no contemptible arguments for it For first Jerem. 2. 18. Sihor is a River of Aegypt which is not questioned to be any other then Nilus and its Etymon seems to bewray the truth of it from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 denigrari from the muddy blacknesse of the River And Nilus is notorious for this quality and therefore has its denomination thence in the Greek quasi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 acording to which is that of Dionysius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is For there 's no River can compare with Nile For casting mud and fattening the soile But now to recite the very words of the Prophet What hast thou to do with the way of Egypt to drink the waters of Sihor the Latine has it ut bibas aquam turbidam This is Nilu◠But the Seventy translate it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To drink the water of Gihon which is the name of this very River of Paradise And the Abyssines also even to this day call Nilus by the name of Guion Adde unto this that Gihon runs in Aethiopia so does Nilus and is Siris as it runs through Aethiopia which is from Sihor it is likely and then the Greek termination makes it Sioris after by contraction Siris 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is The Aethiopian him Siris calls Syene Nilus when by her he crawls As the same Author writes in his Geographical Poems And that Pison is Ganges has also its probabilities Ganges being in India a Countrey famous for Gold and precious Stones Besides the notation of the name agrees with the nature of the River Pison being from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 multiplicare And there is no lesse a number then Ten and those great Rivers that exonerate themselves into Ganges as there must be a conflux of multifarious experience to fill up and compleat that virtue of Wisdome or Prudence So that we shall see that the four Rivers of Paradise have got such names as are most advantageous and favourable to the mysterious sense of the story Wherefore regardlesse here of all Geographical scrupulosities we will say that Gihon is Nilus or Siris the River of the Aethiopians that is of the Just and the virtue is here determinately set off from the subject wherein it doth reside For by the fame of the Justice and Innocency of the Aethiopians we are assured which of the Cardinal Virtues is meant by Gihon And the ancient fame of their honesty and uprightnesse was such that Homer has made it their Epithet calling them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The blamelesse Aethiopians adding further that Jupiter used to banquet with them he being so much taken with the integrity of their conversation And Dionysius calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The divine or Deiforme Aethiopians and they were so styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by reason of their Justice as Eustathius comments upon the place Herodotus also speaking of them says they are very goodly men and much civilized and of a very long life which is the reward of Righteousnesse So that by the place where Gihon runs it is plainly signified to us what Cardinal Virtue is to be understood thereby Notation of the name thereof The name Gihon as you have seen fairly incites us to acknowledge it a River of Aethiopia The notation thereof does very sutably agree with the nature of Justice for it is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 erumpere And Justice is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bonum alienum as the Philosopher notes not confined within a mans self but breaks out rather upon others bestowing upon every one what is their due Ver. 14. Is Hiddekell The word is compounded says Vatablus from two words that signifie velox rapidum and this virtue like a swift and rapid stream bears down all before it as you have it in the Cabbala And stoutly resists Philo uses here the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to resist which he takes occasion from the Seventies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he interprets against the Assyrians The Hebrew has it Eastward of Assyria and therefore Assyria is situated Westward of it Now the West is that quarter of the world where the Sun bidding us adieu leaves us to darkness whence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the West wind in Eustathius has its name from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the wind that blows from the dark Quarter Assyria therefore is that false state of seeming happiness and power of wickednesse which is called the kingdome of darknesse And this is the most noble object of Fortitude to destroy the power of this kingdome within our selves Perath From 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fructificavit Ver. 17. In processe of time c. This is according to the minde of the Pythagoreans and Origen And that Pythagoras had the favour of having the Mosaical Cabbala communicated to him by some knowing Priest of the Jewes or some holy man or other I think I have continuedly in the former Chapter made it exceeding probable The Region of mortality and death Nothing is more frequent with the Platonists then the calling of the body a Sepulchre and this life we live here upon Earth either sleep or death Which expressions are so sutable with this Cabbala and the Cabbala with the Text of Moses that mentions the death and sleep of Adam that it is a shrewd presumption that these Phrases and Notions came first from thence And Philo acknowledges that Heraclitus that mysterious and abstruse Philosopher whom Porphyrius also has cited to the same purpose in his De antro Nympharum has even hit upon the very meaning that Moses intends in this death of Adam in that famous saying of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We live their death to wit of the souls out of the body but we are dead to their life And Euripides that friend of Socrates and fellow-traveller of Plato's in his Tragedies speaks much to the same purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who knows whether to live be not to die and to die to live So that the Philosophick sense concerning Adams death must be this that he shall be dead to the Aethereal life he lived before while he is restrained to the Terrestrial and that when as he might have lived for ever in the Aethereal Life he shall in a shorter time assuredly die to the Terrestrial That the sons of men cannot escape either the certainty or speed of death Ver. 18. Both good for himself c. For the words of the Text doe not confine it to Adams conveniency alone but speaks at large without any restraint in this present verse Wherefore there being a double convenience it was more explicite to mention both in the Cabbala Ver. 19. Fallen and unfallen Angels The fallen Angels are here assimilated to the Beasts of the Field the unfallen to the Fowls of the Air. How fitly the fallen Spirits are reckoned amongst the Beasts
nakedness came into the world but the toil and drudgery of Tillage and Husbandry the grievous pangs of Childe-bearing and lastly what is most terrible of all Death it self Of all which as of some other things also I shall give you such plain and intelligible reasons that your own hearts could not wish more plain and more intelligible To what an happy condition Adam was created you have already heard How he was placed by God in a Garden of delight where all his senses were gratified with the most pleasing objects imaginable his eyes with the beautie of trees and flowers and various delightsome forms of living creatures his ears with the sweet musical accents of the canorous birds his smell with the fragrant odours of Aromatick herbs his taste with variety of delicious fruit and his touch with the soft breathings of the air in the flowry alleys of this ever-springing Paradise Adde unto all this that pleasure of pleasures the delectable conversation of his beautiful Bride the enjoyments of whose love neither created care to himself nor pangs of childe-bearing to her for all the functions of life were performed with ease and delight and there had been no need for man to sweat for the provision of his family for in this Garden of Eden there was a perpetual Spring and the vigour of the soil prevented mans industry and youth and jollity had never left the bodies of Adam and his posterity because old age and death were perpetually to be kept off by that soveraign virtue of the Tree of Life And I know as you heartily could wish this state might have ever continued to Adam and his seed so you eagerly expect to hear the reason why he was depriv'd of it