their lives to rob and kill as if they were of little worth yea when they know that they must die how desperately go they to the gallows and how little make they of their lives It s true as was aforesaid that nature abhorreth death but we see among Souldiers that he that at first is timerous when he hath been used a while to kill men or to see them kill'd by thousands groweth senseless almost regardless of his life and will make as it were a jest of death And when it is so ordinary a thing with men to kill birds and fishes and beasts for their daily food and pleasure why should they not easily bear their own if they look for nothing after death A beast loveth his life as well as we and our death is no more painful than theirs and we should have as much courage as a beast Especially men that live a poor and miserable life on earth would little fear that death which endeth it and so humane Government it self would be in vain He that would have an instrument to revenge him on his enemy to kill his Governour or do any villany in the world if it were not for fear of another world might find enow among Poor villains that by misery or melancholly are a-weary of their lives At least as long as they run but a hazard like a Souldier in fight and may possibly scape by craft or flight or friends or strength what wickedness will they not commit What Prince so just that hath not some rebellious Subject or some Enemy that seeks his life What man so good that is not maliced by some Who hath mony or an estate which one or other doth not desire and if there were nothing but death and annihilation to restrain men what Prince what person had any security of his life or estate If a Rogue once grow but sensual and idle he will deliberately resolve I will venture my life to live in pleasure rather than live in certain toil and misery a short life and a sweet is better than a longer which is miserable and must end at last We see if once men be perswaded that they shall die like beasts that they are not much troubled at it because they think that when they have no being they shall have no fear nor care nor grief nor trouble nor pain nor want And though right improved Reason which hath higher expectations makes a greater matter of the loss of them yet sensual men so brutine themselves that they grow contented with the felicity of a Bruit and are not much troubled that they have no more Annihilation therefore certainly is a penalty utterly insufficient even to keep any common Order in the World as I proved before And therefore it is certain that the penalty inflicted hereafter will be greater than Annihilation And if so it must contain with the Being of the Creature a suffering worse than the loss of Being § 35. The Belief of a Hell or endless punishment being that which is de facto the restraint of the Obedient part of the World and that which proveth too weak with the Disobedient part it thence followeth that a Hell or endless punishment will be inflicted The Reasons I have given before 1. Because that Experience sheweth that the Threatning of Hell is necessary in the Law therefore it self is necessary in the execution 2. Because God doth not govern the World by deceit § 36. God will inflict more punishment for the final rejection of his Government than Kings do for treason and rebellion against thousands There is no proportion between God and Man and between a fault against God and against Man Therefore if racks torments and death be justly inflicted for Treason against a King much more may be expected for rebellion against God Obj. But mens sins do God no hurt as they do the King Answ They do wrong where they do no hurt It is not for want of Malignity in sin but through the perfections of God that they do not hurt him But they displease him and injure him and they hurt the World and the sinner himself who is not his own A Child is to be corrected for many faults which do his Father no harm It is not hurting God that is the Cause that sin is punished Obj. But God is mercifull as well as just Answ True and therefore he shewed mercy to sinners in the day of Mercy And it is for the contempt and abuse of mercy that he condemneth them If the Mercy abused had been less the sin and punishment had been less A mercifull King and Judge will hang a Murderer or Traytor Mercy to the good requireth punishment of the bad Gods Attributes are not contrary He is mercifull to the due Objects of mercy and hath penal Justice for the Objects of that Justice Obj. But after this life the ends of punishment cease therefore so will the punishment For there will be none in the next World to be warned by it nor any further sin to be restrained unless it be a Castigatory Purgatory for the sinner himself Answ 1. I have proved that the Law was necessary to the Government of this World And if it was necessary that God say everlasting death shall be the wages of sin then his Truth and Justice make the execution necessary afterwards 2. When this life is ended we look for a New Heaven and a New Earth wherein dwelleth righteousness And the penalties of the sinners of this World may be a means of that righteousness of the next as the punishment of the Devils is a warning to us and proposed to us for our terror and restraint 3. How little know we whether thousands of the Orbs which we see are not inhabited and whether the penalties of Earthly sinners may not be a warning to any of those superiour Worlds God hath not acquainted us with all the uses that he can make of sinners punishments And therefore when Nature telleth us what is due it is folly to say it will not be because God hath no use for it Obj. But Hell is a cruelty which expresseth tyranny rather than wise justice Answ That 's but the voice of Folly partiality and guilt Every thief that is hanged is like enough to think the same of his own Punishment and Judge If you think it such a cruelty why was not the threatning of it enough to govern you and to counterpoise a Feather the trifles of sordid fleshly pleasure Why did you choose it in the choice of sin were you not told of it and was not Life and Death offered to your choice Would you choose that which you think it is cruelty to inflict who is it that is cruel to you but your selves Why will you now be so cruel to your own souls and then call God cruel for giving you your choice O sinners as you are wise as you are men as ever you care what becometh of you for ever
