those Helps So that alwayes the Uncertainty of Opinion is grounded on the Insufficiencie of the Vnderstanding to receive an Object and on the Disproportion of the Object to the Nature of the Vnderstanding The next Cause of Opinion and Vncertainty in Assents may be Acutenesse and Subtilty of wit when Men out of Ability like Carneades to discourse probably on either side and poizing their Judgements betweene an equall weight of Arguments are forc'd to suspend their Assents and so either to continue unresolved and equally inclineable unto either part or else if to avoyd Neutrality they make choise of some thing to averre and that is properly Opinion yet it is rather an Inclination than an Assertion as being accompanied with feare floating and Inconstancie And this indeed although it be in it selfe a defect of Learning yet considering the Estate of man and strict conditions of perfecting the Vnderstanding by continuall Inquiry man being â—…ound in this also to recover that measure of his â—…irst fulnesse which is attainable in this Corrupâ—…ed Estate by sweat of braine by labour and degrees Paulatim extundere artes I say in these considerations Irresolution in Iudgement so it be not Vniversall in all conclusions for that argues more weaknesse than choise of conceit nor Particular in things of Faith and Salvation which is not Modesty but Infidelity is both Commendable and Vsefull Commendable because it preventâ—… all temper of heresie whose nature is to be peremptory And both argues Learning and Modesty in the softnes of Iudgement which will not suffer it selfe to be captivated either to its owne conceits or unto such unforcible reasons in the which it is able to descry weaknesse And this is that which Pliny commends in his friend Titus Ariston whose hesitancy and slownesse of resolution in matter of Learning proceeded not from any emptines or unfurniture but ex diversitate RationuÌ„ quaâ—… acrimagnoque Iudicio ab origine Causâ—…que primis repetit discernit expendit out of a learned cautelousnâ—…sse of judgment which made him so long su spend his Assent till he had weighed the severall repugnancies of reasons and by that means found out some truth whereon to settle his conceit For as the same Pliny elsewhere out of Thucydides observes It is rawnes deficiency of learning that makes bold and peremptory 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Demurs and fearfulnes of Resolution are commonly the companions of
onely on his owne judgement with contempt or neglect of others But I consider a double Estate of the Learned Inchoation and Progresse And though in this latter there be requisite a Discerning Iudgment and Liberty of Dissent yet for the other Aristotl's speech is true Oportet discentem credere Beginners must beleeve For as in the Generation of man hee receiveth his first life and nourishment from one Wombe and after takes onely those things which are by the Nurse or Mother given to him but when he is growne unto strength and yeares hee then receiveth nourishment not from Milke onely but from all variety of meats and with the freedome of his own choise or dislike so in the generation of Knowledge the first knitting of the Ioynts and Members of it into one Body is best effected by the Authority and Learning of some able Teacher though even of his Tutors Gate being a childe was wont to require a reason but being growne thereby to some stature and maturity not to give it the Liberty of its owne Iudgement were to confine it still to its Nurse or Cradle I speake not this therefore to the dishonour of Aristotle or any other stom whose Learning much of ours as from Fountaines hath bin derived Antiquity is ever venerable and justly challengeth Honour Reverence and Admiration And I shall ever acknowledge the worthy commendation which hath been given Aristotle by a learned man that he hath almost discovered more of Natures Mysteries in the whole Body of Philosophy than the whole Series of Ages fince hath in any particular member thereof And therefore he and all the rest of those worthy Founders of Learning do well deserve some credit as well to their authority as to their matter But yetnotwithstanding there is difference betweene Reverence and Superstition we may Assent unto them as Antients but not as Oracles they may have our minds easie and inclinable they may not have them captivated and fettered to their Opinions As I will not distrust all which without manifest proof they deliver where I cannot convince them of Errour So likewise will I suspend my beleefe upon probability of their mistakes and where I finde expresse Reason of Dissenting I will â—…ather speake Truth with my Mistresse Nature than maintaine an Errour with my Master Aristotle As there may be Friendship so there may be Honour with diversity of Opinions nor are wee bound therfore to defie men because we reverence them Plura sâ—…pe peccantur dum demeremur quam dum off endimus Wee wrong our Auncestors more by admiring than opposing them in their Errours and our Opinion of them is foule and without Honour if we thinke they had rather have us followers of them then of Truth And we may in this case justly answer them as the young man in Plutarch did his Father when he commanded him to do an unjust thing I wil do that which you would have me though not that which you bid mee For good men are ever willing to have Truth preferred above them Aristotle his Commendation of his middle Aged men should be a rule of our Assent to him and all the rest of those first Planters of Knowledge Wee ought neither to overprize all their Writings by an absolute Credulity because they being Men and subject to Errour may make us thereby liable to Delusion neither