and his Son Solomon the wisest of men have assured us in sundry positions that understanding takes her possession of the Soul with it and that through his Commandments it is that we are wiser then our Teachers And surely if there were not some defect in every man of these Graces by the intetposition of Sin and Satan he would sooner or later hear that gracious and effectual Eccho resound in his Soul from the Spirit of all true love and comfort Let not your hearts be troubled This is the only rational way I think of cure Redire ad cor and to get that clean swept and garnished that the Spirit of true love may enter in and keep possession against all unruly passions and I dare say whoever tries it will subscribe his probatum to it SECT IV. The Remedies which are ordinarily prescribed against Sorrow considered with respect to their force and efficacy and how little Philosophy of it self can do towards the conquest of it BUt as I said let us not altogether reject every prescribed alleviating Medicine Indeed there are many from our common undertaking comforters and we are ready to catch at them like Reeds in a sinking condition Although they are firm Truths and such as have been used by the greatest Philosophers and Divines towards the cure yet barely and simply considered all or either of them have not the efficacy to bring a man to any safe or quiet Harbour They may keep a man from drowning but withall they may and do often leave him plunging in the deep without the co-operation of some more Sovereign Medicines and are some of them fitter ingredients for a complicated disease where murmuring and repining are joyned with it than bare sorrow which I bless God I never was infected with for I own his Judgments just and am more apt to have St. Gregory's noise in my ears Tu vero bona tua in vita tua c. than the contrary But I mention them as I thought on them and leave them to others to make their best use of them which are these following 1. That death is a common thing and a debt we all owe to Nature and must shortly pay and therefore it should not so much trouble us to behold it in another 2. That we cannot recall our Friends and Relations by our mourning and therefore our sorrow is vain 3. That they whom we love are at rest and happy which is rather cause of joy 4. That 't is not our case alone we are not single but others daily suffer the like As to the first the thing is very obvious to the meanest capacity and perhaps if we did in our serious thoughts oftner behold death he might prove like Aesop's Lion to his Fox not altogether so terrible but yet he will be a Lion still and as Aristotle calls him omnium terribilium terribilissimum and further if we did look upon him at hand ready to seize us then together with us all worldly things would change their hue and put on as it were another face 'T is sure that Death passeth upon all men but as St. Paul says because all men have sinned and from thence it is that death hath such a sting And 't is sin that has made sorrow and trouble attendants on death as well as death on it both for our selves and others And therefore the contemplation of the primary cause of our sorrow should rather take up our thoughts as I have already said than the secundary For the thought of death certainly was never wholly absent from any man in his sorrows nor ever cured any but the true sense of his own deserts have As to the second every man knows it as well as the other neither was there ever any man yet that had his reason left him who thought to revive his Friend or Relation thereby or to awake him with his shrieks and cries It is every mans deepest corrosive that there is no redemption from the Grave And though in truth it be a vain thing to persist in that which profiteth us nothing yet that vanity will not be driven away by anothers barely telling us so or our own thinking or knowing it so The faculties of the Soul will not cease to work though there is knowledge that the operation is oft-times in vain 't is in vain we know to fear death but that knowledge will not cure a man of his fear Certainly the wounds of the Spirit are sharper and more malignant than those of the Body and 't is the same reason must argue us into patience of both But let her set us upon the Rack 't is in vain to cry out it will profit us nothing we shall scarce hearken to her and keep silence This advice best comes when we begin to be weary of our mourning and not before and then only will this reason be hearkned unto In the mean time let us consider if we can All things are vanity which are the causes of our vexation of Spirit As to the third I look on it as a good Christian contemplation and may in the declination of the disease prove a pleasant Cordial but in the state thereof of little prevalence to a cure because it is a thing we never doubted of but upon the first departure of the Soul of him or her who lived well c. think it received into Eternal bliss And therefore if these thoughts had in them any present sanative virtue they would rather keep us from sorrowing at all since they possess us as soon as our sorrow and are contemporary with our distemper The wise Son of Syrach allows us a moderate sorrow bids us weep for the dead but not over-much because he is at rest And St. Paul's advice or caution is that we sorrow not as others which have no hope that is with a desperate faithless sorrow as if they were eternally lost and that Christ should not raise them up at the last day But surely no man will charitably deny but that a strong Faith and a deep worldly sorrow may sometimes possibly subsist together and that there may be spe dolentes as well as spe gaudentes For I cannot so discard my own charity as not to think some very good men have gone sorrowing to their Graves and yet have rejoyced too in the hopes that God will bring with him those that sleep and they shall meet together But for our present pensive thoughts and mourning 't is sure they arise not only for want of this belief or from any supposed detriment happened or like to happen to our Relation or Friend whom we once enjoyed and now are deprived of but to our selves from our present loss For 't is most certain with every man that whenever any object has stollen into and possessed his heart and taken root there if the same be eradicated and snatched away though he suppose it planted in a more pleasant Soil there will immediately
