Scripture and to be tried by them and with open arms to accept and embrace the Truth as our Authour speaks pag. 19. But there is no Truth so sacred no Evidence so clear which perverse Wranglers will not seek to evade and wrest though they do it to their own destruction What can be more clear against the obstinate Jews than that memorable Prophesy Gen. 49.10 The scepter shall not depart from Judah nor a Law-giver from between his feet until Shiloh come And yet they have no less than Twenty six Answers for it See Taylor 's Liberty of Prophecying pag. 80. Thus the late Infamous Mr. Hobs every-where abuseth the Scripture with a Profanation not inferior to the denying of it And so do those of the Church of Rome Socinians Enthusiasts and others See John 3.20 21. CHAP. III. The Immortality of the Soul proved by such Arguments as are drawn from the light of Natural Reason and the common Sense and Experience of Mankind The First Argument WE come now to the proof of the Immortality of the Soul by such Arguments as are proper for the conviction of those Persons who will not acknowledge the Authority of the Scripture and they are drawn either from those Faculties and Powers wherewith the Soul is endued or from the gross and dangerous Absurdities that flow from the contrary Opinion Under each of those general Heads of Argument several particulars will be necessarily comprehended Argum. I. The noble Faculties and Capacities of the Soul argue that its Original is higher than our Author is willing to allow of and that its Nature is immortal The excellency of any Substance must be known by the Faculties Virtues or Powers radicated in it and the excellency of those Faculties by the Acts proceeding from them which connotes or takes in the Objects about which those Acts are conversant Talis est cujusque rei Natura qualis est ejus Operatio or if you will Operari sequitur esse the being of things is the root of their working As they are more or less noble so are their Acts and the Natures of all things are suited to the Ends and Uses for which they are design'd by the All-wise Contriver Thus from the Influences Operations and Effects of the Sun we boldly conclude that its Nature is more noble than that of a Clod. First It is manifest that the Nature of the Soul is very vigorous and sprightly It s vital active Power worketh ad intrà both in the Operations of the Intellect and Will and ad extrà as excited by the Imperium of the Will How quick are the flights of our Thoughts into the uttermost Regions of the Earth How speedily do they compass Sea and Land and not content with such a Circuit soar aloft and lose themselves in forming Notions of imaginary Spaces beyond the Coelum Empyraeum it self and by and by are got as low as the very Centre of the Earth And all this in the twinkling of an Intellectual Eye With what facility and briskness can it turn it self from one Object â—o another and instead of being weary delights it self in these sportful Vagaries which are as agreeable to its active Nature as it is for Matter to lie still in a drooping senseless unactive State Insomuch that some good Philosophers think that the Soul is constantly in action without which they suppose the cessation of its Essential form would be inferred And it is a great question whether the nature of Habits which has puzled so many thinking men lies not much in some unobserved Acts which the Soul hath intrinsecally and in the depth of it of which we are not conscious till some further Acts proceed from them which take in more of Corporeity and Animal Spirits However we are sure that when the use and exercise of our Senses are interrupted by natural Sleep the Soul is often at work and its Reasonings sometimes as lofty and solid in Dreams as when we are awake and it may be more Whence an Ancient Philosopher thought that mens dreaming when asleep was an intimation that they should live when dead And the Peripateticks as Aelian tells us Var. Hist lib. 3 cap. 11. supposed that the Soul was more sagacious and its Apprehensions more Prophetick in Dreams than in the day-time when taken up with serving and caring for the Body And the Stoicks of old thought that Sleep was familiare domesticum Oraculum However 't is evident from all this that the Nature of the Soul is very active Hence Porphyry argues That for the Soul to die is for life it self to die or for that which is per essentiam life to cease to be what it is And Cicero Tusc quaest lib. 1.336 Nulla est celeritas quae possit cum animi celeritate contendere and from this Consideration amongst others concludes it must needs be immortal But there is one thing more under this Head which I must not pass by viz. That strength and solidity of Judgment which is many times observable in dying Persons notwithstanding the languishing of their material Animal Spirits now here I demand If the Soul be nothing else but the purer parts of the Blood separated inflamed and made lucid in the Brain how comes it to pass that when the Senses grow dull and the Spirits low Reason doth not always equally decline with them If any of those Material Spirits be more pure and volatile and so apter to be dissipated than the rest one would think it should be the reasoning part and therefore that the decay should always begin there But we find quite contrary that the Rational workings of the Soul are many times rais'd above the usual pitch when the Animal Spirits are almost dissipated and gone or however extremely enfeebled Which made Heraclitus say That the Soul goes out of the Body as Lightning out of a Cloud because it is many times clearest in its conceptions when taking its flight from this Prison This helped to perfect the late Earl of Rochester's Persuasion of the Soul's Immortality viz. When Sickness had brought him so near Death and his Spirits were so low and spent that he could not move nor stir and did not think he should live an hour yet he observed that his Reason and Judgment were so strong and clear that from hence he was fully perswaded that Death was not the Spending or Dissolution of the Soul but only the Separation of it from Matter See his Life page 20 21. And it may be that which we call a Lightning before Death ariseth from some sprightly efforts of the Soul finding it self loosening from Matter shaking off its Fetters and hastening to be quite disentangled But this brings me to a second Particular 2dly The Understanding is a very noble Faculty eager in its pursuits after Knowledge searching into Objects far enough remote from Matter and above the Sphere of Sense It has a natural Bias and inclination to Truth as its object and embraceth it with unspeakable
And their pleading against a more speedy admission thither argues their unfitness to be admitted at all 5thly Our Author's Hypothesis is directly contrary to the avowed Doctrine of the Church of England Which I the rather mention because he professeth himself to be a Member of that Church and looks upon those that dissent from it as mistaken persons pag. 17. Need I prove that the Church of England asserts the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality See the Order for the Burial of the Dead where among many other Expressions to the same effect you find these words Almighty God with whom do live the Spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord and with whom the Souls of the Faithful after they are delivered from the burthen of the Flesh are in joy and felicity c. Nothing can be more express for the Immortality of the Soul and its separate subsistence Now I say no honest man who believes that the Soul dies with the Body can declare his unfeigned Assent and Consent to or heartily join with that Church in this part of the Burial Office which I have mentioned And as for those whom he calls Dissenting Brethren if our Author's Opinion be true they ought to dissent from that Church more than they do In a word he will find it hard to mention any point of difference between sober Dissenters and the Church of England so important as that wherein he himself differs from them or which tends so much to induce or encourage to an ill Practice or Course of Life See more of this in the Book of Homilies Sermon the 9th against the fear of Death CHAP. VI. The Testimony of the Ancient Philosophers produc'd for a further confirmation of this great Truth THough the Persons with whom I have now to do are commonly so full of themselves and overfond of their own Conceptions that the Sentiments or Authorities of others are not much regarded by them yet since our Author has thought meet to mention the names of Aristotle Dicaearchus and Pliny as supposing them to be of his Opinion I must say something to confront what is alledged from them that his Reader may not be amused with a meer shew of Antiquity This Point was often weighed in the Schools of the Philosophers the Academy Peripatum Stoa c. They thought it worth their most serious enquiry because the common Interest of Mankind was so nearly concerned in it Pherecydes is mentioned by Cicero Tusc Quaest lib. 1. as one of the first of the Ancient Philosophers upon record who defended the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality though he doubts not but others were of the same Opinion before him And Pythagoras was so taken with his Discourses about it that thereupon he turned Philosopher who was before an Athleta as St. Augustin observes Epist 3. ad Vollusianum But now says he we all see Assyrium Amomum vulgò nascitur referring those words of Virgil to the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality brought from Syria or Assyria into Greece by Pherecydes Vid. Menag Not. in Diog. Laert. pag. 41. Pythagoras was of the same mind with his Master and the name of the Pythagoreans was so famous for many Ages after that none else seemed learned but they as Cicero observes ubi supra These Philosophers were wont to call the higher Region of the Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the lower 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The one the Divine the other the beastly part 'T is reported of Plato that he travelled into Italy to converse with them and how well he and they agreed in this Point you shall see more by and by Thales was of the same mind as may be seen in Laertius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I mention not Zoroaster nor the Oracles of the Magi in Chaldaea who were his Followers of which the Platonists take notice nor yet what is wont to be alledged from Hermes Trismegistus because these Fragments of Antiquity are by some reckoned suppositious by others at least dubious But give me leave however to add what a great Philosopher of our own says So if what 's consonant to Plato's School Which well agrees with Learned