what the condition of the Body to which it shall be rejoined Lastly what will be the quality of its happiness then when it shall be received into Heaven with its Body there to live an eternal and glorious Life Whether the SOUL OF A BELIEVER Be indued With Perception after Death The First Discourse THat I may come to the Resolution of the first of these Questions whether the Soul of a believer be indued with perception after death I desire that I may be pardoned if at first I enter upon considerations a little Philosophical which nevertheless I shall endeavour to explain as briefly and intelligibly as I am able I lay down therefore as a foundation a thing which remains indisputable among Christians viz. that the Soul and Body are two substances in their natures marvelously differing and in like manner endowed with faculties altogether various for the Body is in its nature material and taken from the Earth and the other Elements the Soul is a spiritual substance almost of the same kind with those intelligences separate from Matter which we usually call by the name of Angels The Body hath indeed certain Organs as they are called by the mediation whereof it is capable of receiving the Images of sensible things and to judge of their qualities the Hearing the Seeing the Smelling and those other things which we name Senses are without doubt Corporeal powers in us and appointed to judge of Colours sounds odours and other qualities which attend and accompany material objects nevertheless 't is the Soul that Comunicates to the Body the power of using its own Organs and imploying its self in the use of those Senses and this appears manifestly because as soon as the Soul is separate from it all the powers of these Organs are extinct and there remains not the least shadow of their Operations moreover the body seems likewise to be the seat of certain appetites and passions For Choler and lust do very much affect and trouble it when they are moved and the part that the temperament of the Body hath in their motions is a proof sufficiently certain that they also are powers naturally bound and fastened with it the Cholerick would not be naturally subject to anger the Sanguin of good humor and mercy the Melancholick soure and sad the Flegmatick slow and little affected on the accurance of troublesome objects if this mixture of humors out of which the temper of the Body arises had not a marvelous power to give the byass and inclinations to the motions of the Soul But so it is that these passions are not moved but by means of some external object that touches the Phantasy and by the Phantasy moves the affections For 't is offence which awakens Choler and 't is the occurence of objects pleasant and agreeable which makes the bud of joy that lies latent in the blood to put forth bloom now 't is the Soul that gives assistance to the Phantasy to receive the Images as external things which either offend or charm our passions variously according to the difference of our humors and that which is more 't is the Soul that reasons with understanding upon those things that are presented to it by the interposition of the bodily Senses and which bestirs it self either to embrace or reject that whereof it hath endeavoured to know the nature and qualities by its reasonings in such sort that although objects have a great Connexion with our humors and our humors a great power to give a tendency to our motions the Soul nevertheless ought to be the Mistress of them and to put bounds to the efficacy of objects and to the motion of our humors and passions And that which I have already said of the Senses viz. that the Body destitute of the Soul utterly loses them experience obliges me to say also of all those passions which Philosophers comprehend under those two general names of the Irascible and Concupiscible that the separation of the Soul doth equally abolish them Whereof the discourses of reason do easily discover the Cause For be the Constitution of the Organs of the Body what it will be it for the use of the external senses upon the qualities of things sensible be it for the Operation of the internal senses as is the imagination so it is that seeing they cannot Act any further than the Soul moves them as when the main spring in a Watch foiles all the other movements stand in a moment it must necessarily be that when the Soul withdraws all the actions of the Organs cease so that both reason and experience with one consent teach us what we ought to think of the faculties of our bodies Touching the Soul we have no experiences visible and ordinary of what it doth or doth not after death and if we consult the discourses of our reason concerning it we find there difficulties great beyond comparison For first of all every one makes here this consideration which appears to them of no small consideration And 't is this though the Body and Soul be two substances very different nevertheless they are so united in man that they make but one subject so that neither Body apart nor Soul apart do constitute as they say any perfect Being or any compleat Nature neither the Body makes the Man nor the Soul but both together go to his Composition and when they are separated the Body holds no place among the particular kinds of Beings that exist absolutely without dependance on each other nor the Soul neither Of the one we say 't is the body of a man and of the other 't is in like manner his Soul of both if they come to be united we say and that properly 't is the man to whom they have this respective Relation Now it seems that imperfect natures produce no operations Every thing that you observe in nature be they such as have Souls forms which do inform and animate their matter as are Plants and Animals be they such as have only a form which in some sort supplies to them the place of a Soul as are Minerals and Metals if you imagin that after their dissolution the Form subsist a while so as the Matter do not exercise the functions of the whole Composition nor will the Form exercise them neither That is to say as the body of a dead Horse hath no motion his Soul if you imagin it to subsist some time after its separation will be as great a stranger to Horse-like actions and operations moreover as it is true that as long as the Soul of a man is in his Body it gives activity to his Senses so on the other hand it seems that it hath absolutely need of its presence and the mediation of its Organs for the forming of its own discourses and ratiocinations 't is the Soul that gives unto the Body the virtue of Seeing Tasting and Smelling and generally of knowing by the operation of the Senses those things that
here below and that they shall obtain the reward that is promised them above by a manner of speech frequent in the Scripture where that which goes before is put for that which follows he makes no scruple to name one for the other Now the gratuitous reward of good works consists not in a privation of all perception but in the possession of Contentment and glory In the same Book the Souls of those that had been Martyred for the word of God are represented crying how long Lord just and true wilt thou not judge and avenge our blood on those that dwell on the earth which is a proof that there is in them memory and apprehension And it cannot be said here that this cry is attributed to them as in the eighth Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans sighs and groans and desires are ascribed to the whole frame of Heaven and Earth or as the cry of vengeance is attributed to the blood of Abel by a kind of Prosopopeia or ficttion of personality because it being notorious that the Heavens and the Earth and the blood of a man have no knowledg or preception there is no danger that such manner of figurative expressions should beget erroneous opinions in the mind of any one the nature of the thing gives sufficient notice that necessarily there must be some figure in the enunciation or discourse but where 't is said of the Souls of men which we see during the time that they are in the body endued with lively and excellent perception supposing that they were extinct or at least wholly asleep after death who can hinder himself by Reading these words from drawing opinions of a quite contrary nature Now to the end that no man may doubt of the meaning of this Text it is appointed them to rest and expect a little while Now although by a kind of Prosopopeia or fiction of person we may attribute such voices to things void of all perception who ever saw God introduced making answer to them or any one for him forming a Dialogue in the manner with things without all understanding To conclude there is given unto them white garments which can signifie nothing less than some great light of knowledg and some great purity of holiness or perfection of sanctification Now neither the one nor the other can subsist without a perfect use of the understanding faculty and all the affections of the Soul And although these white Robes should signify either the grace of justification or the hope of happiness and glory because sometimes white Robes were the marks of those that aspired to the most eminent Offices in the Roman Common Wealth yet that cannot be without some perception and affection For if it be the first in as much as these Souls are represented in a place whether they could have had no admission if they had not been justified and their sins pardoned it is not properly justification which they have already which is given to them 't is the Taste and Sense of it whereof the fulness is bestowed on them whereas here below we have nothing but the foretasts of it in the peace and joy of our Souls and if it be the second that can represent nothing but the desire of their full and perfect glorification accompanied with assurance and by consequence with incredible contentment which cannot be reconciled with the sleep of the Soul and the extinction of all its powers The Apostle writing to the Philippians saith that he was ballanced or in a strait between two thoughts whether he ought to desire death or to continue a longer time in the World Because if he had regard to the Edification that his Ministry might give to the Church and the profit that it might draw from hence he ought much rather to chuse a longer life but if he had regard to his own particular good death was more desirable to him than life I pray if he had believed that all the powers of his Soul as well as those of the body had remained at death benummed for so long a time would he have thought that death would have been more advantageous to him I do acknowledge that he had endured many evils for the confirmation of the truth that he Preached from which a death such as those against whom I dispute do represent it drousie and void of all understanding would have secured him but so it is that the knowledg he had of our Lord Jesus whilst alive the marvellous Revelations that had been made unto him the Joy and Consolation that came unto him from the sense of the love and peace of God and the exercise of so many excellent Virtues wherewithal he was endued were in my opinion things of such importance that they should rather cause him to prefer life in which he retained the possession of them though accompanied with many afflictions than to embrace death which what ever it might be otherwise deprived him of the enjoyment of them But the reason that he adds wherefore he ought to chuse death if he had no regard but to his own person that it is much better to be with Christ cuts off all occasion of doubting concerning the mind of St. Paul in this matter For those without doubt are not with Christ which sleep without perception and without any knowledg of their felicity though they were received into the most holy and most illustrious place of his glory Otherwise those might be said to live and dwell with Kings which are interred in the Chappels of their Palaces whether the least ray of the glory that compasses them about cannot enter That other passage seems not to me less express 2 Cor. 5. 1 2 3. where the Apostle explains himself in these words we know that if the earthly house of this Tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens wherefore we groan desiring earnestly to be clothed with our house that is from Heaven For is there any probability that he should desire with so much vehemency to be stripped of this Tabernacle of earth to be clothed with that which is from Heaven if he not only got nothing new but lost all the knowledg of things that he had in this life totally and altogether Now that he intends to speak there of the change that was to betide him before the Resurrection is a thing clear and manifest by the whole issue of the discourse 't is true he had said before that he knew that he that raised up the Lord Jesus would raise us up also by Jesus and cause us to appear in his presence and 't is for that reason that he testifies that he fainted not in his Tribulations and adds that though our outward man grew into decay nevertheless the inward man was renewed day by day going on from strength to strength and if we are exposed to several afflictions he says that our light affliction that is but
face of God but even the memory of ever having seen him or learned any thing of him either in the Tabernacle or in the World If he understands by seeing the face of God seeing him as he is seen in Heaven how could David make this wish or holy aspiration if he were of this opinion that sleep should lock up the eyes of his understanding for so long a time Certainly this was not the opinion of David nor any of the faithful of that time or age their common opinion was that which is plainly expressed in the Book of Ecclesiastes That when man dies the body returns to the dust from whence 't was taken and the Soul returns to God that gave it Now to believe that the Spirits of the faithful can be with God without having any knowledg of his presence or enjoying one beam of his happiness is a thing altogether without reason or probability At such times as God promises some particular assistance to his faithful ones he says I will be with you And 't is also their common and ordinary wish for those to whom they wish grace and benediction the Lord be with you If God then cannot be with any person without giving him some taste of his favours how can our spirits be with God without enjoying some gracious effect of his presence Certainly though we had no other proof of the state of the faithful after death than those words of our Saviour to the Thief that was Converted upon the Cross this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise they would be sufficient unless we were willingly blind to assure us that they are at rest but 't is such a rest as is accompanied with much content and joy For that the word to day ought to be taken in the ordinary and common sense to signify the time that was immediately to follow the death of our Lord whilst his Soul remained separate from his body is a thing that cannot be doubted unless by those that out of jocundness of humours abuse their reason In what place of the New Testament doth our Saviour or any one else use it in any other sense And although the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews having met with it in Psal 95. 