by way of case put how doleful such an act would prove to him imagine and think of it waking and yet loath and abhor the Act nay tremble at the very thought of it And therefore it appears to me a strange folly as well as cruelty in Dionysius if the story be true That put one of his best friends to Death for dreaming he had cut his Throat and alledged no juster cause than this that what he thought on in the Day that he dreamed on in the Night Had the party that told his dream withal affirmed that his Affections seemed delighted and pleased with the Act I should have thought there had been some ground for the execution but without such declaration no colour of Justice for it If we voluntarily drown as we say our Reason with Wine we cannot excuse the irregular motion of the Imagination nor the assent or compliance of the Affections therewith much less the assent of our will and the putting our thoughts and designs in execution Yet I cannot allow that there is thereby an exaltation of the crime as some Lawyers would because there is an exaltation of the Imagination There are two sins indeed but the latter is not made greater by the former but rather the contrary In no other cases of Reasons disability whether temporary or perpetual whether that we call Delirium Lunacy or Phrenzy and all that we comprize under the general notion of non compos mentis I do verily think that if it happened or came by the default of our own Soul we are answerable to Divine Justice for the deliquity of our very Imagination and the consequent Acts thereof nay I cannot see why we should altogether exempt men from human censure and corporal punishment if the evil of their Imagination appear at any time by overt act provided that punishment extend not to the present separation of the Soul and Body so as to leave the Soul remediless by Death which for ought we know might recover its pristine state here and so purify it self for another state hereafter Most certain it is men can in these cases of Lunacy c. happening one way or other imagine and design evil and not seldom accomplish and compass their evil designs And therefore our great Lawyer in commenting upon the Statute of the 25th Ed. 3. of Treason wherein the very Imagination is struck at shews very little of a Philosopher whatsoever he shews of a Lawyer in my judgment by telling us That a man Non compos mentis a man who is not Master of his Reason or Reason is of no power or Authority in him as I expound it is totally deprived of compassing and Imagination I think he might more truly affirm that he who imagines the death of our Sovereign with any the least appearing assent of his Affections is Non compos mentis than that a man Non compos mentis cannot imagine or have his Will and Affections assent to that Imagination which we find but too often in these kind of men And truly since all our safety depends much on that of our Soverigns and that Lunacy may be so acted as the wisest of men cannot discern the reality thereof I think that Comment might well have been spared and the question left undecided till there had been a necessity for it which God prevent and so of his goodness direct all our thoughts as that they do not outrun our Reason too far and kindle in us such a blind zeal as requires at length a greater power than Reason to controul and suppress I must confess I have ever looked upon this one faculty in us Imagination sufficient to shew us that the extract of the Soul is Divine that as it may be and often is rather than any other faculty immediately influenced from that good Spirit and by it we are enabled sometimes to think that which is good without any precedent motion of any other faculty so it is most subject to delusion from infernal Powers That duly beheld it almost necessarily drives us towards an invocation of one Eternal wise Mind the Creator Preserver Guider and Director of all its works Which is the chief and last thing I designed to set down in this Treatise IV. We cannot deny unto Beast these four faculties of a Soul very fimilar with ours Imagination Memory Affection and Will But we may and do rationally suppose for we cannot observe more in them or the contrary that they imagine through Sense they remember again from Sense they affect by Sense and Will in pursuance hereof only and not otherwise as we have touched already neither can they or are they enabled to weigh and consider so as to raise within themselves an evidence of things unseen which is the proper act of Reason a thing merely incorporeal and necessarily moving upon the cooperation and making a judgment with the assistance or help of other faculties of themselves somewhat more than corporeal likewise So as all our faculties are of Divine extraction and capable to be wrought upon otherwise than through Sense though indeed they are most commonly roused and set on work through bodily Organs as those of Beasts Most certain it is that we do as well as in that excellent faculty Reason whereby we are enabled to ponder and weigh and try and judge of the reality and truth of things herein excell them and go beyond them That we do now and then wish our selves out of this Body which we could never do from Sense and desire a clearer evidence or manifestation and appearance of the truth and reality of our own being and all beings whatsoever the original from whence c. than Sense is able to assist us in or indeed can rightly afford us Then next are not all our Affections readily imployed upon things meerly incorporeal and insensible whenever they offer themselves or are offered thereto Do we not love and admire Truth Justice Mercy c. Do we not hate the contraries thereof falshood wrong and cruelty Every one will confess this But now how are things brought in this shape to the Affections Why chiefly by an Imagination capable of divine impression an Imagination that may be wrought upon otherwise than through Sense and able to introduce apparitions to the other faculties of the Soul without the least help or assistance by Sense so as human Imagination is most certainly divine 'T is no battery upon the Soul through Sense barely no inculcating or telling us by word or Writing that Vertue is amiable which properly make it so to us But first an Inquest our Imagination that presents and next a Judge our Reason that allows and approves of it within us as such Indeed Imagination in Beast lodged immediately over the doors of Sense do's from thence work so strangely to our admiration so circumspectly as I may say direct their Affections and Will as that it has obtained the allowance of some to supply the place of Reason in