Pythagore Aegyptian Trismegist and th' Antique Roll Of Chaldee Wisdom all which time has tore But Plato and deep Plotin do restore Which is my scope I sing out lustily If any twitten me for such strange lore And me all blameless brand with infamy God purge that man from fault of foul malignity Dr. More 's Psychozoia pag. 2. Tertullian also in his Book de Anima supposeth that Plato derived his Sentiments from the Writings of Trismegist in Egypt Come we therefore to that Divine Philosopher and his Master Socrates concerning whom we have more certain knowledge and in comparison of them and their Followers Cicero looks upon all other Philophers as Plebeian Tusc Quaest lib. 1.341 And brings in his greatest Encomiums of Aristotle with a Platonem semper excipio pag. 226. And St. Augustine agrees with him in it Augustinus Platonem caeteris Philosophis Gentium longè lateque praefert says Lipsius Manuduct ad Stoicam Philosoph pag. 19. But we will first begin with Socrates What this Great Man thought may be learned from his Admirer and Disciple Plato who in his Phaedo and elsewhere brings him in strongly disputing for and asserting the Soul's Immortality Where he shews That as Death is the separation of Soul and Body so the Soul can subsist of it self when so separate pag. mihi 84. And that the readiest way to attain to knowledge in this life is to abstract our minds as much as possibly we can from commerce with the Body till God set us free from it and then we shall have a more pure and sincere understanding of the Truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à corporis insipientâ liberati as Ficinus renders it pag. 89. He derides the Childish fears of those who think the Soul is dissipated when the Body dies as if they apprehended it should be blown away especially if they dye when the Wind is high pag. 110. 'T is impossible says he that the Soul should perish by Death except that can die which is immortal pag. 164. And smiles at his Friend Crito for asking him how he would be buried I cannot says he persuade thiâ— â—â—iâ—o that I who now dispute am Socrates but he thinks that Carcass which he shall see by and by is I But I tell you I shall go to a blessed State after I have drunk this poison and this I speak to comfort both you and my self Do not say when you see my Body laid out burnt or buried that it is Socrates Thus that Venerable Old man conquered the Fears of Death by the hopes of a Blessed Immortality and drank the fatal Potion without any observable disturbance of Mind or change of Countenance praying for an happy passage out of this Life into a better But I must not translate the whole Dialogue Plato speaks often of the
will appear if we consider what Objects were like to be presented to him in the Third Heaven whither he was caught up and what deep impressions he received from them retaining the memory of those things when he was in the Body which for ought he knew were discovered to him when he was out of it Phil. 1.21 22 23 24. The Apostle tells the Philippians that he was in a strait betwixt two having a desire to depart or to be dissolved and to be with Christ which says he is far better i. e. it was more for his present personal advantage And this departing he opposeth to abiding in the flesh which was more needful for them viz. that they might be farther edified by his Ministry Now if the Soul die with the Body I demand what doth the Apostle mean by departing and being with Christ Did he not enjoy more communion with Christ before his death than he can be supposed ever to have enjoyed since if his Soul and Body perished together And why doth he say That to dye is gain verse 21. if by dying he mean sinking into an unactive state And why doth he oppose departing and being with Christ to living or abiding in the flesh if his Soul could not live out of the flesh nor survive his Body Again I ask Why the Apostle was in so great a strait as not knowing what to chuse in this matter Had he so little regard to the Honour and Interest of his great Master so little love to the Service of Christ and the Souls of men as to question whether he should chuse to live for the edification of the Church or fall down into a dead unactivity Will you say that the Troubles and Persecutions which he met with made him weary of his Life and Work The Answer is easy Himself tells you that none of those things moved him that he fainted not yea he calls them light Afflictions and had learnt to rejoice in Tribulations So that in short you may turn and wind which way you will either what the Apostle says here hath no tolerable sense in it or your Hypothesis of the Soul 's dying with the Body is absurd and unchristian A parallel place we have 2 Cor. 5.1 2 3 to the 9th where the Apostle speaks of the dissolution of the earthly tabernacle and moreover verse 6. While we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord and v. 8. We are confident and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. And v. 4. He compares Death to uncloathing What say you to this Cannot a man live when his Clothes are put off and laid aside even so may the Soul when separate from the Body else the Apostle's Confidence in this matter was vain What did you mean to appeal to the Scripture or so much as to name it The same Truth further appears in the Parable of the rich Sensualist and Lazarus Luke 16.19 c. whence you may learn the different States of separate Souls after Death Object But this is no History but a Parable and therefore it is absurd to draw any Arguments from it Answ I readily grant that there are many Circumstances in Parables which must not be too far strained and particularly in this But yet I say it was designed to instruct and not to deceive them Let it therefore be considered that either it was the common Opinion amongst the Jews the Sadducees excepted who were a despised Sect that the Souls of good men are happy and of bad men miserable when separate from their Bodies or it was not their common Opinion If not it seems not a thing worthy the Wisdom of our Lord to establish his Parable upon an Hypothesis contrary to the common belief of the Jews For this would be more likely to prejudice them against his Doctrine as built upon false and extravagant Opinions than to gain upon them But if it really was their Opinion that the Souls of men do subsist and are happy or miserable when separate from their Bodies c. then I say either this Opinion was true or false if true it was what I am pleading for if false this Parable was like to confirm them in their Error and so you reflect upon him that spoke it I mention not the Conceit of Tertullian who will have Herod and John the Baptist pointed at in it Deut. 34.5 6. We read that Moses died and was buried and yet long after Mat. 17. we find that Moses and Elias appeared upon the Mountain talking with our Saviour when he was transfigured Therefore something of Moses was alive and capable of acting though his Body was buried Again Exod. 3.6 God stiles himself the God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob long after they were dead And yet our Lord tells the Sadducees Matth. 22.32 That God is not the God of the dead but of the living i. e. their Ruler Benefactor and Felicity a Relation which the Dead are not capable of as Mr. B. observes See his Notes upon the place Therefore Abraham Isaac and Jacob were in some sense living viz. as to their Souls though their Bodies were dead And besides you must take notice that the Sadducees denied not only the Resurrection of the Body but the Immortality of the Soul as Dr. Hammond observes and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth not only the rising of the Body but our living after this Life when the Body is dead And so the force of our Saviour's Argument is very discernible Again Luke 23.46 our Lord commends his self-resigning Soul into his Father's hands having before told the Penitent Thief To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise and Stephen dying prays Lord Jesus receive my spirit Pray be so kind as to give the World some satisfactory interpretation of those places and reconcile them to the Notion of the Soul 's dying with the Body For I do assure you most Christian Interpreters put another sense upon them and it would be a piece of Charity to undeceive them if you know how and when your hand is in pray write down that the Apostle meant where he speaks of the spirits of just men made perfect Heb. 12.23 If by perfection you mean sleep dissipation death or perishing you must make us a new Dictionary which may also tell us what your Notion of Blessedness is that so we may know how to interpret those words of St. John Rev. 14.13 Blessed are the dead which dye in the Lord and their works to follow or rather accompany them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vide Pol. Synops And also what Solomon means Prov. 14.32 The righteous hath hope in his death It is easy to produce much more Scripture-proof to establish the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality or to enlarge more upon what hath been already offered But thus much may suffice for those who are ready to submit to the Rules and Authority of