7 8. to day if you will hear his voice harden not your hearts Understands it of the time of the Preaching of the Gospel of Salvation is there any probability that in imitation of him we should expound those words of Jesus Christ after this manner Verily verily I say unto thee that in the day of the Resurrection I will receive thee to a participation of my own glory in Paradise If such comments be allowed will there be any thing certain either in the word of God or Language of men Doth it not plainly appear that our Lord seeing this Thief in anguish of Spirit through the fear of the judgment of God the execution whereof he expected according to the common sense and apprehension of Conscience immediately after death was willing to comfort him by the assurance of the pardon of his sins and hope of happiness which his Soul should enjoy assoon as it was separated from his Body Either the Spirit of Christ being dislodged from the body ascended into Paradise or not If it did not ascend thither our Lord promised nothing but that the Soul of this person should on that very day be present with his Deity in Heaven Now though our Lord were God blessed for ever there is no probability that he had any regard to his Deity in the speaking of those words For besides that his Divinity was not then so clearly Revealed as that from thence he should begin to give knowledg of what he was to that man who can doubt but that seeing both their Bodies in one and the same condemnation he was willing to raise the hope of this Wretch who in the midst of his anguish discovered some faith and expectation from him by the assurance that he gave him that within a few moments their spirits should be well near in the same Condition in a place of bliss and happiness But let it be granted that he understands his Divinity So it is in my opinion that it cannot come into a sound mind that Christ should promise to the Soul of this person to give it from that same hour the enjoyment of Paradise and yet notwithstanding it should have no knowledg of the glory thereof or the happiness that doth attend it Moreover it had been much more to the purpose to have been content to have consented to be mindful of him when he came into his Kingdom as he desired then by great words to give him occasion to hope for content and happiness near at hand and afterwards fill this Soul which he had made so desirous of happiness with nothing but darkness and forgetfulness If the spirit of our Lord ascended into Paradise doubtless it was not to sleep there for the little time of its separation from the body but to receive inexpressible Consolations in the bosom of his Father Otherwise to what purpose was it to transport it on high Had it not been more to the purpose to leave it buried in the same Tomb with the Body to the end that it might be there united again when the time should come Now if the Soul of Christ could be sensible of some Contentments after death ours may be sensible of them also And no inconsistance will be found between their separation from the Organs of their Bodies and the use of their Powers and Capacities But what need is there of so many Texts and of so much discourse in a case so plain that nature it self seems to have taught it us For certainly it is not more generally believed among men that their Souls are immortal and subsist after the Body than it is generally acknowledged that they subsist with knowledg and sense either of some felicity for those that lived in the practice of Piety and Vertue or of some punishment for those that have given up themselves to Impiety and Vice From thence comes the hopes of the Elysian fields among the Pagans and the fear of the Torments of Hell From thence is preserved among the Jews the expectation of Paradise and the fear of the bottomless Pit Thence is produced among the Turks the opinion of their Paradise and the fear of an infernal state and that without attending the Resurrection immediately after the dissolution of the Body and the separation of the Soul Lastly thence comes among Christians to some a belief of Purgatory to others a hope of a better life than this and to others dreadful frights concerning what will betide them after death when they are not in their Consciences assured of the forgiveness of their sins I say that nature it self teaches it Because things that are so universal and concerning which there is no controversy among Nations whose inclinations are divers whose professions are different and
whose Religions in all other things are directly opposite must have without doubt some common Foundation and it cannot be common in such sort as it is unless it be established even in the very nature of things So that although it be not possible clearly and distinctly to explicate the reasons of it yet they may be sufficiently seen darkly and in gross to impress upon the mind an indelible perswasion of it For there are multitudes of persons that would find themselves much perplexed if you should oblige them to discourse particularly the reasons that have perswaded them that there is a natural difference between Vice and Virtue the most able among the Philosophers have found some difficulty in freeing themselves from the natural reasons that do either prove or deny the immortality of our Souls And among Christians there are none but Spirits much exercised in discourse which are fit by natural reason to dispute for the Being and Providence of a God against Atheists and yet nevertheless these things prove themselves so smartly to our understandings that the ignorant and vulgar themselves have an abhorrence for those that make any doubt of them Certainly the holy Scripture as I said in the beginning is the only place from whence we may draw lights sufficiently clear to perswade our selves of this truth by a perswasion that will deserve the name of faith and may be capable of giving any sound Consolation to our Consciences But nevertheless I shall not scruple to say that if the holy Scripture had not spoken it so clearly the belief of the immortality of our Souls would have been sufficient to have satisfied our reason that they make use of their faculties though the body should supply no Organs unto them For it is easy to conceive that there is in man whilst he is compounded of Soul and Body an understanding faculty which for some space of time doth not exercise its own proper Operations Since this conjunction is made in such sort that the Organs of the one must serve to the Operation of the faculties of the other and that they do Operate either always or for the most part by their Mediation when the Organs come to be disordered or hindred 't is necessary that the Operations of the mind do cease of themselves But that there is a substance that doth actually exist separate from the Body which is endued with an understanding faculty and nevertheless cannot use it because it hath no Body is a thing in my apprehension absolutely inconceivable For it cannot actually exist unless it live nor can we conceive any sort of life in it which doth not include in the same thought the use of its faculties You may easily conceive that the Body lives though the man do neither see nor discourse Because life may subsist in a man without seeing or discoursing But you cannot imagin that the Body of a man lives but you must likewise imagin that it is nourished and that his heart beats or at least that the Spirits have some heat and motion in the seat of life So that the faculty wherein life consists will move and Act though all the rest should be laid to sleep in the reasonable Soul then when 't is separated from the Body what power will act if it have no use of that of the understanding For there 's in them no power vital animal or natural like to those of our Bodies and as to that which we call the Locomotive that is to say the power by which we move from place to place if it have no use of its understanding there is no reason to imagin that it will have any power of removing it self from one place to another a thing whereunto nature it self will furnish us with a Testimony sufficiently evident and authentique in as much as it hath not given to any living Creature this power of moving it self unless it be to Animals endued with Phantasy and certain appetites which do necessarily require the removal of the Body for their satisfaction in such manner that if there be in the Soul neither understanding nor appetite it will be against all reason to imagin in it any use of the Locomotive faculty So that it will be the same thing to say that the Soul dies with the Body and will rise again with it as to say that it lives and yet nevertheless performs none of the actions of life But this is not all in this power of understanding that we here possess are imprinted certain habits which without doubt have nothing common with the Organs of the Body unless it be as I have said above that they have given occasion to the intellect to exercise Contemplations and to form those ratiocinations and discourses by which these habits are obtained Such is for Example the habit which in Philosophy we call by the name of wisdom which consists in a clear and certain understanding of the first principles of things and in the knowledg of Conclusions that depend thereon in objects the most Excellent and Noble that can be presented to the mind of Man For that this is an habit purely intellectual reason teaches us and experience consents unto it Because on the one side it performs its Operations on objects that have nothing of the nature of Bodies and on the other side it is not found in any subject of the nature of those that have no powers but Corporeal For there was never found neither Horse nor Elephant nor any other Animals devoid of Reason in whom appeared the least ray of that which we call wisdom Either then these kind of habits are wholly razed out by death or they remain in the Soul now there is no good reason why we should say they are obliterate For though I willingly grant that in some sort they intered the intellect by the means of the Body and that the Organs of the Body have contributed something to those reasonings by which they are formed nevertheless they are in themselves totally intellectual and have their proper seat in the reason it self as on the contrary although it be by the conduct of the intellect that the body learns to accustom it self to certain motions directed by measure and art as is for example the habit of Fencing well or Riding the great Horse the habit is nevertheless Corporeal So then when the reasonable Soul comes to be separated from the Body if the body by the presence of the sensitive Soul alone can subsist alive without it there is nothing can hinder but that it may preserve some of those habits which it obtained by the direction of the understanding as they say there are some Horses so well trained that they will of themselves move regularly though there be no Rider to govern them 'T is much more likely that the Soul remaining alive and subsisting after the Body the habits which are so perfectly proper to it should also remain and subsist with it If then they do subsist
beloved thereof The believing Soul therefore ardently loves the happy Spirits which are received on high and likewise the Holy Angels and being likewise reciprocally loved by them and loving our Lord Jesus with an affection far above what it bears to Angels and Spirits and being much assured that it is yet much more beloved of him and to conclude seeing in its Habitation in the Heavens in the aspect of the marvellous things that are there in the company of Holy Spirits in the Society of Angels in the presence and Communion of Jesus Christ so many and such irrefragable Testimonies of the love of God towards it it plunges and drowns and totally swallows it self in the love that it bears to him and finds in all these motions a sensible and sublime taste of unspeakable felicity What it is that the Resurrection will add to the blessedness of the believing Soul The Third Discourse THis which I have said hitherunto very imperfectly concerning the happiness of the believing Soul after it is separate from the Body may enable us to conceive something of its grandeur as by the lightning that passes before our eyes we do in some manner judge of the quantity of fire that is wrapt up in the dark clouds But although there be attractives enough in what we understand of it to excite the desire and admiration of it in our hearts yet it falls far short of its perfection as long as man remains deprived of the other half of his essence For the believer of whose happiness we are now discoursing may be considered after three manners First in himself then as the world hath some Relation to and Connexion with him And lastly as he hath some Relation to the Church as a member hath Relation to his Body Now to consider him in himself seeing he is composed of a Soul and a Body to whatsoever perfection the Soul be advanced so it is that whilst the Body remains under the power of death its happiness is not compleat To consider it in the Relation that it and the World have between each other forasmuch as the World was made for-man and hath been made subject to vanity by reason of him when man shall be placed all entire in perfect happiness as far as precisely concerns himself nevertheless he cannot be said to be absolutely and entirely happy as long as the World remains subject to misery by reason of him and by occasion of him bears the marks of the cruse of God Lastly to consider him after the third manner Forasmuch as he is a part of that whereof the Church is the whole although he should behold himself perfectly happy in himself and although he should see the World delivered from the curse that it incurred for his sake nevertheless he cannot be said to enjoy a full felicity until the whole Church on its part partake in the enjoyment of it If Esther esteemed her self miserable although she were advanced to the glory of a great Empire whilst she beheld her Nation in danger of desolation the Believer may not account it self happy whilst some of his brethren are fighting upon Earth and others with respect to their Bodies are under the power of death and rotting in their graves Forasmuch then as the Soul in that beatitude that it enjoys in the Heavens hath sufficient knowledge of all these Relations 't is impossible that it should not desire the Resurrection of its Body to the end that it may be united with it and the deliverance of the World out of its misery and vanity so that it may no longer be subject to corruption for its sake and the glorification of the Church in a perfect felicity so that the state of that wherewith it hath such inviolable ties may not divide its thoughts betwixt grief and and joy Now he is not happy perfectly that doth desire and hath yet reason and subject to desire something 'T is very true the desire of the Soul in all these regards is without inquietude and anxiety for these passions are generated either from the impatience of our spirits or the uncertainty of the event of what we desire or from hence that although the event that we expect is sure yet the condition that we are in in the mean while is troublesome in it self and uneasy to be born As to what concerns impatience there is not the least string or fiber there-of in the Souls that are on high they are endued with all sorts of Virtues principally they are all swallowed up in a profound respect to the providence of God And as to the assurance of their hope they are more than most assured that it will never fail them since God hath promised it and the power that he hath to execute his Counsels finds no where either difficulty or impossibility to arrest or hinder it to conclude as to what respects their condition the little which I have above reported of it represents it capable of swallowing up in the sweetness of its contents all resentments they may have for the length of their expectations When the Holy Ghost in the Revelation causeth us to hear them cry how long Lord wilt thou not avenge our blood we may not take that for any mark of inquietude of mind any more than for an inordinate desire of vengeance Forasmuch as in this place they consider their enemies as reprobated and adjudged by God to the suffering of punishment and are no longer obliged to have any charity for them Our charity having none for its object but such as may have some access to the mercy of our Heavenly Father Is the gate then closed upon any one Yea as it hath been from the beginning upon Devils or on those that have sinned against the Holy Ghost or on those against whom God hath pronounced an irrevocable sentence of death and condemnation our charity remains utterly extinct in respect of them And to desire the Execution of this condemnation as the Souls of the faithful do is nothing but a conformity to the Divine Justice and will So that the words how long are purely and simply a Holy breathing of Zeal which they have to see the glory of God shining in the Execution of his judgments which doth not pass the bounds of respect which they owe to the conduct of his wisdom Nevertheless although they be without inquietude so it is as I have said they are not without out desire Now he which desires gives evidence that something is wanting to his condition and by consequent is not accomplished in all things And 't is for this reason that we must see what will be the happiness of believers in these three respects at the last day For the first it seems that there are principally two things to be considered that is to say what will be the quality and condition of the body when it shall be raised again and then what will be the estate of the Soul when it shall be rejoined unto