villanies though they call it railing nor will he flatter proud rebellious dust though they call flattery a necessary civility nor will he give leave to his Messengers to leave sin in honour and to let the proud do what their list and quietly damn themselves and others without plain reproof though it be called unreverent sawciness or sedition 2. And he that considereth how little Title Caesar had to the Kingdom of the Jews and that the sword alone is a better proof of force and strength than of Authority and is a Plea which an Usurper may have on his side will rather praise the submission and peaceableness of Christ than blame him as disloyal But for the doctrin of Obedience in general who hath ever taught it more plainly and pressingly than Christ and his Apostles 2. The Gospel or doctrin of Christ it self also hath the very Image and Superscription of God I will not say imprinted on it for that is too little but intrinsecally animating and constituting it which is apparent in the Matter and the Method and the Stile 1. The Matter and Design containeth the most wonderful expression of the Wisdom of God that ever was made to man on earth All is mysterious yet admirably fit consistent and congruous as is before declared That a world which is visibly and undeniably fallen into wickedness and misery should have a Redeemer Saviour and Mediator towards God! That he should be one that is near enough to God and unto us and hath the nature of both that he should be the second Adam the Root of the Redeemed and Regenerate that God should give all mercy from himself from his own bounty and fulness and not as unwilling be perswaded to it by another and therefore that the Redeemer be not any Angel or intermediate person but God himself that thus God come nearer unto man who is revolted from him to draw up man again to Him that he lose not the world and yet do not violate his governing Justice that he be so merciful as not to be unrighteous nor permit his Laws and Government to be despised and yet so just as to save the penitent renewed souls that he give man a new Law and conditions of salvation suitable to his lapsed guilty state and leave him not under a Law and conditions which were fitted to the innocent that he revealed himself to the apostate world in that way which only is fit for their recovery that is in his admirable love and goodness that so love might win our love and attract those hearts which under guilt and the terrors of condemning justice would never have been brought to love him that guilty souls have such evidence of God's reconciliation to encourage them to expect his pardon and to come to him with joy and boldness in their addresses having a Mediator to trust in and his Sacrifice Merits and acceptable Name to plead with God that Justice and Mercy are so admirably conjoyned in these effects that Satan and the world and death should be so conquered in a suffering way and man have so perfect a pattern to imitate for self-denial humility contempt of honour wealth and life and exact obedience and resignation to the will of God with perfect love to God and man that the world should be under such an universal Administrator and the Church be all united in such a Head and have one in their nature that hath risen from the dead to be in possession of the glory which they are going to and thence to send down his Spirit to sanctifie them and fit them for Heaven and afterward to be their Judge and to receive them unto blessedness and that sinners now be not condemned meerly for want of innocency but for rejecting the grace and mercy which would have saved them that we have all this taught us by a Messenger from Heaven and a perfect rule of life delivered to us by him and all this sealed by a Divine attestation that this doctrin is suited to the capacity of the weakest and yet so mysterious as to exercise the strongest wits and is delivered to us not by an imposing force but by the exhortations and perswasions of men like our selves commissioned to open the evidences of truth and necessity in the Gospel All this is no less than the Image and wonderful effect of the Wisdom of God And his Goodness and Love is as resplendent in it all for this is the effect of the whole design to set up a Glass in the work of our Redemption in which God's Love and Goodness should be as wonderfully represented to mankind as his Power was in the works of Creation Here sinful man is saved by a means which he never thought of or desired he is fetch'd up from the gates of hell redeemed from the Sentence of the righteous violated Law of God and the execution of his Justice The Eternal Word so condescendeth to man in the assumption of our nature as that the greatness of the love and mercy incomprehensible to man becomes the greatest difficulty to our belief He revealeth to us the things of the world above and bringeth life and immortality to light He dwelleth with men He converseth with the meanest He preacheth the glad tidings of Salvation to the world He refuseth not such familiarity with the poorest or the worst