dissembled what he thought of the best Form of Government for fear of offending Aristotle I am willing to ascribe my self into the number of them who believe that there is greater apparance that Aristotle was of the Opinion that affirms the Souls immortality and I know many excellent passages may be produc'd out of his Writings which favor it But yet so it is that in other places he seems to lay down principles which are incompatible with the same and some of his most famous disciples have believ'd that he held the contrary Socrates as we find in Plato knows not how to be confident of it and perswades himself by reasons which for the most part are but of slender moment and always speaks of it as of other things with doubting and not determining any thing although through the desire he had that his Soul were immortal he inclined more willingly to this opinion and accounted it of most probability which is Cicero's judgement in his Tusculan Questions And truly I conceive that in all things of this Nature the vulgar had better apprehensions then the Philosophers yea that the Philosophers corrupted the sentiments of Nature which remain'd more lively and genuine in the breasts of the people For they had wit and knowledge enough to frame objections against the common conceptions of men but yet they had not sufficient to resolve them whence their minds became unsetled and wavering Whereas the people who understood not so much subtilty held themselves more firmely to that which was taught them by nature it self and they had received from her though doubtingly in regard of the weakness and ignorance of humane reason As it often falls out that a man that knows nothing in Civil Law and yet hath some natural faculty of understanding better discerns the right of a certain Case then knowing Professors who have their heads full of Statutes and Paragraphs great skill rather perplexing and confounding then resolving them in the knowledge of things But Philosophical disputes being spread from the Scholes into Towns among the people have obscured and disorder'd such natural notions much more then the people by their own ignorance and negligence could have depraved and embroiled the same of themselves However were they much better assured then they are that their Souls do not perish with their bodies yet they must necessarily be extremely ignorant of the estate of them after their separation For how blind so ever the reason of man be in that which concerns the Deity his Nature Perfections and Providence yet the arguments which satisfie us of them are so clear and resplendent in the World that in spight of all the darkness of the humane Intellect there is always some beam that breaks through affording that dubious and confused knowledge we mentioned was found amongst the Nations of the World And how intangled soever the disputes of Philosophers were the rational soul of Man gives always so many proofs of its incorruptibility that the knowledge thereof cannot be totally extinguish'd But as to its estate after this Life it is not onely impossible for men to divine of themselves what it will be by reason of the corruption and irregularity which is befallen their faculties but though the eye of their reason were as clear and luminous as could be desir'd yet they were hardly able to make the least probable conjecture concerning it because God hath written nothing of it in the book of Nature from which we draw all our knowledge But they which are instructed by Religion in the History of the Worlds Original can very easily give account thereof For God having produc'd Man in the Nature of things in such an estate that if he had persisted in it he should not have feared death the revelation of that estate which must follow this Life would have been unprofitable to him who was made in case that the design of his creation had been pursued to live perpetually in the World and never to undergo the separation of his Soul from his Body For that Truth teaches us and likewise reason being informed in this particular either consents to or is convinced of it that it was the Offence which the First Man committed which introduced death into the World To what purpose therefore should God have imprinted in Nature any evidence or token of the estate of man after death since in that first integrity of nature there was no suspition nor shadow of Death it self It is true indeed that God denounced to man that if he degenerated from his integrity he should dye which might have occasion'd some thought in him of the pains which follow death being he knew that his Soul was immortal But the apprehension of punishment after sin and also of that which follows death do's not infer any other of remuneration unless God reveal mercy and hope of pardon after the transgression Which God had not as yet done in the integrity of Nature So that man having from God neither hope of pardon in case he should sin nor any cause to think of death in case he should not sin he had no occasion to raise his mind higher towards a better life But if any one conceives some scruple touching the perpetuity of the life of man upon the Earth if he had not fallen into sin and imagines rather that God after he had lest him for some Ages in the World to practice obedience and virtue would have at last taken him to himself and given a greater recompense then that which he could have injoy'd in a terrestrial felicity he must also confess that to instate man in the injoyment of such remuneration there would have been no need of Death and so that it was not necessarily for him to know what the estate of his Soul after separation from his body should be Moreover whatsoever that compensation would have been which man should have received for his Obedience and Virtue insomuch as it would have been a condition and a glory supernatural some revelation of it must necessarily have been made by another way then nature namely then by the evidences which may be had from consideration of the Works of God and the Government of the World And in truth to hear the Poets and Philosophers speak of it sufficiently evinces that such as have had no other light to guid them in search of these things but that of Nature and Reason have onely groped in the dark For how ridiculous is the description which they make of the Infernal Regions and Elysian Fields Is it not pleasant to behold the Landskip which Virgil hath drawn of them in the sixth Book of his Aeneids where he speaks of Rhadamanthus and the severity of his sentences and forgets not to paint out Tysiphone with her scourges and serpents together with the Furies He also places there hideous Hydra's and I know not what kind of other vile beasts at the gates of Hell and in that horrible prison which he represents twice