THE EVIDENCE Of things not SEEN OR Diverse Scriptural AND Philosophical Discourses Concerning the State of Good and Holy men after Death In Answer to these following Questions 1. Whether the Soul after death be endued with perception or sleeps without exercising any of its Faculties until the day of Judgment 2. What is the place of the Souls abode Immediately after death and what is then the measure of the happiness of the Faithful 3. What will be the Condition of the Soul and Body at the Resurrection when they shall be Joyning and Re-joyned together 4. What will be the Nature of a good Mans Happiness in Eternal Glory after the Resurrection By that Eminently Learned Divine MOSES AMYRALDUS Translated out of the French Tongue By a Minister of the Church of England LONDON Printed for Tho. Cockerill at the Sign of the Three Legs in the Poultry THE TRANSLATOR TO HIS Dearest CONSORT My Dear THE Excellent Author of the following Discourses wrote them for the only use of his Dear Wife without any intention of Printing them but some Friends obtaining a sight of them in Manuscript were so delighted with them and so satisfied with the Philosophy and Reason of them together with the Scriptural evidences here made use of which do clearly reveal and plainly Manifest very much of the nature of mans future State and Condition as that they did not only judge them worthy of the Publick view but making it their earnest request to him did by the Mediation of so prevalent a person as his nearest Relation gain his consent as he tells us for the publishing of them Dear Heart I did sometimes since Translate them also for your use and now at your desire I do suffer them to pass the Press you have Communicated them to some of your Relations who think that they may be of great advantage to devout and pious Souls I do therefore willingly commit them to your and their Disposal and if they may promote and increase a love to and a faith in that blessed future State which is the Subject of them I shall most Heartily Rejoyce therein I very well know that such subjects are very congruous suitable and pleasant to your Soul and it was the knowledge thereof that did engage me at some Vacant hours to Translate them You have Experienced much good already by them and I doubt not but they will tend yet further to encrease a passion in you for God and Heaven It may be also that God may bless them to produce the same Effects upon many others that shall peruse them But as the Author inscribed them to no other Name than Hers for whose sake he Wrote them So I having made them English for your Use in a Especial manner do now make the Dedication of them only to your self always praying that God would so bless them to the profit of all that shall Read them that they together with us may be made Partakers of that blessed Inheritance a clear Map whereof is herewith so lively Delineated and so plainly Exhibited to our and their Eyes Now the God of peace fill thee my Dear with all joy through Believing which is the Dayly Prayer of thine G. J. Concerning the STATE Of the FAITHFUL After Death ALthough the Apostle St. Paul writing to the Thessalonians exhorts them to derive their Comforts in the loss of their Friends from the hopes of a happy Resurrection and tho the full Revelation of our happiness be reserved indeed till the day when that shall be Nevertheless we do not cease to Comfort those to whom such accidents arrive by this Consideration that assoon as the Soul is separate from the body it is received into a place of refreshment and repose where expecting this Resurrection it enjoys a Contentment greater than can be expressed We have been accustomed to give this hope to the diseased that we see in danger of death that if they be removed from this life it will be to enter into a better where they shall forthwith possess joy and happiness which we essay to describe in the most Illustrious manner that we are able But the thing it self must infinitely surpass all that we can in our words say concerning it And forasmuch as 't is apparent that naturally things a far off touch us little whereas those that are near and such as we think under our hand give to our Spirits motions and perceptions far more lively this Consolation hath I know not how more of efficacy both to sweeten the trouble of those that live and to abate the regret of those that die than the expectation of the re-establishment of this Body which according to all appearance of things seems to be differred to a time sufficiently long Now as 't is suitable to the Christian Religion and to the Office of those that are to Publish it to fill the minds of men with generous hopes and to make them feel the most lively Consolations so 't is worthy of its Excellence that these hopes and Consolations be true and certain and that those that do receive them have a full perswasion of it For the efficacy of such things depends on the evidence and solidity of their truth and in what degree a man doubts the truth of what is promised or whereof he receives assurance in the same degree the content that he receives from it doth weaken and diminish Forasmuch then as there is nothing the use whereof returns more frequently in the life of man and that there is not a Family among Christians that doth not sometimes need such Consolations and that the infirmity of the flesh finds always much of difficulty to impress on us aforehand the belief of these things and that even among Christians themselves some have doubted of the Estate of Souls after death and that it cannot be avoided but that in the particular Entercourse and Conversation of men they will happen on the discourse of this matter I do believe that it will not be altogether without reason to bestow some hours on the attentive Consideration of this Subject If my thoughts about it be of no use to the Edification of the Publick at least my near Allies may derive with me some particular utility from them in the Afflictions of this sort wherewith God hath visited us I propound to my self therefore to examine by the word of God for 't is from thence only that we can fetch such light as may satisfy us in these matters principally four things First what is the Estate of the faithful Soul after death Whether it be endowed with perception or whether it remain asleep without any use of its faculties until the day of Judgment Secondly it being supposed which we shall make appear that it exercises them with much joy and satisfaction what is the place where 't is received and what is the measure of the joy and happiness that it doth enjoy Thirdly what will be its State at the Resurrection and
for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory Which shews sufficiently that he hath some respect to the day of the full Revelation of our Salvation but that which follows of the destruction of this earthly Tabernacle can it be understood otherwise than of the dissolution of the body That which he writes immediately afterwards that as long as we are lodged in this body we are absent and as it were strangers from our Lord but that through the assurance that we have of our Salvation we desire rather to be strangers from the body and be with the Lord can it be understood of the blessed Resurrection Shall we be then absent and strangers from our bodies or rather will not our Spirits have thereon eternal Habitations I therefore think that the Apostle in that place opposes the time in which we are in this life to that in which we shall be in it no more and that he says that as long as we are in this life we are absent from the Lord but when we are dislodged we are present with him and because although this future time consist of two parts the one wherein we are stripped of our bodies by death the other wherein we are reinvested in them by the Resurrection it is to that in the one and the other our condition must always be the enjoyment of the presence of Jesus Christ he considers it not but as one and the same tract of time in the first part whereof our happiness begins and is compleated in the second which excites our desires and affections to be now stripped of these bodies that we may enter on the possession of those happy beginnings till the time of full and compleat perfection shall come Now this is marvellously far from the opinion of those that take from the Souls of believers all sense and perception whatsoever even that of their proper faculties and essence St. Luke reports that St. Stephen being about to die recommended his Spirit to our Lord Christ saying Lord Jesus into thy hands I commend my Spirit and our Lord himself commended his to his Father on the Cross To what purpose was this then It was not without doubt to secure it from perishing and being reduced to nothing For the substance of the Soul contains nothing of matter nor of the mixture of the Elements 't is of its nature incorruptible and imperishable as are the Angels Was it then to be protected from the Temptations and assaults of the Devil or to be put into the fruition of happiness and glory As to the first it can have no place if the Spirits of the faithful remain swallowed of a sleep so deep that they absolutely lose all use of their understandings For the Temptations of the Devil consist either in an Artificial external presenting to our senses such objects as are proper to move our desires and appetites or in this that internally he forms in our Phantasy such Images of things as may stir and provoke us and in favouring with his efficacy such as are already there or in moving our humours and by our humours soliciting the appetites and passions of our Souls what can these attempts do upon substances which are not at all subject to the motion of humours which in death have lost the faculty of imagination which have no Corporeal senses seeing they are not Bodies and all whose Spiritual capacities are so fettered in the excercise of their powers that neither exteriour objects can by any means touch them nor visions from within be get the least thought there As to the second there is neither felicity nor glory can happen to Spirits without the exercise of their understanding and will There is not a person to whom we say that the Spirits of the faithful gone hence are happy and glorious which doth not immediately conceive that they are so far from being swallowed up in a profound drousiness or sleep that on the contrary they have a very lively and notable sense of their happiness and glory I am much of the opinion of those that think that in the words of our Saviour John 11. 26. and John 5. 24. he that believeth in me shall never see death He is passed from death to life There is a particular Emphasis which makes much to our present purpose I very well know that in divers places it seems probable that what interprets these words by that promise I will raise him up at the last day Nevertheless if since the time wherein he spake those words believers that are departed hence have slept unto this day and must yet sleep till the consummation of Ages without any bodily or mental sense of their condition or essence I am not able to comprehend how the hopes of the Resurrection can perfectly satisfy and compleat the sense and magnificence of the words Although the body sleep after that manner if the principal part of man and that whereof the Scriptures sometimes speaks as if it were the man and the body nothing but its Habitation live and be awake and perceive and exercise with content and joy such operations as are worthy the dignity of his nature death is not properly death nor doth it seem to deserve a name so terrible and odious 'T is much rather a sleep as the Scripture sometimes speaks wherein man entertains himself with visions very pleasant and delightful But if the perception of the Soul and body both be equally extinct and that not only for a little time but for I know not how many Ages how comes it to pass that it is not called death but a passing from death to life And it will appear yet much more strange if we apply it to the Fathers and Patriarchs that lived in the first Ages Such as were Adam Noah Seth and Abraham For since the Apostle Heb. 11. Attributes unto them one and the same faith with us although the things which faith embraces were not so plainly revealed to them as to us yet they ought to produce one and the same effect with respect to them and us Jesus Christ being the same yesterday and to day and for ever Are those then passed from death to life who from before the deluge and soon after were as to their bodies reduced to dust and as to their Souls carried in a profound sleep and total insensibility Truly it seems manifest that they had other hopes and expectations When Jacob after too many afflictions and irksom and troubleous Pilgrimages comforted himself with this that he hoped for the Salvation of God Gen. 49. 18. If he had no hope but that of losing the sense of all good and evil for so long a succession of Ages he would have had more occasion to be afflicted than to rejoyce to fear death than to draw comfort from the near approach and prospect of it besides 't is here very considerable that as he was at a greater distance from the day of judgment
than we are now and as he did not perceive unless it were a far off in the darkness of what to come the manifestation of a Redeemer so also he did not see so clearly as we do the hopes of the Resurrection nor had not such distinct knowledg of the glory that attends us in Heavenly places I observe that David as he approached nearer to the time of our Saviours appearance did both receive from God and deliver to his Church much greater explanations upon these matters than did any of his Ancestors and yet nevertheless had experience of very different emotions of Spirit when he saw himself in danger or in likelyhood of death Sometimes in the Psalms he gives evidence that he was much afraid of death and desires of God with great earnestness that by his good providence and the power of his hand he would hinder his falling under it and these motions of his so frequently reported and repeated in his Writings accompanied with vows so ardent and praises so vivid and full of Devotion when God had rescued him from his dangers do sufficiently shew that this object when it presented it self unto him occasioned terrible agitations to his mind And nevertheless when he was to die he disposed himself to it with great Tranquillity and gave no Testimony of fear or any the least alteration If you enquire of those that think the perceptions of the Soul perish and die with those of the body why David feared death so very much they will say that he himself gives the reason of it 'T is because in death he makes no mention of the name of God nor sings unto him any Songs of praise Psal 6. which proves according to their opinion that death takes away at once both from Soul and Body the knowledg of all things But if this were the only reason why did he not fear death as much when he was old Will it hinder the loss of all sense and memory of objects to die old Or would it be a greater affliction to David when in the flower of his age to lose by losing life the means and opportunity of singing the praises of God than to be deprived of this pleasure and content by dying in a good old age It is therefore much more reasonable to say that David and other Saints of times past did think that God sent them into the world for two ends the one which respects his glory was to advance and celebrate it as much as they were able the other was to enjoy therein for a long time the Testimonies of his Faviour in those Temporal blessings the promises whereof he had given unto them When therefore any danger of death did threaten them before the time which nature seems to have appointed for it viz. seventy or eighty years or if there were in the time of David any other natural and ordinary term of life They were extraordinarily moved and troubled because it seemed that death before full age was a Testimony of the anger and curse of God So that to prevail with God to protect them from it after having begged the pardon of their sins they alledge this reason that otherwise he himself will in some sort be deprived of the end to which he had respect when he sent them into the world For it is as if some young plant should complain to the Gardiner or Master of the plants that having put him in the rank with others to bear some quantity of fruits he would nevertheless cut it off at the root when it began to bud and to give some good hopes thereof But concerning that great tranquillity of Spirit wherewith they received death when it came in such time wherein the untimeliness of it was no mark of the anger of