punishments of Wicked men after Death and tells us in his Timaeus That the Soul of a good man shall be kindly received by his Creator but the Soul of a wicked man shall be cast into Hell The truth is the Platonists have improved the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality better than many of our own Writers notwithstanding their greater helps have done though sometimes they speak too high as if they would even deify the Soul as do some of the Stoicks Plotinus discourseth excellently upon this Subject and shews that if we would seriously view the Soul in its own naked essence we shoul◠〈◊〉 doubt of its Immortality Let a man says he contemplate himself in his own pure and truly Intellectual Nature divesting it of all that is alien to it and he will certainly know that it is immortal He will then observe that his Understanding is not properly directed to things sensible and mortal but by an eternal Virtue doth contemplate Eternal and Intelligible Objects and becomes as it were an Intelligible lucid World to it self And again he tells us That by how much the Soul is more abstracted from the Senses by so much it reasons better so that when it shall be wholly separate from the Body it will know intuitively without elaborate Ratiocinations That now it deliberates when it doubts it doubts when 't is hindred by the Body but will neither doubt nor deliberate when free from the Body but will comprehend the Truth without any hesitation See his Enneads and elsewhere Maximus Tyrius Dissertat 41. handles that Question viz. Whether the Diseases of the Soul or Body be more grievous and tells us That degenerate Souls are buried in their Bodies like Insects in their Holes and are in love with those lurking Places p. 495. And withal That the health of the Body is but uncertain and temporary that of the Soul solid and immortal pag. 491. It were easy to mention more of the Platonists who all to a man maintain the Immortality of the Soul But I proceed The Stoicks say That the Souls of Good men separated from their Bodies are Heroes as Laertius informs us in Zenon Plutarch says That they call all separate Souls Heroes promiscuously and so distinguish Heroes into good and bad De placitis Philosophorum lib. 1. cap. 8. Epictetus calls the Soul of man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 near a-kin to God Antoninus styles the Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in his 9th Book Sect. 39. Wilt thou say to thy mind thou art dead or become like a Beast Seneca speaks too high Quid aliud vocas c. What will you call the Soul but a Deity dwelling in an Humane Body And perhaps such boldness was one Original of Heathen Idolatry And elsewhere Animus si propriam ejus Originem aspexeris c. The Soul if you consider its true Original descends from that heavenly Spirit Sursum Animum c. Its beginnings call it upward there Eternal Rest remains for it And comforting Martia concerning her dead Son Ipse quidem aeternus he is Eternal and in a better State now than he was before The Body is the Prison of the Soul The Soul it self is sacred and eternal Happy is thy Son O Martia who being dead knows such things as these Nec est Ratio aliud quam in corpus pars Divini Spiritùs mersa Idem Plutarch says That the Providence of God and the Immortality of the Soul are so connected that the one necessarily follows the other de serâ Numinis vindictâ And therefore by the way Epicurus made thorough-work in denying both Come we now to Cicero a moderate middle-way Philosopher He disputes at large for the Immortality of the Soul in the First Book of his Tusc Quaest de contemnendâ Morte as also in his Dialogue de Senectute c. I will cite some Passages out of him to the shame of those Christians who stand in need of such Instructions from an Heathen Tu cum tibi sive Deus c. Wilt thou when God or Nature hath given thee a Soul than which nothing is more excellent and Divine so debase thy self as to suppose that there is no difference between thee and a Beast Cic. Paradox pag. 217. Ii vivunt qui c. These Men live who are escaped from the Prison of the Body but that which you call Life is Death De Somn. Scip. 233. Haec Coelestia semper spectato illa Humana contemnito Ibid. Reckon with thy self that thou art not Mortal but only thy Body the Mind is the Man and not that Bodily Figure which you can point as with your Finger Ibid. And to the same purpose he brings in that of Cyrus mention'd by Xenophon I could never perswade my self that our Souls live in the Body and dye when they go out of it Nec vero tum animum esse insipientem cum ex insipienti corpore evasisset sed cum omni admistione corporis liberatus purus integer esse caepisset tum esse Sapientem This is purely Platonick De Senect 211. Except God deliver you from this Prison of the Body you can never come to Heaven Idem And elsewhere he argues from the Worship which was paid to their departed Heroes That the Souls of all Men are Immortal but the Souls of good Men Divine de Legib. Also Tusc lib. 1. Ipsi illi Majorum Gentium Dii qui habentur hinc à nobis perfecti in Coelum reperientur pag. 329. And so infinitely fond is he of this Opinion that he thus concludes de Senect pag. 213. Quod si in hoc erro c. If in this I be mistaken that I believe the Souls of Men immortal I am willingly mistaken Nor will I suffer this Error in which I am delighted to be extorted from me as long as I live But if after Death I shall have no Sense as some diminutive Philosophers think I fear not lest those dead Philosophers should deride my Error In a word both Cicero Seneca and several of the Platonists and Stoicks speak of the Soul as if it were an Incarnate Deity That it has many bright Resemblances of God stampt upon it Deum te scito esse Somn. Scip. Because as the Great God rules the World so thy Soul rules and governs thy Body as an inferior kind of Deity It must indeed be acknowledged that Aristotle speaks sometimes dubiously and is not consistent with himself in this matter But his greatest Admirers have generally believ'd it And some of them take it ill that any should question whether their Master was of the same mind However the Authority of that Philosopher needs not much to move us since he is also inconsistent with himself concerning the Deity as Lactant. observes And again Aristoteles Deum nec coluit nec curavit See more to the same purpose in Lips Manuduct ad Stoic Philos lib. 1. pag. 18. Nevertheless there are not wanting even in him some fair acknowledgments of this great
Evidence when set before them Recipitur ad modum recipientis and therefore it will not be alien to the Design which I have in hand to lay down some Directions which will tend to make all that hath been already spoken more effectual And they are such as these Direct 1. Be impartial in your Enquiries about this matter and take special care that your Understandings be not byassed by the Interest of your Lusts which will dispose you to hate even Reason it self and to shut your eyes against the Light Socrates discoursing concerning the Immortality of the Soul warns his Hearers to take care that they be not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 haters of Reason than which a greater mischief could not befall them Phoedo pag. 133. Atheistical Inclinations in mens Wills and Affections do commonly set their Understandings on work to frame Principles suited thereto and to defend and maintain those Principles and a Mind thus depraved is like a Corrupt Judge who will hear nothing against the Party that has bribed him When the Soul has so far degraded it self as to become a Slave to the Sensual Appetite the consciousness of its own guilt makes it willing to suppose it self no nobler a Substance than those Material Spirits which have led it captive all the while that so it may die with the Body and not be called to an account for its unnatural self-abasement Alii deliciis immersi ac voluptatibus omnia cuperent cum illis paritèr concidere hoc est cum corpore nec esse ullum Judicem qui vitae hujus rationem à nobis reposceret Lud. Viv. de Ver. Fid. lib. 1.145 It is worth your while to examine whether something of this nature be not the Spring and Fountain of these brutish Principles and if so you have reason to suspect them as proceeding from so vile an Original It is also possible that some thinking Persons of a sober conversation may have an Ingenium Haereticum and affect singularity in Opinions to make themselves more taken notice of and admired by such who have not Wit enough to detect their Sophistry But ordinarily 't is Mens love to their Lusts and sensual Pleasures their neglect of God and Religion their wilful despising the Concerns and Interests of a future State which disposeth them to wish their Souls were Mortal for fear of what may come after and then to believe though not without a great deal of wavering and hesitation that they are so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Hierocles A wicked Man would not have his Soul to be Immortal lest he should be punish'd for his wickedness yet he anticipates the Sentence of his Judg condemning it to Death before-hand Malunt extingui quam ad supplicia reparari Minut. Felix Direct 2. Be not overfond of your present Conceits It becomes you to suppose that you may be mistaken because many as wise Men have been so before you He knows little of the weakness of Humane Understandings not of the unsearchable depths of the Works of God who sees not how necessary a qualification Modesty and a promptitude to suspect his own Judgment must needs be in a Philosopher And though this must not be so far strained as to make us turn Scepticks yet it ought to restrain us from an over-forwardness to vent uncouth Opinions and from passing an hasty judgment on things before we have well weighed what may be said on both sides These things which appear difficult to you may perhaps be easy to another and those things which you look upon as Demonstrations to a more discerning Person will it may be appear no better than Dreams and Self-conceit will make you slight the weightiest Reasons which are brought to awake and undeceive you Some of you value your selves upon the account of a natural quickness of Wit with some acquired Scraps of Philosophy but take care that this do not make you set too high an esteem upon your little crude Notions which a small time may discover to be meer trifles and Death will terribly confute for ever Direct 3. Let your Diligence and Seriousness in these Studies be answerable to the weight and consequence of those Truths you enquire after 'T is a matter that nearly concerns you to know whether the Soul be Immortal or no. If after all the pains you have taken to make your self believe that the Soul dieth with the Body you should at last find your self mistaken where are you then What will you do when Death hath drawn aside this Vail of Ignorance and placed you in the Society of wretched Spirits forsaken of God and past all hopes of recovery Will not this be a dreadful disappointment If I saw a Man cut a little too deep when he was pairing his Nails perhaps I might laugh at him for his rashness but if I see him attempting to Stab himself that 's no laughing matter and I am guilty of Murther if I do not endeavour to prevent it and therefore I say again be serious Let me tell you from a Person of as comprehensive a Genius and as high a Station as the best and greatest of you all the great Cardinal Richlieu That the Soul is a serious Thing and must be either sad here for a moment or sad for ever 'T is an easy matter to get some crude undigested Notions and Terms of Art to play withal but solid and satisfactory Knowledge must be the fruit of Industry and hard impartial Study And you have reason enough to question all those Opinions which are the Off-spring of unthinking sloathfulness though none are usually more confident than such Triflers who like drunken Persons boast of their Wit to the increase of their shame The best way to know that the Soul is Immortal is to keep its noblest Faculties indue Exercise and then they will speak for themselves Direct 4. See that your Ends be right in these Studies i. e. suitable to the tendency of those Truths you search into Study the Dignity of Humane Nature that you may walk as becomes Men worthy the Faculties of that Rational Immortal Spirit which God hath given you Right ends will help you in the use of means but if you study these things meerly to please your Phansy this is but a more refined sort of Sensuality and then 't is no wonder if you miss of the Truth nor indeed any great matter whether you find it or no for any great good it's like to do you An honest manly Design in these Studies will prepare you for the entertainment of the Truth Indeed 't is a noble Employment to enquire into the Works of God and especially into our own Souls that we may know him and love him better and discharge our Duty towards him more faithfully and in so doing we may humbly expect some such Afflatum divini Numinis as our Author speaks page 15. which may enlighten our Understandings and lead us into those Truths which we seek after Otherwise 't is