and in short it is this His disobedience to a commandement which God had given him the circumstances whereof I shall declare unto you as followeth Amongst those several living creatures which were in Paradise there was the Serpent also whom you know to this very day to be full of subtilty therefore you will lesse wonder if when he was in his perfection he had not onely the use of Reason but the power of Speech It was therefore this Serpent that was the first occasion of all this mischief to Adam and his posterity for he cunningly came unto the woman and said unto her Is it so indeed that God has commanded you that you shall not eat of any of the trees of the Garden 2 And the woman answered unto the Serpent You are mistaken God hath not forbid us to eat of all the fruit of the trees of the Garden 3 But indeed of the fruit of the Tree in the midst of the Garden God hath strictly charged us Ye shall not eat of it neither shall ye touch it lest ye die 4 But the Serpent said unto the woman Tush I warrant you this is only but to terrifie you and abridge you of that liberty and happinesse you are capable of you shall not so certainly die 5 But God knows the virtue of that tree full well that so soon as you eat thereof your eyes shall be opened and you shall become as Gods knowing good and evil 6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was pleasant to the eye and a tree to be desired to make one wise she took of the fruit and did eat and gave also to her husband with her and he did eat 7 And the eyes of them both were opened and they knew they were naked and were ashamed and therefore they sewed fig-leaves together and made themselves aprons to cover their parts of shame 8 And the Lord God came into the Garden toward the cool of the evening and walking in the Garden call'd for Adam But Adam had no sooner heard his voice but he and his wife ran away into the thickest of the trees of the Garden to hide themselves from his presence 9 But the Lord God called unto Adam the second time and said unto him Adam where art thou 10 Then Adam was forc't to make answer and said I heard thy voice in the Garden and I was afraid because I was naked and so I hid my self 11 Then God said unto him Who hath made thee so wise that thou shouldst know that thou art naked or wantest any covering Hast thou eaten of the forbidden fruit 12 And Adam excus'd himself saying The woman whom thou recommendedst to me for a meet help she gave me of the fruit and I did eat 13 And the Lord God said unto the woman What is this that thou hast done And the woman excus'd her self saying The Serpent beguiled me and I did eat 14 Then the Lord God gave sentence upon all three and to the Serpent he said Because thou hast done this thou art cursed above all cattel and above every beast of the field and whereas hitherto thou hast been able to bear thy body aloft and go upright thou shalt henceforth creep upon thy belly like a worm and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life 15 And there shall be a perpetual antipathy betwixt not only the woman and thee but betwixt her seed and thy seed For universal mankind shall abhorre thee and hate all the cursed generations that come of thee They indeed shall busily lie in wait to sting mens feet which their skill in herbs however shall be able to cure but they shall knock all Serpents on the head and kill them without pity or remorse deservedly using thy seed as their deadly enemy 16 And the doom of the woman was Her sorrow and pangs in childe-bearing and her subjection to her husband Which law of subjection is generally observed in the Nations of the world unto this very day 17 And the doom of Adam was The toil of Husbandry upon barren ground 18 For the earth was cursed for his sake which is the reason that it brings forth thorns and thistles and other weeds that Husbandmen could wish would not cumber the ground upon which they bestow their toilsome labor 19 Thus in the sweat of his face was Adam to eat his bread till he return to the dust out of which he was taken 20 And Adam called his wife Eve because she was the mother of all men that ever were born into the world and lived upon the face of the earth 21 And the generations of men were clothed at first with the skins of wilde beasts the use of which God taught Adam and Eve in Paradise 22 And when they were thus accoutred for their journey and armed for greater hardship God turns them both out and the Lord God said concerning Adam deriding him for his disobedience Behold Adam is become as one of us to know good and evil Let us look to him now lest he put his hand to the Tree of Life and so make himself immortal 23 Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the Garden of Eden to till the ground from whence
had joyes multiplyed upon the whole man beyond all expression and imagination for ever he now sunk more and more towards a mortal and terrestrial estate himself not being unsensible thereof as you shall hear when I have told you the doom of the Eternal God concerning the Serpent and him 14 Things therefore having been carried on in this wise the Eternal Lord God decreed thus with himself concerning the Serpent and Adam That this old Serpent the Prince of the rebellious Angels should be more accursed then all the rest and whereas he lorded it aloft in the higher parts of the Air and could glide in the very Ethereal Region amongst the innocent and unflan souls of men and the good Angels before that he should now sweep the dust with his belly being cast lower towards the surface of the Earth 15 And that there should be a general enmity and abhorrency betwixt this old Serpent as also all of his fellow-rebels and betwixt Mankinde And that in processe of time the ever faithful and obedient Soul of the Messias should take a Body and should trample over the power of the Devil very notoriously here upon Earth and after his death should be constituted Prince of all the Angelical Orders whatever in Heaven 16 And concerning Adam the Eternal Lord God decreed that he should descend down to be an Inhabitant of the Earth and that he should not there indulge to himself the pleasures of the body without the concomitants of pain and sorrow and that his Feminine part his Affections should be under the chastisement and correction of his Reason 17 That he should have a wearisome and toilsome travail in this world 18 The Earth bringing forth thorns and thistles though he must subsist by the Corn of the field 19 Wherefore in the sweat of his browes he should eat his bread till he returned unto the ground of which his terrestrial body is made This was the Counsel of God concerning Adam and the Serpent 20 Now as I was a telling you Adam though he was sinking apace into those lower functions of life yet his minde was not as yet grown so fully stupid but he had the knowledge of his own condition and added to all his former Apologies that the Feminine part in him though it had seduced him yet there was some use of this mis-carriage for the Earth would hence be inhabited by Intellectual Animals wherefore he call'd the Life of his Vehicle EVE because she is indeed the Mother of all the generations of men that live upon the Earth 21 At last the Plastick Power being fully awakened Adams Soul descended into the prepared matter of the Earth and in due processe of time Adam appear'd cloth'd in the skin of beasts that is he became a down-right terrestrial Animal and a mortal creature upon earth 22 For the Eternal God had so decreed and his Wisdome Mercy and Justice did but if I may so speak play and sport together in the businesse And the rather because Adam had but precipitated himself into that condition which in due time might have faln to his share by course for it is fitting there should be some such head among the living creatures of the earth as a terrestrial Adam but to live always here were his disadvantage 23 Wherefore when God remov'd him from that higher condition 24 He made sure he should not be Immortal nor is he in any capacity of reaching unto the Tree of Life without passing through his fiery Vehicle and becoming a pure and defecate Ethereal Spirit Then he may be admitted to taste the fruit of the Tree of Life and Immortality and so live for ever THE MORAL CABBALA CHAP. I. 1 Man a Microcosme or Little World in whom there are two Principles Spirit and Flesh 2 The Earthly or Fleshly Nature appears first 4 The Light of Conscience unlistned to 6 The Spirit of Savory and Affectionate discernment betwixt good and evil 10 The inordinate desires of the flesh driven aside and limited 11 Hereupon the plants of Righteousnesse bear fruit and flourish 16 The