God it came without doubt from hence that it was accompanied with the peace of God and some hope of happiness for their Souls Otherwise by the confession of those with whom I now discourse the being deprived of praising God after death and of perceiving any taste of his love towards them should have given them great fears and inconceivable aversions Some of the Pagans as Socrates have sometimes supported themselves by this meditation against the fears of death that either it did or it did not take from them all sense and perception of things If it did not those that die ought if they be honest men to hope for Contentments after death in the Conversation of those persons that had gone hence before them the company of Cepheus Museus Homer Hesiod Vlysses and Agamemnon without doubt as they imagined would give them incomparable satisfaction if it did there was no reason to fear death since it reduced men to a state of utter insensibility but these persons never tasted any thing of the sweetness of the peace of God nor of the Contentment that arises from the assurance of his paternal love Having therefore no experience of any other good things than such as this world affords they might well depart from life as they themselves do express it as from a banquet after they had been satisfied therewith without much complaint that they are obliged to leave the fruition and use of it to those that were to come after but as for David and other servants of God to whom he had given the beginnings and foretasts of his glory with what grief ought they to receive the news of death whensoever it should be if they had been not only reeling and staggering as were the Pagans between the hope of seeing Abraham Isaac and Jacob and the fear of losing all kind of sense and perception but deeply and fully perswaded that in stead of being put into the full fruition of what they had had some foretasts here below death would utterly ravish from them even the total memory of it This same David testifies in many places a very sensible and deep regret and trouble for being separated from the Ark of God because 't was there that God gave demonstrations of his presence in an extraordinary manner Nevertheless in Caves and Deserts and the wildest Forests he might entertain himself with God and derive from the Fountains of his own Meditations as it appears he often did abundance of pleasant consolations to allay the trouble which was occasioned by his estrangment and separation from it I pray you therefore if he had believed that death would have taken from him all knowledg and memory of God for so many ages what Lamentations would he have made Or could he have found words sufficient to express the anguish of his Soul on this occasion Ever and anon he enquires with some kind of impatience when shall I see the face of my God If by these words he understands the Ark how much more ought he to desire to see the face of God after his death and with what unquietness must he be filled when he considers that death takes from him not only the pleasure of seeing the
as 't is altogether apparent how will it be possible that a Being effectively living endued with faculties so excellent and those faculties adorned with habits so comly should remain so many ages without being awakened in any manner to discover them by some Operations Is it not the property of habits to incline the faculties to action to facilitate the action to which they do incline them yea and in some manner to spur them thereunto And since that man is a being naturally active and that 't is the Soul that gives him this activity and since that which makes the Soul incline it self more to one thing than another in its actions is because its habits give him a tendency that way Why is it that the Soul cannot preserve in it self when separated the activity that it Communicated to the Body and that its proper habits should not have the power they had before to bend it in its actions that way to which they themselves are inclined But let us not fasten our selves on the teaching and institutions of nature Let us consult the Analogy of Religion Certainly all believers have Communion with Christ And this Communion on their parts consists in faith whereby they receive him and on his part in the Communication of his Spirit by which he comforts and sanctifies them Now this Communion is so strict and close that it never suffers any separation And as the death of the body in our Saviour did not hinder in him the personal union of the Divine nature with the humane so that the saying of the Ancient Church is true that what Christ once takes in that regard he never leaves so the death of our Bodies hinders not the mysterious union of our Saviour with us In such manner that those that he hath once taken for his members cannot but always remain so Therefore even after death the Communication of his Spirit of holiness and Consolation abides with us Now what is this Spirit of holiness and Consolation which doth never comfort or sanctify us Or what is this holiness and comfort if it gives us no sense of it self or us When any member of the body becomes mortified it is not reputed a member of it because 't is not esteemed a member but by reason of its Communion in the same life and with the same Soul which is the principle both of life and action If then the Soul do not partake in the Spirit of Christ who alone animates the whole mysterious body composed of himself and the faithful that he hath redeemed how can it be his member And how can it partake of him if it have no use of any of its faculties For the participation of the Spirit consists either in those actions to which it moves and excites us or in the habits which it impresses upon the faculties of our minds Now there is no action where the faculties are deeply asleep for 't is the property of sleep to arrest and intercept the action of our faculties and as to habits 't is neither reasonable nor imaginable that they should be preserved so many ages in a subject where they never discover themselves by any Operations the body may certainly in a sense retain the quality of a member of Christ in the dust of the grave although it feel no effect of the Communication of this Spirit because though it have immediately and by it self no connexion with the head it may have it at least by the mediation of the Soul which is the other part of the whole which both together they do compound For the Soul by the relation that it hath to it in that respect always considers it as a dependance or appendix of his essence in as much as without it it cannot constitute any subject and as an essence on which it self in some sort depends For as much as without it it cannot constitute a compleat man So that the Soul having an effective and immediate Communion with Christ by the participation of his Spirit the Body also retains some connexion with the head at least mediately and by virtue of the interposition of the Soul But if all connexion between Christ and the Soul comes to be broken which will certainly happen if the Spirit do not Communicate to it neither in habits nor actions the Soul will by it self cease to be a member of Christ and the body cannot be so by its intervention I conclude then touching this first point that the Soul separate from the body hath understanding and perception and by consequence that the Souls of the faithful departed hence do enjoy some degrees of felicity and glory Let us see whither it may proceed or what may be the degrees thereof as far as the word of God and the Analogy of faith will inform us What is the happiness of faithful Souls after their separation from the Body and what is the place where they are gathered together or assembled The Second Discourse BEcause the place whereinto the Souls of the faithful are assembled at the time of their separation doth contribute without doubt very much to their contentment and when we shall have decided where it is it will be much more easy to speak of the nature of happiness it self before we proceed to enquire into the degrees of the happiness of good men it seems necessary to search and examine what is the place which is appointed for their abode and residence To the end therefore that I may there begin my discourse it must be known that many have been of this opinion that the Souls of the Patriarchs and Fathers that lived under the Old Testament were not received into Heaven till the manifestation of the New and that by the ascension of Christ on high admission thither was granted to them And the principal foundation that they have for this opinion is that passage in the ninth Chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews where it is said Vers 8. that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest under the time of legal dispensation whilst the first Tabernacle was standing Having therefore banished Souls from the habitation of Heaven for all the time that ran by till the ascension of our Saviour and it being necessary to provide for them some certain habitation to the end they might not remain wanderers and vagabonds because they did not believe any place more proper to mark out for them than the bosom of Abraham of which our Saviour speaks in the Gospel they have made no difficulty to determine that is there they have made their abode all this long tract of time only they have found themselves much perplexed when they have been to determine precisely in what part of the World the bosom of Abraham should be For some have placed it in the near neighbourhood of Hell although our Lord put a great deep between them others have made it the Porch or Antichamber of Heaven to conclude others not knowing
very far from the place whereof he had raised in them very strange and pleasant hopes and expectations And this good God which hath had so much care by all means to provide for the comfort of our faith would not have commanded us to embark with so much Courage and Resolution upon a Sea so troublesome and full of darkness and Abysses as is death if he had not clearly shewed us the Haven where our Souls must arrive after such troublesome agitations The other point which concerns the quality and degree of the blessedness of those Souls that are gathered together in Heaven will put us to some little more trouble whether it be seriously to search what may be said concerning it from the word of God which speaks not so plainly of it or whether it be to contain our selves modestly within the bounds of what it hath revealed and of what we can comprehend by the Analogy of Faith without passing the limits of it I shall endeavour notwithstanding to do the one and the other I must lay down here for the foundation of our discourse that the Souls of the faithful are put by death into a state of perfect sanctification seeing they enter into Heaven For nothing enters there that doth pollute or foul In short seeing that sin either in Bodily affections such as the Schools call the Irascible and Concupiscible or in the habits of the mind it self and in the evil dispositions of the understanding and will death must enfranchise them from subjection to the one and the other For first of all the Soul being delivered from the body it can be no longer subject to its affections and that among others is the reason why we die that the affections and desires of our members which have not been perfectly mortified by the grace of God which we receive here below might entirely be extinguished by the destruction and dissolution of the members themselves which 't is like the Apostle would signify when he says the body is dead because of sin that is to say mortal or subject to death to the end that sin might be extinguished Moreover as to what concerns the habits of the Spirit as it was that of God that began to dissipate them here below to the end that he might introduce those that are better so it is he himself that doth altogether cleanse us of them after death and impress upon us a perfect and compleat sanctity Now compleat Holiness doth necessarily suppose some perfection of knowledg For we are so framed that the love and affection of our wills is generated by the light that is in our understandings and this Frame or Constitution being essential to our Souls and by consequence absolutely inseparable from them in what place or in whatsoever state they be it must be that they be such as well after as before their separation from the Body for it cannot be conceived either that we can love those things that we do not at all understand or that we cannot love those which we do know to be truly lovely or that we love more or less in proportion to the knowledg we have of them In the mean time the perfection of knowledg depends of two things the one is the object which is presented to us the other is the manner in which we receive it the object may have the advantage of being presented to us after an excellent manner but if we be not well disposed to receive it the effect which it ought to produce in our Souls is not produced at all And on the other side we may be well disposed to receive it but if it be not presented to us in good manner we cannot derive those lights from it which otherwise we might Now as to the disposition of the faculties of our Souls we do here suppose that after death they will be perfectly well constituted since they will be delivered from sin by the extinction of the lusts and desires of the Body and be rendred incomparably more strong and luminous than naturally they could be by the presence of the Holy Ghost It remains now that we consider what may be the objects that present themselves to the contemplation of Souls thus qualified and prepared It seems to me that we may boldly say they are necessarily of three kinds The first are such as our Souls may have had some knowledg of whilst we lived and whereof we continue to retain the memory The second contain those works of God which are presented to their eyes The third are the persons that will there be seen and the Communion which they will have on high with those other Spirits which are found there Now as touching memory I think there is no person which doth not easily conceive that we have two sorts thereof For their is one that consists in the retention of things sensible and singular with their circumstances and particularities according to which our memories received the images of them which we recal in our Fantasy when occasions are presented or our Spirits engage themselves in the search of them for there is no person that knows not by experience what it is to review his memory there to recover the Idea's or Images of diverse sensible things which are there laid in reserve almost as a person passes his eyes over the Books in his Closet to find one there that he hath present use of But there is another also which consists in things more universal and which have their foundation in reason and discourse For there never were men which have not or might not make this Observation in themselves that after having as it seemed so forgotten certain conclusions which at some other times we had known that at the first attempt they did not present themselves to our thoughts but when we come attentively to consider the principles whereon they depend immediately we find the foot-steps of our reasonings and without any great difficulty return to the consequences that we had drawn from them in such manner that there is a like difference between a man that never knew science and another that hath had knowledg of it but the discontinuance of Meditating thereon hath a little obscured the Idea's thereof in his mind as there is between a man which never was in a Country and another who after having exactly known it hath been a stranger to it for some few years the one finds much difficulty in obtaining the knowledg of it and if he wander never so little from the beaten rode behold him utterly bewildred the other immediately recollects himself and the least thing which presents it self before his eyes replaces in his memory the Situation of the whole Country and if I may so say repaints in his mind the Map of a Province As to what concerns this first sort of memory 't is a corporeal faculty in us whereof I desire no other argument but that 't is found among beasts 'T is very true that as the