certainly to conjecture what the cause of death is God himself would have purposely hid it from them least not being able to discover the remedy of it despair should sink and ruine all the World All other ignorances have been prejudicial and very often pernicious to men to this alone we owe the conservation of humane Society So that we may pertinently apply to this in particular that which Horace speaks generally of the ignorance in which it hath pleased God we should live touching events to come Prudens futuri temporis exitum Caliginosa nocte premit Deus The sole Word of God which is the special revelation we are in quest of is that which accords all these differences and clears up all the difficulties and confusions We shall not dispute at present whether in his first creation the body of man was naturally so well constituted that through prudence whereby he was able to avoid all hurtful things and the use of aliments which the blessing of God rendred as efficacious for the conservation of life by the good and pure qualities which he at first indued them with as now they are often full of noxious juices since the curse of God blasted them for our offence he might without other assistance from the Deity avoid all alteration and corruption either by disease or Age. God hath in the composure of Gold and Diamonds and other like things given sufficient proof of his power and hath so exactly temper'd the contrary qualities of the Elements in the constitution of certain bodies that they seem not subject to any corruption whatsoever And the long life which the first Men liv'd even after sin and the examples of the like we meet with in several profane Histories and some also though few which may be found in the Histories of these latter times give us enough to judge how firm and durable the life of man would be were he as exactly and perfectly fram'd and the aliments that support him as good as the estate of Nature in its integrity could have promised We onely affirm that though as the Philosophers thought the body of man being composed of the Elements and consequently including contrary and repugnant qualities would have carried in its self the seeds of death yet this revelation teaches us that the Wisdom of God would have so provided therein that if no disorder had hapened in the World through sin the propensity which our bodies have to their own dissipation would have been restrain'd and hindred by his Providence For he would have repell'd all sorts of eternal accidents he would have hindred the intemperature of the humors both by preserving them in right harmony and supplying man with aliments indued with excellent faculties and void of all noxiousness and by infusing new vigor of life in time of necessity to hinder the approach of Old-age would have maintained man in a vigorous and flourishing consistence and so given him the immortality of which we have now nothing left but the desire Whence likewise the union of the Soul and Body would have continued to eternity not subject to any important change or evil accident So that admitting death to be an accident that sutes with the natural principles of the composition of their bodies yet the cause that they do dye is because it having been covenanted that the consequences of a mortal condition should be hindred upon condition that man continued in obedience sin supervening hath changed the dispensation of all that and effected that death is become in quality of a punishment and vengeance And this ought nor to be deemed strange For there are things which considered in themselves have nothing so shameful in them but that they may well endure either the presence of another or the publike day-light which yet through the disorder befallen in nature are become ignominious Nakedness which of it self is not dishonest is become unseemly through sin which hath caused rebellion in the corporeal appetites against reason So that they who affirm it indifferent to go naked or clothed shew that extreme profaness hath worn out of their foreheads that shame which causes others to express their consciousness of sin and the unseemliness of the irregularity of our sensual faculties so as to be asham'd of their impudence who are not so themselves Wherefore though death were a natural accident which yet it is not the horror of it is too great to acknowledge no more in it but pure nature and its motions For why then do Infants dye We learn from the same revelation that that so sudden separation of the soul from the Body is not for ever but that the being which is given them though at first it seem's to have been allotted for a moment onely and by consequence little better then not-being shall endure eternally when the considerations shall cease for which it suffer'd the Eclipse of the time that it was to appear in this Life For the being of man when it hath once had a beginning is of perpetual duration and the time of Death is but as an Eclipse of his course But this is not the place for this discourse and therefore we shall add but a word more and pass forward Whether we consider the justice or the goodness of God this revelation amply furnishes us what to answer in defence of both He takes away little children at their birth and notwithstanding does not incur thereby any blame of cruelty because before they were born they deserved that punishment by reason of the natural infection of sin which they drew from those that begat them And indeed as we crush the Eggs of Scorpions before they are hatcht not because they have as yet deserved to be destroy'd for any wound which we have received by them but because in growing up the seeds of venome which that brood hath by nature will infallibly be exerted to our mischief so is it sometimes expedient for God to stifle from the wombe such children as have so many seeds of vice in them that coming to years would do much more mischief then any Scorpion in the World This the Philosophers never understood and therefore could not return in answer But if there opinion were admitted it would be requisite to defer judging of the merit of Infants till they come to the age that ennables them to manifest and display their Vice Moreover God resumes some of them back to himself whom he pleases to render happy by his goodness Nor is it necessary that he should permit them a longer abode in this life that so they might be capable of happiness for their practises of Virtue because he do's not give it as a Salary deserved from his justice by our Virtues but as a beneficence purely out of his liberality which likewise the Philosophers never thought of for according to them if there remains any beatitude to be hoped after this Life it cannot be aspir'd unto but by Virtue How then can Infants obtain
