suddainnesse or circumvent us with subtlety let them not spare to use their advantage But oh ye tutelar spirits ye well know our weaknesse and their strength our sillinesse and their craft their deadly machinations and our miserable obnoxiousnesse neither is your love to markinde and fidelity to your maker any whit lesse then your knowledge so as your charge can no more miscarry under your hands and eyes then your selves As you do alwayes enjoy the beatifical vision of your maker so your eye is never off from his little ones your blessednesse is no more separable from our safety then you from your blessednesse SECT. VI The imployments and operations of Angels EVen while we see you not O ye blessed spirits we know what ye do He that made you hath told us your task As there are many millions of you attending the all-glorious throne of your Creator and singing perpetual Hallelujahs to him in the highest heavens so there are innumerable numbers of you imployed in governing and ordering the creature in guarding the elect in executing the commands which ye receive from the Almighty what variety is here of your assistance One while ye lead us in our way as ye did Israel another while ye instruct us as ye did Daniel one while ye fight for us as ye did for Joshua and Judas Maccabaeus another while ye purvey for us as for Elias one while ye fit us to our holy vocation as ye did to Esay another while ye dispose of the opportunities of our calling for good as ye did of Philips to the Eunuch one while ye foretell our danger as to Lot to Joseph and Mary another while ye comfort our affliction as to Hagar one while ye oppose evil projects against us as to Balaam another while ye will be striven with for a blessing as with Jacob one while ye resist our offensive courses as to Moses another while ye incourage us in our devotions as ye did Paul and Silas and Cornelius one while ye deliver from durance as Peter another while ye preserve us from danger and death as the three children one while ye are ready to restrain our presumption as the Cherub before the gate of Paradise another while to excite our courage as to Elias and Theodosius one while to refresh and chear us in our sufferings as to the Apostles another while to prevent our sufferings as to Jacob in the pursuit of Laban and Esau to the Sages in the pursuit of Herod one while ye cure our bodies as at the pool of Bethesda another while ye carry up our souls to glory as ye did to Lazarus It were endlesse to instance in all the gracious offices which ye perform Certainly there are many thousand events wherein common eyes see nothing but nature which yet are effected by the ministration of Angels when Abraham sent his servant to procure a wife for his son from amongst his own cognation the messenger saw nothing but men like himself but Abraham saw an Angel fore-contriving the work God saith he shal send his Angel before thee that thou mayest take a wife thence when the Israelites forcibly by dint of sword expelled the Canaanites and Amorites and the other branded nations nothing appeared but their own arms but the Lord of hosts could say I will send mine Angel before thee by whom I shall drive them thence Balaam saw his Asse disorderly starting in the path he that formerly had seen Visions now sees nothing but a wall and a way but in the mean time his Asse who for the present had more of the Prophet then his Master could see an Angel and a sword The Sodomites went groping in the street for Lots door and misse it they thought of nothing but some suddain dizzinesse of brain that disappointed them we know it was an Angel that stroke them with blindenesse Nothing appeared when the Egyptian first-born were struck dead in one night the Astrologers would perhaps say they were Planet-struck we know it was done by the hand of an Angel Nothing was seen at the pool of Bethesda but a moved water when the suddain cures were wrought which perhaps might be attributed to some beneficiall constellation we know that an Angel descended and made the water thus sanative Gâ—hezi saw his master strangely preserved from the Aramite troops but had not his eyes been opened by the Prophets prayers he had not seen whence that aid came Neither is it otherwise in the frequent experiments of our life Have we been raised up from deadly sicknesses when all naturall helps have given us up Gods Angels have been our secret Physitians Have we had instinctive intimations of the death of some absent friends which no humane intelligence hath bidden us to suspect who but our Angels hath wrought it have we been preserved from mortall dangers which we could not tell how by our providence to have evaded our invisible Guardians have done it I see no reason to dislike that observation of Gerson Whence is it saith he that little children are conserved from so many perils of their infancy fire water falls suffocations but by the agency of Angels Surely where we find a probability of second causes in nature we are apt to confine our thoughts from looking higher yet even there many times are unseen hands had we seen the house fall upon the heads of Jobs children we should perhaps have attributed it to the natural force of a vehement blast when now we know it was the work of a spirit Had we seen those thousands of Israel falling dead of the plague we should have complain'd of some strange infection in the air when