their Enemies Is it not more truly honourable and glorious to serve that God who commandeth the whole World than to be a slave to those Passions and Lusts which put men upon continual hard service and torment them for it when they have done it Were there nothing else to commend Religion to the minds of men besides the tranquility and calmness of spirit that serene and peaceable temper which follows a good Conscience wheresover it dwells it were enough to make men welcom that Guest which brings such good entertainment with it Whereas the amazements horrors and anxieties of mind which at one time or other haunt such who prostitute their Consciences to a violation of the Laws of God and the Rules of rectified Reason may be enough to perswade any rational person that Impiety is the greatest folly and Irreligion the greatest madness The wisest and greatest of men in all Ages at or not long before their death when freest from worldly designs and sensual delights have owned that God and His Truth which they did not embrace and acknowledge as they ought to have done in their lives and the nearer death did approach to them the more serious were they in Religion and did disclaim and abandon those Atheistical and irreligious courses wherewith they or some of them had been formerly entangled Nimrod the Founder of the Assyrian Monarchy when carried away by Spirits at his death as Annius in his Berosus relates the Story cryed out Oh one year more Oh one year more before I go into the place from whence I shall not return Ninus that great King next from Nimrod save Belus at his Death left this Testimony Look on this Tomb and hear where Ninus is whether thou art an Assyrian a Mede or an Indian I speak to thee no frivolous nor vain matters Formerly I was Ninus and lived as thou doest I am now no more than a piece of earth All the Meat that I have like a Glutton devoured all the Pleasures that I like a Beast enjoyed all the beautiful Women that I so notoriously abused all the Riches and Glory that I so proudly possessed I am now deprived of And when I went into the invisible state I had neither Gold nor Horse nor Chariot I that wore the rich Crown of Gold am now poor Dust Cyrus the Persian left this Memento behind him to all Mankind as Plutarch and others tell us Whosoever thou art O O Man and whence-soever thou comest for I know thou wilt come to the same condition that I am in I am Cyrus who brought the Empire to the Persians Do not I beseech thee envy me this little piece of ground which covereth my Body Alexander the Great who conquered the World was at last as we find in Plutarch Curtius and others so possessed with the sense of Religion that he was under much trouble and anxiety of spirit and look'd upon every little matter as portentous and ominous so dreadful a thing saith Plutarch is the contempt of God which sooner or later filleth all mens minds with fears and terrors Julius Caesar who Conquered so many Nations and at last subdued and possessed the Roman Empire could not Conquer himself and his own Conscience which troubled him with Dreams and terrified him with Visions putting him upon Sacrificing and consulting all sorts of Priests and Augures though he found comfort from none in so much as a little before he died he was as heartless as the ominous Sacrifice was that he offered professing to his most intimate Friends That since he had made an end of the Wars abroad he had no Peace at home The like may be said of Tiberius Caesar Nero and other Roman Emperours Hadrian the Emperour celebrated his own Funerals carrying before him his Coffin in triumph when he lived and when he was a dying cried out lamentably Animula vagula blandula quae abibis in loca Ah poor Soul whither wilt thou go what will become of thee Thus the greatest Princes have especially near their latter end a deep sense of Religion of the Souls Immortality and their Eternal estate in another World Nor did ever any Prince Captain or Law-giver go about any great matter but at length he was glad to take in the assistance of a God as Numa Lycurgus Solon Scipio and others Titus and Nerva two Roman Emperours had such serious thoughts and were so sensible of a Deity in the Government of the World that neither of them as the Historian saith was ever seen to smile or play Septimius Severus that Victorious Roman Emperour having had experience of the vanity of this Worlds Riches and Greatness said at his Death I have been all things and it profiteth me nothing Charles the Fifth that Famous German Emperour after twenty three pitch'd Battels six Triumphs four Kingdoms won and eight Principalities added to his other Dominions resigned all these in his life time to his Son and betook himself to a retired life and to his private Devotions This great and wise Prince had his own Funeral Celebrated beforre his face and left this Testimony of the Christian Religion That the sincere profession of it had in it those sweets and joys which the Courts of Princes were strangers to grounding his hope and assurance of Salvation upon the sole Righteousness and Satisfaction of Christ his Mediator and not upon his own Works and to this purpose divers little Papers were written by him and found immediately after his Death as is Recorded by an Author who wrote the Life of Don Carlos his Grand-child Philip the Third King of Spain lying on his death-bed the last of March 1621 sent thrice at Midnight for Florentius his Confessor who gravely exhorting him patiently to submit to the will of God the King could not choose but weep saying Lo now my fatal hour is at hand but shall I obtain eternal felicity at which words great grief and trouble of mind seising on the King he said to his Confessor You have not hit upon the right way of healing Is there no other Remedy Which words when the Confessor understood of his Body the King replied Ah ah I am not solicitous for my Body or temporary Disease but for my Soul Cardinal Wolsey that Great Minister of State who for some years gave Law to England and to other Nations poured out his Soul in these sad words Had I been as diligent to serve my God as I have been to please my Prince He would not have forsaken me now in my gray Hairs Sir Francis Walsingham that great and wise Statesman towards the latter end of his Life grew very melancholy and wrote to the Lord Treasurer Burleigh to this purpose We have lived enough to our Countrey to our Fortunes and to our Sovereign it is now high time we begin to live to our selves and to our God In the multitude of Affairs which have passed through our Hands there must needs be great miscarriages for which a whole Kingdom cannot