This or nothing will make you serious and restrain your Thoughts from those masterless Vagaries in which Irreligious Philosophers are wont to indulge themselves to their own Destruction Dare you take his Name in vain Or vilify his Works to his dishonour Doth not his Excellency make you afraid and his dread fall upon you Look up to the Heavens which are higher than you The Sun in its Meridian brightness is but a shadow of him who is LIGHT and in whom there is no Darkness at all Millions of Angels continually adore him The whole Host of Heaven is at his beck should he give Commission but to one of his Angels to destroy ten thousand such as you how quickly would it be done His Power is Omnipotent His Wisdom Infinite Who would set Thorns and Briars in array against him He would pass through them and consume them How much better is it to lay hold of his Strength that you may be at peace with him Be not deceived God is not mocked You may flatter and befool your selves for a while but what will you do in the end thereof When your mournful Friends stand about you and your Physicians give you up as past hope of recovery How dismal will the thoughts of Eternity then be How severely will Conscience pay you home for all the Tricks and Abuses you have put upon it And whither will you fly to avoid it Do you think your dreaming Philosophy will then stand you in stead Will it secure you from the amazing Apprehensions of what is like to come after Or will you not rather curse the Day that ever you became acquainted with these brutish Principles Well if none of these things move you The Lord have mercy on you for all good Men are deeply affected with them However remember you were fairly warned of your danger 4thly Abstract your Minds as much as possibly you can from things Corporeal that you may converse more intimately with your own Souls Divest your Spirits of all that 's foreign to them that you may better behold their naked Beauty and Perfection Let sensible Objects keep their distance and suffer not any tumultuous Passions to interrupt your more calm retired thoughts or to raise Mists before you And then you will quickly find that the more deeply you contemplate the noblest Acts of your own Souls the greater evidence will appear of their Spiritual Immortal Nature All those Discourses which have been written of the Soul's Heraldry will not blazon it so well as it self will do as a Learned Man observes When we turn our Eye in upon it 't will soon tell us its Royal Pedigree and Noble Extraction by those Sacred Hieroglyphicks which it bears upon it self Smith's Discourses page 66. Many Philosophers have spoken well of this Abstraction of our Minds and retiring into our selves but none more divinely than the Platonists and Plotinus in particular This made them say That Philosophy is Mortis Meditatio because that as in Natural Death the Soul is actually separated from the Body so in these Philosophical Contemplations we must abstract it from coporeal Commerce as much as we can And though this saying is commonly and particularly by Plutarch ascribed to Plato yet St. Jerom tells us Pythagoras was the first Man who said Philosophiam esse meditationem Mortis quotidie de carcere corporis nitentem educere Animae libertatem See Lypsii Manuduc ad Stoic Philos And this says Clemens Alexandrinus Pythagoras meant by the five years silence which he enjoyned his Disciples Ut scilicet à rebus sensilibus aversi nudâ mente c. However Plato discourseth excellently about it See his Phaedo where he brings in Socrates telling his Friends That of all Men Philosophers should not be unwilling to dye who have been endeavouring all their lives long to abstract themselves from their Bodies as much as they can 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 atque ad animam se convertere And should they therefore be unwilling to be set free from those Bodies which have been such an hinderance to them in their searches after Truth And thus he sums up the matter page 89. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If while we are in the Body we can discern nothing purely it must either follow that we shall never attain to knowledge or that we shall do it after Death for then and not before the Soul will subsist without the Body and while we live here the less commerce we have with it the nearer approaches we make to knowledge Antisthenes being asked what good he had got by Philosophy Answer'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He learnt by it to converse with himself Laert. Aristotle himself owns the necessity of this Abstraction and makes it the peculiar Priviledge of some Men more abstracted than others from Corporeal Commerce to improve their Understandings in the steddy Contemplation of Truth And so doth Cicero in those excellent Words Magni est ingénii revocare mentem à sensibus cogitationem à consuetudine abducere Tuse Quaest lib. 1.333 and again 350. And to the same purpose speaks Van Helmont page 342. though in a Dialect almost peculiar to himself And so Descatres how ingeniously soever he talks elsewhere of Matter and Motion when he comes to consider his own Soul thus he begins See Meditat. 3. de prim Philos Claudam nunc oculos aures obturabo avocabo omnes sensus meque solum alloquendo c. Wonder not that I insist so largely upon this for the Life of Philosophy I had almost said of Religion too consists in it But when all is done those Persons who have long suffered their Minds to be immerst in things Corporeal must take a great deal of pains before they can extricate them from those unhappy Complications which have betrayed them to so many mistakes and kept them so ignorant of their more noble Faculties and Powers 5thly So live that you may not be afraid of the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality I have shewed you already that the Interest of men's Lusts will strangely biass their Judgments and therefore keep the Sensitive Appetite at an under Yield not to its extravagant demands Accustom it to be frequently controlled and let it feel that you have something nobler than Material Spirits within you The Soul never more forgets its own Dignity than when it suffers Sense and Appetite to turn Dictators and carry all before them This disposeth it to terrene and sordid Conceptions concerning it self Vicious Inclinations are the Root of corrupt Principles Men will hardly love those Doctrines which Prophesy no good concerning them but evil On the other hand If you so live that your Consciences cannot upbraid you with an Atheistical Contempt or Forgetfulness of him that made you If you contemplate his Excellencies and delight in him as the chiefest Good and pay that Homage which is due to him in your Religious Worship and Attendances upon him such Exercises as these will soon convince you
THE Contrary Hypothesis laid down with an Account how far it agrees or disagrees with the Philosophy of Epicurus Lucretius Hobs c. The Method of the following Discourse Page 1. CHAP. II. The Immortality of the Soul proved by Scripture Page 12. CHAP. III. The Immortality of the Soul proved by such Arguments as are drawn from the Light of Natural Reason and the common Sense and Experience of Mankind The First Argument from the Powers and Faculties wherewith the Soul is endued Page 25. CHAP. IV. The Second Argument from the many gross and dangerous Absurdities wherewith the contrary Opinion is attended Page 49. CHAP. V. Some Subservient Considerations for the further Establishment of the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality p. 67. CHAP. VI. The Testimony of the Ancient Philosophers produced for a further Confirmation of this great Truth p. 79. CHAP. VII Our Author's Objections considered and answered p. 93. CHAP. VIII Of Materiality or Immateriality as they are ascribed to the Soul p. 103. CHAP. IX Directions to such as are in suspence as to the Immortality of the Soul shewing how they may arrive at a certainty in that matter p. 109. CHAP. X. Directions to such as believe the Immortality of the Soul shewing how they ought to improve so important a Doctrine p. 131. The Conclusion p. 161. THE Immortality of the SOUL ASSERTED c. CHAP. I. The contrary Hypothesis laid down with an Account how far it agrees or disagrees with the Philosophy of Epicurus Lucretius Hobs c. The Method of the following Discourse THE Principles of sound Philosophy well tried and digested do greatly improve Humane Understandings the Reasoning Faculty is cultivated and advanced by Exercise by accustoming our selves to think we learn in time to think better and to more purpose and every Truth which we meet with and really make our own prepares us for the discovery of some further Truth which is annexed to it and depends upon it And as our Knowledge increaseth so will also the sense of our Ignorance Hence it is easy to discern the Reasons why amongst so many Pretenders there are so few that deserve the name of Philosophers Some take the knowledge of Words Terms of Art and commonly received Forms of Expression for the knowledge of Things and these they swallow without chewing and upon all occasions bring up again as raw as they took them in and play with them as Boys do with Bubbles till Wise men laugh at them Others there are near a-kin to the former who suck in Opinions as the wild Asses do the Wind without distinguishing the wholsome from that which is corrupt Others can go no further than they are led by the Nose These are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a slavish Nature and he that can so far get the Ascendent over them as to insinuate himself into their esteem which is no hard matter to do may command their Understandings because they themselves never knew how to use them Others have Imaginations so little used to government that they cannot six their thoughts upon a serious enquiry after Truth but they quickly give them the slip and go to play with Impertinencies Some are so dull that they