David saw the Angel of God acting in that mortality Humane reason is apt to be injuriously saucie in ascribing those things to an ordinary course of natural causes which the God of nature doth by supernatural agents A master of Philosophy travelling with others on the way when a fearfull thunder-storm arose checked the fear of his fellows and discoursed to them of the naturall reasons of that uprore in the clouds and those suddain flashes wherewith they seemed out of the ignorances of causes to be too much affrighted in the midst of his philosophicall discourse he was strucken dead with that dreadfull eruption which he sleighted what could this be but the finger of that God who will have his works rather entertained with wonder and trembling then with curious scanning Neither is it otherwise in those violent Huracans devouring earthquakes and more then ordinary tempests and fiery apparitions which we have seen and heard of for however there be natural causes given of the usual events of this kinde yet nothing hinders but that the Almighty for the manifestation of his power and justice may set spirits whether good or evil on work to do the same things sometimes with more state and magnificence of horrour like as we see Frogs bred ordinarily both out of putrefaction and generation and yet
Angell is able to chase whole troops of these malignant For though their naturall powers in regard of the substance of them be still retained yet in regard of the exercise and execution of them they are abated and restrained by the over-ruling order of divine Justice and mercy from which far be that infinite incongruity that evill should prevail above God The same God therefore who so disposeth the issue of these humane contentions that the race is not to the swift nor the battell to the strong cowardizeth and daunteth these mighty and insolent spirits so as they cannot stand before one of these glorious Angels nor prevail any further then his most wise providence hath contrived to permit for his own most holy purposes How ever yet we be upon these grounds safe in the good hands of the Almighty and of those his blessed Guardians to whom he hath committed our charge yet it well befits us to take notice of those powerfull executions of the evill Angels which it pleaseth the great Arbiter of the world to give way unto that we may know what cause we have both of vigilance and gratitude SECT. III. Of the power of Devils NO Dwarfe will offer to wrestle with a Giant it is an argument of no smal power as well as boldnesse of that proud spirit that he durst strive with Michael the Archangell and though he were as then foiled in the conflict yet he ceaseth not still to oppose his Hierarchy to the Celestiall and not there prevailing he poures out his tyranny where he is suffered on this inferior world One while fetching down fire from heaven which the messenger called the fire of God upon the flocks and shepherds of Job another while blustring in the air with hurrying winds and furious tempests breaking downe the strongest towers and turning up the stoutest oaks tearing asunder the hardest rocks and rending of the tops of the firmest mountains one while swelling up the raging Sea to suddain inundations another while causing the earth to totter and tremble under our feet would we descend to the particular demonstrations of the powerfull operations of evill spirits this discourse would have no end If we do but cast our eyes upon Jannes and Jambres the Egyptian Sorcerers in whom we have formerly instanced in another Treatise to this purpose we shall see enough to wonder at How close did they for a time follow Moses at the heels imitating those miraculous works which God had appointed and inabled him to do for Pharaohs conviction Had not the faith of that worthy servant of God been invincible how blank must he needs have looked to see his great works patterned by those presumptuous rivals Doth Moses turn his rod into a serpent every of their rods crawleth and hisseth as well as his Doth he smite the waters into bloud their waters are instantly as bloudy as his Doth he fetch frogs out of Nilus into Pharaohs bed-chamber and bosome and into the ovens and kneading troughs of his people they can store Egypt with loathsome cattle as well as he All this while Pharaoh knows no difference of a God and hardly yeelds whether Jannes or Moses be the better man although he might easily have decided it out of the very acts done he saw Moses his serpent devoured theirs so as now there was neither serpent nor rod and whiles they would be turning their rod into aserpent both rod and serpent were lost in that serpent which returned into a rod He saw that those Sorcerers who had brought the frogs could not remove them and soon after sees that those juglers who pretended to make serpents bloud frogs cannot when God pleaseth to restrain them make so much as a louse But supposing the sufferance of the Almighty who knows what limits to prescribe to these infernall powers They can beguile the senses mock the fantasie work strongly by philtres upon the affections assume the shapes of man or beast inflict grievous torment on the body conveigh strange things insensibly into it transport it from place to place in quick motions cause no lesse suddain disparitions of it heal diseases by charmes and spels frame hideous apparitions and in short by applying active