must needs be so too for ours is the same with theirs Evangelically considered their Types Sacrifices Prophecies and Ordinances referring to Christ who is the very substance of the Christian Religion The Mosaical Law of the Old Testament what is it else but Evangelium reconditum a veiled Gospel And the Gospel in the New Testament what is it but Lex Revelata the Law of the Old Testament revealed And thus it appears that the Christian Religion is the most Ancient Secondly If we look at the means and way of Atonement and Propitiation held forth in the Christian Religion it must needs appear to be the most Wise and Reasonable of any Religion The Eternal God or Supreme Being as He is full of Love and Mercy so He is Just and Righteous His Justice is infinite as Himself is He will so shew Mercy as that He will appear to be infinitely Just toward the the Offendor and therefore in Reason there must be some way or means of Satisfaction and Atonement found out or else God and Man being separarated by Sin could not be reunited The wiser sort among the Heathens were convinc'd by the Light of Reason That Man being alienated from God and not able of himself to come to God in regard of his darkness and ignorance there is a necessity of some way or means of cleansing and atonement Hence came the multitude of their Sacrifices and Oblations especially when any great Plague or Judgment was upon them But now that Christ the Son of God who is equal with God should be this way or means by giving up himself a Sacrifice for Sin of this they were wholly ignorant Is it so that the Justice of God offended by Sin is infinite Then it is but reasonable that this infinite Justice should have infinite reparation and satisfaction which neither Angels nor Men being but finite Creatures can give to the infinite God And therefore unless the Mediator or Days-man that takes up the difference between God and man be himself the infinite God as well as man such an infinite Satisfaction cannot be given This way or means being contrived and found out only by the wise infinite God and clearly held forth in the Christian Religion and in no other Religion besides it must needs be even by the Light of Reason the best and safest and truest Religion as that which vindicates the Honour of the great God and gives true peace and security to man Thirdly The Glorious Miracles wrought by Christ may convince any man's reason of the Truth of the Christian Religion Not only Josephus and other Jews besides him but also divers Heathen Authors and some of Christ's greatest Adversaries do acknowledge His Miracles Julian the Apostata as great an Enemy as he was confess'd that Jesus cured the Blind and the Lame and delivered some from Devils that were possessed in Bethsaida and Bethany Pilate himself in a Letter of his to the Emperor Tiberius witnesseth That Jesus gave sight to the Blind cleansed the Lepers healed them that were diseased delivered them that were possessed from Devils over-ruled the Waters raised the Dead and rose again Himself from the dead after three days Hereupon Tertullian bids the Senate and People of Rome read their own Commentaries and search their Records where they shall find the Miracles of Jesus which if they had not been sufficiently known to be true and real Tertullian himself in this Case might have been easily convicted of lying and forgery These Miracles of Christ were wrought not in one or two places but in many not in a corner but in the open view of the World and were attended with such Majesty and Power that there are thousands that will rather die on a Rack than deny or gainsay the same Jesus wrought great Miracles saith Josephus and although He was Crucified and put to death yet His Disciples forsook him not but did cleave unto him And as He Himself wrought many Miracles when he was upon Earth so His Disciples after He was gone from them by His power and virtue did likwise effect such Miracles as fill'd the World with the fame of them and were a special means to convert whole Kingdoms to Christ If any be so absurd and impudent as to deny the Miracles of Christ then I would ask of them whether it be not a great and strange Miracle That so many Nations and in them so many Wise and Learned men should follow and adore a poor contemptible man without Miracles and should be willing to die for Him even for Him that died a cursed ignominious Death upon the Cross If His Miracles were not great and far surmounting the Nature and capacity of a meer Man if they were not divine and supernatural can any sober man imagin that so many thousands would be so far convinc'd and perswaded by them as to die joyfully and triumphantly for the Name and Honour of this Jesus Is it a Miracle to work upon a man by touching him and much more without touching him and most of all without seeing him Then what a Miracle is it to work powerfully in the Hearts of whole Nations a far off without once seeing them and to touch them without coming at them and to convert and draw them to Himself without touching them with His Hand Yea but say some very absurdly and irrationally Christ and His Apostles wrought Miracles by the help of Magick Let such vain men resolve us if ever they knew or heard of a Magician that wrought such Miracles and came with such power and efficacy upon the Hearts of all sorts of men after his death as Jesus did And as for His Apostles what gain or advantage could they get by exercising this Magick No considerate man will attempt any great matter but for some end or other Now what Profit what Preferment what Honour in this World got they by it Nay did it not procure them much Hatred Danger Imprisonment Torments and at last Death it self Magicians usually hide themselves and conceal their Art when they are pursued for it But did the Apostles do so What a strange kind of Magick is this that will needs be known and exercised even in despite of the rage of Rulers and People yea of Death it self Doubtless 't is very remarkable that as in Moses time God so ordered in His wise Providence that there should be many great Magicians in Egypt that He might make His own Power the more evident So in the times of Christ and His Apostles there was great store of them in Judaea Rome and other places that a difference might be put between the Illusions of Satan and the miraculous Works of God Pliny reports that there were never more Magicians in the World than in the Reign of Nero which was the time of spreading the Gospel by Christ's Apostles neither was the vanity of that Art as he saith ever more apparently known than at that time If therefore this Art of Magick did never