we see hear or feel the Effects As concerning any such like future motion the cause of the Wind whence it comes or whither it goes which the Text tells us we know not that is Reason's inquiry and it must be Reason's eye that beholds ought thereabout And what is from thence brought into the Soul is of some continuance a thing no ways incident to Beasts and that which we call belief which whatever it be continues the same till Reason be consulted again and inform otherwise If I believe the Wind to be fluent air If I believe it to be caused by some fermentation like that in our Bodies upon meeting of divers humors upon the concourse of several Atoms If I believe it is sent out of the caverns of the Earth c my belief in each case continues all the while the same till Reason frame another in my Soul Nay Sense shall not alter a belief without some consult of Reason and therefore a belief once raised or framed do's upon every touch of Sense make a kind of resort to Reason for its allowance or disallowance for its continuance as it is or its change For instance if I once believe that you love me or have a kindness for me If after I hear otherwise from others or see a strangeness in your countenance or feel some hard usage from you before the alteration of this first setled opinion or belief there will necessarily be some consult of Reason whether this or that may not be and yet your Affection continue firm Now if Reason do not weigh things by it self but listens only to the introduction of Sense so far forth as to change my belief without due examination this is the thing which I call Credulity and for which Reason is negligent and to blame Though I allow a Will in Brutes Imagination or Cogitation Memory and such a kind of Reason as by and through Sense co-operating with those faculties guides them in a regular motion and may be said to create a knowledge in them yet without Sense it is idle and nothing And can neither put a stop to the Affections in opposition to Sense nor create any such thing as a belief which is a matter effected above and beyond Sense though not clean contrary to Sense as some would have us to believe and through human Reason and is the consequent in such a Soul only as shall be able to work when the windows of Sense shall be shut up or Sense shall be no more Many Beasts are quick of Sense and so of knowledge I grant and may be said to be sensibly rational but not rationally sensible or so much as to consider their Sense or raise any belief about it And this is the utmost I am able to judge of their capacity for I must confess and acknowledge that could I discern more or could any man discover to me some certain indubitable sign of any such rational motion in them at any time as to give a check to their Affections which is the thing I call Conscience or create a light in them out of the reach of Sense and raise an evidence of things not seen which is the thing I adjudge to be Faith or Belief and which the weakest human Soul is in some measure capable of and I doubt not but Divine Grace does sometimes shine upon such beyond our inspection It would overthrow my opinion of their annihilation or else much shake and batter my belief of our own Immortality The Fowls of the Heaven are of so quick Sense as that thereby perceiving the alteration of the Air by a kind of adjunct Reason accompanying that Sense they know their appointed time as 't is said of the Stork and move accordingly yet being uncapable to foresee or judge of any cause thereof they cannot be said to believe ought thereabout before or after Undoubtedly the Ox may know his Feeder from another man as sure as the Feeder knows the Ox from another Beast but the Ox cannot believe any thing of the Feeder that he may or will hurt him upon a displeasure as the Feeder may of the Ox for that must proceed from Reason's inquiry or information above or beyond Sense Many Creatures when they feel pain or are sick and sensible thereof have such a kind of Reason ready attendant as often effectually works their cure without inquiry into natural causes and so may be said to know the cure but yet without an inspect into natural causes 't is impossible to believe it and therefore 't is that rational sight only that creates a belief and is in no wise the sight of Sense Now when from Reason there is raised in the Soul of man especially with concurrence of some Sense collateral as I may say to the thing believed a firm and indubitable belief of any thing we make use of the word knowledge and say we know and yet in truth there is no more than a belief in the case For instance I know I shall dye Now if I had never seen man dy or heard of death I should by my Reason observing my decay and waxing old as a garment verily believe some such thing but withal seeing and hearing continually of the death of others I rest assured I shall dy and so say I know But my own death being absolutely out of the reach of Sense I cannot properly be said to know so much neither does what I say therein amount to any more than a belief And so it is in many like cases where we say We know as where Iob says as we translate it I know that my redeemer liveth there is no more to be understood than a firm strong Faith the like of St. Iohn Baptist giving knowledge of salvation And so I think is St. Paul to be understood in that Chapter where he mentions knowledge so often Now a Beast neither knows or believes any thing of his own death for that as the causes and symptoms of death are out of the reach of his Reason which only accompanies Sense and is nought without it So his very death is out of the reach of Sense it self and he cannot know it For this reason perhaps some may think them the more happy Creature but if we consider it and make good use of our Reason we shall find that over and above that superlative prerogative of beholding in a manner and so believing future happiness we have here a great benefit and advantage by it above other Creatures and are enabled from hence to quit the Affections which otherwise would be disturbed by the often false alarms of Sense to which they are subject and so keep our Soul from being wounded by any thing from without Knowledge I say is a thing of the meaner extract the product of Sense and in no wise of Reason neither is Reason the parent thereof in any case unless in some case of Conscience a thing so much talked of and which I