of this discourse is imployed to come to this Conclusion as we set shadows and leaves round about Pictures which serve for nothing but to fill up the void space and give some little Ornament to the Table so there is something in this discourse of our Lord the use whereof consists wholly in making the Parable more full bright and luminous 'T is therefore to be Considered whether it were the common opinion of the Jews that the Souls of unbelievers are tormented immediately after death or that being deprived of all perception and use of their faculties they remain as if they were in a profound sleep if it were the last of these our Lord did not it seems a thing worthy of his wisdom to establish his Parable upon an Hypothesis contrary to the common belief of the Jews For if a parable be not taken from a truth really and indeed accomplished at least it ought not to contradict the common conceptions of men And our Lord never proposed any in which we might not easily see much reason and appearance of possibility and by how much the more of difficulty there is to comprehend for these two persons could reason together there being too great a gulph between them by so much the rest of the Parable ought to be accommodated to the sense and apprehension of the Auditors to the end that they may not accuse him that speaks of giving them instructions built upon false and extravagant opinions If it were the common opinion of the Jews that Souls enjoy perception after death our Lord sufficiently confirms it not only in that he makes no opposition to it but moreover in that he builds thereupon instructions excellent and full of wisdom I make no doubt therefore but that he gives us to understand in this Emblem that the Souls of the wicked are tormented from the time they go out of this life and that the Souls of the faithful do receive Consolation which cannot be without some notable sense or perception nor can there be so notable a sense if they have not their faculties active and awake When the Apostle St. Paul tells us he was caught up into Paradise where he heard things that could not be uttered 't is true he tells us that he knew not whether'twas in the body or out of the body So that although it be not without probability that it was rather out of the body yet it would be great boldness positively to determine concerning it since he himself would not do it But 't is clear that he supposes that it might be done out of the body and by consequent that Souls can make use of their faculties when they are separated from it for in that estate in which he supposes his Soul was or might be they could not hear things unspeakable soon after without some use of their understanding moreover it must be an excellent use thereof as well because of the greatness of the object which without doubt could not be comprehended unless by an understanding very active as because it so vehemently applyed it self unto it and it received such deep impressions from it that after it was rejoined to its body and again offered unto its Organs as before it nevertheless retains the memory thereof Now it is enough that St. Paul supposes that it might be to rescue our minds from all difficulty and doubt in this matter The Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews representing in a stately manner the condition whereunto Christians are called says that it is to the Heavenly Jerusalem to thousands of Angels to the assembly of the first born who are enrolled or whose names are written in Heaven and to the Spirits of just men sanctified I will not stay to search out what is signified by those words enrolled in the Heavens although it seems to be a manner of speech taken from publick Registers and Rolls wherein are written the names of such Citizens which ought to have the right of Free-men and to partake in the priviledges of the Corporation Which will signify that these first born are already received into the Heavens a place of abode not at all proper for a sleep so profound and void of all perception as is that to which some condemn Souls till the day of the Resurrection I will only say that this word the Spirits doth signify without doubt Souls separated from their Bodies and that the word which we Translate Sanctified signifies properly perfect or accomplished A Title that in the New Testament is not given unless it be to those which be it in knowledg or holiness have obtained that degree of perfection whereunto before they did aspire and whereunto those that they have left behind them are not yet arrived Thus we are said to be perfect in comparison with the Jews who lived under the dispensation of the Law but imperfect in comparison with them that have obtained that knowledg whereunto we cannot come in this life so that these just men made perfect concerning the Spirit of whom he speaks in this Text are those that have obtained a degree of perfection which we have not as yet which cannot be obtained without an excellent use of those faculties which are called Understanding and Will In the Book of the Revelation Chap. 14. Vers 13. It is said that the Spirit declares those happy which are dead in the Lord now happiness and the privation of the use of all their faculties are inconsistent Aristotle himself says that happiness cannot properly be attributed unless it be to such who are actually in the exercise of the most excellent operations of their noblest and most excellent powers and vacant in the contemplation and love of the bravest and sublimest Objects and to the end that we may not think that they are called happy because they are appointed to the injoyment of the happiness which is to be revealed at the last day as the same Philosopher says we call little Children happy by a kind of hope when there is much of probability that one day they will obtain it 'T is said that they rest from their labours and their works follow them Now 't is true indeed that we call sleep by the name of rest in opposition to the labours and troubles of the day but nevertheless if speaking of a person that is returned into his Country after great and memorable battels fought in Forreign Lands we should say that henceforth he rests from his labours I do not think that any one would understand thereby that he had slept for a long time but that he enjoyed in peace and tranquillity the fruit of his former pains and labours and indeed these words and their works follow them do mean they enjoy their reward For because the work and the reward are inseparable by the appointment of the good will of God and the holy Spirit being willing to inform us that believers shall not lose their labours in the good works that they do
well what to hold or affirm have left the Question undecided Now as to what concerns the bosom of Abraham as when our Lord saith Mat. 8. 11. that many shall come from the East and West and shall sit down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob. He never intended to design or determin the place where these Patriarchs are together so that if the place where they are may be gathered from this Text 't is from those words in the Kingdom of Heaven And not from those and shall sit with Abraham Isaac and Jacob So there is no appearance that he intended to determine any certain place by those words in Abrahams bosom Because in his time there were two manners of eating together the one by sitting round a Table as we now do the other by lying on beds in such fashion that their heads were near each other and one did repose himself as it were in the bosom of his neighbour in the one of those Texts the Lord hath respect to one of these customs and in the other to the other to signify one and the same thing viz. that they shall eat with Abraham And because to eat together after this manner is a Testimony of a Familiar Conversation and of a Society full of friendship to signifie that Lazarus had this strict familiarity with Abraham he says that he was in his bosom as to signifie that others shall enjoy the same sweet society with him he says they shall be with him at Table Which shews without doubt that they must be in the same place but doth in no manner determine whether this place be above the Heavens or beneath the earth As to the meaning of the other Text surely those that make use of it to exclude the Spirits of the Fathers from entring into Heaven before the Ascension of Christ are deceived in the interpretation of it The Apostle means nothing thereby but that by the Ceremony of the High Priests entring once a year into the Holy of Holies with Blood for the expiation of Sins the holy Spirit did give them sufficiently to understand that the true High Priest was not as yet entred into the Sanctuary of Heaven and that the means by which that was to be accomplished was not yet made evident or revealed and indeed it could not be made evident but by the coming of the Thing it Self now the Thing it Self and the Ceremony could not subsist at the same time for the one had the place of a Figure the other of Reality and Truth and the Figure and Truth are appointed for divers times and differing dispensations the Truth therefore existing the Figure necessarily ceases And therefore as long as the Figure did by the appointment of God subsist the Truth could not be presumed actually exhibited But be the interpretation that they have given to this Text What it will it will be of no great importance whether they be deceived in it yea or no since that which the most part of them hold is a constant truth and the whole World are at an agreement with them in it And 't is that since our Lord Jesus is ascended on high the entrance into the Heavens hath been open not only to the faithful that have departed since him but also generally to all those that have lived under the dispensation of the times passed as well since as before the publication of the Law upon the mountain For what doth it concern me that Abraham and the other Patriarchs Fathers Believers and good men that lived in former times had not the advantage of entring into Heaven till our Saviour ascended thither since I my self shall enter there at death and meet them all there to partake with them in the same joy I say what doth it import me that God hath at other times taken the Souls of Believers as Elias speaks of his own and hath lodged them apart in some place at a distance from him until the ascension of our Saviour since that when he takes mine he will place it in his Sanctuary But because all Christians are not of this Opinion and that some have thought that although the faithful after death do enter into a deep Repose accompanied with Consolation and joy marvellously sensible nevertheless they will not be permitted to enter into the presence of God in the Heavens nor to enjoy the Vision of him until the Resurrection I think my self obliged briefly to examine the Texts and Reasons upon which they do establish their Persuasion They say therefore that the holy Scripture doth ordinarily remit us to the Resurrection for the accomplishment of our hopes and that it is on that day alone that our Lord doth promise to give Rewards to those that believe in him as may be seen Joh. 6. and in many other places of like nature even some have made no scruple to alledge to this purpose that Text of St. Peter where he says that Christ was quickened in the Spirit by which also he went and preached unto the Spirits in Prison because although he there speaks of the Spirits of those that lived long before the Revelation of the new Covenant nevertheless according to their opinions there is a likeness of Reason and that we ought to make the same judgment of Believers now and those of times past in this matter and behold well near how they explain themselves There is none say they that is either rewarded or punished with those Rewards or Punishments that are appointed by the Laws until the Sentence be given and pronounced judicially now the Judgment that must pass judicially upon us is differred till the last day so that it will be contrary to all ordinary forms of Administring Justice that the Spirits of Believers should be admitted to the Vision of God before our Lord shall have pronounced Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you before the beginning of the World for I was an hungry c. Therefore as Criminals were kept in Prison and that 's it which is signified by the word Prison 1 Pet. 3. 19. until the pronunciation of Judgment and as they are not brought forth in publick to be punished till after Judgment is pronounced so it is reasonable that some place be appointed for the Reception of those which shall be absolved at the Coming of Christ which is different from the place wherein they shall receive their Reward but as those that are in Prison are racked and tormented in their Consciences by the fear of Judgment and the punishment that doth attend them which is properly in their opinion the pain that the damned at this time endure so it is reasonable that those that expect their Reward in the place of Repose should enjoy Consolation in the assurance of their future absolution and hopes of Glory Now if this Consideration be valid for the Fathers of the most ancient times without doubt it will be as good for the faithful of the new Covenant as for
those of the old As to this Text of Scripture I observe that 't is understood after diverse manners whereof among others there are two worthy of Consideration for some have thought that by the Spirit of Christ is meant his Soul by his preaching the knowledge that he gave to the Souls of the ancient Believers of the propitiation that he made upon the Cross by the word which we translate Prison a kind of Watch-Tower wherein these Souls expected the Redemption hoped for according to the promises that had been given them concerning it they suppose then the Souls of the ancient Believers in condition something like those that are set in Centinel on some high place in a besieged City to discover afar off from whence and when succour will appear unto them only they put this difference that the hopes of succour in a place besieged is always mixed with doubts because of the uncertainty of all human Counsels and Events and this doubt is not without fear nor fear without unquietness nor by consequent without anxiety and perturbation whereas the Souls of the holy Persons of passed ages never having any doubt concerning the promise of God have possessed a hope altogether assured and by consequent a tranquillity very profound and a contentment without any mixture of afflictions others have thought that by the Spirit of Christ must be meant his Divine Nature by his preaching the invitation to Repentance that he caused to be made in the days of Noah And by the Spirits that are in Prison for they believe that to accommodate this Hebrew phrase to our Language 't is necessary to supply these words which are or which are now the Souls of those which would not hearken to this invitation and who by reason of their obstinacy have been put under chains of darkness in those horrible Prisons where they expect their final punishment Now to make here a small Digression and to return again after a little while to the preceding Question I say that whether of these two interpretations we do embrace it will evidently conclude that Souls are not destitute of all knowledge after death for if we fasten on the first the Souls of the faithful expect with great longing the revelation of the Redemption of Jesus Christ and if we follow the second Offenders do not use always to sleep in their holes the worm of their Conscience and the fear of what is to come will awaken them Besides if the Souls of the wicked lose all sense at their going out of the Body there will be no need of assigning to them one certain and common Prison they will be sufficiently well disposed of for the expectation of Judgment in whatsoever part of the World they shall be found But let us return to the Question in hand I think this second Interpretation much the better and most agreeable both to the intention and words of the Apostle and if I should hold my self to that I should have nothing to answer but that although the Prison and place of punishment be different sufficiently often yet they are not always so sometimes Offenders are punished in the Gaols and Prisons wherein they are kept expecting the sentence of the Judge and in the time that St. Peter wrote 't was a thing sufficiently common among the Ramans and Greeks to make use of the same place first as a Prison and then as the Theater of punishment so that this Text proves not at all that the Souls of Unbelievers are not now kept in Hell although one day they must there be tormented for their Crimes And by the same reason it will not follow that the Souls of Believers are not now assembled in the Heavens although that must be one day the