hearty and sincere Love of God and a mans neighbour is as the Sun in the Soul of man Notionality and Opinions the weak and faint Light of the dispersed Stars 18 Those that walk in sincere Love walk in the Day They that are guided by Notionality travel in the Night 22 The Natural Concupiscible brings forth by the command of God and is corrected by devotion 24 The Irascible also brings forth 26 Christ the Image of God is created being a perfect Ruler over all the motions of the Irascible and Concupiscible 29 The food of the divine Life 30 The food of the Animal Life 31 The divine Wisdome approves of whatsoever is simply natural as good 1 WEE shall set before you in this History of Genesis several eminent examples of good and perfect men such as Abel Seth Enoch Abraham and the like Wherefore we thought fit though Aenigmatically and in a dark Parable to shadow out in general the manner of progresse to this divine Perfection Looking upon Man as a Microcosm or a Little World who if he hold out the whole progresse of the Spiritual Creation the processe thereof will be figuratively understood as follows Wherefore first of all I say that by the will of God every man living on the face of the Earth hath these two Principles in him Heaven and Earth Divinity and Animality Spirit and Flesh 2 But that which is Animal or Natural operates first the Spiritual or heavenly Life lying for a while closed up at rest in its own Principle During which time and indeed some while afterwards too the Animal or Fleshly Life domineers in darknesse and deformity the mighty tempestuous Passions of the flesh contending and strugling over that Abysse of unsatiable Desire which has no bottome and which in this case carries the minde to nothing but emptinesse and unprofitablenesse 3 But by the will of God it is that afterwards the Day-light appears though not in so vigorous measure out of the Heavenly or Spiritual Principle 4 And Conscience being thus enlightned offers her self a guide to a better condition and God has fram'd the nature of man so that he cannot but say that this Light is good and distinguish betwixt the dark tumultuous motions of the Flesh and it 5 And say that there is as true a difference as betwixt the natural Day and Night And thus Ignorance and Enquiry was the first days progresse 6 But though there be this principle of Light set up in the Conscience of Man and he cannot say any thing against it but that it is good and true yet has he not presently so lively and savoury a relish in his distinction betwixt the evil and the good For the evil as yet wholly holds his Affections though his Fancy and Reason be toucht a little with the Theoretical apprehensions of what is good wherefore by the will of God the heavenly Principle in due
of the Field you shall understand more fully in the following Chapter In the mean time you may take notice that the Platonists indeed Plato himself in his Phaedrus makes the Soul of Man before it falls into this Terrestrial Region a winged Creature And that such phrases as these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the like are proper expressions of that School And Plato does very plainly define what he means by these wings of the soul and there is the same reason of all other spirits whatsoever after this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the nature of the wing of the soul is such as to be able to carry upward that which otherwise would slugge downwards and to bear it aloft and place it there where we may have more sensible communion with God and his holy Angels For so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the plural number is most sutably translated in such passages as these and most congruously to the thing it self and the truth of Christianity And it may well seem the lesse strange that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should signifie Angels in the Greek Philosophers especially such as have been acquainted with Moses when as with him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies so too viz. Angels as well as God Wherefore to conclude the losse of that Principle that keeps us in this divine condition is the losing of our wings which fallen Angels have done and therefore they may be very well assimilated to Terrestrial Beasts Ver. 20. A faculty of being united c. This vital aptitude in the soul of being united with corporeal Matter being so essential to her and proper the invigorating the exercise of that faculty cannot but be very grateful and acceptable to her and a very considerable share of her happinesse Else what means the Resurrection of the dead or Bodies in the other world which yet is an Article of the Christian Faith Ver. 22. This new sense of his Vehicle There be three Principles in Man according to the Platonists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first is Intellect Spirit or divine Light the second the Soul her self which is Adam the Man Animus cujusque is est quisque the Soul of every man that is the Man the third is the image of the Soul which is her vital Energie upon the Body wherewith she does enliven it and if that life be in good tune and due vigour it is a very grateful sense to the soul whether in this Body or in a more thin Vehicle This Ficinus makes our Eve This is the Feminine Faculty in the Soul of Man which awakes then easiliest into act when the Soul to Intellectuals falls asleep Ver. 24. Over-tedious aspires 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a solemn monition of Aristotle somewhere in his Ethicks And it is a great point of wisdome indeed and mainly necessary to know the true laws and bounds of humane happinesse that the heat of melancholy drive not men up beyond what is competible to humane nature and the reach of all the faculties thereof Nor the too savoury relish of the pleasures of the flesh or Animal Life keep them down many thousand degrees below what they are capable of But the man that truly fears God will be delivered from them both What I have spoken is directed more properly to the soul in the flesh but may Analogically be understood of a soul in any Vehicle for they are peccable in them all Ver. 25. Stood naked before God Adam was as truly clothed in Corporeity now as ever after for the Aether is as true a body as the Earth But the meaning is Adam had a sense of the divine Presence very feelingly assured in his own minde that his whole Beeing lay naked and bare before God and that nothing could be hid from his sight which pierced also to the very thoughts and inward frame of his spirit But yet though Adam stood thus naked before him notwithstanding he found no want of any covering to hide himself from that presentifick sense of him nor indeed felt himself as naked in that notion of nakednesse For that sense of nakednesse and want of further covering and sheltring from the divine Presence arose from his disobedience and rebellion against the commands of God which as yet he had not faln into Not at all ashamed Shame is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fear of just reprehension as Gellius out of the Philosophers defines it But Adam having not acted any thing yet at randome after the swing of his own will he had done nothing that the divine Light would reprehend him for He had not yet become obnoxious to any sentence from his own condemning Conscience for he kept himself hitherto within the bounds of that divine Law written in his soul and had attempted nothing against the Will of God So that there being no sin there could not as yet be any shame in Adam CHAP. III. 1 The Serpent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Pherecydes Syrus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 names of Spirits haunting Fields and desolate places The right Notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 13 That Satan upon his tempting Adam was cast down lower towards the Earth with all his Accomplices 15 Plato's Prophecie of Christ The reasonablenesse of divine Providence in exalting Christ above the highest Angels 20 That Adams descension into his Terrestrial Body was a kind of death 22 How incongruous it is to the divine Goodnesse Sarcastically to insult over frait Man fallen into Tragical misery 24 That it is a great mercy of God that we are not immortal upon Earth That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are all one A Summary representation of the strength of the whole Philosophick Cabbala Pythagoras deemed the son of Apollo That he was acquainted with the Cabbala of Moses That he did miracles as also Abaris Empedocles and Epimenides being instructed by him Plato also deemed the son of Apollo Socrates his dream concerning him That he was learned in the Mosaical Cabbala The miraculous power of Plotinus his Soul Cartesius compared with Bezaliel and Aholiab and whether he was inspired or no. The Cabbalists Apology THE first verse This old Serpent therefore In Pherecydes Syrus Pythagoras his Master there is mention of one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Princeps mali as Grotius cites him on this place which is a further argument of Pythagoras his being acquainted with this Mosaical Philosophy And that according to the Philosophick Cabbala it was an evil spirit not a natural Serpent that supplanted Adam and brought such mischief upon mankind The Beasts of the Field But now that these evil spirits should be reckoned as beasts of the field besides what reason is given in the Cabbala it self we may adde further that the haunt of these unclean spirits is in solitudes and waste fields and desolate places as is evident in the Prophet Esay his description of the