ought we rudely to undervalue them because being Great men and so well deserving of all Posterity they may challenge from us an Easines of Assent unto their Authority alone if it bee only without and not against Reason as Tâ—…lly professed in a matter so agreeable to the Nature of Mans Soule as Immortality Vt rationâ—…m nullam Plato afferret ipsa Authoritate me frangeret Though Plato had given no reason for it yet his Authority should have swayed Assent I say not slavish but with reservation and with a purpose a lâ—…vaies to be swayed by Truth more than by the thousand yeares of Plato and Aristotle 4 Another Cause of Errour may be a Fastning too great an Affection on some particular Objects which maketh the Minde conceive in them some Excellencies which Nature never bestowed on them As if Truth wâ—…re the hand-maid to Passion or Camelion like could alter it selfe to the temper of our defires Every thing must be Vnquestionable and Authenticall when wee have once affected it And from this Root it is probable did spring those various Opinions about the utmost Good of mans Nature which amounted to the number of two hundred eighty eight â—…s â—…as long ago observed by Varro which could not â—…ut be out of every particular Philosophers con â—…ipt carrying him to the Approbation of some particular Object most pleasing and satisfactory to the Corruption of his owne crooked Nature so that every man sought Happinesse not where it was to be found but in himselfe measuring it by the Rule of his owne distempered and intangled Iudgement whence could not possibly but issue many monstrous Errours according as the Minds of men were any way transported with the false Delight either of Pleasure Profit Pompe Promotion Fame Liberty or any other worldly and sensuall Objects In which particular of theirs I observe a preposterous and unnaturall course like that of the Atheist in his Opinion of the Soule and Deity For whereas in Nature and right Method the Determinations of the Vnderstanding concerning Happines should precede the pursuit of the Will they on the contrary side first love their Errour and then they prove it as the Affection of an Atheist leads him first to a Desire and wish that there were no God because â—…e conceiveth it would goe farre better with him in the end than otherwise it is like to doe and then this Desire allures the Vnderstanding to dictate Reasons and Inducements that may persuade to the Beleefe thereof and so what was at first but a wish is at last become an Opinion Quâ—…d nimis volumus facile credimuâ—… we easily beleeve what we will willingly desire And the reason is because every man though by Nature he love Sinne yet he is altogether impatient of any checke or conviction thereof either from others or himselfe and therefore be his Errours never so palpable his Affections never so distempered his Minde never so depraved and averse from the Rules of Reason he will notwithstanding easily persuade himselfe to thinke he is in the right course and make his Iudgement as absurd in defending as his Will and Affections are in embracing vitious Suggestions Viti a nostra quia amamus defendimus When once our Minds are by the violence and insinuation of Affection transported into any crooked course Reason will freely resigne it selfe to bee perverted and the discourse of the Vnderstanding will quickely bee drawne to the maintaining of either So easie it is for men to dispute when they have once made themselves obey And another reason hereof is because as a Body distempered and
progresse in any Inquiry but Iudgement is the Ballace to Poise and the Steere to guide the course to it s intended End Now the manner of the Iudgements Operation in directing either our Practise or Contemplation is by a discourse of the Mind whereby it â—…educeth them to certaine Grounds and Principles whereunto they ought chiefly to be conformable And from hence is that Reason which Quintilian observes why shallow and floating Wits seeme oftentimes more fluent than men of greater sufficiencies For saith he those other admit of every sudden flash or Conceipt without any Examination but apud Sapientes est â—…lectio Modus They first weigh things before they utter thâ—…m The maine Corruption of Iudgement in this Office is Prejudice and Prepossession The Duty of Iudgement is to discerne between Obliquities and right Actions and to reduce all to the Law of Reason And therefore t is true in this as in the course of publique Iudgements That respect of persons or things blind the Eyes and maketh the Vnderstanding to determine according to Affection and not according to Truth Though indeed some Passions there are which rather hood-winke then distemper or hurt the Iudgement so that the false determination thereof cannot bee well called a Mistake but a Lye Of which kind flattery is the principall when the Affections of Hope and Feare debase a man and cause him to dissemble his owne opinion CHAP. XL. Of the Actions of the Vnderstanding upon the Will with respect to the End and Means The Power of the Vnderstanding over the Will not Commanding but directing the Objects of the Will to bee good and convenient Corrupt Will lookes only at Good present Two Acts of the Vnderstanding Knowledge and Consideration It must also be possible and with respect to happinesse Immortall Ignorance and Weaknesse in the Understanding in proposing the right means to the last End HItherto of the Actions of the Vnderstanding Ad extra in regard of an Object Those Ad Intra in regard of the Will Wherein the Vnderstanding is a Minister oâ—… Counsellor to it are either to furnish it with an End whereon to fasten its desires or to direct it in the means conducible to that end For