place of their recompence and their glory But let us give this honour to those that have proposed this first interpretation to see if by receiving it it can be proved that the Souls of the faithful have not at present their habitation in the Heavens Although the Vision of God in which consists our supream happiness must be chiefly Communicated in the Heavens nevertheless the Court of Heaven and the Vision of God may be things distinct I say God may make himself seen out of Heaven if he pleases and if he pleases he may receive a person to Heaven who shall not see God by that Vision in which consists the top and highest part of happiness Let us put the Case that the Souls of the faithful have in other ages or are at present put in some place as in a Watch-Tower those of the faithful of times past in expectation of the Redemption of the Cross and those of the faithful of the time present in expectation of the appearance of the same Redeemer this place may very well be in the Heavens though the Vision of the glory of God be not yet Communicated to them and if we compare this Text so interpreted with that This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise there will be much more reason to believe that the place of this Sentinel is in Heaven than any where else for the Paradise whither the Soul of our Lord Ascended is in the Heaven and there by consequence are the Souls of those to whom he will give the knowledge of his satisfaction As to what concerns those other Texts wherein the Scripture sends us to the day of the blessed Resurrection for the obtaining of our Reward it seems not at all necessary to understand them in such manner as may persuade us to exclude faithful Souls from Heaven There is no term more usual to represent the glory which we expect on that very happy day than that of triumph Let us then compare the Condition of them that have formerly Triumphed at Rome with the faithful that expect the Reward of Glory they first of all fought at a distance from the City in strange Countreys some nearer and some farther off according as the emergency of things and the extent of the Empire did require after they had vanquished their Enemies they were permitted to enter into the City of Rome as private persons there to demand the charges of the Common-wealth or the honour of Triumph the Senate first appointed it and no man ever triumphed at Rome without consent of the Senate or by authority of the People After a permission of Triumph was obtained they went out of the City to return again in some short time not as private Persons without any Attendance or Ornaments but as victorious Captains and Conquerors with solemn pomp and magnificence Wherefore then after the Believer hath fought here below against the Enemies of the glory of God and his Salvation and is escaped victorious in all his Combates may he not be permitted to enter as a private person stripped of his body into the heavenly Jerusalem not to demand a Triumph for that is already determined but to expect the day on which it must be Celebrated in
the mean whiles passing its happy time in the company of those Saints and Angels which are in the same expectation The same thing is practised towards Embassadors who first enter as private persons into the capital Cities of those Empires whither their Embassies are addressed and soon after go forth to return again on another day in the glory of a great and courtly Attendance and at the Entry of Princes when they return from some Conquest or some glorious Expedition the same method of proceeding is frequently observed the Pomp and Magnificence is differred to some solemn day but in the mean while they live at home with their ordinary Court To conclude the same thing having been used towards our Lord Jesus it may not be thought strange if God make use of it towards Believers For first of all He fought upon the Cross and by his courage became victorious his Body being laid in the Grave his Soul ascended into Paradise and if I may so say without any noise and afterwards being returned and his Body raised he was carried up on high mounted on the Clouds and entred in triumph into Heaven among the applauses of happy Spirits and the acclamations of Angels in the mean time 't is no wonder if the Scripture speaks something more rarely of the reception of Souls into Heaven than of the glorious day of the blessed Resurrection for those beginnings of our happiness which we enjoy immediately after death are indeed very marvellous if we consider them precisely and in themselves but they are obscure imperfect and of little or no lustre if we compare them with the splendor and magnificence in which we shall see the accomplishment of it therefore as the promises of reward made to Jesus Christ for his obedience to the death of the Cross do properly respect his ascension into Heaven and his exaltation to the right hand of his Father in glory so that St. Paul refers it thither Phil. 2. that hinders not but that his Soul might obtain the right of entring into Paradise during the time of its separation from the body and that he did make use of it so that although the promises of Reward have a particular respect to the Resurrection that doth not infer that our Souls are deprived of the liberty of entring into the heavenly Sanctuary there to live in the expectation of it And if any of us according to the manner of the ancient Romans should adopt any one for his Child with resolution to declare this adoption publickly and according to Law upon some certain day to the end that he may be capable of succeeding to our Estate and Honours nothing hinders but that in the mean time he may lodge in our House though perhaps he may keep a little more close and private till the day apointed for this publick and solemn action or installation 'T is true there are some that make some scruple of lodging the Souls of those in Heaven that God hath raised up with purpose to permit them to live yet a while in the World as that of Lazarus and some others For what likelyhood is there say they of bringing them back from that place of glory and happiness to one so wretched as is that of our Conversation on this Earth Had it not been much better never to have given them any taste of the joys of Heaven than to pluck them thence and return them to live among the infirmities and inconveniencies of the present life They are therefore willingly enclined to say that it would have been more adviseable to have assigned them an Habitation in some place whereof the deprivation would neither be so sensible nor so prejudicial But methinks these men give themselves a great deal of trouble to no purpose For if there be any inconvenience therein is it not easie for God to appoint some particular Habitation for those and in the mean time receive all others into the Heavens to the end that none may go thence till on the final Resurrection A score of Souls it may be which were to be reunited to their Bodies by a particular dispensation must they give Law to so many Millions of Spirits as are not at all subject to it nor must have experience of any other Resurrection than that of the general and last day To which we may add that although they should have been received into Heaven seeing that in their first Creation they were made for the glory of God and on other accounts have so many obligations to him because he hath redeemed them they will have no reason to complain if they suffer something extraordinary for his service Scipio Africanus after very glorious Triumphs went to War for the obtaining of Forreign Conquests under the Authority of his Brother and in the quality of his Lieutenant for the sole love that he bore to him and to assist him in arriving at the highest dignities of the Common-Wealth In which he suffered some diminution of his own besides the incommodities which he received in his own person and the sensible griefs that he had experience of by the captivity of his Son The Angels themselves descend from Heaven where they enjoy the vision of God with unspeakable contentments to the end that they Minister to the Protection and Salvation of believers To conclude in whatsoever place those Souls be lodged which by a particular Resurrection return again to the Habitation of their bodies they are delivered from their infirmities as long as they are separated from them and it seems probable that they cannot re-enter there without some disadvantage by that change of condition Wherefore since they cannot return into the world without some abatement to their felicity it cannot be more troubleous to them to be brought back from the Heavens than from the Elementary Region If it were reasonable absolutely to decide this Question touching the place where the faithful are received after death by simple reasonings drawn either from the probability of things or even from the harmony that the parts of Theology and Religion have among themselves there are those that are clear enough and pregnant enough to perswade us to believe that they are received into the Heavens for since as St. Paul teaches us our Conversation is in Heaven and we have the honour to be Citizens thereof for what reasons are we so long exiled from our Country What sin remains unpardoned which should hinder our return to the place whence we are descended Since we are exhorted to tend thither and henceforth to think of nothing but Heavenly things why are we so long deprived of the fruit of our thoughts and desires How is it that the Gospel labours so powerfully to beget in us a desire after it if it give us not also the enjoyment of it Since we are dead to the World and our life is hid with Christ in God why do we not go to converse where our life is kept in reserve for us
Since our head is there and the Communion that we have with him is so strict and indissoluble wherefore doth not he assemble his members about him although by his wise dispensation some part of them remain yet a while on Earth Since he hath prayed that where he is we may be also why is the fruit of this prayer which without doubt God did hear differred for so many ages Since he hath said that he went thither to prepare a place for us why should we doubt that he doth receive us to the place that he hath designed and marked out for us To conclude since he shews himself to those that enquire not after him why doth he depart or withdraw himself so far from those that seek and desire him with so great passions and affections When Mary cast her self at his feet to embrace him he said touch me not for I am not yet ascended to my Father Without doubt because this woman transported with the pleasure of seeing him raised again was willing as we say to rejoyce and congratulate with him in so glorious a Victory and because she and his other disciples had hitherunto had some hope that the Lord would remain on Earth with them to re-establish the Kingdom of Israel she was ravished with joy as if henceforth there were nothing that could hinder but that she might enjoy his presence according to her wish and content there with all the desires of her Soul For that reason he repressed this heat and ardour and tells her that 't is not yet done it remains as yet that he ascend on high ere they must see the accomplishment of their expectations For according to his admirable goodness and wisdom he knew so to dispose his actions and discourses to his servants and to accommodate them for a little time to the quality of their knowledg and understanding but at this time that he is ascended upon high wherefore in expectation that he will descend thence to raise our Bodies should he not permit our Souls to go cast themselves at his feet and refresh themselves with the pleasant enjoyment of his presence all these considerations certainly ought to make very great impressions upon our minds but that which ought fully to perswade them is that the holy Scriptures given us most evident and indubitable instructions concerning it Let us therefore chuse some passages very express and which will render the thing wholly manifest St. Paul in the place that I alledged above saith that if the earthly House of our Body be dissolved we have a Building of God an House eternal in the Heavens And we have seen above that he speaks of what happens to the faithful immediately after death and not only of what they expect at the last Resurrection Will any one say that these words in the Heavens do not signify the place but the condition that is to say that Habitation is called Heavenly not because 't is in the Heavens but because 't is very holy and happy Certainly this neither can nor must be For besides that we may not have recourse to interpretations which seem a little forced without an absolute and invincible necessity he says 't is an house Eternal in the Heavens Now the Court of Heaven which is appointed for the faithful may well be called Eternal although it be necessary that Souls leave it for a moment at the time of the Resurrection Because things that are done for a very little space of time and only by dispensation are not at all considered and so small an interval hinders not but that we say they have always continued in that same place Even as we do not quit our dwelling by making a voyage into the Country and although the Angels come sufficiently often on Earth yet we do not cease to name them the Angels of Heaven but if Souls be in any place out of Heaven until the day of the Resurrection that Habitation being to be abandoned for ever it cannot in any wise be said to be Eternal The same Apostle says that he desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ Forasmuch as it was much better for him without doubt Jesus Christ is in the Heavens and if St. Paul had not believed that he should go thither when he died but that he must be confined in some other place of the world wherever it be out of the presence of our Lord he had not served himself of such expressions our Lord promised the Thief that he should that day be with him in Paradise now Paradise is in Heaven and although our Lord did soon redescend from thence to reunite himself to his body the thief without all controversy continued there having no need or occasion to return to this Earth In the Book of the Revel Chap. 14. Vers 4. All the faithful departed hence are represented under the number of an hundred and forty and four thousand gathered together in the Heavens in the company of the Lamb and following him whithersoever he goes Now there is no probability that God would represent to his Prophet Visions of this nature for the confirmation and consolation of his Children if they were contrary to the truth of things In the Epistle to the Hebrews 't is said that we are come to the assembly and Church of the first born whose names are written in Heaven Now 't is not the manner to enrol and make men free of a City and soon after exile them for a very long time into the Countrey Besides 't is apparent that this word written or enrolled signifies in this Text assembled for here are no publique Rolls or Records in the Heavens where the names and qualities of believers are actually written But because those that are admitted to the priviledges of Freemen in a City are wont first of all to be Enrolled after that manner of speaking which I have before remarked where that which goes before is put for that which follows and that which follows for that which goes before the holy Apostle calls those written or enrolled which are actually received into the possession of their Heavenly freedom and truly it seems to me that there is no reason to doubt of a thing whereof God hath been pleased to give most express assurance in all the periods and parts of the holy Scriptures For why think we did he raise and Translate Enoch before the Law Elias under the legal Oeconomy and Jesus Christ under the Gospel so apparently and manifestly that no man could doubt but that they are carried to Heaven if it were not to this end that we might raise our desires thoughts and affections thither after them I very well know that these things have a particular regard to the hope of the Resurrection but I do also maintain that God would not have drawn the hearts of men so visibly to himself if he had had any intention to command their Souls separated from their Bodies to remain I know not where