cannot apprehend any thing that lies out of the common Road and is not plain and obvious Others are so sloathful that they grow weary before they have half accomplish'd their search And others so foolishly conceited that they think it below them to alter their present Sentiments But the great hinderance of useful Knowledge is an in-bred radicated Enmity in Corrupt Nature against those Truths which have a nearer tendency to the reformation of ill Manners and the exercise of serious Religion Hinc origo mali And the Age in which we live affords many unhappy Instances of the Predominancy of this Corruption which makes a Learned Gentleman thus to reflect upon it viz. That we are fallen into an Age declining from God in which many are fond of those things which lead us farthest from him and seem most to secure us against him and the Rabble of Atheistical Epicurean Notions which have been so often routed and have fled before the World are now faced about and afresh recruited to assault this present Generation Sir Ch. Wolseley's Unreasonableness of Atheism pag. 37. A like Complaint we have in a late Judicious Philosopher who speaking of the Excellency of the Platonick Doctrine because it draws off our Minds from perishing Transitory things to the contemplation of more noble Intellectual Beings further adds Quâ quidem in re infinitum propè momentum est c. i. e. which is a matter of infinite moment for we are overwhelmed with a Rout of Philosophers who contend that nothing but Bodies can be understood Du Hamel de consens Vet. Nov. Philos Praefat. The like you may find in Ludovic Viv. de Veritat Fidei lib. 1. pag. 145. The Knowledge of Atheists saith Van Helmont wholly depends on a Brutal Beginning and they are unapt to understand those things which do exceed sense for that is the cause why they exclude themselves from the Intelligible World pag. 348. And I find that the late Ingenious E. of Rochester came at last to the same Apprehension viz. that That absurd and foolish Philosophy which the World so much admired propagated by the late Mr. Hobs and others had undone him and many more See his Funeral Sermon pag. 26. How far these Observations are pertinent to the matter in hand you shall see more by and by For my part I desire not to make any man's Opinions seem worse than they are much less to charge Atheism or Infidelity upon a Gentleman who in appearance disowns them You shall therefore hear him speak for himself The Opinion which he undertakes to maintain is this viz. That the Humane Soul is a material Spirit generated growing and falling with the Body and rising again with it at the sound of the voice of the Archangel and the Trump of God pag. 1. Hereupon he endeavours to persuade us that the Soul is nothing else but the inflamed glowing Particles of the Blood called Spirits which are says he the Active Principle of Life Motion Sense and Understanding in Man and Beast pag. 10. And hence he infers That the Soul cannot subsist act or suffer any thing in a state of Separation from the Body but that by Death the man's Faculty of thinking is certainly destroyed pag. 2 3 14 15. And yet he owns the Article of the Resurrection and the last Judgment appointed of God for the distributing of Recompences according to the behaviour which men have used in passing through the Trials and Temptations of this World pag. 6. You have here such a medly of Epicurean Dreams and Christian Doctrines mixt together as is not commonly to be met with The one part of his Hypothesis is below the common Reason and Sentiments of Mankind the other above the reach of the greatest Philosophers without the help of
Supernatural Revelation I mean the Doctrine of the Resurrection at the sound of the Voice of the Archangel and the Trump of God The truth is Our Author hath advanced so far into the Tents of Epicurus Lucretius Hobs and others of our trifling Atomists that it is a wonder he went no further and who knows but he may yet be within call or at least that we may prevent others from being infected with the like Contagion Let us now see how far these Philosophers and he are agreed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Soul says Epicurus is certainly a Body consisting of thin subtil parâ—s and at our dissolution is dissipated and hath no longer the same Faculties no motion nor sense Diog. Laert. in Epicur pag. 281 282. The same you have over again in Gassendus's Syntagm Philos Epicur pag. 136. And moreover pag. 137. Exortum ergo Anima habet à quo usque ut adolescit vigescit que cum corpore sic tendat oportet ad Interitum cum eodem senescens ac sensim deficiens That is The Soul riseth grows decays and falls with the Body It is needless to tell the Learned how much Lucretius and Hobs c. have endeavoured to cultivate and recommend this sort of Philosophy See Hobs of the Kingdom of Darkness Leviath part 4. chap. 44. and Gassendus himself hath too much encouraged it Thus you see how far they are agreed Nevertheless there are not wanting in our Author's Book some Concessions which I think will be sufficient to overthrow all that part of his Hypothesis which savours more of the Epicurean than the Christian As for Example 1. He would not be taken for one who denies that there are any Spiritual Substances pag. 6. but rather supposeth that the Angels are Immaterial Intelligent Spiriâ—â— pag. 15. and in this I must acknowledge he is more refined than Mr. Hobs who cannot endure to hear of any Substances but corporeal and explodes the rest as mere Phantasmes and Idols of the Imagination Leviath part 3. cap. 34. pag. 208. and so did his Master Epicurus see Diog. Laert. in Epicur pag. 282. where he endeavours to make us believe that nothing can be understood as incorporeal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 except a Vacuum an Inanity or Empty Space for Bodies to move in and therefore says he they who say the Soul is incorporeal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 talk vainly Now thus far our Author agrees with him that the Humane Soul is corporeal but yet he denies not the Angels to be immaterial And this I say is somewhat odd if we consider that the Soul of man is made to know love and delight in God as the Angels themselves are and indeed what can they do that is higher than this yet our Author supposeth them to be Immaterial but the Soul to be no better than corruptible matter Surely it is much more rational to say Ex operationum similitudine colligi potest similitudo essentiae Anima autem vim intelligendi volendi cum Angelis habet communem ergo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 essentiae as Alsted observes from the likeness of Opeâ—â—â—ion we may gather the likeness of Esseâ—â—e c. which Consideration will weigh the more with those who consider at how great a rate the Soul of man was redeemed by him who took not upon him the Nature of Angels And therefore I must take leave to conclude with Mr. B. Nulla mihi obvia est ratio quae prohibere videtur ne Naturam totam mentalem nobis notam Angelorum scilicet Hominum ad unam speciem in sensu generaliore quasi in classem unam benè redigam Meth. Theol. part 1. cap. 4. pag. 134. 2dly He owns the Being and Perfections of the Deity and speaks with Reverence of our Blessed Saviour Jesus Christ 3dly He speaks well of the Holy Scriptures and cites several passages out of them which he thinks make for his purpose and moreover is willing that the Point of the Soul's Immateriality should be tried by their Authority pag. 19. And therefore I must say sans ceremonie if he refuse to submit to the determination of the Scripture as to the Soul's Immortality the Appeal which he hath made is no better than trifling Prevarication ill becoming a Philosopher and worse a Christian And besides if he imagine that he can prove the Article of the Resurrection as laid down in his Position without â—â—e help of Scripture I think he would do well to give the World a Specimen of his Transcendent Sagacity in that matter but if he fly to Scripture-Authority where it is on his side it will justly be accounted a piece of Partiality and Impiety too if he yield not to it where it makes against him In a word If the Scripture may be Judge in the case it will be easy enough to disprove the former part of his Assertion viz. That the Soul falls or dies with the Body And again If he renounce the Scripture he will never be able to prove the latter part of it viz. That the Body riseth again at the voice of the Arch-angel So that the two parts of his Hypothesis seem to mix together like Oyl and Water They want a tertium quid to unite them which yet must be neither Reason nor Scripture These things being premised what I have to say at present upon this occasion shall be digested into the following Method First I shall evince by plain Scripture-proof That the Soul of man is immortal and doth not fall dye or perish with the Body 2dly I shall prove the same by the Light of Natural Reason for the conviction of such as will not submit to Scripture-Authority 3dly I shall shew That the most considerable amongst the Ancient Philosophers did assert and maintain the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality 4thly Our Author's Objections shall be considered 5thly Something shall be said to the point of materiality and immateriality which our Author harps so much upon 6thly Some Directions shall be given to such as question the Soul's Immortaâ—ity that they may arrive at a certainty in this matter 7thly I shall shew how those who believe the Immortality of the Soul ought to improve so momentous a Doctrine CHAP. II. The Immortality of the Soul proved by Scripture SO full and clear is Scripture-Evidence in this matter that he who owns the Authority of those Sacred Records and yet denies the separate subsistence of the Soul after Death seems to be as inconsistent with himself as those Philosophers against whom Aristotle disputes Metaph. Lib. 4. who affirmed That a thing might be and not be at the same time I shall therefore under this Head make it appear That the Scriptures do frequently speak of the Soul as a Substance distinct from the Body and capable of subsisting acting and suffering in a state of separation from it and do further assure us That the Souls of good men shall be happy when so separate even before