they would fall did not he infuse Light into them they would become darkness as well as we There remains therefore but one Expedient which is for God who alone is infinite to satisfie himself And here it is that humane Reason is confounded Let us nevertheless experience how far we are able to comprehend this abysse By the words above recited out of the Prophet Isaiah it appears that he that underwent the chastisement of our peace was to be man A man of sorrows saith he and acquainted with grief who must lay down his soul an offering for sin and this cannot be meant of any other Creature But had he had not express'd the same so manifestly the nature of the punishment which it behov'd him to suffer necessarily requires it For this is the wages of sin In the day thou eatest of the fruit of this Tree thou shalt dye the death that is thou shalt be under the subjection and condemnation of death both as to body and soul For as the Reward of Piety ha's respect to the whole complete man compos'd of body and soul so also ha's the retribution of sin which ha's corrupted both the one and the other And indeed he that was to break the Serpents head according to the word of God was to be the seed of the Woman If therefore the satisfaction which he was to render to God ought to be of an infinite value what person is able to render it though a man unless himself be of an infinite dignity And if such man be of an infinite dignity what remains but that he is also God since infiniteness of dignity cannot reside but in the divine Essence and Nature Certainly infiniteness of Dignity is as much incommunicable as infiniteness of Essence for it ha's its root and foundation in infiniteness of Essence and the one is as the natural reflexion or irradiation of the other So that as it is impossible to separate the light and strength of the Sun from the Sun it self or to imagine that something should possess that admirable splendor and vivificant virtue which is in the Sun and not fancy it to be the Sun it self So yea much more impossible is it to attribute a dignity beyond all limits to any whatsoever and not withall attribute to him an uncircumscrib'd and infinite essence And to this how seemingly repugnant soever to their reason do the Divine Scriptures manifestly astipulate out of which I shall for brevity's sake produce but some few irrefragable passages Thus speaks the Prophet Malachi in the 3. chap. of his Prophecy Behold I will send my messenger and he shall prepare the may before me and the Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his Temple even the messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in Words which we have shewn above and the Jews grant are intended of the Messias alone the Messias who alone was promis'd to be a Redeemer to his Church Now I beseech you to whom was the Temple of Jerusalem dedicated but to the true God and can it then be meant of any simply a Creature that it was his Temple Certainly neither the Jealousie of the Lord could endure it nor the ancient piety of the Jews have permitted it the erection of Temples and dedication of Altars being not due but to the Deity alone as testimonies of the soverain honor we owe to his supreme nature and Majesty But David apertly terms him God in the 45. Psalm and will not have us put to the necessity of gathering it by consequence Thy throne O GOD is for ever and ever The scepter of thy kingdom is a right scepter Thou lovest righteousness and hatest wickedness therefore O God thy God hath annointed thee with the oyl of gladness above thy fellows For I challenge any man to make out to whom else these words can sute but to the Messias Whose throne is this that must abide for ever and to eternity For that the words he uses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie a duration without end they know who understand any thing in this language Now there is no appearance that the Holy Spirit would give the name of God to a simple creature on this manner together with a Kingdom of everlasting duration So likewise in the 110. Psalm where David calls the Messias his Lord ther 's no question but he would have him understood to be something more besides a meer man For David was a King and depended of no other but God so that between the Divine Power and that which is truely Regal such as that of David was there can be no other intermediate And yet he stiles him with the same appellation subjects use to their soverain Prince In the 110. Psalm The Lord said unto my Lord sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool But least any further cavill at this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which sometimes in Scripture is given both to men and to Angels by reason of the greatness of their strength and eminence of power though it cannot be found attributed to one alone in particular either of Angels or men that are in power in the world Isaiah makes the commentary of it For unto us a child is born unto us a Son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called Wonderfull Counsellor The mighty God The Father of Eternity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Prince of Peace Are these titles competent to a creature I know well that they assay to turn this passage to Hezekiah and refer all these titles to God except that of the Prince of Peace which they say is given by him to Hezekiah but it behoveth to have lost both shame and the use of common sense to believe them For in what other place of the Scripture where the Prophets mean to speak of God and some action purposed by him to be done do they accumulate so many titles Besides that to them that understand it the genius of the language contradicts them very evidently and their best Paraphrasts being overcome with the clearness of the truth refer it to the Messias But the Prophet Jeremy speaks with the greatest clearness possible in the 23. chap. of his Prophecy Behold the days come saith the Lord that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch and he shall raign as King and shall execute judgement and justice in the Earth In his days Judah shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely and this is his Name whereby he shall be called THE LORD OVR RIGHTEOVSNESSE 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For here the Ineffable name of God is us'd which is as much incommunicable according to the opinion of the Jews themselves as his very essence And indeed the greatest part of his other Names seem to hold forth his Properties but this denotes his eternally permanent essence This is it by which he delights to call himself and glorifies himself in it 'T is true