as is needful to their cure He spendeth his time in doing good and healing all manner of bodily diseases He refuseth the honours and riches of the world and the pleasures of the flesh to work out our salvation He beareth the ingratitude and abuse of sinners and endureth to be scorned buffeted spit upon tormented and crucified by those to whom he had done no greater wrong than to seek their salvation He maketh himself a Sacrifice for sin to shew the world what sin deserved and to save them from the deserved punishment God had at first decreed and declared that death should be the punishment of sin and Satan had maliciously drawn man to it by contradicting this threatning of God and making man believe that God would falsifie his word and that he did envy man the felicity of his advancement to be liker God in knowledge And now Christ will first justifie the truth and righteousness of God and will demonstrate himself by dying in our stead that death is indeed the wages of sin and will shew the world that God is so far from envying their felicity that he will purchase it at the dearest rate and deliver them freely from the misery which sin and Sathan had involved them in Thus Enemies are reconciled by the sufferings of him whom they offended even by his sufferings in the flesh whose Godhead could not suffer and by his death as Man who as God was most immortal As soon as he was risen he first appear'd to a Woman who had been a sinner and sent her as his first messenger with words of love and comfort to his
spiritual or putting it out of relish with that which is our true felicity or the way thereto It is only on such accounts and in such cases as these that Christ forbiddeth us the pleasures of the flesh And so will Parents restrain the appetites of their Children and Physicians of their Patients and every wise man will restrain his own when present sensual pleasure tendeth to greater future pain The satisfying delights of man can be no where but in the love of God and in a heavenly life and in the foresight of endless joyes and in the knowledge and means which lead to these And the unwholsom luscious pleasures of the Flesh do greatly tend to draw down the minde and corrupt the affections and dull our desires and endeavours towards these higher things And therefore our Saviour doth strictlyer here dyet us than is pleasing to diseased Souls But he loveth not our sorrows or pains nor envyeth us any desireable pleasure He came not to torment us but to save us from torment If he forbid us any delight it is because he would have us have better and more which that would keep us from If he teach us to deny our Honour with men it is but that we may have Honour with God and Angels If he call us from our present wealth and profit it is but to secure our Everlasting Riches and prevent our loss All his Precepts are wholly fitted to our own good though our good be not the highest ultimate end but the Glory and Pleasure of our Maker § 19. There cannot possibly be any higher motives to sincere piety and honesty given to the World than the Christian Religion sets before them even the joyes of Heaven and the pains of Hell and all the pleasures and priviledges of an holy life And therefore it must needs be the powerfull means to all that is truly good and happy § 20. It stronglyest fortifieth the minde of Man against the power of all temptations For as it enervateth the Temptation by teaching us to mortifie the lusts of the flesh and to contemn the World so it alwayes counterpoiseth it with the Authority of God the Joyes of Heaven the punishment of Hell which are in the ballance against all the pleasures of sin as a Mountain is against a Feather § 21. It affordeth us the most powerfull Supports and Comforts in every suffering that we may bear it patiently and with joy For it assureth us of the Love of God and of the pardon of our greater sufferings It sheweth us how to be gainers by all and sheweth us the glory and joy which will be the end of all § 22. It affordeth us the greatest Cordials against the fears of death For it assureth us of endless happiness after death And if a Socrates or Cicero or Seneca could fetch any comfort from a doubtfull conjecture of another life what may a Christian do that hath an undoubted assurance of it and also of the nature and greatness of the felicity which we there expect And why should he fear dying who looks to pass into endless pleasure And therefore Christianity conduceth not to pusillanimity but to the greatest fortitude and nobleness of minde For what should daunt him who is above the fears of sufferings and death § 23. It containeth nothing which any man can rationally fear can be any way a hinderance to his salvation This will be more cleared when I have answered the objections against it § 24. It containeth nothing that hath the least contrariety to any Natural Verity or Law but contrarily comprehendeth all the Law of Nature as its first and principal part and that in the most clear and legible character superadding much more which Naturalists know not So that if there be any good in other Religions as there is some in all it is all contained in the Christian Religion with the addition of much more There is no truth or goodness in the Religion of the Philosophers the Platonists the Stoicks the Pythagorean Bannians in India the Bonzii in Japan or those in Siam China Persia or any other parts nor among the Mahometans or Jews which is not contained in the Doctrine and Religion of the Christians § 25. Accordingly it hath all the reall Evidence which the true parts of any other Religion hath with the addition of much more supernatural evidence For all that is justly called the Law of Nature which is the first part of the Christian