the general Resurrection and final Judgment and the Souls of wicked men miserable For the proof of these things let us take a view of the following places of Scripture We will begin with the Account of man's Creation at first Gen. 1.26 And God said let us make man in our image after our likeness and let â—hem have dominion c. Verse 27. So God created man in his own image in the image of God created he him male and female created he them Chap. 2.7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul Where you may observe First That man was the Master-piece of God's Workmanship or the most excellent Creature of all this lower World And therefore when all things were prepared for his happy Subsistence a Council as it were is held about his Creation to shew us how much the Wisdom of God is displayed and shines forth in such a Creature who is an Epitome of all the World besides 2dly He was made in the image of God after his likeness Let us therefore consider wherein this Image may reasonably be supposed to have consisted and where shall we seek for it but in the Soul which is the noblest part of man and therefore most fit to be the Subject of the Divine likeness And there you may find it partly in the spiritual intellectual Immortal nature of the Soul and partly in the holy rectitude of its Faculties The former was the natural the latter the moral or holy Image of God in man This was the health and perfection of his Nature some way due to it considering the end for which he was made though not inseparable from it The Fall defaced it Grace repairs it again Ephes 4.24 Col. 3.10 It is therefore absurd to suppose that the words should be interpreted of either of these viz. the Natural or Moral so as to exclude the other A Soul made of corruptible perishing Matter is not fit to be called an Image of the Immortal God neither is it a capable Subject of those Divine and Holy Qualifications which all speak an Immortal Nature in which they are implanted and point at a glorious Immortality as their end There is another part also of the Image of God in Man and that is the Image of his Supereminence or Majesty in that Dominion which God gave him over the Creatures But this need not stop us being altogether distinct from the former which are principally intended and mentioned as such Man was first created in the Image of God and then had this Dominion given him Let us makâ— man in our image and let him have dominion The gross Conceits of the Anthropomorphites I pass by though the Epicurean is as stupid as they who would Circumscribe the Deity with the finite Figure of a Man See Creech's Notes on Lucret. page 4. I only add If it be Treason to impair or debase the King's Coin which hath his Image and Superscription upon it let them look to it who are not afraid to vilify and cast dirt upon the Reasonable Soul which was created after the Image of him who accepteth not the persons of Princes 3dly It is observable that the original of the Soul was different from that of the Body The one was formed out of pre-existent created Matter the Dust of the Ground and so was a dead unactive thing till the other viz. the Spirit of Life or Lives as it is in the Hebrew was breathed into it by the Almighty This was not educed ex potentiâ materiae but rather created immediately to actuate and inform the Body which God had prepared for it This is Divinae particula aurae something nobler than the purest Spirits of the Blood and therefore under no necessity of perishing or being dissipated with them Which will further appear from the Account which Solomon gives of man's Dissolution by Death Eccles 12.7 Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it who is elsewhere styled the Father of Spirits and the God of the Spirits of all flesh These places do mutually illustrate each other and confirm the Truth which I am inferring from them There are many other places which speak of the Soul as a Substance distinct from the Body Job 14.22 His flesh upon him shall have pain and his soul within him shall mourn though Aristotle as cited by our Author pag. 2. counts it a great impropriety of speaking to say the Soul is sorrowful 2 Cor. 4.16 Though our outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed day by day It seems then that they do not both perish together in the end for if so they would both together tend alike to perishing in the way We find also the Soul distinguished from the Spirit Heb. 4.12 To the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and elsewhere we find these two distinguished from the Body 1 Thess 5.23 And I pray God your whole spirit soul and body be preserved blameless c. If you look narrowly and impartially into these places perhaps you may find not only aâ—â— Intellectual Spirit and a Body but also the material Soul or Spirits which you talk of that are the vinculum unionis between them and the nearer Instruments of the nobler Spirit 's Operations But I proceed Matth. 10.28 Our Blessed Saviour assures us That they which kill the Body are not able to kill the Soul But our Author would persuade us That the Soul falls perishes dyes with the Body pag. 1 14 15. How these will be reconciled I am utterly at a loss Ipse viderit 2 Cor. 12.1 2 3. The Apostle speaking of the Revelations which had been made to him viz. That he was caught up into Paradise or to the Third Heaven and heard unspeakable words which it was not lawful or possible for a man to utter tells us withal twice over That whether he was at that time in the body or out of the body he could not tell Whence it is plain that the Apostle supposeth the Soul capable of subsisting and acting out of the Body or else he would never have questioned whether it was not his own case But how easily could our Author have solved this difficulty and told the Apostle Sir You need not question but your Soul was in the Body for it cannot act without bodily Organs It cannot see without the Eye c. pag. 2. nor probably do or suffer any thing at all pag. 3. So true it is That vain man would be wise that is be accounted so Job 11.12 I wonder not that some of the Predecessors of these Philosophers encountred the Apostle and some said What would this babler say Acts 18.17 18. I might further add That the Apostle here doth not only suppose that the Soul can subsist and act separate from the Body but that it can act very nobly too which
we cry up the meer sound of Matter and Motion Dubium quidem nullum est immaterialem Mundum essentiarum varietate intelligibilium aequè admirabilem augustum esse atque mundum corporeum videmus sed in quo illa consistat Diversitas nobis indicio certo non percipitur says a Modern Metaphysician Ritschel Metaph. pag. mihi 43. See also Mr. Glanvill's Sadducismus Triumphatus page 78. Our Author has told you what Dr. More and Mr. Baxter have said in this matter but for reasons best known to himself says not a word to answer their Arguments And it is no contemptible Observation of the Platonists which a late Author takes notice of viz. They observe That the Unity of the World is so closely combined in all its parts that between the Superior and Inferior Species there are middle Natures wherein they meet that no Vacuum might interpose in the Series of things And to Man they give the name of Horizon as uniting the Superior and Inferior Natures together in some respects nearly allied to the Bruits in others to the Angels 5thly If our Author's Opinion be true the best Men are most wretchedly deceived and befooled The wiser and holier any Man is the more firmly he believes and rejoyceth in the consideration of the Soul's Immortality Such will not be perswaded that they shall ever be deserted of that Free Divine Goodness and Grace which hath so often embraced them but firmly believe that Almighty Love whereby they live to be stronger than Death and more powerful than the Grave They cannot imagine that their Souls which have been so often blest with the Irradiations of Divine Light and the Warmth and Vigour of Divine Love shall ever fall down into a dead unactive State Hence many of them have died triumphantly with raised expectations of entring immediately into a glorious and blessed State How chearfully Socrates that Philosophical Proto-Martyr received the Summons of Death you shall hear by and by Seneca tells Lucilius with what pleasure he thought on a future State and that when the Soul takes a view of the Amplitude and Glory of the heavenly Regions contemnit prioris domicilii Angustias It contemns the straitness of its former Habitation And Cicero brings in Cato crying out O praeclarum diem c. O excellent happy day When I shall go to that Assemby of Divine Souls and depart from this Rout and Confusion here below Plotinus talks Seraphically upon this Subject Ennead 4. lib. 7. ch 10. where he tells us That purified vertuous Souls differ but little from Angelical Essences and that little is their present Inhabitation in the Body and if Men were of this divine and raised Temper they would not in any sort disbelieve the Souls Immortality More of this kind you may find in Plato Hierocles Epictetus Antoninus not to mention the Raptures of many dying Christians Martyrs and others lest it should be called Canting according to the Dialect of this prophane Generation And now what think you Is it rational to imagine that Men of the most unspotted Integrity Wisdom and Vertue in all Ages have so wretchedly been deceived in a matter which so nearly concern'd them while a few dreaming sensual Epicureans have been in the right Credat Judaeus Apella If you think that Goodness and Purity naturally lead Men to such self-deceiving hopes of Immortality which Death will quickly defeat you confound the Natures of Good and Evil and contradict your self in the same breath Ni ita se haberet ut animi immortales essent haud optimi cujusque animus ad immortalem Gloriam niteretur Cic. de senect pag. 202. Equidem efferor studio patres vestros quos colui delexi videndi Ex vitâ istá discedo tanquam ex hospitio non tanquam ex domo commorandi enim Natura Diversorium nobis non habitandi dedit Ibid. Validiora sunt Divinorum virorum praesagia quam aliorum Plato Ep. 2. 6thly If this Hypothesis be true Nature hath dealt worse with Mankind than with the Beasts themselves by leading them into such mistakes as the inferior Creatures are not obnoxious to I have shewed you before how natural it is to the Soul of Man to apprehend it self to be Immortal and if this be a mistake it is so far better with the Bruits which are not misled by any such fallacious Instinct They are alive to the present but dead to the future They may play and sport themselves and enjoy the Objects that are grateful to their Senses without being abused with the hopes or disturbed with the dread of what may befal them in a future State While poor Mankind are divided between fruitless desires and groundless fears of what can never happen to them if the Soul perish with the Body The Swan may die singing while the pensive Emperor cries out Animula vagula blandula quae nunc abibis in loca Poor wandring Soul whither art thou now going Unhappy Reason which deals so ill with those that possess and admire it and worst with those who take most pains to improve it Thus you must agree with Cotta That God did Man a mischief by making him Rational Cic. de Nat. Deor. lib. 3. 