But there is something more in the matter which is that although some have more apprehensions of them and others less yet all are desirous to be delivered from them and to finde out some remedy against them For there is nothing that so harrasses the mind or gives it such anguish as Fear does and there is no man finds any pleasure in being tormented in that manner How therefore is it come about that men have been so susceptible of these vain terrors seeing we naturally repell those things that are enemies unto us And is it not so much the more considerable that there have been always found some people although they have been very rare among others that have endeavored as Epicurus to deliver men from such affrightments by openly preaching Impiety either by words or example For David complaines that there were some even amongst the Jews that were so devoid of sense as to deny that there is a God or if there be that he takes any consideration of humane actions by his Providence A strange thing that they which would imprint such vain Fears in the mind of Men should have succeeded so happily and so universally therein notwithstanding all the natural repugnances in us against them and they which would deliver us from them could never effect their purpose although they had the assistance of natural profaneness to favour them thereunto Do's not this surpass all astonishment that the Fear of Divine Justice naturally disquiets the souls of men and causes such painful agitations therein and yet notwithstanding if Epicurus should have mounted upon the Theater at Athens and the Poet Lucretius gone into the Pulpit for Orations and there preached to the people the contempt of God and his Thunders that instead of recompensing them for attempting to free men from such a tyrannical opinion the greatest wretches would have been ready to beat out their brains with stones And that those Nations being so inflamed with love of their Liberty and an ardent hatred against Tyrants which affected the Domination over their Goods and Persons that they erected statues in their streets in honor of them that kill'd them should have so great an abhorrence against those which went about to disabuse them from a fancy which oppress'd and tyranniz'd over their souls Surely it must rather be acknowledged that Nature prevail'd and the wrath of God which is in a high degree revealed to men from Heaven and Quae caput a coeli regionibus ostendebat And it helps not to alledge that it hath not been possible for us to be delivered from these Terrors because we have not been instructed in the Doctrine of Epicurus For whosoever looks narrowly thereinto will not without admiration remark two things First that there are very few men but have a propensity to Prophaneness and consequently every one is an Instructer to himself in the Epicurean discipline Yet nevertheless the number is so small that ha's delivered themselves from the inquietudes of conscience that perhaps there never was so much as one person that became absolutely freed from them not even Lucretius or Epicurus himself In some men the more resistance they employ against those assaults the greater is their importunateness and they are re-enforced by the endeavors that are us'd to repell them so that from Impiety to which they would resign up themselves to sin more at ease without being molested by such alarms in the midst of their pleasures they fall into Superstition like a fugitive slave that is drawn back by the throat into his Masters house where he is inforced to obey whether he will or no for fear of the Scourge and the Torture Others indeed go so far that the pleasures wherein they swim and wherewith they almost totally subvert their reason remove in a manner such sentiments out of their minds so as sometimes to make a mockery thereof But 't is as when Criminals give themselves to debaucheries in the Prison For when the fumes of wine are a little exhal'd and they begin to think of their crimes with a setled consideration they fret and are excruciated with the horror of Gibbets and Wheels which are preparing for them But if it happen to them to be always drunk which yet is rarely so yet they are in their sleep tormented with horrible visions and affrighting dreams The second thing observable is that the honester part of mankind are they which feel those Terrors least by reason that a good conscience which hath knowledge of the Goodness of God and his inclination to Mercy assures and reposes it self in the same and notwithstanding such good men abhor that doctrine from the bottom of their hearts that removes all fear of the Deity out of the Mind of Man In so much that they which are least disquieted with these Troubles are the men that esteem them to have their foundations in Nature and to be grounded upon Truth On the contrary they which believe them vain and groundless are the most severely assaulted with them without being able to be released from them In which on the one side shines the Goodness of God towards them that love him sincerely and fear him awfully and on the other side his Justice upon them that disesteem him What man was ever more outragious against God then Caligula or who ever so audaciously contemned his Vengeance And for all that when so ever it thundred as if the Deity had spoke to him from Heaven he hid himself under his Bed as if he intended to make a Buckler of it against the Tempest Whereas in the midst of the Darkness in which the Pagans liv'd Socrates maintained his mind in that same tranquillity at his Death wherein he had pass'd the whole course of his days But there is one thing highly worthy consideration which is that the stings of Conscience are never so sensible and so quick as when men approach near Death or behold themselves in some eminent danger that menaces them And whence should it be so but onely that by the instinct of Nature they presage and anticipate with their fear the misery that attends the Wicked after this Life Misery I say which is so much the more horrible in the apprehensions they have of it by reason that they know not what it is and because all men have a perswasion that their souls are immortal For if Death did extinguish the Soul with the Body and so rescued both the one and the other from the Divine Vengeance and the jurisdiction of Fortune at the same time there would be nothing at all to justifie those fears in reason In case I say those terrors were not natural in us there would be no person but would free himself from them with this consideration There was a time when we were not in Being and one day we shall exist no more which was the consolation of Epicurus But on the contrary then is the time that those Alarms are redoubled and the tempests increase