two extremes the first and the last that makes up the Creation of the Spiritual Adam or Christ compleated in us and includes the middle which is Blood First therefore is Repentance from what we delighted in before Then the killing of that evil and corrupt life in us which is resisting to blood as the Apostle speaks And the 1 Epistle of John ch 5. v. 4. What ever is born of God overcomes the world Who is he that overcomes the world but he that believes that Jesus Christ the divine Light and Life in us is the Son of God and therefore indued with power from on high to overcome all sin and wickednesse in us This is he that comes by Water and Blood by repentance and perseverance till the death of the body of sin not by repentance only and dislike of our former life but by the mortification also of it Then the Spirit of Truth is awakened in us and will bear witnesse of whatever is right and true And according to this manner of testimony is it to be understood especially That no man can say that Jesus Christ is the Son of God but by the Spirit of God as the Apostle elsewhere affirms This is the heavenly Adam which is true Light and Glory to all them that have attain'd to the resurrection of the dead and into whom God hath breathed the breath of Life without which we have no right knowledge nor sense of God at all 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They are thâ— words of Philo upon the place For how should the soul of man says he know God if he did not inspire her and take hold of her by his power Ver. 8. To the Kingdome of Heaven And the end of the doctrine of John which was Repentance was for this purpose that men might arrive to that comfortable condition here described and therefore it was a motive for them to repent For though sorrow endure for a night yet joy will come in the morning For the new Jerusalem is to be built and God is to pitch his Tabernacle amongst men and to rule by his Spirit here upon Earth which if I would venture upon an Historical Cabbala of Moses I should presage would happen in the seventh thousand years according to the Chronology of Scripture when the world shall be so spiritualized that the work of Salvation shall be finished and the great Sabbath and Festival shall be then celebrated in the height A thousand years are but as one day saith the Apostle Peter And therefore the seventh thousand years may well be the seventh day Wherefore in the end of the sixth thousand years the Kingdomes of the Earth will be the second Adams the Lord Christs as Adam in the Sixt day was created the Lord of the world and all the creatures therein and this conquest of his will bring in the Seventh day of rest and peace and joy upon the face of the whole Earth Which presage will seem more credible when I shall have unfolded unto you out of Philo Judaeus the mysterie of the number Seven but before I fall upon that let me a little prepare your belief by shewing the truth of the same thing in another Figure Adam Seth Enos Cainan Mahalaleel Jared they died not enjoying the richness of Gods goodness in their bodies But Enoch who was the seventh from Adam he was taken up alive into Heaven and seems to enjoy that great blisse in the body The world then in the Seventh Chiliad will be assumed up into God snatch'd up by his Spirit inacted by his Power The Jerusalem that comes down from Heaven will then in a most glorious and eminent manner flourish upon Earth God will as I said pitch his Tabernacle amongst men And for God to be in us and with us is as much as for us to be lifted up into God But to come now to the mysterie of the Septenary or number Seven it is of two kindes the one is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Septenary within the Decade is meerly seven unites The other is a Seventh Number beginning at an Vnite and holding on in a continued Geometrical Proportion till you have gone through Seven Proportional Terms For the Seventh Term there is this Septenary of the second kinde whose nature Philo fully expresses in these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To this sense For always beginning from an Vnite and holding on in double or triple or what Proportion you will the seventh Number of this rank is both Square and Cube comprehending both kindes as well the Corporeal as Incorporeal Substancâ—e the Incorporeal according to the Superficies which the Squares exhibite but the Corporeal according to the solid dimensions which are set out by the Cubes As for example 64. or 729. these are Numbers that arise after this manner each of them are a Seventh from an Unite the one arising from double Proportion the other from triple and if the Proportion were Quadruple Quintuple or any else there is the same reason some other Seventh Number would arise which would prove of the same nature with these they would prove both Cubes and Squares that is Corporeal and Incorporeal For such is sixty four either made by multiplying eight into eight and so it is a Square or else by multiplying four Cubically For four times four times four is again sixty four but then it is a Cube And so seven hundred twenty nine is made either by Squaring of twenty seven or Cubically multiplying of Nine for either way will seven hundred twenty nine be made and so is both Cube and Square Corporeal and Incorporeal Whereby is intimated that the world shall not be reduced in the Seventh day to a meer Spiritual consistency to an Incorporeal condition but that there shall be a co-habitation of the Spirit with Flesh in a Mystical or Moral sense and that God will pitch his Tent amongst us Then shall be settled everlasting righteousnesse and rooted in the Earth so long as mankind shall inhabite upon the face thereof And this truth of the Reign of Righteousness in this Seventh thousand years is still more clearly set out to us in the Septenary within Ten. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Philo calls it the naked number Seven For the parts it consists of are 3 and 4 which put together make 7. And these parts be the sides of the first Orthogonion in Numbers the very sides that include the right angle thereof And the Orthogonion what a foundation it is of Trigonometry and of measuring the altitudes latitudes and longitudes of things every body knows that knows any thing at all in Mathematicks And this prefigures the uprightness of that holy Generation who will stand and walk 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Inclining neither this way nor that way but they will approve themselves of an upright and sincere heart And by this Spirit of Righteousness will these Saints be enabled to finde out the depth and breadth