the Will alone is a blind Faculty and therefore as it cannot see the right Good it ought to affect without the Assistance of an Informing Power So neither can it see the right way it ought to take for procuring that Good without the direction of a Conducting power As it hath not Iudgment to discover an End So neither hath it Discourse to judge of the right Means whereby that may be attained So that all the Acts of the Will necessarily presuppose some precedent guiding Acts in the Vnderstanding whereby they are pro portioned to the Rules of right Reason This Operation of the Vnderstanding is usually by the Schoole-men called Imperium or Mandatum a Mandate or Command because it is a Precept to which the will ought to be obedient For the Rules of Living and Doing well are the Statutes as it were and Dictates of right Reason But yet it may not hence be concluded that the Vnderstanding hath any Superiority in regard of Dominion over the Will though it have Priority in regard of Operation The Power of the Vnderstanding over the Will is onely a Regulating and Directing it is no Constraining or Compulsive Power For the Will alwaies is Domina sâ—…orum actuum The Mistresse of her owne Operation For Intellectus non imperat sed solummâ—…dò significat voluntatem imperantis It doth only intimate unto the Will the Pleasure and Law of God some seeds whereof remaine in the Nature of man The Precepts then of right Reason are not therefore Commands because they are proposed by way of Man date but therfore they are in that manner proposed because they are by Reason apprehended to be the Commands of a Divine Superior Power And therefore in the breach of any such Dictates we are not said properly to offend our Vnderstanding but to sinne against our Law giver As in Civill Policy the offences of men are not against inferiour Officers but against that soveraigne Power which is the Fountaine of Law and under whose Authority all subordinate Magistrates have their proportion of government Besides Ejus est imperare Cujus est punire For Law and Punishment being Relatives and mutually connotating each the other it must necessarily follow that from that power only canbe an imposition of law from which may be an Infliction of Punishment Now the Condition under which the Vnderstanding is both to apprehend and propose any either end or means convenient to the Nature of the Will and of Sufficiency to move it are that they have in them Goodnesse Possibility and in the end if we speak of an utmost one Immortality too Every true Object of any Power is that which beareth such a perfect Relation of convenience fitnes therunto that it is able to accomplish all its desires Now since Malum is Destructâ—…vum all Evill is Destructive It is impossible that by it selfe without a counterfeit and adulterate face it should ever have any Attractive Power over the Desires of the Will And on the other side since Omne bonum is Perfectivum since Good is perfective and apt to bring reall satisfaction along with it most certainly would it be desired by the Will were it not that our Vnderstandings are clouded and carried away with some crooked misapprehensions and the Will it selfe corrupted in its owne Inelinations But yet though all mans Faculties are so depraved that he is not able as he ought to will any Divine and Perfect Good yet so much he retains of his Perfection as that he cannot possibly desire any thing which he apprehends as absolutely disagreeable destructive to his Nature since all Naturall Agents ayme still at their owne Perfection And therefore impossible it is that either Good should be refused without any apprehension of Disconvenience or Evill pursued without any appearance of Congruity or Satisfaction That it may appeare therefore how the Vnderstanding doth alwaies propose those Objects as Good to the Will which are notwithstanding not only in their owne Nature but in the Apprehension of the Vnderstanding it selfe knowne to be evill And on the contrary why it doth propose good Objects contrary to its owne Knowledge as Evill We may distinguish two opposite conditions in Good and Evill For first all Evill of Sin though it have Disconvenience to mans Nature as it is Destructive yet on the other side it hath agreement thereunto as it is crooked and corrupt As continuall drinking is most convenient to the distemper of an Hydropticke Body though most disconvenient to its present welfare Now then as no man possessed with that disease desires drinke for this end because he would dye though he know that this is the next way to bring him to his Death but only to give satisfaction to his present Appetite So
like an Itch or Vicer in the Body which is with the same nayles both angered and delighted and hath no pleasure but with vexation Thirdly they are ever attended with Repentance both because in promises they disappoint and in performances they deceive and when they make offers of pleasure do expire in pains as those delicates which are sweet in the mouth are many times heavy in the stomacke and after they have pleased the Palat doe torment the bowels The Minde surfets on nothing sooner than on unnaturall Desires Fourthly for this reason they are ever changing and making new experiments as weake and wanton stomacks which are presently cloy'd with an uniforme dyet and must have not onely a painefull but a witty Cooke whose inventions may be able with new varieties to gratifie and humour the nicenesse of their appetite As Nero had an officer who was called Elegantiae Arbiter the inventor of new Lusts for him Lastly unlimited Desires are for the most part Envious and Malignant For he who desires every thing cannot chuse but repine to see another have