power then other men to conjoyn them actually and really together In which impossibility of amassing a supreme Good in the World of so many pieces and consolidating them so well together that their Union be never discompos'd who sees not the necessary despair there is of all humane power to obtain the same Which despair of obtaining cannot of consequence but cause the pursuit to be abandon'd So that as Nature hath given us the Desire to be happy Necessity will have bound us down to a perpetual despair of being so And the most excellent of all things in the world and for which all the rest seem to have been made shall never arrive to its end but shall appear as if it were purposely framed to be tormented continually with the dispair of never being able to reach it's injoyment In which respect that of Horace to a Miser will be as applicable to every man Tantalus a labris sitiens fugientia captat Flumina quid rides mutato nomine de te Fabula narratur I shall proceed yet something further The desires which men have are of two sorts Of which the first are conformable to Nature and do nothing at all encounter reason The second are extravagant and repugnant thereunto As if a man should desire to be all spirit and to have no Body at all this were an extravagance to which right reason cannot assent For t is to desire not onely a thing which will not but likewise which cannot be being involved in a manifest contradiction in as much as a man cannot be a man without having a body nor have a body and be all spirit together And if he should desire to be metamorphis'd into the nature of those simple Intelligences which we commonly called Angels and are not destinated to be conjoyned to Bodies his wish would not be less absurd Because in case he should become such a simple and immaterial Intelligence he were no longer the same person but should in effect desire the abolition of his own being for that in transmutations wherein the form it self of the thing as they speak perishes the thing perishes also Whence it would concern him as little to be an Angel as to be a Dog and to desire one as the other It is not from such desires as these that we are to deduce arguments to shew what is the nature of man and of his Soul because they which make them deviate from the rules of Nature The other sort of wishes which are suggested by her and are not thwarted or checked by reason which I say do not destroy the form of our being but ennoble and advance it are they which ought to be taken for manifest indices either of what we naturally are or at least of what we ought to be For whence should those desires happen to us if they be not inspir'd by Nature And to what end should they have been placed in us if that of which we received of them never intended to give us the satisfaction and injoyment they aim at Admitting it were possible for us to compass all those things which are necessary to make up the supream Good of Aristotle and that we were in full possession thereof besides that natural desire of the supreme Good which might seem to be contented in the injoyment there would be left another not less vehement or less inrooted in us which is that of the perpetuity of such felicity without any alteration or interruption whatsoever Now when we should with all imaginable care have cemented the parts together that compose it when we should have nailed linked and invested them so that there would be nothing but death able to dissolve the junctures yet it would last but for our Life our Life could not last to the end of an Age. And then what would become of those desires of injoying the same for millions of years even to perpetuity But some may here arrest my course and demand whether experience shows not that it is impossible to obtain a beatitude durable for ever For who is he that is exempted from Death Wherefore since wise persons do not onely not consult about things absolutely impossible but do not so much as desire them or if they happen to let a wish escape from them by some suddain impetus of nature they presently bring the discourse of reason to repress it it follows necessarily that such desire of a perpetual felicity is out of the limits of reason and by consequence ought to be check'd by it rather then cherish'd and encouraged For death which happens universally without priviledge to any renders not the injoyment of a perpetual Good more impossible to all men then the weaknes of our minds the inclination which we have naturally to vice and the infinite multitude of inevitable miseries attending humane condition renders impossible the possession of the Happiness which Aristotle describes and terminates within the duration of our Lives And nevertheless none ever condemned that desire in man of his felicity none ever accounted it but both natural and reasonable Moreover it is manifest that all the World desires Immortality and the things which we have already deduced demonstrate the same Yet there never was any person that attain'd it Must it therefore be concluded that the desire of it is absurd and besides the rules of reason and Nature Epicurus himself did not account it so who amidst the gripings of the Stone and upon the very confines of death comforts himself with the immortal glory which his Philosophical contemplations had acquired and should preserve for him to perpetuity Cicero professeth Death is terrible to them who leave nothing of themselves after departure out of this life but not to those whose praises cannot dye Alexander esteemed Achilles happy in that he had Homer to celebrate his Virtues and high atchievments of Armes being his memory would remain consecrated to eternity in the Poem of the Iliads And himself made profession that he did not at all fear death because he beliv'd his victories would render him immortal And not so much but Ennius the Poet presag'd he should live for ever in the mouthes and memories of men by means of his Verses Ovid and Horace promise themselves nothing less from their Works then that they shall continue their names throughout all successions of time speaking of them as trophies erected to exempt them from the Power of the Fatal Sisters Such as cannot hope the same from their works or great exploits expect at least to survive in their children and would be very effectually comforted against death if they could be assured that by help of their Pictures or Front of their Houses their posterity should retain the remembrance of their countenances from age to age Therefore as the impossibility of obtaining from this Life the supreme Good described by Aristotle do's not hinder but that man was framed by nature to possess it and as the impossibility of obtaining immortality do's as