us they bidding more open warre to the quiet and happiness of mans life as that judicious Poet Spencer has well observed in his Legend of Sir Guyon or Temperance Cant. 6. A harder lesson to learn continence In joyous pleasure then in grievous pain For sweetness doth allure the weaker sense So strongly that uneathes it can refrain From that which feeble Nature covets fain But grief and wrath that be our enemies And foes of life she better can restrain Yet Virtue vaunts in both her Victories And Guyon in them all shews goodly Masteries What a rigid and severe thing c. This is the conceit of such as are either utter strangers to Religion or have not yet arrived to that comfortable result of it that may be expected For God takes no delight in the perpetual rack of those souls he came to redeem but came to redeem us from that pain and torture which the love of our selves and our untamed lusts and pride of spirit makes us obnoxious to which men being loth to part with and not having the heart to let them be struck to the very quick and pulled up by the roots the work not accomplished according to the full minde and purpose of God there are still the seeds of perpetual anxiety sadness and inevitable pain For to be dead is easement but to be still dying is pain and it is most ordinarily but the due punishment of halting and hypocrisie And mens spirits being long sowred thus and made sad their profession and behaviour is such that they fright all inexperienced young men from any tolerable compliance in matters of Religion thinking that when they are once engaged there they are condemned ad Fodinas for ever and that they can never emerge out of this work and drudgery in those dark Caverns till they die there like the poor Americans inslaved and over-wrought by the merciless Spaniard But verily if we have but the patience to be laid low enough the same hand that depressed us will exalt us above all hope and expectation For if we be sufficiently baptized into the Death of Christ we shall assuredly be made partakers of his Resurrection to Life and that glorious liberty of the Sons of God according as it is written If the Son make you free then are you free indeed free from Sin and secure from the power of any Temptation But if Mortification has not had its perfect work too mature a return of the sweetness of the Animal Life may prove like the Countreymans cherishing the Snake by the fire side which he had as he thought taken up dead in the Snow it will move and hisse and bite and sting The strong presages of the manifold corporeal delights and satisfactions of the flesh may grow so big and boisterous in the minde that the soul may deem her self too straitly girt up and begin to listen to such whispers of the Serpent as this What a rigid and severe thing is this business of Religion c. and account her self if she be not free to every thing that she is as good as free to nothing Ver. 2 3. But the womanish part in Adam 'T is but one and the same soul in man entertaining a dialogue with her self that is set out by these three parts The Serpent Adam and the Woman And here the soul recollecting her self cannot but confess that Religion denies her no honest nor fitting pleasure that is not hazardous to her greater happiness and bethinks her self in what peril she is of losing the divine Life and due sense of God if she venture thus promiscuously to follow her own will and not measure all her actions and purposes by the divine Light that for the present is at hand to direct her Ver. 4. But the Serpent c. The sense of this verse is that the eager desire of pleasure had wrought it self so far into the sweetness of the Animal Life that it clouded the mans judgement and made him fondly hope that the being so freely alive to his own will was no prejudice to the will of the Spirit and the life of God which was in him when as yet notwithstanding the Apostle expresly writes What fellowship is there betwixt righteousness unrighteousness What communion betwixt light and darkness What agreement betwixt Christ and Belial And he elsewhere tells us That Christ gave himself for his Church that he might so throughly purge it and sanctifie it that it should have neither spot nor wrinkle but that it should be holy and unblameable a true Virgin Bride clothed with his divine Life and Glory And those men that are so willing to halt betwixt two the Flesh and the Spirit and have house-room enough to entertain them both as if there could be any friendship and communion betwixt them let them seriously consider whether this opinion be not the same that deceived Adam was of and let them suspect the same sad event and acknowledge it to arise from the self-same Principle the inordinate desire of pleasing their own wills without the allowance of the divine Light and consulting with the will of God Ver. 5. Skill and Experience in things And some men make it no sin but warrantable knowledge to know the world and account others fools that are ignorant of that wicked mysterie For man would be no Slave or Idiot but know his own liberty and gain experience as he pretends by the making use of it But that the accurate exercise of Reason in the knowledge of Gods marvellous works in Nature or those innocent delightful conclusions in Geometry and Arithmetick and the like that these parts of knowledge should be perstringed by Moses in this History it seems to me not to have the least probability in it for there are so very few in the world whose mindes are carried any thing seriously to such objects that it had not been worth the taking notice of And then again it is plain that the miscarriage is from the affectation of such kinde of knowledge as the Woman the flowring life of the body occasioned Adam to transgresse in Wherefore it is the fulfilling of the various desires of the flesh not an high aspire after Intellectual Contemplations for they respect the Masculine Faculties not the Feminine that made way to the transgression Wherefore I say the wisdome that the Serpent here promised was not Natural Philosophy or Mathematicks or any of those innocuous and noble accomplishments of the understanding of man but it was the knowledge of the world and the wisdome of the flesh For the life of the body is full of desires and presages of satisfaction in the obtaining of this or the other external thing whether it be in Honour Riches or Pleasure and if they shake off the divine Guide within them they will have it by hook or by crook And this worldly wisdome is so plausible in the world and so sweetly relished by the meer natural man that it were temptation enough for
and sincerity and if the divine Light had wrought it self into a more full and universal possession of all his faculties the regulated joyes of the body which had been the off-spring of the woman had so far exceeded the tumultuous pleasures of inordinate desires that they would like the Sun-beams playing upon a fire extinguish the heat thereof as is already said in this fifteenth verse Ver. 16. So that the kindly Joy of the health of the body shall be much depraved The divine Light in the Conscience of Adam might very well say all this he having had already a good taste of it in all likelihood having found himself after inordinate satiating his furious desires of pleasure in a dull languid nauseating condition though new recruits spurred him up to new follies For the Moral Cabbala does not suppose it was one single mistaken act that brought Adam to this confusion of minde but disobedience at large and leading a life unguided by the Light and Law of God Earthly minded Adam Philo calls him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the earthly minde pag. 332. Ver. 17 18 19. Adams Conscience was so awakened by the divine Light and Reason and Experience so instructed him for the present that he could easily read his own doom if he persisted in these courses of disobedience that he should be prick'd and vex'd in his wilde rangings after inordinate pleasure all the while the Earthly mind was his light guide But after all this conviction what way Adam would settle in did not God visit him with an higher pitch of superadvenient grace that would conveigh Faith Power and Affection unto him you see in the verse immediately following Ver. 20. Adam was not sufficiently For meer conviction of Light disjoin'd from Faith Power and Affection may indeed disturb the minde and confound it but is not able of it self to compose it and settle it to good in men that have contracted a custome of evil Called her My life So soon as this reproof and castigation of the divine Light manifested in Adams Conscience was over he forthwith falls into the same sense of things and pursues the same resolutions that he had in designe before and very feelingly concludes with himself that be that as true as it will that his Conscience dictated unto him yet nothing can be more true then this That the Joy of his body was a necessary solace of life and therefore he would set up his happiness in the improvement thereof And so adhering in his affection to it counted it his very life and that there was no living at all without it They are almost the words of Philo speaking of the sense of the body in which was this corporeal Joy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. which corporeal sense the earthly minde in man properly therefore called Adam when he saw efformed though it was really the death of the man yet he called it his life This is Philo's Exposition of this present verse Ver. 21. Put hairy Coats The Philosophick Cabbala and the Text have a marvellous fit and easie congruency in this place And this Moral sense