most part of those faculties that we have in common with beasts are more excellent in us our memory without doubt is more strong and of larger capacity than theirs and our imagination more clear and full of Light but so it is that Dogs and Horses and Elephants and Foxes know infinite things by their figures and colours and other sensible marks of that kind and 't is also seen that sometimes they act by simple memory although they have no objects before their sences Therefore seeing 't is a Corporeal faculty 't is to be presumed that death hath great power upon it when it dissolves and universally ruines all the Organs of the Body So that I do not doubt but that our Souls do forget an infinite number of the little singularities and particularities of sensible things at their departure hence which we easily remember whilst we are living here But as to the other because 't is a power of the Soul it self as endowed with reason it must most necessarily remain So that we may by no means doubt whether they do remember that they have here seen a World and learnt by the Preaching of the Gospel that the Sun of God came thither to save sinners They will Remember that there is a Church on Earth and that they were members of it having believed in this Redeemer And generally all the Doctrines of the Gospel wherein they had been instructed for their Consolation and Salvation will remain most firmly impressed upon their memories and that 't is so appears by the Book of the Revelation where the Holy Spirit attributes unto them the memory of their Martyrs and charity for the Church and gratitude towards God and the Lamb for the benefit of their Redemption and other things of like kind Concerning which I conceive it will be necessary to make two Considerations The first is that if in the ordinary Preaching of the Gospel or in the study of things that do concern Religion the minds of the faithful have received any impressions less true than might be desired as there is none so advanced in the knowledg of this Divine truth who is not deceived on divers occasions at death they shall be delivered from those errors For that which occasions our mistake in these matters is that although we very well believe the principal and fundamental Articles of Religion and if we know well how to draw our Conclusions from these principles we should certainly preserve our selves from these false impressions so it is that we commit many faults in the conduct of our reason and joyn together perswasions that do not well agree Whereof we do not see the discord and contradiction for besides that naturally since the fall there is some weakness in our discursive faculty especially when there is any Question of things that are a little distant from their principles we there mingle our passions and our interests and permit our selves easily to be carried to that natural obstinacy which causes us to hold fast the things that we have once preconceived even without any appearance of reason The Souls of the faithful being therefore delivered not only from the trouble of the Body but also from all sorts of vices and passions and endued by the presence of the Holy Spirit with a light totally new they then find no difficulty to discern truth from falshood and by consequence to deliver themselves from all false opinions wherewith they may have been prepossessed The second consideration is that although we have been instructed in the belief of the fundamental truths of the Gospel nevertheless we do not as yet comprehend them perfectly enough there remains always some darkness in our conceptions some remnants of incredulity which shake sometimes this way and sometimes that way the things that the word of God hath established in our belief Whereas separate Souls see all these truths so clearly that there remains no darkness in their knowledg of them So that they lose their errors if they had any before they retain the belief of things certain and veritable which they had already received into their minds and those very objects which they had known before they shall perceive by a view incomparably more distinct more perfect and more clearly enlightned As to what concerns the Works of God which are presented to their Contemplation if they were to remain within the compass of this Elementary World it were to be presumed that active and awake as we suppose them they would employ themselves in a great measure in the Contemplation of the most excellent things of the Universe to the end they might observe the marvellous Perfections of their Author Even as I believe that 't is not to be doubted that the Angels that God employs here and there in all parts of the World have derived an infinite number of good and excellent knowledge thence I know not whether I may dare to say that as the Apostle teaches us that the Angels are present in our Assemblies for which reason he commands that women behave themselves there with humilty that they may not offend their eyes by any indecency Souls may be found there voluntarily present to entertain with us a holy Communion as far as they can but we have already said and proved that they are assembled in Heaven and even in that Heaven where our Lord Jesus is in magnificent glory Now it is not my intention carefully to enquire how this Heaven is made and those that permit themselves to be transported by the elevation of their thoughts do much more deserve the blame of rashness and presumption than the praise of subtility or sublimity in their Speculations I will only say two things which cannot be accused of too much curiosity the one is that as if ascending from Earth to the more raised parts of the World we find that progress is made for the better The Water being more transparent than the Earth the Air more transparent than the Water the Fire more pure than the Air and yet the Heavens more pure and luminous than the Fire we should imagine as it is very reasonable that things always advance after the same manner and proportion certainly the Heaven of Heavens must be incomparably beautiful and of a structure most excellent The other is that God having built this lower World to be the Habitation of man nevertheless made it so beautiful that on which side soever we turn our eyes if we be attentive we find not only matter of satisfaction but also of admiration surely seeing he hath chosen this Heaven for his Habitation it must be that the whole Constitution thereof must be infinitely more glorious whereupon I make this Consideration A Pagan Philosopher sometimes entertained this Meditation that if some one had been nourished till the age of five and twenty years in some Cavern where he had never seen the light and where he could learn nothing of the form of the World nor of the things that
it Touching the Body 't is beyond comparison more easy to tell what it will not be then what it will be For we see very clearly what things it must necessarily be delivered from but we do not see in the same manner the things wherewithal it must be endued on that very happy day There are in us two sorts of infirmities whereof the one are so very natural that we should have been subject to them though we had continued in the state of our integrity The others are so far natural that we are subject to them from the womb and from the first principles of our being and yet notwithstanding they have come upon us since the constitution of our nature and had never come into the world but in consequence of sin with regard to these last such as is the deformity of members the ugliness of the visage the want or weakness of any sense maladies wounds ill proportion of stature and to conclude liableness to death since they have no other cause nor original but sin it must necessarily be that sin being entirely and absolutely abolished all these infirmities will necessarily cease of themselves So that though we had nothing else to expect from the Resurrection it must however replace us in a condition not less excellent in what appertains to the constitution of the Body than was the condition of Adam at the hour of his Creation For 't is neither agreeable to the wisdom or mercy nor it may be to the justice of God that having absolved our whole and entire persons from all kind of sin by justification and having delivered our Souls from all evil habits by Sanctification he should notwithstanding leave on our Bodies some trace of those infirmities which had never come there but for the punishment of sin or which are necessary and indubitable dependances of it Imagine you then the most beautiful man upon earth and the most perfectly composed endued with the most lively and vigorous and exquisite senses that can be imagined free him from the danger of all kinds of incommodities in his health make his vigour always equal and flourishing and suppose you that no consequence of years can ever alter or change him and to conclude give him assurance that he shall continue so everlastingly and you will after a sort have conceived the first beginnings of the perfection which we expect in the happy Resurrection Touching the first sort of infirmities which are absolutely natural they consist in the desire of meat drink and sleep and in all those things which are either in some manner like unto them or depend upon them For without doubt Adam desired all this and this desire in a State so Holy and Perfect as was his is an indubitable argument of need and need a necessary consequence of the estate of nature in which he was placed and which the Holy Scripture expresses by this manner of speech he was made a living Soul that is to say that in this respect he was like to other Animals in which the living Soul which the Scripture also attributes unto them derives all these things in consequence to his being Now we ought also to be delivered from these kind of infirmities For the Heavens whither we aspire are not an Habitation agreable to these things although it be said that we shall be there at the Table with Abraham Isaac and Jacob that we shall there be satisfied with the fatness of the House of God and moistened with the Rivers of his pleasures that doth not mean nevertheless that we must make feasts there or to take it according to the Letter that Rivers of pleasure do actually run there But because as long as we are here below we conceive nothing almost but under the Images of things which we see the Scripture accommodating it self unto us as we do to Children doth as it were cover the Heavenly pleasure under the shadow of those that are earthly And as to what concerns generation For as much as it was not instituted in nature unless first of all for the multiplication of single persons for the peopling of the universe and afterwards for the preservation of the species when death removed the individuals the necessity of these two causes then ceasing 't is no wonder that our Saviour hath told us that in that respect we shall be like the Angels Now 't is no disadvantage to be deprived of these things when we have no need of them But to subsist in our being and to exercise perfectly the Operations which are agreeable to our most noble faculties and nevertheless to be delivered from that condition that makes all these base and wretched Actions of our Bodies absolutely necessary is without lying an Estate that ought to be judged very advantageous by those that are compounded more of Spirit than Body and have a Soul a little roused and generous if therefore you add this to those other perfections of which I have made mention you will yet much advance the excellence of that Estate whereof I have formed the Idea In the mean time all these infirmities have their root in us in that we have a Body compounded of the Elements in the same manner as are the Bodies of all other Animals and in that we are endued with a Soul sensitive and vegetative as they speak which hath faculties altogether like to the faculties of the Souls of beasts unless peradventure we be above them in some higher degree of perfection and this composition of the Elements and of a Soul vegetative and sensitive in the constitution of our essence is a cause that although the providence of God should hinder as it did in our integrity our being sick or wounded so it is that our Bodies in themselves would be capable of the impression of the causes of all these alterations and that although God should perpetually preserve us from death nevertheless the constitution of our Body in it self would be perishable and mortal for that the first man had been exempt from all these evil accidents and immortal if he had persevered in his innocence would have proceeded from the care of the Divine Providence and not from the temperature of his Body 'T is therefore necessary that although our Bodies be raised again and remade of the same matter of which they are now compounded the constitution of them must nevertheless be so changed that nothing must remain of all its natural qualities or of that Animal life which we have in common with Creatures endued with sense and destitute of Reason Let us therefore oppose a little those things that depend on this natural complexion of our Bodies to those qualities that are contrary unto them and so let us Endeavour to come to some knowledg of the perfection of the Estate that we expect our Bodies are now in their nature capable of all sorts of evil accidents and impressions which cause incommodity and grief unto them then they shall be so
no more They are at this time corruptible and mortal then they shall be incorruptible and immortal They are now heavy by reason of the Earth that doth predominate in them there they shall be agile beyond all imagination they are at this time capable of being wearied there they shall be indefatigable they are at this time dark then they shall be bright and shining to that degree that the Holy Scripture compares them to the Sun they are at this time perpetually subject to repletion and excretion then they shall be in a Constitution perpetually uniform they are at this time defective in their conformation many ways then the proportion of their parts shall surpass all the measures of nature and art Here they are troubled with the ill taste of their pleasures there their contentments being perfectly pure they will have always a Savour exquisite and eternally agreeable They are now a burthen and hinderance to our minds then they will assist to the vigour and quickness of their Operations In a word they are at this time marvellously earthly then they shall be altogether Heavenly As to what concerns the Operations of the senses and the motions of the affections which as we have said above have their seat in the Body forasmuch as it respects rather the Estate of the Soul when it shall at some time be reunited there and doth not respect the qualities of the body it self I shall speak but one word of it here and 't is this the objects that are perfectly well proportioned to them do indeed delight them but others do offend them so that light it self which in its own nature is so lovely and agreeable offends the eyes if it be but a little too lively and sparkling Instead whereof then the constitution of our senses will be such that they will be impassible and unalterable by grief whatever be the nature of the Objects that do occur unto them and that is it that the Apostle would teach us when he says there is a natural and there is a Spiritual Body For by Spiritual he doth not understand that which is entirely separate from matter otherwise since he calls it matter his words would imply a contradiction but he understands that which although it be matter hath notwithstanding those qualities that follow the nature of Spirits such as are to be immortal incorruptible and impassible When the wife of Lot became a Pillar of Salt if this change were made by degrees and by little and little she was marvellously astonished to see all the colour of her skin and all the substance of her body change and yet more when she perceived all her members to grow stiff in that manner that at last the obduration proceeded even to her very bowels If a while after she had seen her natural constitution to return little by little her Body to become soft and supple her skin return to its former colour and her members retake their precident pliableness in proportion to the horrour that she had of her self in her change in the same proportion will she have experience of ravishment and joy But if immediately after she had seen her self re-established in her first Estate she had begun to perceive an extraordinary strength in her person an Angelical beauty in all her Fabrick and Composition a vigour unknown before in all the Organs of her senses a nimbleness more agile than that of Birds in all her motions and that Majestick aspect that we suppose to have been in the