would seem to carry something of inhumanity of which it is incongruous that he should propose himself an example God who is so good hath so many other means in his hand to lead men to Virtue would never willingly employ any thereunto for which he might be accus'd of barbarousness and cruelty especially seeing it is an accident so frequent that in a Town of a thousand families there do's not pass one day in the year in which it do's not happen 'T is true for certain great and important considerations Kings are excused if they sometimes commit some act of injustice or violence But this must be very rarely done and onely when the safety of the State is concern'd Yet Lucretia could not contain from crying out upon the death of Iphigenia who was sacrific'd for the safety of all Greece Tantum Religio potuit suadere malorum But that there should dye five or six times as many Children in the Cradle as attain to mans estate seems an irregularity which not onely an Epicurean but the most devout and pious amongst the Philosophers cannot but judge unsupportable Above all other considerations the Fear which the thought of death begets naturally in all men deserves our animadversion For how couragious so ever any may endevour to appear 't is as Aristotle calls it the most terrible of all terrors And as one hath observed if Julius Câ—sar who was magnanimity it self said that the most unexpected death was the sweetest and most desirable which testifies that he resented some dread when he thought of it what may we think of the horrors which other men have of it And this Fear does not arise onely from the apprehension that a man shall exist no more but it hath something of I know not what other violence and bitterness For otherwise nature and reason being two things which accord very well together if death were purely natural reason would finde something in that consideration wherewith to be comforted and gently drink off that Cup. But experience shews that the consolations taken from the necessity of Nature and the example of so many other deaths are too weak and of too little efficacy when the business is to strengthen a soul that trembles at the presence of death Which if there have been some that were generously resolv'd to undergo they have been very few in number and almost none in comparison of so many men yea Nations to whom the alarms of death have been terrible and hideous For I do not put in the rank of such as resolve generously against it those Caitifs that tye the rope to their own necks and drink to their companions upon the Ladder For this is so far from true generosity conjoyn'd with the discourse of reason that it is meer stupidness and more then bestial brutality And it is diligently to be observed that they who believe not that their Soul is immortal comfort themselves more easily then others do with the consideration of the necessity of death and say that as the Generations which preceeded their Birth belonged nothing at all to them because they were not yet in being so they ought not to care for those which follow after their death in regard they shall be no longer and that Agamemnon is dead and Romulus and Patroclus and the Scipio's Qui multis quam tu meliores improbe rebus And I believe the greatest part of those that have shewn so high a courage in contemning death among the Pagans had not much consideration of their future condition As it is clear by Socrates who says in Plato that he knew not which was best to live or to dye and that it were a folly to redoubt a thing of which there is no certain knowledge whether it be desirable or to be feared Whereas they that think seriously of immortality find nothing in nature that encourages or comforts them A sure evidance that death hath something of terror in it which does not proceed from nature but from something else for they would at least have more ground of consolation then the others in the subsistence of the better part of their essence Now whence can that horror be but onely that death is the forerunner of divine vengeance and makes up a part of it already If hereupon they agree that it is a punishment for sin certainly since all other Philosophers have held it to be simply natural they cannot know it to be so by any other way then that divine revelation that hath inform'd us by what gate it entred into the World For none of the Ancients ever found out or could so much as divine in a dream what was the cause of it And so far were they from having it come into their minds that on the contrary some have believed that Death was rather a gift and gratification to us from the Deity then a punishment inflicted by his Justice Which opinion the innumerable miseries of humane life greatly concurr'd to render authentick the undergoing whereof being look'd upon as so dolorous that sometime the deliverance from them ha's been accounted the greatest good that could arrive Or if some few have not dared to affirm absolutely that death was a Good yet they maintain'd at least that it was no Evil since it rescues men from all calamities which they suffer To fear death said Socrates to his Judges is nothing else but to seem to be wise and not to be so For it is to pretend to know that which we do not know because none knows what death is nor whether it be not the greatest good that can befall a man To which Plutark refers that exhortation of an ancient Greek Poet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Metuenda non est mors arumnarum exitus So also the greatest part of the reflections of Cicero upon this matter in the first of the Tusculane Questions fall into the Dilemma of Socrates To wit that if the soul be extinguish'd with the body and so the sense of all things be absolutely abolish'd death cannot really be an Evil because a man being thereby wholly depriv'd of existence and exempted from among the nature of things that which is not is equally incapable both of Evil and Good But if the soul survive the Body death is so far from being an evil that it ought rather to be accounted in the number of the greatest goods seeing it delivers from the evils of this present life and puts a man in possession of the contentments of a better upon which he does not omit to mention the converse with the Heroes wherein Socrates placed the greatest part of the hopes of his joy But the business is of higher importancy For though the Light of Nature should have taught men that death is an effect of the justice of God yet is it impossible as we shall see in due place for the same to discover to them the remedy thereof And I conceive that though the reason of man should have been able