Creatures we may rationally conclude that there is a supreme Power and Governour thereof which is God What shall I say further on this subject if enough were not already said methinks this should convince and satisfie the Reason of any man living if he have but a spark of Reason left in him that all Nations generally in every Age time and place of the World have acknowledged that there is a God The Heathens themselves could not endure them that denied a supreme divine Power for this cause they put to death that great Philosopher Socrates and others as supposing them guilty of this horrid Crime The Nations that have no true knowledge of God do at this day adore Stocks Stones brute Beasts and the basest creatures rather than they will have no Deity no Religion at all They are zealous and forward in the Worship of their Idols which shews that though they acknowledge not the true God yet they understand by the Light of Nature and Reason that there is a Supreme Being to whom divine Worship is due And as for such as have even studied and endeavour'd to gratifie the Devil to the utmost by becoming meer Atheists they could never so blot this fundamental Truth and Principle out of their Consciences but that the Majesty of God hath affrighted them and been a terrour to them So then the universality of this perswasion in all places proveth that there is an Eternal Deity in as much as there is no History that sheweth the Manners and and Customs of any People or Countrey but it likewise sheweth their Religion yea all both new and antient Commonwealths had always something or other which they Worshipped and called in their Language GOD But as touching Atheism we can easily shew and would take the pains to shew it but that it is already done in the Writings of others the very time and place and persons when and where and by whom it was first forged which is a sufficient Argument against it such an Argument as may for ever silence the Atheists of our times which are as so many wild Beasts fit to be destroyed 'T is true there are some wicked wretches that do desperately harden their own Hearts and drown themselves over Head and Ears in sensual Delights and Pleasures but yet if God put His Bridle into their Mouths which he will do at one time or other those sparks and notions which God hath implanted in every man's Soul shall break forth and appear and the darkness shall not always obscure the light In these three Cases especially this Principle will shew it self even in those Atheistical spirits that have endeavoured to suppress and extinguish it First When they are surrounded and compassed about with difficulties and dangers and must needs fall into the hands of their Enemies unless they be preserved by a Divine power then though they were never so wicked and Atheistical before yet now as the Tragoedian observes they will fall down on their Knees and pray to a Deity they will cry peccavi and confess there is a God indeed There was a Controversie betwixt the Stoicks and Peripateticks the Stoicks held that Man had no Passions in him but the Peripateticks were of a contrary opinion Now it fell out upon a time that when a Stoick and a Peripatetick were sailing together in one Ship there arose upon a sudden a great Tempest the Stoick began to look pale and the Peripatetick observing it argues thus against him Thou look'st pale Stoick and therefore thou art not without Passions he could not free himself of fear when he was in danger to be cast away So although the Atheist in his jollity amongst his Companions belch forth sometimes that there is no God yet in his distress he is enforced to grant a Deity Secondly This Principle will manifest it self even in Atheists when they are opprest with Sickness and bodily distempers as there was an Atheist call'd Diogenes who being much afflicted with the pain of the Strangury detested his former Opinion And Thirdly When Old age comes upon them they grow more wise and sober So we read of one Cephalus in Plato who said to Socrates that whilst he was a young man he never thought that there was any Styx but now in his old age he came to doubt and question What if there be one This indeed may confute all Atheists as a manifest unanswerable Argument proving that there is a God because the greatest Atheists that denied him in their lives have acknowledged and approved him in their deaths Pherecydes an Assyrian being merrily disposed at a Banquet amongst his Friends bragg'd how long he had lived and had never done Sacrifice to any God but his end was miserable for he was devoured of Lice Diagoras for his damnable Opinion was the cause of the destruction of the whole Countrey Meles in revenge of his Atheism Lucian that scoffing Atheist going to Supper abroad and having left his Dogs fast bound as he went when he returned home having railed against God and His Word his Dogs broke loose fell upon him and tore him in pieces Machiavel rotted in the Prison at Florence as the Italians write Appian scoffing at Religion and chiefly at Circumcision had an Ulcer in the same part of his Body as Josephus reporteth Julian the Apostata being pierced in the Bowels with an Arrow from Heaven pull'd out the Arrow and receiving the Blood that came out of the wound cast it into the air saying Vicisti Galilaee and so died raging Many others besides these might be mentioned who though they acted like Atheists in their lives yet justified God in their deaths CHAP. X. The Immortality of the Soul of Man proved by Reason AS it hath been already demonstrated by the Light of Reason that there is an Eternal God or Supreme Being so it may be evinc'd by Reason that Man's Soul is Immortal and indeed the one of these depends upon and bears witness to the other The spiritualness and immortality of the Soul of Man and that it may and doth subsist without the Body is clearly held forth in the Sacred Scriptures Gen. 2.7 Eccles 12.7 Matth. 10.28 Luke 16.22 23. and 23.43 Rom. 8.10 11. 2 Cor. 5.6 7 8. Phil. 1.21 23. Heb 12.23 Rev. 6.9 10 11. into which the Faith of a Christian must be finally resolved But besides this Divine Testimony we have also the Testimony of the Light of Reason First then Let us consider that the Soul of Man when it understands any thing it abstracts from that which it understands all quantity quality place and time changing it into a more Immaterial and Intelligible nature As the Stomach when it receives meat changeth the outward accidents of the nourishment into its own nature whereby it becomes Flesh and Blood so the Soul when it conceives any thing separates it from the gross matter and conceives it universally in the Mind or Understanding If a Man looks on a Horse he sees him of