Religion is evidenced by the light of Nature and this Christians have as well as others and all that is of true supernatural Revelation they have above others by its proper evidence § 26. The style of the Sacred Scripture is plain and therefore fit for all and yet Majestical and Spiritual suited to its high and noble ends Were it expressed in those terms of Art which the Masters of each sect have devised to transmit their opinions to posterity by they would be fit for none but those few who by acquaintance with such terms esteem themselves or are esteemed learned men And yet the men of another sect might little understand them For most new Sect-masters in Philosophy devised new terms as well as new principles or opinions Though at Athens where the principal Sects were near together the diversity was not so great as among them at a further distance yet was there enough to trouble their disciples He that understandeth Zoroaster and Trismegistus may not understand Pythagoras and he that understandeth him may not understand his follower Plato and he that understandeth him may not understand Aristotle and so of Telesius Parmenides Anaxagoras Aristippus Antisthenes Zeno Chrysippus Heraclitus Democritus Pyrrho Epicurus with all the rest And among Christians themselves the degenerated Hereticks and Sectaries that make their own opinions do make also their own terms of Art so that if you compare the Valentinians Basilidians Apollinarians c. and our late Wigelians Paracelsians Rosicrucians Belimenists Familists Libertines Quakers c. you shall find that he that seemeth to understand one Sect must learn as it were a new language before he can understand the rest So that if the Scripture must have been phrased according to Philosophers terms of art who knoweth to which Sect it must have been suited and every day there riseth up a Campanella a Thomas White c. who are reforming the old terms and arts and making both new so that nothing which is of universal use as Religion is can be fitted to any such uncertain measure Christ hath therefore dealt much better with the world and spoken plainly the things which the simple and all must know and yet spoken sublimely of things mysterious heavenly and sublime This is the true nature and character of Christianity CHAP. V. Of the Congruities in the Christian Religion which make it the more easily credible and are great preparatives to Faith BEcause Truth is never contrary to it self nor agreeable with
permitted Satan to tempt him extraordinarily by carrying him from place to place that he might extraordinarily overcome When Nathanael came to him he told him his heart and told him what talk he had with Philip afar off till he convinced him that he was Omniscient At Cana of Galilee at a Feast he turned their Water into Wine At Capernaum he dispossessed a Demoniack Luk. 4.33 34 c. He healed Simons Mother of a Feaver at a word Luk. 4.38 39. He healed multitudes of torments diseases and madness Mat. 4.24 Luk. 4.40 41. He cleanseth a Leaper by a word Math. 8.2 3. Luk. 5.12 so also he doth by a Paralitick Math. 9. Luk. 5. He telleth the Samaritane woman all that she had done Joh. 4. At Capernaum he healed a Noble-mans Son by a word Joh. 4. At Jerusalem he cured an impotent Man that had waited five and thirty years A touch of his Garment cureth a Woman diseased with an Issue of blood twelve years Math. 9.20 He cured two blinde men with a touch and a word Math. 9.28 29. He dispossessed another Demoniack Mat. 9.32 He raiseth Jairus daughter at a word who was dead or seemed so Mat. 9.23 24. He dispossessed another Demoniack blinde and dumb Mat. 12. He healeth the Servant of a Centurion ready to dye by a word Luk. 7. He raiseth the Son of a Widow from death that was carried out in a Biere to be buried Luk. 7. With five Barley Loaves and two small Fishes he feedeth five thousand and twelve baskets full of the fragments did remain Mat. 14. Joh. 6. He walketh upon the waters of the Sea Mat. 14. He causeth Peter to do the like Mat. 14. All the diseased of the Countrey were perfectly healed by touching the hem of his garment Mat. 14.36 He again healed multitudes lame dumb blinde maimed c. Math. 15. He again fed four thousand with seven Loaves and a few little Fishes and seven baskets full were left Math. 15. He restoreth a man born blinde to his sight Joh. 9. In the sight of three of his Disciples he is transfigured into a Glory which they could not behold and Moses and Elias talked with him and a voice out of the Cloud said This is my beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased hear ye him Mat. 17. Luk. 9. He healed the Lunatick Mat. 17. Multitudes are healed by him Mat. 19.2 Two blinde men are healed Mat. 20. He healed a Crooked woman Luk 13.11 He withereth up a fruitless Tree at a word Mark 11. He restoreth a blinde man nigh to Jericho Luk. 18.35 He restoreth Lazarus from death to life that was four dayes dead and buryed Joh. 11. He foretelleth Judas that he would betray him And he frequently and plainly foretold his own sufferings death and resurrection And he expresly foretold the destruction of Jerusalem and of the Temple and the great calamity of that place even before that generation past away Mat. 24 c. He prophesied his death the night before in the institution of his Supper When he dyed the Sun was darkened and the Earth trembled and the Vail of the Temple rent and the dead bodies of many arose and appeared so that the Captain that kept guard said Truly this was the Son of God Mat. 27. When he was crucified and buried though his Grave-stone was sealed and a guard of Souldiers set to watch it Angels appeared and rolled away the Stone and spake to those that enquired after him And he rose and revived and staid forty dayes on Earth with his Disciples He appeared to them by the way He came oft among them on the First day of the week at their Meetings when the doors were shut He called Thomas to see the prints of the Nails and put his finger into his side and not be faithless but believing till he forced him to cry out My Lord and my God! Joh. 20. He appeareth to them as they are fishing and worketh a miracle in their draught and provideth them broiled Fish and eateth with them He expostulated with Simon and engaged him as he loved him to feed his Sheep and discourseth of the age of John Joh. 21. He giveth his Apostles their full Commission for their gathering his Church by Preaching and Baptism and edifying it by teaching them all that he had commanded them and giveth them the Keyes of it Mat. 28. Joh. 19. 