the same which dye in the cradle and so are prevented of ever exercising themselves in Virtue So great are the advantages of them which have this particular revelation above those which reject it to wit that we know for what reason we dread death so much and why it is indeed to be feared what the sources are from whence we are to draw our consolations against its agonies and lastly what is the way to ascribe glory always to the Deity whatsoever accident happens in the World CHAP. VI. Of the Corruption of Mankind How much it imports true piety to know the Original of it which we cannot do without a particular Revelation THe excellence of the Nature of man is such that he cannot be considered either in his body or his mind or in the dominion which he claims over all things but there are presented very eminent testimonies and tokens of it The Stature of his body is comely and graceful not despicable for its smallness nor unsightly and incommodious by too great bulk the Symmetry of his members his delicate skin and tender flesh have an air so transcendently pleasing that all other Animals may seem coursely composed and made for laborious services but man alone formed and designed for empire Especially in his countenance shines a majesty that speaks him made to contemplate the heavens no less then to command on earth And whereas Brutes have their heads inclined downwards Os homini sublime dedit coelumque tueri Jussit erectos ad Sydera tollere vultus As for his Mind the Sciences and Arts of which he is Author the capacity to govern Societies and conduct Armies the Dexterity of forming a design with understanding and carrying on the same with prudence of contriving the means industriously to their end and guiding them thereunto by courses that seem oftentimes contrary the faculty of conceiving the Ideas of things which are not as if they were although compounded of parts absolutely discrepant the sagacity of knowing how to make use of expedients for long Navigations and tracing wayes in the Sea by direction of the Stars are sufficient proofs and evidences to evince its excellence So that they are without comparison more to be excused who conceiv'd that the Spirit of Man was a small particle deriv'd from the Deity then they which reduc'd it to the condition of Beasts Phocylides had indeed some reason when he said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As if God in creating man and indowing him with so divine an understanding had lent him a little portion of his essence In like manner the Empire which he hath over all other creatures shews sufficiently that it is not for nothing that his mind and body have been indued with so many eminent qualifications above all other things The Earth produces for him the necessities and pleasures of life to his contentment and like a soveraign he employs its stones marbles metals to build his palaces and guild the roofs which he makes of its Cedars He covers himself with the wool of animals and insects spin silk for his service Notwithstanding his own weakness he ranks Elephants in battel and makes them subservient to his passions without their knowing that they are so He hath put the bridle in the mouth of Horses and tamed that proud and fierce animal for his convenience Even the life of poor beasts is nothing to him for his sustenance and how terrible soever the Sea be yet he hath found out means to fail upon it securely and to conjoyn nations by commerce whom vast distances of Oceans have divided But notwithstanding all this his corruption appears so manifestly that there is none but ha's observ'd it For one comely and perfectly well composed person there will ever be found a hundred that have somewhat of difformity There are always some impotent and less-favoured by nature some one-ey'd and lame and even some persons born to Kingdomes whose structure and conformation of members is pitiful or ridiculous We are subject to so many diseases that sometimes one single person suffers more of them in his life then all other animals together of a whole province The corruption of his Mind is extremely great Not to speak at present of that ignorance which is common to all and the most knowing complain of with good reason although it may seem that man having been made to serve himself with all things he ought at least to know them The Evil which he commits both against others and himself hath given occasion to One heretofore to say That as it were better to give no wine to sick persons because if it profits one it hurts more so it would have been better not to have allow'd man the use of reason since for one good that it does it causes ten thousand evils in the World There are nothing but Wars of Nation against Nation yea of the same Nation in its own bowels In Cities there are seditious in families tumults The Husband and Wise do not accord in the same bed whose souls notwithstanding ought to be cemented together And that which is more strange every one is not at agreement with himself our natural instability disquiets us our passions turmoile us our desires and jealousies fret and devour us and which is a lively token of our corruption in what condition soever we be I do not say tolerable onely but even honorable and desirable by others we are never contented with it That which a while since we ardently desired we soon after despise and what we made no account of when we injoy'd we resent its loss with sorrow thus condemning our own judgement of error frequently with remorse for suffering our selves to be transported with passion and appetite Witnes that excellent Satyre of Horace in which he introduces old soldiers complaining that they are not Merchants and Merchants envying the happiness of the military life The Lawyer there extolls the tranquillity and peace of the Husbandman who also esteems himself miserable in comparison of those that dwell in Cities So that whether it be chance or the wish and choice of reason that puts men upon their course of life yet there is not one but finds something to dislike in his own and repines that he is not well at ease nor so favourably treated as his Neighbor And notwithstanding were a proffer tender'd to exchange conditions and the Merchant sent to the Campe and the Soldier to traffick at Sea as also were the Husbandman become a Lawyer and engaged in the toilesome affairs of Law-Courts and the Lawyer oblig'd to drive the Waine there is none of them but would asmuch disapprove the change Lastly we need not much exalt our selves for the Dominion which we have over other things for the Earth produces nothing but with the labor of our armes and sweat of our brows and besides recompenses us oft-times with bryars and thistles The Frost and Mill-dew blast our Vines and Corn the Caterpiller and Locust