the Flesh and forforsaking the good of this World which a man would not do if he had not the hope of Immortality in which he findeth the recompence of his losses yea this very perswasion of the Souls Immortality made some Heathens willingly suffer death for the safety of their Countrey If our last End were only in this Life then all that we do should be for this last End to aim at it to procure it and never to cross it Doubtless it were great folly and madness in men to undergo so many hard things as they do if they had not a perswasion in their Hearts of this Immortality and if their hope were only in this Life of all men they should be most miserable But they are perswaded that the Soul is Immortal and they find that this World wherein they now converse is too steril and empty to fill the vastness and limit the desires thereof It must be the possession of an immortal infinite immutable good that must satisfie their Understandings and Wills both which faculties aim at the chiefest and highest object The Vnderstanding is carried ad summam Causam to the first of Truths and the Will ad summum Bonum to the last of Ends And therefore He only which is the First and the Last can satisfie the vast desires of the Soul Sixthly Upon this ground the Soul must needs be Immortal because God is just A man may as well say that there is no God at all as to say that God is unjust Now then God being the just Judge of all it behoves him to punish the Wicked and to reward the Just but if God did not this in another life he should never do it for in this life the Wicked flourish and the Just are oppressed Therefore as God is just there remains another Life after this wherein the Souls of the Just shall be rewarded and the Souls of the Wicked shall be punished If the Soul were Mortal forasmuch as in this World wicked men prosper in their Wickdeness and good men as to their outward being perish in a way of Righteousness how should the Justice of God who is the Supreme Being and whose ways are ways of Righteousness be vindicated Seventhly It may satisfie the Reason of any man that the Soul is Immortal since there is an universal consent and agreement of all Nations of the Earth in one or other kind of Religion and the Worship of some Deity which is raised out of this hope That that God whom they worship will reward their Piety if not here yet in another Life Nulla gens adeò extra leges est projecta ut non aliquos Deos credat saith Seneca Hence proceeded those Fictions of the Poets touching the Elysian Fields or places of Happiness for men of honest and well ordered lives and places of Torment for the wicked and irreligious It must needs be a visible Character of a a Deity imprinted in the Soul an irresistible principle in Man's nature that must constrain it unto those sundry Religious Ceremonies observed among all Nations wherein even in places of Idolatry some were so irksom and repugnant to Nature and others so void of Reason as that nothing but a firm and deep perswasion of a Divine Judgement and of their own Immortality could ever have imposed them upon their Consciences And besides this consent of men unto Religion in general we find it also unto this one part thereof namely the Immortality of the Soul All the wisest and best reputed Philosophers for Learning and Honesty and even Barbarians Infidels and savage people have discern'd it by the glimmerings of the Light of Reason CHAP. XI The verity and excellency of the Christian Religion evinc'd by Reason THe Light of Reason is of excellent use to convince Heathens and Infidels of the truth of the Christian Religion there being no Religion at this day professed throughout the World that hath so much reason in it and for it as the Christian Religion hath if we consider the way of cleansing and expiating Sin by Christ the dignity and excellency of the Person of the Mediator the exactness of Divine Justice which requires Satisfaction the Rewards and Punishment prescribed and appointed by the Christian Religion the excellent Doctrine and Instructions thereof the Exemplary Life of Christ and His Apostles How many things in our Religion are witnessed to and approved in the Writings of the most Rational and Learned Heathens and how the greatest Enemies of the Christian Religion as Julian Porphyry and others were once Christians and came to renounce the same meerly through Pride and Discontent If these and other things relating to our Religion be but duly weighed it will appear even to the Eye of Reason that there is much Truth and Excellency therein and that other Religions are but fictitious and vain having no rational Consistence in them But we will handle this matter more particularly though with as much Brevity as possibly we can First The Antiquity of the Christian Religion proveth it to be the true Religion Prima sunt vera verum est prius That is most true which is most antient Seeing the true Religion is the way whereby Man must come to God and have Communion with him and is copula relationis between God and Man it must needs be as Antient as Man is As for the Writings of most of the Heathens unless it be those that are forged and suppositious they are but of yesterday in comparison of Moses the Law-giver under God to the Jews even Orpheus the first Heathen Poet was eight hundred years after Moses as Strabo Plutarch and Diodorus Siculus testifie The most Antient Records of the Heathens began in Solon's time which was in the time of Esdras the Romans had their Religion from the Graecians and the Graecians from Caecrop an Egyptian and the Carthaginians had theirs from Cadmus a Phoenician Now these two Countries Egypt and Phoenicia with the Mediterranean Sea do compass about Judaea and therefore any man that 's rational may easily perceive that all their Religion came from the Jews This is sufficiently demonstrated by several Writers of ours and particularly by Mr. Gale in his late Books so that it would be superfluous for me to enlarge upon this subject When the Wise men of Greece ask'd their Gods whence the knowledge of Arts and Sciences should come they received this Answer Solus utique Chaldaeus sapiens and Orpheus their antient Poet tells us that when God was angry He destroyed the World committed the Truth uni Chaldaeo And Plato in his Epimenides referreth all uni Barbaro If it be demanded who this Chaldean this Barbarian should be the Egyptians call him Theut which signifieth a Stranger meaning Abraham for so Origen against Celsus and Josephus against Appian say plainly that when the Heathen Nations used to Conjure they would make use of Abraham's Name saying Per Deum Abraham Well then if the Jewish Religion be Ancient ours