20. He appeareth to above five hundred Brethren at once 1 Cor. 15. He shewed himself to them by many infallible proofs being seen of them forty dayes and speaking of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God and being assembled with them commanded them to tarry at Jerusalem till the Spirit came down miraculously upon them And he ascended up to Heaven before their eyes Act. 1. And two Angels appeared to them as they were gazing after him and told them that thus he should come again When Pentecost was come when they were all together about a hundred and twenty the Holy Spirit came upon them visibly in the appearance of fiery Cloven Tongues and sate on each of them and caused them to speak the languages of many Nations which they had never learned in the hearing of all Upon the notice of which and by Peters Exhortation about three thousand were then at once converted Act. 2. After this Peter and John do heal a man at the entrance of the Temple who had been lame from his birth and this by the name of Jesus before the People Act. 3. One that was above forty years old Act. 4.22 When they were forbidden to preach upon their praises to God the place was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost Act. 4.31 Ananias and Sapphira are struck dead by Peters word for hypocrisie and lying Act. 5. And many Signs and Wonders were done by them among the People Act. 5.12 Insomuch that they brought the sick into the streets and laid them on Beds and Couches that at least Peters shadow might over-shaddow them Act. 5.14 15. And a multitude came out of the Cities round about to Jerusalem bringing sick folks and Demoniacks and they were healed every one v. 16. Upon this the Apostles were shut into the common Prison But an Angel by night opened the Prison and brought them out and bid them go preach to the People in the Temple Act. 5. When Stephen was martyred he saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at his right hand Act. 7. Philip at Samaria cured Demoniacks Palsies Lameness and so converted the people of that City insomuch that Simon the Sorcerer himself believed The Holy Ghost is then given by the Imposition of the hands of Peter and John so that Simon offered money for that gift Act. 8. Philip is led by the Spirit to convert the Aethiopian Nobleman and then carryed away Act. 8. Saul who was one of the murderers of Stephen and a great Persecutor of the Church is stricken down to the Earth and called by Jesus Christ appearing
they tell them of the doctrine of their leading Doctors that Kings excommunicate are no Kings but may be killed And of the many Rebellions which the Pope hath raised against Kings and Emperours And the Papists say that the Protestants are worse than they and that their Religion hath every where been introduced by rebellion or stablished by it and that the Bible which is your Religion hath caused most rebellions and therefore they dare not let the people read it And is this your holy doctrine Answ 1. That Christianity is incomparably more for Government and due subjection than Heathenism is past all doubt to those that are impartial Judges How few of all the Roman Heathen Emperours was there that died not by subjects hands Among the Athenians a King and a Tyrant were words too often of the same significant How hateful the name of a King was among the Romans is well known How few even of their most renowned Orators and Philosophers were not put to death upon accusation of resistance of some Prince Brutus Cicero Cato Seneca c. Cicero pro Milone can say Non se obstrinxit scelere siquis Tyrannum occidat quamvis familiarem which Brutus practised on Caesar Et Tuscul 5. Nulla nobis cum Tyrannis societas est neque est contra naturam spoliare eum quem honestum est necare Much more such dangerous doctrine hath Cicero Seneca Traged Hercul fur saith Victima haud ulla amplior potest magisque opima mactari Jovi Quam Rex iniquus But Christianity teacheth us subjection to bad Rulers and not only to the good The ordinary Writings of the Athenian and Roman learned men are so bitter against Kings and so much for the peoples power that it is meer impudency for men of their Religion to asperse Christianity as injurious to Kings How things were used to be carried at Rome you may perceive by these words of Lampridius who wondring that Heliogabalus was killed no sooner but permitted three years saith Mirum fortasse cuipiam videatur Constantine venerabilis quod haec clades quam retuli loco Principum fuerit quidem propè triennio ita ut nemo inventus fuerit qui istum à gubernaculis Romanae Majestatis abduceret cum Neroni Vitellio Caligulae coeterisque hujusmodi nunquam tyrannicida defuerit Hesichius in Arcesil saith Arcesilaus Regum neminem magnopere coluit Quamobrem legatione ad Antigonum fungens pro patria nihil obtinuit And Laert. maketh Solon resolve not to live in his own Country meerly because there was a Tyrant that is a King that had by a