will not seem hard if you consider such phrases as these in Scripture But as for his enemies let them be clothed with shame and elsewhere Let them be clothed with rebuke and dishonour besides other places to that purpose And to clothe men according to their conditions and quality what is more ordinary or more fit and natural As those that are fools they ordinarily clothe them in a fools coat And so Adams will and affection being carried so resolvedly to the brutish life it is not incongruous to conceive that the divine Light judging them very Brutes the reproach she gives them is set out in this passage of clothing them with the skins of beasts The meaning therefore of this verse is that the divine Light in the Conscience of Adam had another bout with him and that Adam was convinced that he should grow a kinde of a Brute by the courses he meant to follow And indeed he was content so to be as a man may well conceive the pleasure of sin having so weakned all the powers of that higher life in him that there was little or nothing especially for the present able to carry him at all upwards towards Heaven and holiness And of a truth vile Epicurisme and Sensuality will make the soul of man so degenerate and blinde that he will not only be content to slide into brutish immorality but please himself in this very opinion that he is a real Brute already an Ape Satyre or Baboon and that the best of men are no better saving that civilizing of them and industrious education has made them appear in a more refined shape and long inculcate Precepts have been mistaken for connate Principles of Honesty and Natural Knowledge otherwise there be no indispensable grounds of Religion and Virtue but what has hapned to be taken up by over-ruling Custome Which things I dare say are as easily confutable as any conclusion in Mathematicks is demonstrable But as many as are thus sottish let them enjoy their own wildeness and ignorance it is sufficient for a good man that he is conscious unto himself that he is more nobly descended better bred and born and more skilfully taught by the purged faculties of his own minde Ver. 22. Design'd the contrary The mercy of the Almighty is such to poor man that his weak and dark spirit cannot be always so resolvedly wicked as he is contented to be wherefore it is a fond surmise of desperate men that do all the violence they can to the remainders of that Light and Principle of Religion and honesty left in them hoping thereby to come to rest and tranquillity of minde by laying dead or quite obliterating all the rules of godliness morality out of their souls For it is not in their power so to do nor have they any reason to promise themselves they are hereby secure from the pangs of Conscience For some passages of Providence or other may so awaken them that they shall be forced to acknowledg their errour and rebellion with unexpressible bitterness and confusion of spirit And the longer they have run wrong the more tedious journey they have to return back Wherefore it is more safe to close with that life betime that when it is attained to neither deserves nor is obnoxious to any change or death I mean when we have arrived to the due measure of it For this is the natural accomplishment of the soul all else but rust and dirt that lies upon it Ver. 23. Out of this Paradise of Luxury The English Translation takes no notice of any more Paradises then one calling it always the Garden of Eden But the Seventy more favourable to our Moral Cabbala that which they call a Garden in Eden at first they after name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may signifie the Garden of Luxury But whether there be any
force at all in this or no that Supplement I have made in the foregoing verse will make good the sense of our Cabbala And in the very Letter and History of the Scripture if a man take notice he must of necessity make a supply of something or another to pass to what follows with due cohaesion and clearness of sense So in the very next Chapter where God dooms Cain to be a Vagabond and he cryes out that every man that meets him will kill him according to the concise story of the Text there was none but Adam and Eve in the world to meet him and yet there is a mark set upon him by God as if there had been then several people in the world into whose hands he might fall and lose his life by them And then again at ver 17. Cain had no sooner got into the Land of Nod but he has a wife and a childe by her and he is forthwith said to build a City when as there is no mention of any but himself his wife and his childe to be the Artificers but any ingenious Reader will easily make to himself fitting supplements ever supposing due distances of time and right preparations to all that is said to be acted And so in the story of Samson where he is said to take three hundred Foxes it may be rationally supposed that Countrey was full of such creatures that he had a competency of time a sufficient number to help him and the like That the History of Scripture is very concise no body can deny and therefore where easie natural and agreeable supplements will clear the sense I conceive it is very warrantable to suppose some such supplies and for a Paraphrast judiciously to interweave them But now that Paradise at first should signifie a state of divine pleasure and afterward of sensual voluptuousness it is no more harsh then that Adam one while is the Spiritual or Intellectual Man another while the Earthly and Carnal For one and the same natural thing may be a Symbole of contrary Spiritual Mysteries So a Lion and a Serpent are figures of Christ as well as of the Devil and therefore it is not so hard to admit that this Garden of Eden may emblematize while Adam is discours'd of as innocent and obedient to God the delights of the Spirit but after his forsaking God the pleasures of the Flesh and consequently that the fruit of the Tree of Life in the one may be perseverance and establishment in the divine Life in the other a settlement and fixedness in the brutish and sensual Ver. 24. The manly faculties of Reason and Conscience These I conceive may be understood by the Cherubim and flaming Sword For the Cherubim bear the Image of a man and Reason is a cutting dividing thing like a Sword the Stoicks call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dividing and distinguishing Reason For Reason is nothing but a distinct discernment of the Idea's of things whereby the minde is able to sever what will not sute and lay together what will But if any body will like better of Philo's interpretation here of the Cherubim and flaming Sword who makes the Cherubim to signifie the goodness and power of God the flaming Sword 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the effectual and operative Wisdome or Word of God it does not at all clash with what we have already set down For my self also suppose that God by his Son the Eternal Word works upon the Reason and Conscience of man For that Word is living and powerful sharper then any two-edged Sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow and is the discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight but all things are naked and open unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do Heb. 4. That he could not set up his rest for ever Assuredly a mans heart is not so in his own hand that he can do himself all the mischief he is contented to do For we are more Gods then our own and his Goodness and Power has dominion over us And therefore let not a man vainly fancy that by violently running into all enormity of life and extinguishing all the Principles of Piety and Virtue in him that he shall be able thus to hide himself from God and never be re-minded of him again for ever For though a man may happen thus to forget God for a time yet he can never forget us sith all things lie open to his sight And the power of his ever-living Word will easily cut through all that thickness and darkness which we shrowd our selves in and wound us so as to make us look back with shame and sorrow at a time that we least thought of But that our pain may be the lesse and our happiness commence the sooner it will be our wisdome to comply with the divine Light betimes for the sooner we begin the work is the easier and will be the more timely dispatch'd through the power of God working in us But this I must confess and I think my self bound to bear witness to so true and useful a mysterie wrapt up in this Mosaical covering that there is no other passage nor return into happiness then by death Whence Plato also that had been acquainted with these holy writings has defined