other persecuting Emperours devised most exquisite Torments to be inflicted on the poor Christians and put thousands of them to a cruel death and yet for all this Christianity prevailed and the Kingdom of Christ was enlarged Which is an undoubted Proof and Demonstration even to the Eye of Reason of the Truth and Excellency of the Christian Religion and that the Kingdom of Christ is most divine and powerful and not worldly weak and carnal That this Jesus who was born in the little Countrey of Judaea subdued by the Romans of poor Parents in a sorry Village destitute of Friends and of all Worldly helps and advantages should give Law to and Conquer the World by His Gospel or the Word of His Kingdom is not this wonderful And would ye know what He promiseth His Subjects and Followers Why instead of great matters that they might expect in this Life He tells them plainly what great Afflictions and Tribulations they must endure for His sake if they will follow Him and be His Disciples indeed they must expect to be persecuted reproached scourged imprisoned and put to death Whereas other Kings and Monarchs promise great Dignities and Preferments in the World to their followers this King on the contrary by the Doctrine of the Cross drew the Nations to Him other Monarchs Conquer by killing their Enemies this King Conquered by dying for His Enemies the death other Monarchs is the decay and ruine of their Kingdoms and Conquests but the death of Jesus hath established and enlarged His Kingdom and is the life and happiness of His Subjects Who seeth not therefore by the Light of Reason a humane weakness in the greatness of Worldly Empires and a divine power in the weakness of Christ's Kingdom When He died and was buried His Kingdom seem'd to die and to be buried with Him a few poor despised Followers He had and these were at their wits end when their Lord and Master was Crucified and laid in the Grave Well but at length they open their mouths and boldly teach men to believe on Jesus who was Crucified and Buried but is now Risen again and to suffer for His sake And if they be forbidden they will rather die than not Preach and own this Crucified Jesus hereupon they are accused and brought before Magistrates where they own their Crime as their Adversaries term'd it and are not asham'd of it and is not this admirable Other Malefactors are tormented to make them confess their fault and these are tormented to make them conceal it those hold their peace to save their lives these die for speaking and yet by this strange way and means Christ that was crucified spreads His Kingdom and fills the whole World with it Out of weakness he brings forth strength and out of death he brings forth life And who can thus draw one contrary out of another Who can thus overcome by yielding who can thus trample upon and triumph over his Enemies by dying but Jesus in whom the power of the Eternal God was and whose Kingdom is not of this World but Divine and Heavenly Whilst He lived upon Earth He was despised and rejected but after His death He is worshipped as God even to this day and His true Followers will rather die a thousand deaths than deny His Eternal Godhead and Kingdom And may not this one Consideration if there were no more touching the Kingdom of Christ wherein it far excels the Kingdoms of this World serve to convince any sober rational man of the verity and efficacy of the Christian Religion Sixthly What strange Conversions and Changes have been wrought by the Gospel of Christ in the Hearts and Lives of some of the most eminent and famous men for Learning and Parts How were they wrought upon and converted by the plain Preaching of weak simple men Even by the foolishness of Preaching as the World counts it that so the divine power and excellency of this Jesus and of the Christian Religion might the more appear Paul befor his Conversion was counted a wise and learned man and was in great reputation so that Porphyry the famous Philosopher saith of him that it was great pity such a man should be a Christian yet when Paul had received the greatest Authority and raged most against the Gospel and Kingdom of Christ he was wonderfully converted and turned quite another way and was glad to tread many a weary step and to endure many great difficulties for the Gospels sake Origen also a man of great Learning and knowledge in Philosophy and the Arts being converted by a divine power to the Christian Religion was content to be a poor Catechist in Alexandria and was every day in danger of death when he might have been with his fellow Plotinus in great Authority and Favour had it not been for his Christian profession Surely it must needs be some Divine and Heavenly power that did thus prevail upon these men and upon many other Wise and Learned men that might be mentioned Never was there such wonderful Conversions in any Religion as in this never such sound Repentance and Reformation never such true Justice Fortitude and Constancy in Affliction even to Death and Martyrdom as in this so that it was commonly said of the Christians Soli Christiani mortis contemptores Seventhly 'T is an Argument of the Truth and Excellency of the Christian Religion That it hath been so much opposed and persecuted from time to time by the rage and cruelty of the Devil and wicked men As it was commonly said of that Monster Nero a Persecutor of Christians That it must needs be a good and excellent thing which so wicked a man hated The more wicked and ungodly men are the more they hate that which is Divine and which most resembles the Holy God Now no Religion or Profession in the World hath been so desperately hated and persecuted by wicked ungodly wretches as the Christian Religion and yet the more it has been opposed and trampled upon by them the more it has prevailed and flourished even in despight of their rage and malice What a miserable end did befal Herod and other great Persecutors of this Religion Many of which did vindicate Christ and His Truth at and by their death when the Hand of God was heavy upon them though they had raged against Him in their life time and done whatever they could to root out His Kingdom and People Nay Satan himself the greatest Persecutor of all hath witnessed for the Christian Religion against himself All the Art Magick which he invented could never Conjure or call up Christ Plotinus and Apollonius and other great Magicians that rais'd up the Image of Jupiter and other Heathen Gods though they assayed with all their skill and power to bring up the Image of Christ yet could they never effect it for Christ is not subject to their power being infinitely above them 'T is well known to the Heathens that at the Birth and Death of