7thly This Hypothesis cannot stand but upon the supposition of a continued course of Miracles to make it good which is very absurd and unphilosophical Take his Opinion in his own Words page 10. Every days experience shews That Corn ground and made into Bread is one of the strongest supports of Life both for Man and Beast that concocted in the Stomach is converted into Blood in the Liver purified in the Heart sent thence by the Arteries into the Head and Brain where becoming a Spirit inflamed and lucid it acts in all the Organs the powers of Life Motion Senses and Understanding And this is his material Soul In like manner page 12. It seems one may venture to conclude that Corn may be converted into a living and rational Activity as being a proper nourishment for Man and Beast and for their Bodies and Souls one as well as the other as being so for the Man who is a Contexture of both To this I answer 1st 'T is observable that his Anatomy and Philosophy are all of a piece In that he assigns the Office of Sanguification to the Liver from which Modern Anatomists have upon very good grounds discharged it 2dly If this Opinion hold good the Grass in the Fields and the very Dust and Mire in the Streets which we tread upon may after several refinings become a Rational Soul and prove as wise as our Philosopher himself and discourse as subtily of what it once was when it lay trodden under foot in the Streets That which the other day was no better than Wheat-flower or Meal may now be making Syllogisms reflecting upon its own Acts contemplating the highest Majesty aspiring after a glorious Immortality These things I must confess sound a little aukwardly but he has a ready way to solve
the scornful Reproaches of every capricious Enthusiast You take the way to render it contemptible and to open the Mouth of self-conceited Ignorance against all Humane Literature in General because you make so bad an use of a very small Part of it There is nothing more common than for confident Ignorance to get into the Chair and to pass Sentence without hearing what may be said on the other side and so Learning shall be condemned as an airy Phansy and those that want it will be ready to run it down lest they should be run down themselves for want of it I know the best things are liable to the greatest abuses but some cannot some will not distinguish between the use and the abuse of them You shall meet with some that will tell you That not only yours but all other Philosophy is vain and if an impartial Stander-by ask them how they prove it They will alledge the vanity of yours and infer an Universal Conclusion from a particular Instance This say they is your Philosophy which teacheth us that we have every Week a new Soul and that at length Soul and Body dye together But if these Reflections fall into the hands of any such Persons I must take the liberty to tell them That they do not argue fairly in the Case neither must they suppose that all Philosophers are Vertiginous because perhaps in some the Material Spirits in the Brain have a Circular Motion Neither is Philosophy to be worse thought of for the phantastick Dresses which these Men put upon it 4thly This impious Hypothesis opens a Door to Atheism Infidelity and all manner of Licentiousness Our knowledge of the Spirits above us must arise from the knowledge of our own Souls Hence the first part of Wisdom is truly to know our selves that so we may understand our Duty Interest and End And it is in our own Souls as in a Glass that we must behold the Image of God which should lead us to its great Original and the reason why we know God no better is because we are so ignorant of our selves Hence the Doctrine of the Soul is the most useful part of Natural Philosophy and so nearly connected with Divinity that it may justly be reckoned a part of it also Therefore they who can once persuade themselves that all those noble Operations of the Soul whereof we have been speaking proceed from no higher a Principle than matter and motion are in a ready way to deny the Deity or however to entertain very gross and unwarrantable Conceptions of it as the Epicureans did and to conclude with them that the World was made by a fortuitous concourse of Atoms and that God regards not the Actions and Affairs of Mankind nor is either pleased with Virtue or displeased at its contrary as Lucretius c. Omnis enim per se Divûm Natura necesse est Immortali aevo summa cum pace fruatur Semota à nostris rebus sejunctaque longe Nec bene promeritis capitur nec tangitur irâ And so said his Master Epicurus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Blessed and Immortal Being hath neither any business of his own nor creates any to others and is neither angry nor pleased with any man Laert. in Epicur A Notion more befitting Sardanapalus than a Deity as Max. Tyr. observes No wonder that Ill men are fond of such Opinions as these which so much befriend their Wickedness And as for Death they say it is nothing to us because all Good and Evil lies in Sense of which Death is the privation And such Apprehensions as these must make our Lives pleasant to us and take away the desire of Immortality Laer. ibid. And further They would persuade us that the Fears of Punishment after Death arise only from Old Wives Fables Ibid. Moreover the Immortality of the Soul is so clearly held forth in the Gospel that to deny the one is implicitly to deny the other And he who pretends to evade the Evidence produced out of the New Testament besides the Old for the proof of this Truth is in a proximate disposition to disown all the great Fundamentals of Christianity which are establish'd upon the same Authority And verily it is a gross reproach to our Holy Religion when Persons that profess it maintain such bruitish Principles as Socrates Plato Seneca and abundance more of the Heathens would have been ashamed of Which makes a great Divine suppose That in this Age it is one of the Devil 's chief Designs to assault Christianity by false Philosophy And pray consider What can such Opinions or any that border upon them lead men to but Sensuality and Debauchery though I verily believe you design not so Are any men more likely to live as Brutes than such who think they shall die alike You may tell them of a Resurrection and Future Judgment as long as you will 't is ten to one but they reply as the tree falls so it lies and if once they can so far stifle Reason as to disbelieve the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality after so much Natural and Supernatural Evidence for it I do not see why they may not far more plausibly deny the Article of the Resurrection and then they will let loose the Reins to Lust and Appetite and become the Plagues of Humane Society And indeed 't is observable that many of those who maintain these beastly Opinions commonly live up to them and are not of the best Reputation in point of their Morals And 't is no thanks to their corrupt Principles if they be not all alike scandalously vicious 1 Cor. 15.32 Let us eat and drink for to morrow we die A Proverb familiar among the Epicureans or a reflection upon them in their own Language as Grotius and others observe And therefore I must say That those Persons who propagate such Conceits do discourage Virtue but incourage Vice and Wickedness which is contrary to the publick Peace Tranquility and Felicity of Mankind And let them tell us if they can what good purpose can be pretended for the establishment of such an Hypothesis which can in the least compensate for those Mischievous Effects and Influences upon the Lives of men which it has a manifest tendency to produce Let the matter be well weighed on both sides Indeed 't is not to be wondred at that wicked men should put the Evil day as far from them as they can even as the Devils would not be tormented before the time But that any good man except under the power of Melancholy or Temptation should be fond of such Opinions as these is hardly to be supposed What Shall we fear to be made happy too soon Shall a dead unactivity be preferr'd before Communion with God in a state of sinless Perfection But those that are after the flesh savour not the things of the spirit Rom. 8.5 A Turkish Paradise seems more suitable to the humour of such Persons than the heavenly Jerusalem
that your Souls are no such Earthly Material Things as you are ready to imagine The thoughts of a glorious Immortality will be refreshing to you and you will have some Anticipations of it in the serenity of a vertuous Mind and the testimony of a good Conscience You will quickly see that Vice and Wickedness debase the Soul and that Goodness and Piety are things too noble to be subjected so meanly as in a few corruptible perishing material Spirits If your Souls have once the Image of the Divine Holiness imprinted upon them it will dispose you to discern and acknowledg that Natural Image of the Spiritual Immortal Deity which is antecedent to the other because there must be an agreeableness between the Faculty and the Object and such Divine Qualities must be seated in a Subject suitable to them 6thly Take notice of that certain and full evidence which we have of a world of Spirits How near many of them are to us and how oft concerning themselves about us The Books which have been written about Witchcrafts Possessions Apparitions c. do all prove That there are multitudes of Malignant Spirits which seek the Ruin and Destruction of Mankind and carry on a Warfare against the Interest of God and Religion in the World They know well enough that the Souls of Men are Immortal elfe they would not take so much pains to destroy them I need not name the Authors who Treat of those things Fernelius Wierus Glanvill More Baxter and many more And on the other hand Ambrose Lawrence Zanchy c. will shew you That there are benign Spirits which guard and watch over good Men and Minister for them If you disbelieve all the Testimonies which these Learned Persons have given in the Case you forfeit your own Credit and cannot reasonably expect that any Man should believe you As to the Matter of Apparitions even about Monuments and Sepulchres Socrates makes mention of them Phaedo 117. and supposeth them to be the Souls of bad Men in a State of punishment for the wickedness of their Lives 118. and Cicero in his Tusc Quaest takes notice of such Apparations Visis quibusdam saepe movebantur hisque maxime nocturnis ut viderentur ii qui vita excesserant vivere St. Austine makes mention of one Gennadius a Physician and an excellent Natural Philosopher and withal very charitable to the Poor who falling into doubt concerning the Immortality of the Soul was instructed concerning it in