Philosophy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The meditation of death viz. the dying to the lust of the flesh and inordinate desires of the body which Purgatory if we had once passed through there would soon spring up that Morning Joy the resurrection from the dead and our arrival to everlasting life and glory And there is no other way then this that is manifestable either by Scripture Reason or Experience But those that through the grace of God and a vehement thirst after the divine Righteousness have born the Crosse till the perfect death of the body of sin and make it their business to have no more sense nor relish of themselves or their own particular persons then if they were not at all they being thus demolished as to themselves and turned into a Chaos or dark Nothingness as I may so speak they become thereby fitted for the new Creation And this personal life being thus destroyed God calls unto them in the dead of the Night when all things are silent about them awakes them and raises them up and breathes into them the breath of everlasting life and ever after actuates them by his own Spirit and takes all the humane faculties unto himself guiding or allowing all their operations always holding up the spirit of man so that he will never sink into sin and from henceforth death and sorrow is swallowed up for ever for the sting of Death is Sin But whatever liberty and joy men take to themselves that is not founded in this new life is false and frivolous and will end but in
that no man can adde any thing to it But then for comparison of persons what dotage is it for any man because he can read the common Alphabet of Honesty and a Pious life in the History of the Old and New Testament finely allegorizing as is conceiv'd those external Transactions to a mysterious application of what concerns the inward man to either place himself or for others to place him in the same level with Jesus Christ the Son of God the Saviour of men and Prince of the highest Angelical Orders who rose out of the grave by the Omnipotent hand of his Father and was seen to ascend into Heaven by his Apostles that gazed upon him as he passed through the Clouds and whom all true Christians expect visibly to appear there again and re-visit the world according to the promise Now it seems to me a very unreasonable and rash thing if not impious and blasphemous to acknowledge any man whatsoever comparable to so sacred a Person as our Saviour Christ every way approved himself and was approved by a voice from Heaven saying This is my beloved Son hear him If any man therefore having none of these testimonies from above nor being able to do any thing more then other men shall be so unmannerly as to place himself in the same order and rank with Christ the Son of God because he has got some fine fancies and phrases and special and peculiar interpretations of Scripture which he will have immediately suggested from the Spirit I cannot forbear again to pronounce that this man is overtaken with an high degree of either pride or madness and if he can perswade any others to look upon him as so sacred a Prophet that it must be in them at least Inadvertency or Ignorance Nay I think I shall not say amisse if I attribute their mistake to a kinde of Pride also For Pride affects nothing more then Singularity and therefore undervaluing the plain simplicity of ordinary Christianity such as at first sight is held forth in the Gospel of Christ they think it no small privilege to have a Prophet of their own especially they getting this advantage thereby that they can very presently as they fancy censure and discern the truth or falshood of all that venture to speak out of the Rode of their own Sect as if every body were bound to conne their lessons according to their Book And it is a fine thing to become so accurately wise at so cheap a rate and discover who is Spiritual or who is the Carnal or meer Moral man This is indeed the folly of all Sects and there is no way better that I know to be freed from such inveiglements then by earnestly endevouring after that which they all pretend to and to become truly more holy and sincere then other men for the throughly purified man is certainly delivered from all these follies These things I could not forbear to speak in zeal to the honour of my Saviour and the good and safety of his Church For if men once get a trick to call the world Christian where the death of Christ on the Crosse at Jerusalem is not acknowledged a sacrifice for sin nor himself now in his humane Person a Mediatour with God the Father and the Head of his Church Militant and Triumphant nor that there is any Eternal Life nor Resurrection but that in the Moral or Mystical sense assuredly this will prove the most dangerous way imaginable quite to take away that in time which is most properly called Christian Religion out of the world and to leave meerly the name thereof behinde But a Religion so manifestly established by God in a most miraculous manner and being so perfect that the wit of man cannot imagine any thing more compleat and better fitted for winning souls to God It can be nothing but giddiness or light-mindedness to think that this Religion can be ever superannuated in the world but that it shall last till Christs Corporeal appearance in the Clouds For there is no reason at all that the holy Ghost should be thought to come in the flesh of some particular man no more then God the Father did under the Law For what can he tell us more or better then Christ already has told us or what himself may tell us without any personal shape And there is no Prophecie of any such thing but onely of that which is better that Christ will procure for all those that are his faithful and obedient followers the Spirit of Truth and Righteousnesse and indue them with the divine Life and that it shall so at length come to pass that Justice Peace and Equity shall more universally and fully flourish in the world then ever yet they have done And that faith in God and of the Life to come shall be more vigorously sealed upon the hearts of men and that there shall be a neerer union and conjunction betwixt the humane and divine nature in us then ever and more frequent and sensible commerce betwixt the Inhabitants of the Aethereal and Terrestrial Region according as I have already declared concerning the Seventh day in this Defence of the Moral Cabbala But in the mean time though that full Sabbatisme be so far off yet I doubt not but there have been and are very sweet and joyful praelibations of it in sundry persons which quickens their hopes and desires of the compleatment thereof and divine Providence is not idle all things working towards this last Catastraphe and the heads of Sects themselves though I never saw any yet that my light and judgement could pronounce infallible and perfect as I think there never will be any till Christ himself come again who will appear in no Sectarian way for himself hath given us an intimation that if any one say Loe here is Christ or there is Christ believe it not yet such is the grosse ignorance or hypocrisie of ordinary carnal Churches as they call them that some heads of Sects I say have spoken very true and weighty things against them very lively setting them out depainting them in their own colors insomuch that they will be able not only to turn from them the affections of all plain hearted men that are fast friends to the eternal Righteousness of God and prefer that before the most specious devices of arbitrarious Superstition but also to raise their anger and indignation against them But it does not presently follow that because a man can truly discover the gross faults falsities that are in another that therefore he is utterly blameless himself and not at all imposed upon by his natural complexion nor speaks any thing that is false nor omits any thing that is both true and necessary But be these Sects what they will be the grand Churches themselves are so naked and obnoxious that unlesse they cast away from them their hypocrisie pride and covetousnesse they will in all likelihood raise such storms in all Christendome