of an inward complacency Whoever surfeited of rational joy Sensitive pleasures ingratiate themselves by intermission Voluptates commendat rarior usus whereas all intellectuals heighten and advance themselves by frequent and constant operations The pleasures of the body do but emasculate and dispirit the soul they do not at all satisfie it but rational pleasure raiseth and cheers the soul and oyls the very members of the body making them more free and nimble nay speculative delights will compensate the want of sensitive pleasures Hence it was that a Philosopher put out his eyes that he might be the more intent upon his study he shut his windows close that the Candle might shine the more clearly within Amongst all mental operations reflex acts tast pleasure best for without some reflection men cannot tell whether they rejoyce or no Now these acts are the most distant and remote from sense and are the highest advancements of Reason Indeed sensitive pleasures make more noise and crackling like thorns under a pot whereas mental intellectual delights like the touches of a Lute make the sweetest and yet the stillest and softest musick of all Intellectual vexations and troubles have most sting in them for a wounded Conscience who can bear why then should not intellectual delights have most honey and sweetness in them Sensitive pleasures are very costly and chargeable there must be much preparation and attendance much plenty and variety if a man will enjoy them 'T is too dear for every one to be an Epicure or Sensualist but the pleasure of the mind doth freely and equally diffuse it self we need not pay any thing for it if we can but love and imbrace it As for sensitive and corporal pleasures a sick man cannot relish them nor an old man imbrace them a Crown of Rose-buds becomes not a grey head nor a grave Senator but the pleasure of the mind is a delight most fit for a Senator for a Cato 't is an undecaying a growing pleasure 't is the only pleasure upon the bed of sickness and the staff for old age to lean upon when all other pleasures forsake a man the mind of him that has the Gout may delight it self and make musick whilst the body is in pain A moral Philosopher was so affected with the rational intellectual delights of the Soul when out of the body in another World that he breaks out into these expressions There saith he shall I have the pleasure of seeing all my Friends again there I shall have the pleasure of more enobled acts of Reason there shall I tast the so much long'd for sweetness of another world Now if Philosophers and Moralists have been so much affected with meer rational delights how much more should Christians prize and be affected with those spiritual supernatural and heavenly delights and pleasures which are revealed in the Gospel and which eye hath not seen nor ear heard nor hath entred into the heart of a meer rational man With God is fulness of joy and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore Here are the best and chiefest delights and pleasures which contain the very quintessence of all other delights Seneca could say Hoc habet animus Argumentum divinitatis quod eum divina delectant This is an Argument of the Souls Immortality that it is delighted with divine and spiritual things Indeed the spiritualiz'd Soul of a Saint by the perfect enjoyment of God comes near the pleasure of God himself If that small tast which we have of God and spiritual pleasures here in this life bringeth much joy and satisfaction to the Soul far beyond all meer rational delights and Philosophical pleasures how great will the delights and pleasures of the Saints be in their most happy and glorious vision and contemplation of God in Heaven when they shall behold him face to face and know him as they are known of him whereas here they see him but darkly as in a glass and through a cloud CHAP. XIX Shewing that the light of Reason and much more the light of Faith fortifies men against the excessive fear of death ALthough there be a far more excellent way then that of reason and morality to overcome the fear of death namely by Faith in the death and resurrection and victory of Christ O death I will be thy death O grave I will be thy victory Blessed be God who hath given us victory through Jesus Christ Yet we find that the improvement of the light of Reason and moral Vertues in some Heathens have tended much to the composing of their spirits and the allaying of their passions in their greatest sufferings and when their immortal Souls were about to forsake their mortal bodies The wisest and most rational amongst them have dyed with most composedness and serenity of spirit Concerning Death The Reason of a man Arguments drawn from the light of Reason against the fear of death will suggest these and the like Considerations to him First That a wise man should not be like the inconsiderate vulgar sort of people that are of cowardly ignoble spirits and afraid to dye nor should he be led by opinion but by judgment in this matter No man knows what death is that he should fear it and there is no reason that he should fear a thing whereof he is wholly ignorant and therefore Socrates the wisest man amongst the Philosophers when he was about to dye by the sentence of the Magistrates speaks thus to his Friends That to fear death is to make shew of greater understanding and sufficiency then can be in a man by seeming to know that which no man knoweth And being sollicited by his Friends at his death to plead before the Judges for his life and in the justification of himself made this Oration to them If I should plead for my life saith he and desire you that I may not dye I doubt I may speak against my self and desire my own loss and hindrance because I know not what it is to dye nor what good or ill there is in death They that fear to dye presume to know it As for my self I am utterly ignorant what it is or what is done in the other World Perhaps death is a thing indifferent perhaps a good thing and to be desired Those things that I know to be evil as to offend my Neighbour I fly and avoid those that I know not to be evil as death I cannot fear and therefore I commit my self to you and because I cannot know whether it is more expedient for me to dye or not to dye determine you thereof as you shall think good Secondly That a man should continually torment himself with the fear of death argues great weakness and pusillanimity There is scarce a Woman though she be the weaker vessel but in a few dayes she will be pacified and contented with the death of her Husband or Child And why should not Reason and Wisdom in Man effect that in an hour which