powers to passive subjects they can produce wonderful effects each of all which were easie to be instanced in whole volumes if it were needfull out of history and experience Who then O God who is able to stand before these sons of Anak what are we in such hands Oh match desperately unequal of weaknesse with power flesh with spirit man with Devils Away with this cowardly diffidence Chear up thy self O my soul against these heartlesse fears and know the advantage is on thy side Could Samson have been firmly bound hand and foot by the Philistine cords so as he could not have stirred those mighty limbs of his what boy or girl of Gath or Ascalon would have fear'd to draw near and spurn that awed champion No other is the condition of our dreadfull enemies they are fast bound up with the adamantine chains of Gods most mercifull and inviolable decree and forcibly restrained from their desired mischief Who can be afraid of a muzzled and tyed up mastive What woman or childe cannot make faces at a fierce Lion or a bloudy Bajazet lockt up fast in an iron grate were it not for this strong and straight curb of divine providence what good man could breath one minute upon earth The Demoâ—iack in the Gospel could break his iron fetters iâ— pieces through the help of his â—egion those Devils that possessed him could not break theirs they are fain to sue for leave to enter into swine neither had obtained it in all likelyhood but for a just punishment to those Gadarene owners How sure may we then be that this just hand of omnipotence will not suffer these evill ones to tyrannize over his chosen vessels for their hurt How safe are we since their power is limited our protection infinite SECT. IV. Of the knowledge and malice of wicked Spirits WHo can know how much he is bound to God for safe-guard if he doe not apprehend the quality of those enemies wherewith he is incompassed whose knowledge and skil is no whit inferiour to their power They have not the name of Daemones for nothing their natural knowledge was not forfeited by their fall the wisdom of the infinite giver of it knows how rather to turn it to the use of his own glory However therefore they are kept ofâ— from those divine illuminations which the good Angels receive from God yet they must needs be granted to have such a measure of knowledge as cannot but yeeld them a formidable advantage For as spirits being not stripped of their original knowledge together with their glory they cannot but know the natures and constitutions of the creatures and thereby their tempers dispositions inclinations conditions faculties and therewith their wants their weaknesse and obnoxiousnesse and thereupon strongly conjecture at their
even their omnipotent maker who best knows what is derived from him styles them by his Apostle Powers and by his Psalmist mighty ones in strength A small force seems great to the weak but that power which is commended by the Almighty must needs be transcendently great we best judge of powerfulnesse by the effects How suddainly had one Angel dispatched every first-born in Egypt and after them the hundred fourscore and five thousand of the proud Assyrian Army and if each man had been a Legion with what ease had it been done by that potent spirit Neither are they lesse able to preserve then to destroy That of Aquinas is a great word One Angel is of such power that be were able to govern all the corporeall creatures of the world Justly was it exploded as the wild heresie of Simon Magus and his clients the Meandâ—ians that the Angels made the world No this was the sole work of him that made them but if we say that it pleases God by their ministration to sway and order the marvailous affairs of this great Universe we shall not I suppose vary from truth If we look to the highest part thereof Philosophers have gone so far as to teach us that which is seconded by the allowance of some great Divines that these blessed Intelligences are they by whose agency under their Almighty Creator the heavens and the glorious luminaries thereof continue their ever-constant and regular motions And if there fall out any preternaturall immutations in the elements any strange concussations of the earth any direfull prodigies in the skie whither should they be imputed but to these mighty Angels whom it pleaseth the most high God to imploy in these extraordinary services That dreadfull magnificence which was in the delivering of the Law on Mount Sinai in fire smoak thundrings lightnings voices earthquakes whence was it but by the operation of Angels And indeed as they are the nearest both in nature and place to the majesty of the highest so it is most proper for them to participate most of his power and to exercise it in obedience to his Soveraignty As therefore he is that infinite Spirit who doth all things and can do no more then all so they as his immediate subordinates are the means whereby he executeth his illimited power in and upon this whole created world Whence it is that in their glorious appearances they have been taken for Jehovah himself by Hagar by Manoah and his wife yea by the better eyes of the Father of the faithfull Now Lord what a protection hast thou provided for thy poor worms and not men creeping here on thine earth and what can we fear in so mighty and sure hands He that passeth with a strong convoy through a wild and perilous desert scorns the danger