a Dream by a conspicuous young Man that appear'd to him The famous Story of Evagrius the Philosopher who appear'd to Synesius the Bishop after his Death you may find in Baronius's Annals ad Annum 412. where he also relates the Story of Michael Mercatus and Marsilius Ficinus intimate Friends and both addicted to the Platonick Philosophy Who after many Debates about the Immortality of the Soul and a Future State mutually agreed That whether soever of them died first should if the Laws of the Invisible World would admit of it appear to the Survivor and give him an account of these things Thus says Baronius they swore to one another Not long after Marsilius dies and appears to his Friend and tells him those things were true which the Christian Faith taught concerning the Immortality of the Soul This Baronius says he had from the Grandson of the fore-mentiond Mercatus And the same is reported by many other Writers A like account you have of the Apparition of Major George Sydenham to Capt. William Dyke who had made such an agreement as the former telling him That there was a God and a very just and terrible one and that if he did not turn over a new Leaf he will find it so See Glanvill's Sadduc Triumph 408. But those that regard not the Sacred Records will not be convinc'd tho one come to them from the load However such passages as these have been believed by wise Men in all Ages and by Persons as capable of discerning Truth and distinguishing it from Impostures as any of the Pretenders of this present Generation who care not for hearing any news from the Invisible World 7thly If your Genius incline you to Philosophy you may easily find nobler things than Matter and Motion to entertain your selves with if you will but consult the Writings of Plato Plotinus Epictetus Cicero Seneca Antonine c. But above all if you believe that God regards the Affairs and Actions of Mankind then look unto him for Direction and Light in this matter and he that so seeks after the Truth will hardly miss of it in its more weighty and important Instances CHAP. X. Directions to such as believe the Immortality of the Soul shewing how they ought to improve so important a Doctrine THUS far I have proved that the Soul is Immortal and laid down some Directions for those that hesitate in the Matter in order to their better receiving of the proof that has been given But since there are many who profess to believe this great Truth and yet live as if they believ'd it not and so encourage those of the contrary Opinion and harden them in their Impiety I must not let go this point till I have drawn some more practical Inferences from it which if those that believe it would live up to 't would conduce more effectually to the Conviction of the Irreligious sort of Philosophers than the most accurate Reasonings are like to do There is somewhat in an holy Life which commands Awe and Reverence from the worst of Men. Thus Herod feared John the Baptist knowing that he was a just Man and an holy Mark 6.20 Good Examples many times prove more powerful than either Doctrines or Precepts What will it avail any Man to believe well and to live ill to be Orthodox in his judgment and Scandalous in his practice to own the Dignity of Humane Nature and yet live as if Man was only a more subtil kind of a Beast to rule the rest To this purpose you have a very observable passage in the Preface to Mr. Baxter's Reasons c. I oft think what one told me That an Infidel answer'd him when he asked him How he could quiet his Conscience in such a desperate State saith he I rather wonder how you can quiet your Conscience in such a common careless course of life believing as you do If I believ'd such things as you do I should think no care and diligence and holiness could be enough And the late E. of Rochester told an intimate Acquaintance of his There was nothing that gave him and many others a more secret encouragement in their ill ways than that those who pretended to believe lived so that they could not be thought to be in earnest when they said it See his Life by Dr. Burnet pag. 120 For he was sure Religion was either a meer Contrivance or the most important thing that could be So that if he once believed he would set himself in great earnest to live
suitably to it Ibid. Therefore that you may not destroy your own Souls and contribute so much to the ruin of others even while you profess to believe the Immortality of the Soul take these following Directions Direct 1. If you believe that the Soul is Immortal let it be your great care to secure your Eternal Interest If there was no more than a bare probability that the Souls of Men must be for ever either happy or miserable it would yet be a point of the highest Wisdom to take the safest side and to prepare for Eternity as much as possible But when there is so full evidence both Natural and Supernatural as puts the case beyond probability and makes it certain it must needs be the most stupendious folly to neglect the Interest of our Souls which are daily hasting to their Eternal State If the Soul be Immortal says Socrates we had need to take care of it and the danger is dreadful if we neglect it Phaedo 167. And here let me ask you Do you not know that the Life of Man is short and uncertain That the deceitful pleasures of the Flesh will soon be at an end and that the more delightful your accommodations are here below the more unwilling 't is likely you will be to leave them Haec sunt quae faciunt invitos mori And can you chuse but fear what will follow after Death Do you not know that the time of this present Life is given us to prepare for another And what are you in pursuit of that can justify so stupid a neglect of your greatest concerns or that will make amends for the loss of your Immortal Souls Have you not sometimes thoughts of repenting hereafter Why in so thinking you implicitly own the Necessity of Repentance and is it not the height of madness to delay the doing of that which must be done or you are undone and lost for ever In a word Are you not doing violence to your own Consciences all this while and putting away far from you that which most nearly concerns you Be persuaded therefore at length with a manly Resolution to lay aside every weight and the Sins that do so easily beset you and run with Patience the Race that is set before you And if you be so resolved you may proceed as follows 1st Labour to understand what it is that must make your Souls happy if ever they be so You may know by the acts of your Understandings and Wills as before described what Felicity and Perfection your Souls are fundamentally capacitated for Nothing but the highest Truth and the chiefest Good can satisfy them You may divert them for a while with variety of lower Objects but they quickly grow weary and run from one thing to another which may shew you that they are not yet got to their Centre You may charm them with the Delights of Sense and Appetite and some more refined Speculations too and yet you do but degrade them all the while and so they will tell you if you take them apart and freely converse with them Suffer them to act according to their nobler Tendencies and you will soon find them conversing with the World of Spirits to which they are so nearly allyed and reaching forth towards Immortality as a thing suitable to their Nature and design'd for them by its Author They will be looking to their great Original and he will meet them with the Attractive Influences of his Grace This is the way to ennoble them indeed This is something worthy the Nature of a Man These are delights which you may justify while the sordid pleasures of the Flesh leave a sting behind ' em The Life which I am exhorting you to hath something in it not only manly and rational but also Divine viz. To exercise your selves in contemplating and admiring the Perfections of the Deity till correspondent impressions be wrought upon your own Spirits transforming them into the same image from glory to glory 2 Cor. 3.18 And when once you have learnt to relish these spiritual intellectual Pleasures you will look down with a generous disdain upon those Husks which you were once fond of You will scorn those empty Notions which before you were in love with and have a clear testimony of your Immortality within your selves You will detest being so prophane as to sell your Birth-right for a morsel of unsatisfying transitory Pleasures You will then be fully convinced that true Holiness which consists in separating our selves from that which is common and unclean that we may be devoted to the Love and Service of God is perfective of Humane Nature and essentially necessary to its Happiness and that it is a perfect contradiction for an unholy Soul to be truly blessed because nothing but knowing and delighting in God can make us so and in these consists our Holiness And what is there that can justly offend you in such a Life as this Can you be better or more honourably employed Do not even the worst of men when they come to die wish they had thus lived and the best bewail that they have fallen so much short Lord pardon mine Omissions said Bishop Usher Can you be too diligent and serious in the Service of him who hath done all the good that ever was done for you and must do all that ever shall be done to make you happy He needs not you The loss is your own if you turn your backs upon him Consider how much patience he hath already exercised towards you O do not slight the offers of his Mercy and Grace and then think to complain of him as unmerciful in destroying you Thus did that wicked and slothful servant Matth. 25.24 I know indeed that the carnal mind is enmity against God and prejudiced against these things which lead towards him but I know also that this is the disease of Corrupt Nature which where-ever it is must be cur'd or the Party is ruin'd for ever Neither is it sitting still and complaining that will cure it much less pleading it as an excuse against our Duty A willingness to be healed is in this Case a great step towards it But I proceed 2dly Humble your selves for the gross neglects you have hitherto been guilty of What have you done since you came into the World that 's worthy the Nature and Capacities of a man Have you not been making provision for the flesh to fulfil the Lusts thereof while the Immortal Spirit has been almost starved for want of its proper Food viz. Knowledge and Vertue Nascitur enim ex prudentiâ sapere ex temperantiâ sobrium esse pietate Deum colere Hae sunt cibi animae propiè quae idonea est ad sugendum c. Philo Judaeus 127. Is it a light matter that you have debased so noble a Nature all this while and at once sacrilegiously robbed God of that Honour which was due to him from the Rational Creature and unnaturally set your Souls to