faction set up himself and yet ruled as he professed as righteously as a Senate And he saith of Thales that it was one of the rarities which he spake of Rempubl vidisse Tyrannum senem And of Chrysippus Quod videtur aspernator Regum immodice fuisse c. We do not deny but there are three sorts of Christians that are too much for the resisting and destroying of bad Governours and speak much as these Heathens did The one sort are some over-philosophical learned men who have more conversed with the antient Greeks and Romans than with Christian Writers Such was honest Petrarch who perilously saith Et sane si vel unum Patria civem bonum habeat malum Dominum diutius non habebit The second sort are the faction of the Pope who are led to it by meer interest their Religion and Clergy-interest both consist in an universal Kingdom or Government over Kings and all the Christian world it is no wonder therefore to find them industrious to subject all powers to themselves The third sort are here and there a few Enthusiasts or fanatical deluded persons who are like the turbulent Zealots among the Jews who occasioned the combustions and bloud-shed at Jerusalem about the time of its destruction who are but the ignoranter sort of Christians misled by pretences of zeal or inspiration for want of judgment stayedness and experience And this is vitium personae and is no disparagement to Christ As for any doctrines of rebellion or sedition or deposing and killing excommunicate Kings there is none more condemneth them than Christ It is not every proud or covetous person that maketh the name of Christianity or Church-government a cloak for his usurpation ambition or worldliness that we are pleading for A Roman Praefect was wont to say Make me the Bishop of Rome and I will be a Christian What if the match had been made and the Pagan had turned Christian in profession for that Bishoprick and had lived like a Pagan still and domineered according to his ambition would Christianity have been ever the worse for that Judge of Christ by his own Book and doctrine and not by the Council of Laterane nor by the books or doctrine or practice of any proud and worldly hypocrite who abuseth his Name to sin against him Christ never promised to make such Laws as no man could abuse or break Yet withall let me tell you that the splene and envy of factious persons doth usually cause them to belie each other and make each others doctrine as odious as they can and if wrangling boys fall out and call one another bastards it is no good proof that they are so indeed Object But those of you that do escape the doctrines of disloyalty are traitors against your Countries liberties and base-spirited men and flatterers of Princes and defenders of tyranny and oppression and all to beg their countenance for your Religion The Christian spirit is poor and private in comparison of the old Greek and Roman genius which would stand up against the proudest Tyrant Answ It seems Christianity is hot and cold as malice fancieth it Indeed the doctrine of it is so much for submission patience and peace as giveth more countenance to this accusation than the former but is guilty of neither of the crimes It is not flattering hypocrites that I am to defend let them bear their shame but it is the doctrine of Christ which is the thing in question Did Christ flatter Herod when he said Go tell that Fox Behold I cast out devils c Luk. 13.32 Did John Baptist flatter him when he lost his liberty and life for reprehending his filthy lust Did Christ flatter the Pharisees Matth. 23. Doth James flatter the rich and great Jam. 5.1 c. Go to now ye rich men weep and houl for the miseries that shall come upon you your riches are corrupted and your garments moth-eaten your gold and silver is cankered and the rust of them shall be a witness against you and shall eat your flesh as it were fire ye have heaped treasure together for the last days Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth and been wanton ye have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter ye have condemned and killed the just and he doth not resist you And Jam. 2.6 Do not rich men oppress you and draw
may let it go and boast of your better choice as you find cause How much did the light of nature teach the Stoicks the Cynicks and many other Sects which differeth not much in austerity from Christ's precepts of mortification and self-denial Socrates could say Opes ac nobilitates non solum nihil in se habere honestatis verum omne malum ex eis aboriri Laert. l. 2. in Socr. p. 99. Dicebat unicum esse bonum scientiam malumque unicum inscitiam Id. ib. Et referenti quod illum Athenienses mori dâ—crevissent natura illos inquit Ib. Et multa prius de immortalitate animorum ac praeclara disserens cicutam bibit p. 105. Magna animi sublimitate carpentes se objurgantes contemnebat p. 96. When he was publickly derided Omnia ferebat aequo animo And when one kickt him and the people marvelled at his patience he said What if an Ass had kickt me should I have sued him at Law p. 93. When he saw in Fairs and Shops what abundance of things are set to sale he rejoycingly said Quam multis ipse non egeo cum libere quo vellet abire carcere liceret noluit plorantes severe increpavit pulcherrimosque sermones illos vinctus prosecutus est If so many Philosophers thought it a shameful note of cowardise for a man to live and not to kill himself when he was falling into shame or misery much greater reason hath a true believer to be willing to die in a lawful way for the sake of Christ and the hope of glory and to be less fearful of death than a Brutus a Cato a Seneca or a Socrates though not to inflict it on themselves Soundly believe the promises of Christ and then you will never much stick at suffering To lose a feather and win a Crown is a bargain that very few would grudge at And profanely with Esau to sell the birth-right for a morsel to part with heaven for the paltry pleasures of flesh and fancy were below the reason of a man if sin had not unmann'd him Matth. 