of wild beasts or robbers no lesse then if he were in a strong tower at home so do we the onsets of the powers of darknesse whiles we are thus invincibly guarded When God promised Moses that an Angel should goe before Israel and yet withall threatned the subduction of his own presence I marvel not if the holy man were no lesse troubled then if they had been left destitute and guardless and that he ceased not his importunity till he had won the gracious ingagement of the Almighty for his presence in that whole expedition For what is the greatest Angel in heaven without his maker But let thy favour O God order and accompany the deputation of the lowest of thine Angels what can all the troops of hell hurt us Assoon may the walls of heaven be scaled and thy throne deturbed as he can be foiled that is defenced with thy power Were it possible to conceive that the Almighty should be but a looker on in the conflict of spirits we know that the good Angels have so so much advantage of their strength as they have of their station neither could those subdued spirits stand in the incounter but now he that is strong in our weaknesse is strong in their strength for us blessed be God for them as the Author of them and their protection Blessed be they under God as the means used by him for our protection and blessings SECT. V. The knowledge of Angels IF Sampson could have had his full strength in his mill when he wanted his eyes it would have little availed him such is power without knowledge but where both of these concur in one how can they fail of effect Whether of these is more eminent in the blessed spirits it is not easie to determine so perfectly knowing are they as that the very heathen Philosophers have styled them by the name of Intelligences as if their very being were made up of understanding Indeed what is there in this whole compass of the large Universe that is hid from their eyes only the closet of mans heart is lockt up from them as reserved solely to their maker yet so as that â—hey can by some insensible chinks of those secret notifications which fall from us look into them also all other things whether secrets of nature or closest counsels or events are as open to their sight as the most visible objects are to ours They do not as we mortals are wont look through the dim and horny spectacle oâ— senses or understand by the mediation of Phantasms but rather as clear mirrours they receive at once the full representations of all intelligible things having besides that connaturall light which is universally in them all certain speciall illuminations from the Father of lights Even we men think we know something neither may our good God lose the thank of his bounty this way but alas he that is reputed to have known most of all the heathen whom * some have styled the Genius of nature could confesse that the clearest understanding is to those things which are most manifest but as a bats eyes to the Sun Do we see but a worm crawling under our feet we know not what that is which in it self gives it a being Do we hear but a Bee humming about our ears the greatest Naturalist cannot know whether that noise come from within the body or from the mouth or from the wings of that Flie How can we then hope or pretend to know those things which are abstruse and remote But these heavenly spirits do not only know things as they are in themselves and in their inward and immediate causes but do clearly see the first and universal cause of all things and that in his glorious essence how much more do they know our shallow dispositions affections inclinations which peer out of the windows of our hearts together with all perils and events that are incident unto us We walk therefore amids not more able then watchfull overseers and so are we lookt thorough in all our wayes as if heaven were all eyes Under this blessed vigilancy if the powers of hell can either surprize us with
when it was for a plague to Egypt they were supernaturally produced Hail an ordinary meteore murrain of Cattel an ordinary disease yet for a plague to obdured Pharaoh miraculously wrought Neither need there be any great difficulty in discerning when such like events run in a natural course and when spirits are actors in them the manner of their operation the occasions and effects of them shall soon discry them to a judicious eye for when we shall finde that they do manifestly deviate from the road of nature and work above the power of secondary causes it is easie to determine them to be of an higher efficiency I could instance irrefragrably in severall tempests and thunderstorms which to the unspeakable terrour of the inhabitants were in my time seen heard felt in the Western parts wherein the translocation and transportation of huge massy stones and irons of the Churches above the possibility of naturall distance together with the strange preservation of the persons assembled with other accidents sensibly accompanying those astonishing works of God still fresh in the minds of many shewed them plainly to be wrought by a stronger hand then natures * And whither else should we ascribe many events which ignorance teacheth us to wonder at in silence If murders be descryed by the fresh bleeding of cold and almost putrefied carcasses If a man by some strong instinct be warned to change that lodging which he constantly held for some years and findes his wonted