that which himselfe wanteth And therefore Dionysius the Tyrant did punish Philoxenus the Musitian because he could sing and Plato the Philosopher because he could dispute better than himselfe In which respect hee did wisely who was contented not to be esteemed a better Orator than he who could command thirty legions Secondly unbounded Desires doe worke Anxiety and Perturbation of Minde and by that means disappoint Nature of that proper end which this Passion was ordained unto namely to be a means of obtaining some further good whereas those Desires which are in their executions Turbid or in their continuance Permanent are no more likely to lead unto some farther end than either a misty and darke or a winding and circular way is to bring a Man at last unto his journeyes end whereof the one is dangerous the other vaine And together with this they doe distract our noble Cares and quite avert our thoughts from more high and holy desires Martha her Many things and Maries One thing will very hardly consist together Lastly there is one Corruption more in these unlimited Desires they make a man unthankfull for former benefits as first because Caduca memoria fâ—…turo imminentium It is a strong presumption that he seldome looks backe upon what is past who is earnest in pursuing some thing to come It is S. Pauls Profession and Argument in a matter of greater consequence I forget those things which are behind and reach forth unto those things which are before And secondly though a man should looke backe yet the thoughts of such a benefit would be but sleight and vanishing because the Mind finding present content in the liberty of a roving Desire is marvellous unwilling to give permanent entertainment unto thoughts of another Nature which likewise were they entertained would be rather thoughts of murmuring than of thankful fulnesse every such man being willing rather to conceive the benefit small than to acknowledge the vice and vastnesse of his owne Desires The next rule which I observed for the government of these Passions do respect those Higher and more glorious Objects of Mans Felicity And herein 1 Our Desires are not to be Wavering and In constant but Resolute and full of Quicknesse and Perseverance First because though we be poore and shallow vessels yet so narrow and almost shut up are those passages by which wee should give admittance unto the matter of our true happines yea so full are we already of contrary qualities as that our greatest vehemency wil not be enough either to empty our selves of the one or to fill our selves with the other And therefore the true Desires of this Nature are in the Scripture set forth by the most patheticall and strong similitudes of Hunger and Thirst and those not common neither but by the pantâ—…ng of a tyred Hart after the rivers of water and the gaping of the dry ground after a seasonable showre Secondly overy desirable Object the higher it goes is ever the more united within it selfe and drives the faster unto an unity It is the property of Errours to be at variance whereas Truth is One and all the parts thereof doe mutually strengthen and give light unto each other So likewise in things Good the more noble the more knit they are Scelera disiâ—…dent It is for sinnes to be at variance amongst themselves And those lower Goods of Riches Pleasure Nobility Beauty though they are not Incomparable yet they have no naturall Connexion to each other have therfore the lesse power to draw a conslaâ—… and continued Desire But for nobler and immateriall goods wee see how the Philosopher hath observed a connextion betweene all his morall vertues whereby a man that hath one is naturally drawne to a desire of all the rest for the minde being once acquainted with the sweetnes of one doth not onely apprehend the same sweetnesse in the others but besides findeth it selfe not sufficiently possest of that which it hath unlesse it bee thereby drawne to procure the rest all whose properties it is by an excellent mutuall service to give light and lustre strength and validity and in some sort greater Vnity unto each other And lastly for the highest and divinest good the truth of Religion that is in it selfe most of all other One as being a Beame of that Light and Revelation of that Will which is Vnity it selfe And therefore though we distinguish the Creed into twelve Articles yet Saint Paul calleth them all but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one Faith as having but one Lord for the Object and End of them Now then where the parts of good are so united as that the one draweth on the other there is manifestly required united desire to carry the soule thereunto II. The last Rule which I observed was that our Desires ought not to bee faint and sluggish but industrious and painefull both for the arming us to avoid and withstand all oppositions and difficulties which we are every where likely to meet withall in the pursuit of our happinesse and also for the wise and discreet applying of the severall furtherances requisite thereunto And indeed that is no True which is not an Operative Desire a Velleity it may be but a Will it is not For what ever a man will have hee will seek in the use of such meanes as are proper to procure it Children may wish for Mountaines of gold and Balaam may wish for an happy death and an A theist may wish for a soule as earthly in substance as in Affection but these are all the ejaculations rather of a Speculative fancie than of an industrious affection True desires as they are right in regard of their object so are they laborious in respect of their motion And therefore those which are idle and impatient of any paines which stand like the Carman in the Fable