16.25 26. Whosoever will save his life shall lose it and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul Virulent Eunapius giveth us the witness of natural reason for a holy mortified life whilst he maketh it the glory of the Philosophers whom he celebrateth Of Antoninus the son of Aedesius he saith Totum se dedidit atque applicuit Diis loci gentilibus sacris mysticis arcanis citoque in Deorum immortalium contubernium receptus est neglectâ prorsus corporis curâ ejusque voluptatibus remisso nuntio sapientiae studio profano vulgo incognitum amplexus Cuncti mortales hujusce viri temperantiam constantiam inflecti nesciam mentem demirati suere Eunap in Aedes What a Saint doth he make Jamblichus to be of whom it was feigned that in his Prayers he would be lifted up above ten cubits from the earth and his garments changed into a golden colour till he had done Eun. in Jambl. p. 572. Even while he raileth at the Alexandrian Monks ut homines quidem specie sed vitam turpem porcorum more exigentes c. p. 598. contrary to the evidence of abundant History he beareth witness against a vitious life And if holiness and mortification or temperance be so laudable even in the judgment of the bitterest Heathens why should it be thought intollerable strictness as it is more clearly and sweetly proposed in the Christian verity And if he say of Jamblicus Ob justitiae cultum facilem ad deorum aures accessum habuit we may boldly say that the righteous God loveth righteousness and that the prayers of the upright are his delight and that their sufferings shall not always be forgotten nor their faithful labours prove in vain CHAP. XII The reasonable Conditions required of them who will overcome the difficulties of Believing and will not undo themselves by wilful Infidelity I Have answered the objections against Christianity but have not removed the chiefest impediments for recipitur ad modum recipientis the grand impediments are within even the incapacity or indisposition or frowardness of the persons that should believe It is not every head and heart that is fit for heavenly truth and work I will next therefore tell you what conditions Reason it self will require of them that would not be deceived that so you may not lay that blame on Christ if you be infidels which belongeth only to your selves Cond 1. Come not in your studies of these sacred Mysteries with an enmity against the doctrine which you must study or at least suspend your enmity so far as is necessary to an impartial search and examination For ill will cannot easily believe well Malice and partiality will blind the strongest wits and hide the force of the plainest evidence Con. 2. Drown not the love of truth in a vitious fleshly heart and life and forfeit not the light of supernatural revelation by wilful sinning against natural light and debauching your consciences by abusing the knowledge which already you have Sensuality and wilful debauchery is the common temptation to Infidelity when men have once so heinously abused God as that they must needs believe that if there be a God he must be a terrour to them and if there be a judgment and a life of retribution it is like to go ill with them a little thing will perswade such men that there is no God nor life to come indeed When they once hope it is so and take it for their interest and a desirable thing they will easily believe that it is so indeed And God is just and beginneth the executions of his justice in this world and the forsaking of a soul that hateth the light and wilfully resisteth and abuseth knowledge is one of his most dreadful judgments That man who will be a drunkard a glutton a whore-monger a proud ambitious worldling in despight of the common light of nature can hardly expect that God should give him the light of grace Despighting truth and enslaving reason and turning a man into a beast is not the way to heavenly illumination Cond 3. Be not ignorant of the common natural Truths which are recited in the first part of this book for supernatural revelation presupposeth natural and grace which maketh us Saints supposeth that reason hath constituted us men and all true Knowledge is methodically attained It is a great wrong to the Christian cause that too many preachers of it have missed the true method and still begun at supernatural revelations and built even natural certainties thereupon and have either not known or concealed much of the fore-written natural verities And it is an exceeding great cause of the multiplying of Infidels that most men are dull or idle drones and unacquainted with the common natural truths which