sleeping place that night crushed with the unexpected fall of an unsuspected contignation If a man distressed with care for the missing of an important evidence †such a one I have known shal be informed in his dream in what hole of his Dove-cote he shall find it hid If a man without all observation of Physical criticisms shall receive and give intelligence many dayes before what hour shal be his last to what cause can we attribute these but to our attending Angels If a man shall in his dream as Marcus Aurelius Antoninus professes receive the prescript of the remedy of his disease which the Physitians it seems could not cure whence can this be but by the suggestion of spirits And surely since I am convinced that their unfelt hands are in many occurrences of my life I have learned so much wit and grace as rather to yeeld them too much then too little stroke in ordering all my concernments O ye blessed spirits many things I know ye do for me which I discern not whiles ye do them but after they are done and many things ye may do more which I know not I blesse my God and yours as the author of all ye doe I blesse you as the means of all that is done by you for me SECT. VII The Degrees and Orders of Angels HEaven hath nothing in it but perfection but even perfection it self hath degrees as the glorified souls so the blessed Angels have their heights of excellency and glory He will be known for the God of Order observeth no doubt a most exact order in his Court of heaven nearest to the residence of his Majesty Equality hath no place either in earth or in hell we have no reason to seek it in heaven He that was rapt into the third heaven can tell us of Thrones Dominions Principalities Angels and Arch-angels in that region of blessednesse We cannot be so simple as to think these to be but one classe of spirits doubtlesse they are distinctions of divers orders But what their severall ranks offices employments are he were not more wise that could tell then he is bold that dare speak What modest indignation can forbear stamping at the presumption of those men who as if upon Domingo Gonsales his engine they had been mounted by his Gansaes from the Moon to the Empyreall heaven and admitted to be the heralds or masters of ceremonies in that higher world have taken upon them to marshall these Angelicall spirits into their severall rooms proportioning their stations dignities services according to the model of earthly Courts disposing them into Ternions of three generall Hierarchies the first relating to the immediate attendance of the Almighty the other two to the government of the Creature both generall and particular In the first of Assistents placing the Seraphim as Lords of the chamber Cherubim as Lords of the cabinet-counsel Thrones as entire Favourites in whom the Almighty placeth his rest In the second of universall Regency finding Dominions to be the great Officers of State who as Chancellours Marshals Treasurers govern the affairs of the world Mights to be the Generals of the heavenly Militia Powers as the Judges Itinerant that serve for generall retributions of good and evil In the third of speciall government placing Principalities as rulers of severall Kingdoms and Provinces Archangels as guardians to severall Cities and Countreys and lastly Angels as guardians of several persons And withall presuming to define the differences of degrees in each order above other in respect of the goodlinesse and excellency of their nature making the Arch-angels no lesse then ten times to surpasse the beauty of Angels Principalities twenty times above the Arch-angels Powers forty times more then Principalities Mights fifty more then Powers Domininions sixty above Mights Thrones seventy above Dominions Cherubim eighty above thrones Seraphim ninety times exceeding the Cherubim For me I must crave leave to wonder at this boldnesse and professe my self as far to seek whence this learning should come as how to beleeve it I do verily beleeve there are divers orders of celestial spirits I beleeve they are not to be beleeved that dare to determine them especially when I see him that was rapt into the third heaven varying the order of their places in his severall mentions of them Neither can I trust to the Revelation of that Sainted Prophetesse who hath ranged the degrees of the beatitude of glorified souls into the several chores of these heavenly Hierarchies according to their dispositions and demeanures here on earth admitting those who have been charitably helpfull to the poor sick strangers into the orb of Angels Those who have given themselves to meditation and prayer to the rank of Archangels those who have vanquished all offensive lusts in themselves to the order of Principalities to the height of Powers those whose care and vigilance hath restrained from evil and induced to good such as have been committed to their oversight and governance To the place of Mights those who for the honour of God have undauntedly and valiantly suffered and whose patience hath triumphed over evils To the company of Dominions those who prefer poverty to riches and devoutly conform their wills in all things to their Makers To the society of Thrones those who do so inure themselves to the continuall contemplation of heavenly things as that they have disposed their hearts to be a fit resting place for the Almighty To the honour of Cherubim those