Time performeth in one of the weaker Sex who is more subject to grief and passion Shall not Wisdom and Reason enable us to do more in this matter then ignorance and folly Perhaps we account our death a great matter as if all things here below did depend upon us and must suffer with us This is but a wild conceit and vain imagination for which there is no reason Thirdly By this cowardly slavish fear of death man shews himself unjust and irrational for if death be a good thing as the best and wisest Men conceive it is why then doth he fear it If it be an evil thing why doth he make it worse by adding one evil to another Fourthly For a man to fear death is to be an enemy to himself and to his own life for he can never live at ease and contentedly that feareth to dye That man only may be said to be a Freeman which feareth not death and truly life would be but a slavery if it were not made free by death for death is the only stay of our liberty and the common and ready receptacle of all evils 'T is then a misery and bondage and miserable are all they that do it to trouble our life with the fear of death and our death with the care of life What murmuring and repining would there be against Nature if death were not at all If we should still have continued here though never so much against our own wills and liking Would not a durable life accompanied with trouble and affliction be much more insupportable and painful then life with a condition to leave it If death were quite removed out of the World we should desire it more then now we fear it yea perhaps thirst after it more then life it self as being a remedy against many evils and a means to obtain much good and were not some bitterness mingled with death men would run unto it with exceeding great desire and indiscretion To keep therefore a moderation so that men may neither love life too much nor fly from it that they may neither fear death nor run after it both sweetness and bitterness are therein tempered together Fifthly The light of Reason will tell a man that death is a thing natural a part of the order of the whole Universe and very profitable for the succession and continuance of the works of Nature and wouldst thou have the order of Nature changed yea ruinated for thee Nay death is part of thy essence it being no less essential to thee to dye then to be born and to live in flying death thou flyest from thy self thy essence is equally parted into these two life and death this is the condition of thy creation this is the frame and constitution of thy nature if it grieve thee to dye why wast thou born Men come not into the world upon any other design but to go forth again after they have acted their part upon this Stage To be unwilling to dye is against nature 't is as if thou wert unwilling to be a man for all men are mortal and therefore a wise Heathen when news was brought him of the death of his Son said without passion I knew I begot a mortal man Children and Beasts fear not death yea many times they suffer it chearfully It is not then the light of Nature and Reason that teacheth us to fear death but rather to attend and receive it as being serviceable to Nature Sixthly Death is certain and inevitable and therefore a rational discreet man will not torment himself with the fear of it That which cannot be avoided should be endured with patience and magnanimity What is there more inevitable more inexorable then death And to what purpose should we importune or parley with him that will not be intreated In things uncertain we may fear and in things that are not past remedy we may do our endeavour to help and restore them but for that which is certain and inevitable as death is we must resolve couragiously to attend and endure it Here we should make of necessity a vertue and welcome and receive this Guest kindly for it is much better for us to go to death willingly and freely then that death should come to us and surprize us suddenly and unawares Seventhly To dye is a thing but reasonable and just for why shouldst not thou give place to others as others have given place to thee Why should not they as well succeed thee in this life as thou didst succeed others that went before thee If thou hast made thy advantage of this life 't is but reason that thou shouldst be satisfied with thy lot and be willing to go hence that others may come in thy stead and take thy place Death is a debt that must be paid whensoever it is demanded and it is against reason that thou shouldst refuse to dye and so to discharge that debt which lyes upon thee 'T is a thing general and common to all to dye and wilt thou stand alone by thy self and expect a priviledge and exemption which is granted to no other man in the World Wilt thou be shut out from the common lot of mankind which all others partake of Millions of men are already gone before us and millions of men will follow us when we are gone one generation passeth away and another generation cometh and as great a noise as we make in the World amongst our Neighbours there will be little notice taken of us when we are removed out of this life And why should we make so great account of our selves when others take so little notice of us Why should we think that the whole World is concern'd in us when so few that live near us do not at all remember us or speak a word of us Eighthly Such men as are led by Judgment and Reason should be so far from this slavish fear and pusilanimity that they should put on a generous undaunted Resolution to dye and even contemn death especially being required to dye in a good Cause for Truth and Righteousness and for the good and benefit of their Country which should be dearer to them then a thousand lives He that knows not how to contemn death shall never be able to perform any worthy Acts for God and his Country for whilst he goes about in a base cowardly manner to secure his life he exposeth himself to many dangers and hazardeth his Conscience Honour Vertue and Honesty The contempt of death is that which produceth the most valiant Acts and the most honourable Exploits He that fears not to dye needs not fear the face of any man be he never so great and potent in this World Elvidias Priscus a noble Roman being commanded by the Emperor not to come to the Senate or if he came then to speak as the Prince would have him and no otherwise made this gallant and noble Answer That as he was a Senator so it was fit he should come