of Euphrates Pison Phasis or Phasi-tigris That the Madianites are called Aethiopians That Paradise was seated about Mesopotamia argued by six Reasons That it was more particularly seated where now Apamia stands in Ptolemee's Maps 18 The Prudence of Moses in the commendation of Matrimony 19 Why Adam is not recorded to have given names to the Fishes 24 Abraham Ben Ezra's conceit of the names of Adam and Eve as they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 25 Moses his wise Anthypophora concerning the natural shame of nakednesse 124 CHAP. III. 1 How much it saves the credit of our first Parents that the Serpent was found the prime Author of the Transgression That according to S. Basil all the living creatures of Paradise could speak undeniable reasons that the Serpent could according to the Literal Cabbala 9 The opinion of the Anthropomorphites true according to the Literal Cabbala 14 That the Serpent went upright before the fall was the opinion of S. Basil 16 A story of the easie delivery of a certain poor woman of Liguria 19 That the general calamities that lie upon mankinde came by the transgression of a positive Law how well accommodate it is to the scope of Moses 23 That Paradise was not the whole Earth 24 The Apparitions in Paradise called by Theodoret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 130 THE DEFENCE OF THE PHILOSOPHICK CABBALA CHAP. I. 1 Why Heaven and Light are both made Symbols of the same thing viz. The World of Life That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 intimate a Trinity That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a title of the Eternal Wisdome the Son of God who is called also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well in Philo as the New Testament That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the holy Ghost 2 The fit agreement of Plato's Triad with the Trinity of the present Cabbala 5 The Pythagorick names or nature of a Monad or Unite applyed to the first days work 6 What are the upper waters and that Souls that descend 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are the Naides or water Nymphes in Porphyrius 8 That Matter of it self is unmoveable R. Bechai his notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very happily explained out of Des Cartes his Philosophy That Vniversal Matter is the second days Creation fully made good by the names and property of the number Two 13 The nature of the third days work set off by the number Three 16 That the most learned do agree that the Creation was perfected at once The notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strangely agreeing with the most notorious conclusions of the Cartesian Philosophy 19 That the Corporeal world was universally erected into Form and Motion on the fourth day is most notably confirmed by the titles and propertie of the number Four The true meanning of the Pythagorick oath wherein they swore by him that taught them the mysterie of the Tetractys That the Tetractys was a Symbole of the whole Philosophick Cabbala that lay couched under the Text of Moses 20 Why Fish and Fowl created in the same day 23 Why living creatures were said to be made in the Fift and Sixt days 31 And why the whole Creation was comprehended within the number Six 135 136 CHAP. II. 3 The number Seven a fit Symbole of the Sabbath or Rest of God 7 Of Adams rising out of the ground as other creatures did 11 That Pison is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and denotes Prudence The mystical meaning of Havilah 13 That Gihon is the same that Nilus Sihor or Siris and that Pison is Ganges The Justice of the Aethiopians That Gihon is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and denotes that virtue 14 As Hiddekel Fortitude 17 That those expressions of the Souls sleep and death in the Body so frequent amongst the Platonists were borrowed from the Mosaical Cabbala 19 Fallen Angels assimilated to the beasts of the field The meaning of those Platonical phrases 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the like That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Platonisme is the same that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Moses that signifies Angels as well as God 22 That there are three principles in Man according to Plato's School 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that this last is Eve CHAP. III. 1 The Serpent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Pherecydes Syrus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 names of Spirits haunting Fields and and desolate places The right Notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 13 That Satan upon his tempting Adam was cast down lower towards the Earth with all his Accomplices 15 Plato's Prophecie of Christ The reasonablenesse of divine Providence in exalting Christ above the highest Angels 20 That Adams descension into his Terrestrial Body was a kind of death 22 How incongruous it is to the divine Goodnesse Sarcastically to insult over frail Man fallen into Tragical misery 24 That it is a great mercy of God that we are not immortal upon Earth That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are all one A Summary representation of the strength of the whole Philosophick Cabbala Pythagoras deemed the son of Apollo That he was acquainted with the Cabbala of Moses That he did miracles As also Abaris Empedocles and Epimenides being instructed by him Plato also deemed the son of Apollo Socrates his dream concerning him That he was learned in the Mosaical Cabbala The miraculous power of Plotinus his Soul Cartesius compared with Bezaliel and Aholiab and whether he was inspired or no. The Cabbalists Apology 172 THE DEFENCE OF THE MORAL CABBALA CHAP. I. What is meant by Moral explained out of Philo. 3 That the Light in the first day improv'd to the height is Adam in the sixt Christ according to the Spirit 4 In what sense we our selves may be said to do what God does in us 5 Why 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are rendred Ignorance and Inquiry 18 Plato's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Pythagoreans 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 applyed to the Fourth days progresse 22 That Virtue is not an extirpation but regulation of the Passions according to the minde of the Pythagoreans 24 Plotinus his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 applyed to the Sixt days progresse 26 What the Image of God is plainly set down out of S. Paul and Plato The divine Principle in us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of Plotinus 28 The distinction of the Heavenly and Earthly Man out of Philo. 31 The Imposture of still and fixed Melancholy and that it is not the true divine Rest and precious Sabbath of the Soul A compendious rehearsal of the whole Allegory of the Six days Creation p. 194 CHAP. II. The full sense of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that keeps men from entring into the true Sabbath 4 The great necessity of distinguishing the innocent motions of Nature from the suggestions of Sin 5 That the growth of a true Christian indeed doth not adaequately depend upon the lips of the Priest 7 The meaning of This is he that comes by Water and Blood 8 The meaning of Repent for the Kingdome of Heaven is at hand The seventh thousand years the great Sabbatism of the Church of God That there will be then frequent converse betwixt Men and Angels 9 The Tree of Life how fitly in the Mystical sense said to be in the midst of the Garden 17 A twofold death contracted by Adams disobedience The Masculine and Feminine Faculties in Man what they are Actuating a Body an Essential operation of the Soul and the reason of that so joyful appearance of Eve to the Humane Nature 209 210 CHAP. III. A story of a dispute betwixt a Prelate and a Black-Smith concerning Adams eating of the Apple 1 What is meant by the subtilty or deceit of the Serpent That Religion wrought to its due height is a very chearful state And it is only the halting and hypocrisie of men that generally have put so soure and sad a vizard upon it 5 6 That worldly Wisdome not Philosophy is perstringed in the Mysterie of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil 10 The meaning of Adams flying after he had found himself naked 20 Adam the Earthly-minded Man according to Philo. 21 What is meant by Gods clothing Adam and Eve with hairy Coats in the Mystical sense 23 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Paradise of Luxury That History in Scripture is wrote very concisely and therefore admits of modest and judicious Supplements for clearing the sense 24 What is meant by the Cherubim and flaming Sword Plato's definition of Philosophy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A more large description of dying to Sinne and of the life of righteousness That Christian Religion even as it referres to the external Person of Christ is upon no pretence to be annull'd till the Conflagration of the world 224 ERRATA PAg. 39. lin 24. read sacred p. 79 l. 19. r. Sensus p. 87. l. 14. r. wilde p. 126. l. 26. r. goodly p. 204. l. 35. r. run p. 230. l. 34. r. generous FINIS