female Hero's of time past implanted in all the comportment of her Body and on all the lines and stroaks of her countenance neither the word joy nor that of ravishment are capable of representing the emotions that she would have thereupon in her Soul Now the change that happens in our Bodies by death is much worse than a Transformation into a pillar of Salt and the condition into which they will be re-established in the Resurrection incomparably more Excellent than all that at this time can be imagined concerning it From whence 't is easy to conjecture in some manner what a spectacle so marvellous will produce in us Concerning the Soul and the condition wherein it will be found then when it shall be reunited to the Body if from these goodly lights wherewithall it is filled and encompassed in the Heavens it should be brought back into a Body incommodated with the trouble and confusion that is found in the affections and Organs of ours at present without doubt it would receive much disadvantage thereby this would be well nigh as if you should recal an excellent Philosopher from the top of an high Mountain where he did contemplate the Heavens and the Stars which are there and saw the Clouds and Fogs under his feet and make him descend to the bottom of it where he can contemplate nothing but through the darkness of the Clouds But the thing that happens to the Body will place it in such a condition as will in no wise incommodate the actions and Operations of the Soul Let the nature thereof be what it will 't is necessary that besides the Operations of understanding and reason that it now attend to the Conservation of the three faculties which we have in common with beasts The vital the natural and the animal As to the vital faculty our Soul will then so animate our Body that it will no longer hold it fast unto it self by the bond of that Coelestial heat and those Spirits that continually beat in our hearts it will be there even as light is in the Body of the Sun and will not keep it self there by any other bonds than it self the Body such as we now have is too far removed from the nature of Spiritual substances to be capable of being joined with them so closely unless it be by the means of something more subtil and less Earthy but the qualities wherewithall it will be reclothed by the Resurrection will purify and subtilize it in such manner that it will be further removed then from the gross qualities which we observe therein than now are those little Bodies which we call by the name of Spirits which serve as a bond and medium between our Bodies and Souls As to the natural faculty our Soul will be neither imployed in the Concoction as they call it nor in the assimilation of nourishment as now it is obliged to do to preserve unto the parts of the Body their just vigour and stature For in the frame wherein the power of God shall place them at first they shall remain for ever without any need of reparation in their substance or in their powers Such well near as is the nature of the Stars according to the Peripateticks whose matter is so pure or form so perfect or the bond that joins the matter to the form so strict and indissoluble that they can never suffer any alteration according to the opinion of those Philosophers As to the Animal
faculty which displays it self chiefly in the Operations of sense and motion I know not at all what will be then the constitution of our Organs nor what will be the nature of the Operation of our Soul upon them nor how the species of sensible things will be received by them And what is more I am not afraid to be esteemed an ignorant on this account at least for certain I shall have many Companions to partake with me in the blame thereof For I do not believe there is a man upon Earth that knows it But so it is that I very well know all will be otherwise than now it is the constitution of such Organs as now we have and the dispensation of Spirits whereupon depends all their Operations being a certain consequence of the passible and corruptible state of nature Now that which is natural will be swallowed up with that which is supernatural as that which is sensual by that which is Spiritual and that which is mortal by immortality and life And although we do not know the manner after which the Soul will be then joined to the Body for its Operations they will not be for that either the less certain or the less decorous If the measure of our knowledg were the measure of the Existence of things the greatest part of the objects of our faculties and their Operations would suffer very notable diminutions in the qualities of their Being yea some would be even absolutely expelled out of nature And I do not know whether we have used any of our senses as we ought That is to say whether of any of them we have very exactly and distinctly comprehended what it is that the Soul doth in their Operations what is the agency and activity of the Spirits And lastly what it is that the Organ it self contributes thereunto how ever it be the Organ after what manner so ever it be constituted the Soul after whatsoever manner it operate there will exercise so admirably each one what is proper to it self that they will do it without offence impediment errour or weariness with a vigour and clearness with an exactness and perfection wholly beyond imagination In conclusion to say something also of the appetites which have properly their seat in the Body and which as I have said are included under desire and anger these are passions which forasmuch as they are Corporeal will be so extinguished by death that they will return no more to life by the Resurrection And if it be true that there be virtues which have their seat in these passions as 't is apparent that Philosophy hath there placed those that they call properly moral either they will be no longer necessary because there will be no objects upon which they may be exercised or they consist not in the moderation of those appetites but in an excellent and invariable temper of the mind and will which will then be irrevocably fastened to all sorts of excellent objects by the light of the understanding All these impidements being removed if there were nothing else the reasonings of the Soul must be supreamly excellent For a good part of the failures which happen to us come either by the errour of our senses in the report that they make to us concerning sensible things or from the fumes of our passions which blind our understandings or from this that the aliments being not well concocted the Spirits which are formed out of part of their substance do retain something of their grossness and impurity wherewithal they infect the Organs which serve for the use of discourse or from this that from their first conformation there was some fault in their natural temper and construction But the same change which will put all the other parts of the Body into so excellent a constitution will put also those into the same condition wherein the intellective power of the Soul hath its seat and where it will form its ratiocinations This will be done the rather because all the other parts of the Body are not to be restored unless it be for their own proper felicity these are to serve the Operations of the Soul on which depends the happiness of the whole entire man and all the parts of him the Soul therefore being otherwise full of the illuminations of the Divine Spirit and strengthened by his presence far above the natural vigour of its faculties and coming to be lodged in a Body all whose power will be admirably perfect and bringing thither the impression of much excellent knowledg which it had already gained during the time of its residence in the Heavens it cannot effect any thing but productions worthy of its marvellous essence And as if during the time of a long separation the husband and wife had equally encreased in beauty and virtue and all other advantages they would receive incredible contentment if they might return to each other to enjoy long one and the same common felicity The Soul will rejoyce in its reunion to the Body and the Body will rejoyce in the presence of the Soul and both together composing one onely essence will be equally ravished with the happiness of their condition and with the assurance that they will have that it will be Eternal The second respect according to which man hath a Connexion and Relation to the World will deserve very attentive Consideration many things do manifestly show that the world was created for man The dignity of his nature which raised him infinitely above all other Creatures if he had remained in his integrity would not have permitted that he should have held any other place than that of an end to the use whereof other things were appointed The Empire that God gave him over all Plants and Animals at the beginning when he placed him in the Terrestrial Pardadise confirms it evidently For God would not have so ordained it if it had not been agreeable to the nature of the things themselves But nothing Teaches it unto us more expresly than the misery whereunto the world is subject on the occasion of mans sin For that 's it which the Apostle means when he says that the Creature is made subject to vanity not of it self but by reason of him which hath subjected it Rom. 8. 20. And if it be lawful to illustrate this by a Comparison taken from things Pagan the World was in regard of God as the statue of Minerva in regard of Phidias and man which is the image of God in the middle of the world as the image of Phidias in the middle of her Shield So that all the parts of the Statue were so aptly placed by their Jointures and Colligations that they met all together in the image of the workman in such manner that if it were plucked from thence all the work would fall in pieces all the parts of the World do so Abutt on this image of God that it cannot be corrupted by sin but the whole compages of
to create the World his wisdom which is so admirably discovered in all the parts whereof it is composed and his power which appears not only in the greatness of the work and in the great variety of forms wherewith it is replenisht but especially in this that it was drawn from nothing and formed without the aid of any pre-existent matter And that leads him to the knowledge of the infinity and immensity of the nature of God for the World could not be created of nothing unless by an infinite power and an infinite power cannot reside in a finite or limited Essence from the infinity of his Essence he was able to ascend to his Eternity for it is impossible but that a thing that had a beginning should have a limited nature to which the cause that produced it doth necessarily determine it so that what is infinite in its Essence hath no beginning of its Existence and what hath no beginning of its Existence can have no end 't is for this reason that St. Paul in the beginning of the Epistle to the Romans saith that men may know the Eternal Power of God in his works by the Creation of the World joyning with the declaration of his Power the revelation of his Eternity from thence he was able to conduct his discoursive power a little farther and know yet some other attributes of this blessed Essence and see God a little farther Nevertheless to see him in this fort is not called properly the seeing of him as he is and the reasons of it are evident Firstly In that the perfections which God hath displayed in this work of nature might have been more magnificently discovered if God had set it as one day it must be in a Supernatural State for as I have said already the more excellent the work is the more clearly doth it give us to understand the virtues and properties of its Cause Again though God hath revealed therein some of his Perfections nevertheless he hath not revealed all of them for as to his Justice he hath given no other knowledge of it besides what may be contained in that threatning Thou shalt dye the death now there is a great deal of difference between the knowledge that these threatnings may give us of it and that which is made from experience of the thing it self for what concerns his mercy there was no declaration made of it and therefore Adam could have no understanding of it After the fall till the first coming of Christ God hath revealed among others these two attributes for death and other sorts of judgments which he hath caused to fall upon men have given testimony to his Justice and his mercy is made known in the promise of Remission of Sins so that the faithful that have known them have in some sort seen God in that respect but nevertheless diverse things hinder so that we cannot say that they did see him as he is the one is that as to what concerns his Justice though death and other judgments of God do bear evident testimonies thereof nevertheless the punishment that God made of our Sins on the person of his only Son was a far more apparent evidence and more authentick demonstrations thereof until then it appeared that God was just but it did not appear that he was inflexible and altogether inexorable in his Justice but when he delivered his welbeloved Son unto death for the punishment of our Sins he gave us to understand that his nature did so abhor Sin that 't is absolutely impossible that he should suffer it without punishing it in a very dreadful manner this is it which St. Paul teacheth Rom. 3. That God had made his Son a propitiatory through faith to the end that he might demonstrate his Justice which had not been sufficiently known during the forbearance of the times past for how ever it was God as says the same St. Paul did as it were connive during the times of the ignorance of Gentilism and permit that men should entertain thoughts of his severity less congruous than became a Nature so holy and exactly just as is his the other is that where the Justice of God is not known to the utmost the Mercy of God is not known neither for he that knows not perfectly the whole greatness of the Evil cannot sufficiently comprehend the whole excellence of the Remedy add to this that the mercy of God was then indeed known by excellent premises but it was not sufficiently known by the experience of the effects themselves for death always reigned and Believers were always exposed to afflictions which did precede death and all this bore the Characters or were Signs of that inclination that solicited God to punish Sin so that all these things did in a manner obscure the splendor of this Mercy the third is that the mean by which this mercy makes it self known to be shed abroad upon us being not yet manifest the wisdom of God that reconciled justice and mercy between themselves could not be known in this affair which is the most magnificent and most admirable of all the works that ever it did produce for all the marvels that it hath so liberally scattered in the Heavens and in the Earth approach not that of the incarnation of our Saviour by which God was made capable of suffering the pains which the Sins of men deserved man knows God just by the threatnings of his Laws and merciful by the sweetness of his Promises and the Efficacy whereby he accompanies his word render the one and the other of these two Properties sensible to the Consciences of those whose hearts he touches and besides he is not ignorant that God is sufficiently wise in reconciling them together but nevertheless what sublimity of knowledge and understanding could divine that the mean of this accord was to consist in making God become man and this same man God without mixture or confusion between the natures that constitute his Person or the Properties that do accompany them To conclude man being not only in a State of Nature but also in a State of Corruption and having not received the Spirit of Illumination then unless in some small measure he could not apprehend all the beauties of his Perfections though they had been much more clearly and illustriously revealed From the first Coming of Christ until the second the faithful are in that Condition that we cannot sufficiently express how much of encrease their knowledge hath received For the Justice of God hath appeared in the highest degree in the death of Christ his Mercy in the effect of his satisfaction his Wisdom in the conduct of the mystery of our Salvation his Power in the Resurrection of our Saviour and in the Conversion and Sanctification of our Souls so far that Saint Paul says that we have believed according to the excellent greatness of the mighty power of God himself and although we see not with our bodily eyes the Lord Jesus nevertheless