how shall the goodness of God which we have abundantly shewn is the liberal rewarder of Virtue render to the body the free recompense of the service it hath done the Soul in the practise thereof and of the obedience which its natural appetites have yielded to reason unless it be raised again from the dust Certainly as we said above man is not onely the Soul he is the body also both which contribute respectively to Virtue of which man is capable Wherefore they ought both to be interested in the reward And that justice which is the avenger of sin and without which the Providence of God would be too narrow and defective how will that acquit its charge unless it equally punish the body with the soul Seing they are usually the affections of the body that debauch the mind and 't is the pleasure of the senses that prevents and misguids our reason But the punishment would not be equally proportioned and distributed to the Soul and Body if the soul were miserable to eternity and the body wholly exempted from it to exist no more And the condition of the body would be happy in comparison of that of the mind although the defect of both were equal Moreover the penalty encreasing proportionably to the dignity of him against whom the offense is committed for an outrage done to an inferior person is punisht otherwise then that which is committed against a Soverain Magistrate the justice of God being an infinite power an immense and unlimited dignity and authority how could the punishment of the body by being no more be proportional to the justice of God Or if the justice of God can be satisfied for the offense committed against it with the extinguishment of the body without revival to perpetuity why is not the soul also extinguisht with the body without remaining exposed to a continual and perpetual punishment Certainly it must either be that the body suffers with the soul eternally for satisfaction of the justice of God sutably to his infinite dignity or the soul must be extinguish'd together with the body But neither the justice of the God nor the nature of the soul suffers the same to perish or be abolish'd and therefore the body must be raised from death to partake of the same compensation with it Moreover of how great importance is it for consolation of our minds against the fear of death For death being naturally terrible to all men and the separation of the soul from the body full of bitterness and anguish what more effectual comfort can be received then to expect after a peaceable repose in the grave to be raised by the hand of God from it not to restore us the injoyment of this life that so we might dye over again but to live an eternal life in unexpressible contentment Besides what sweeter consolation in the loss of our friends which is oftentimes more grievous to us then death it self then the hope that they and we shall one day arise from the earth to dwell together in celestial glory Certainly he that represents to himself what joy friends receive here upon an unexpected meeting after divers years absence may in a manner conjecture with what gladness we shall resent the day of that happy resurrection Whence I conceive that excepting the assurance of pardon of sins which delivers the soul it self from the apprehensions of death eternal there is nothing so capable of inflaming the mind of man with love towards God as the hope of resurrection For next to deliverance from the death of the soul which consists in the sense of a remorse and eternal distress what can be more sweet then the deliverance from the death of the body which is to have no more sense nor motion nor life nor being And from the doctrine of the Resurrection however profane men gainsay it results an admiration of the Wisdom of God in reuniting things which nature had so straitly conjoin'd together For since death as we have shewn is not a natural thing but an accident superven'd contrary to the purpose of nature and the design of the first formation of man who in regard of the excellence of his soul ought to be an immortal creature though in reference to his body he was composed of the matter of the Elements what is there more sutable to Divine Wisdom then to reunite without injury either to his justice or his goodness what death had separated by a kind of violence For to repeat those words of of Phocylides it is not meet to dissolve the fair harmony of man And lastly though the power of God may be well understood other ways yet herein is one of the greatest and most admirable testimonies of it to wit that from the earth and the Sea and the entrals of birds and beasts shall be required the bodies of men and that their ashes which are dispers'd and confus'd amongst the Elements shall be recover'd and recollected with so much art that every one shall resume his own body without confusion or mixture Whence is it therefore that this doctrine gives offense and scandal to some Is it repugnant to the Wisdom of God We have prov'd it agreeable thereunto And it would argue defect of wisdom in God if he knew not to distinguish in this confusion of the Elements the places from whence to retake one day the reliques of our members Is it impossible to his power Surely no if we account the same infinite and it is verily infinite if it be divine To conclude doth it encounter reason There is none of us but would naturally desire the resurrection of his body if he esteemed it a thing possible Wherefore seeing God reveals to us both that he will and can do it what is to be doubted more but that reason consents in this desire with nature CHAP. VIII What understanding can be had of true Virtue without a particular Revelation HItherto we have shewn that in the things which relate directly to God and his service and the motives of true and sincere piety men have either been without a particular revelation or absolutely blind or so unresolv'd and wavering in what they knew thereof that they could not from thence render any true devotion to God nor receive any solid consolation to themselves Our next task should be to shew that they likewise needed a particular revelation for the knowledge of true Virtue which ought to be followed amongst men but my design will not permit me to deduce that point at length onely I am to desire the Reader to take notice of two things Indeed I will not question but that they have had far more knowledge of true vertue by the light of nature alone then they had of the requisites and concernments of true piety The excellent instructions of Philosophers commendable Laws of Republicks virtuous deeds of great personages and the universal consent of all Nations any thing civilis'd shew by the account they made of Virtue