and Retribution it is deceitful and absurd to come in with an unproved dream against it and to argue ab ignoto against so many cogent arguments 4. And we have proved supernatural revelation to second this which is evidence more than sufficient to bear down your unproved conjectures 5. If it had been doubtful whether the souls individuation cease and nothing of all the rest is doubtful yet this would not make so great a difference in the case as some imagine for it would confess the perpetuity of souls and it would not overthrow the proof of a Retribution if you consider these four things 1. That the parts are the same in union with the whole as when they are all separated Their nature is the same and as Epicurus and Democritus say of their atoms they are still distinguishable and are truly parts and may be intellectually separated the same individual water which you cast out of your bottle into the sea is somewhere in the sea still and though contiguous to other parts is discernable from them all by God The Haecceity as they say remaineth 2. That the love of individuation and the fear of the ceasing of our individuation is partly but put into the creature from God pro tempore for the preservation of individuals in this present life And partly it is inordinate and is in man the fruit of his fall which consisteth in turning to SELFISHNESS from GOD. And we know not how much of our recovery consisteth in the cure of this selfishness and how much of our perfection in the cessation of our individuate affections cares and labours Nature teacheth many men by Societies to unite as much as possible as the means of their common safety benefit and comfort and earth water air and all things would be aggregate Birds of a feather will flock together And love which is the uniting affection especially to a friend who is fit for union with us in other respects is the delight of life And if our souls were swallowed up of one common soul as water cast into the sea is still moist and cold and hath all its former properties so we should be still the same and no man can give a just reason why our sorrows or joys should be altered ever the more by this 3. And God can either keep the ungodly from this union for a punishment or let them unite with the infernal spirits which they have contracted a connaturality with or let them where ever they are retain the venom of their sin and misery 4. And he can make the Resurrection to be a return of all these souls from the Ocean of the universal nature into a more separated individuation again I only say that if it had been true that departing souls had fallen into a common element yet on all these reasons it would not have overthrown our arguments for a life of full retribution God that can say at any time This drop of water in the Ocean is the same that was once in such a bottle can say This particle of the universal soul was once in such a body and thither can again return it But the truth is no man can shew any proof of such a future aggregation And to conclude the Scripture here cleareth up all the matter to us and assureth us of a continued Individuation yet more than Nature doth though the natural evidences before produced are unanswerable And as for the similitude of Light returning to the Sun it is still an arguing à minus noto we know not well what it is we know not how it returneth and we know not how the particles are distinguishable there They that confess souls to be indivisible though the individuals are all numerically distinct must on the same ground think that two or many cannot by union be turned into one as they hold that one cannot be turned into two or into several parts of that one divided OBJECTION XVIII THe Platonists and some Platonick Divines have so many dreams and fopperies about the soul 's future state in aerial and aethereal vehicles and their durations as maketh that doctrine the more to be suspected Answ 1. Whether all souls hereafter be incorporate in some kind of bodies which they call vehicles is a point which is not without difficulty A sober Christian may possibly doubt whether there be any incorporeal simple essence in a separated existence besides God alone Those that doubt of it do it on these grounds 1. They think that absolute simplicity is a divine incommunicable perfection 2. They think that Christ is the noblest of all creatures and that seeing he shall be compound of a humane Soul and Body though glorified and spiritual to eternity therefore no Angel shall excell him in natural simplicity and perfection 3. Because it is said that we shall be equal with the Angels and yet we shall at the Resurrection be compounded of a soul and body 4. Because it is said that He made his Angels spirits and his ministers a flame of fire 5. Because the ancient Fathers who first thought Angels to be subtil bodies were confuted by those as Mammertus forementioned who asserted them to be fiery bodies animated with incorporeal souls 6. Because they read of the Devils dwelling in the air as one cast down therefore they think that he hath an aery body instead of an ethereal or fiery 7. Because they see the Sun so glorious a creature in comparison of a body of flesh therefore they think that the symmetry and proportion among God's works requireth that bodies and forms or souls be suitable 8. Because they know not what else becometh of the sensitive soul of man when he dieth which they take to be but a subtil body and therefore think it goeth as a body or vehicle with the rational soul 9. Because they mistake that difficult Text 2 Cor. 5.1 2 8. think by the 7 and 8 verses that it speaketh of the instant after death and thinking by the first and second verses that as Beza and most think it speaketh of a celestial body as our cloathing and not of a meer state of glory to the soul I name their reasons that you may be charitable in your censures but the truth is they talk of unrevealed or uncertain things which do but trouble the heads of Christians to no purpose who may live better and speed better by following the naked precepts of Christianity and hoping for such a glory as Christ hath plainly described without prying into that which doth less concern them to be acquainted with 2. And Satan knoweth that over-doing is one way of undoing Thus men on all extremes do harden one another As in these times among us it is notorious that the men of one extreme in Church affairs do harden the other and the other harden them And as Fanaticism riseth from the disliking of sensuality and prophaneness incautelous and sensual and prophane men run into hell to avoid fanaticism