to the Senate and if being there it should be required of him to give his advice he would speak freely that which his Conscience commanded him Being further threatened by the Emperor that if he spake his mind so freely he should dye for it Did I ever tell you said he to the Emperor that I was immortal Do you what you will and I will do what I ought to do It is in your power unjustly to put me to death and in me to dye constantly The noble Lacedemonians being threatened with hard and cruel usage if they did not presently yield themselves and their Country to King Phillip who came against them with a great power one in the name of the rest answered thus What hard dealing can they suffer that fear not to dye And being told that King Phillip would break and hinder all their designs What say they will he likewise hinder us from dying And after this when Antipater cruelly threatened them what he would do unto them if they did not comply with his demands answered If thou threaten us with any thing that is worse then death death shall be welcome to us These were men guided and acted only by the light of Reason and moral Vertues which raised them above the threatnings of their greatest enemies and the fear of death And should not Christianity the best and most excellent Religion as hath been sufficiently proved in this Treatise much more ennoble our spirits and raise our hearts above all slavish fears If we be Christians and Believers we may then argue and reason spiritually from Faith in the Word and Blood of Christ which the most moral Heathens could never attain unto against the slavish fear of death in this manner Two Arguments from Scripture against the fear of death First Did not our blessed Saviour dye and rise again for this end to deliver us not only from the cursed effects of death and from the Devil as the Executioner thereof but also from the fear of death that thereby he might cure us of this fear and raise us above it Heb. 2.14 15. Yea and this was long since foretold and prophesied that Christians applying the victory of Christ over death should be so far from fearing death that they should tread upon this Enemy and insult over him Isai 25.8 Hos 13.14 compared with 1 Cor. 15.54 55. Secondly Hath not God wrought us for the self-same thing that we being made new creatures by the gracious operation of the holy Ghost might aspire unto glory and immortality which we cannot fully enjoy till we dye for we must be absent from the body that we may be present with the Lord 2 Cor. 5.5 8. Thirdly 'T is a condition which our Lord and Master puts us into when he first admits us to be his Disciples That we must deny our own lives for his sake and not only be content to take up the Cross in other respects but our lives should not be dear to us when he calls for them Luke 14.26 We pray that Gods Kingdom may come namely the Kingdom of Glory as well as that of Grace and by death we must enter into this Glory We are born again saith the Apostle to a lively hope of this glorious Inheritance 1 Pet. 1.3 4. Now if we be afraid of the time and means of our translation thither how then do we hope for it after a lively manner Fourthly Have we not the examples of the godly before us even a Cloud of Witnesses who have desired to dye and were above the fear of death Gen. 49.18 Phil. 1.21 23. Luke 2.29 Psal 14.7 2 Cor. 5.2 7. Yea the whole Church of Christ and general Assembly of the Saints love his appearing and earnestly desire that he would come quickly 2 Tim. 4.8 Rev. 22.17 20. How unbecoming is it for a Christian to fear death with a slavish fear For hereby he dishonours God and disgraceth his Religion as if it did not afford sufficient incouragements and supports against this fear Some Heathens as we have heard that had not the true knowledge of Christ have dyed couragiously and undauntedly And shall a Christian whose life is hid with Christ in God and who is risen with Christ and sits together with him in heavenly places be affraid to dye 'T is the property of wicked men to dye unwillingly their death is compell'd and not voluntary And shall ours be so too Shall we be afraid of a shadow we that are passed from death to life and shall live for ever because Christ ever lives The seperation of the Soul from God is death indeed but the seperation of the Soul from the Body to a ttue Believer is but the shadow of death If we be in love with life why do we not effect that life which is eternal and desire to be dissolved that we may be possessed of it Fifthly Shall we in this case be worse then Children or mad Men neither of which fear death Shall not Reason and Religion prevail more with us then Ignorance and Madness with them Do we that are the peculiar People of God rather desire to remain in Egypt or in the doleful irksome Wilderness for this World is no better then to enter into Canaan yea into the heavenly Canaan where we shall be at perfect rest Is not death ordinary and common amongst Christians Do not some of our Friends and Neighbours dye dayly Adam had more reason to fear death then we for he never saw man dye an ordinary death before him but for us to be afraid to dye who see thousands dye before us is the more intollerable The whole Creation groans waiting for the liberty of the Sons of God and earnestly longing for this change Rom. 8.21 22. And shall we be worse then the brute Beasts and other Creatures and afraid of that Porter that opens the door to our own everlasting happiness Hath not this Enemy which seems terrible to us been often foyl'd and vanquished Hath he not been beaten by Christ and thousands of his Saints And shall it be terrible to us to encounter a vanquished disarm'd Enemy whose strength and power is destroyed 'T is in vain if we think to shun that which cannot be avoided for it is appointed unto all men once to dye death is the way of all flesh and there is no discharge from this War What man is he that liveth and shall not see death Heb. 9.27 Psal 89.48 Eccles 8.8 And therefore we must resolve couragiously to meet and encounter this Enemy for we cannot avoid him if we go not to him he will come to us so that we shall be unavoidably ingaged in this conflict sooner or later Sixthly Why should a Christian fear or be troubled considering what a gain and advantage death will be to him For it puts a period to all those tempests and storms those boysterous temptations passions and afflictions with which his life was continually tossed and incumbred and brings him to a
safe harbour it is to him a sweet sleep a bed of rest after all his toyl and labour in a vain and troublesome world Isai 57.2 1 Thes 4.14 Rev. 14.13 There the wicked cease from troubling and there the weary be at rest and hear not the voice of the Oppressor Job 3.17 18. It is the day of a Christians reward and of receiving wages Then is the servant set free and the Heir at full age then shall the banished and strangers from a far Countrey shall enter into their Fathers house and shall be received into everlasting habitations Heb. 11.13 John 14.2 Luke 16.9 Death is the Birth-day of a Christian the funeral of all his vices and corruptions and the resurrection of his Graces Death was the daughter of Sin and in death shall that be fulfilled The Daughter shall destroy the Mother 'T is the dissolution of the Body but the absolution of the Soul Then is the immortal Soul delivered out of a dark prison and then doth she throw off her old ragged clothes and foul garments that she may be deck'd and adorn'd with the glorious Robes of Salvation Isa 52.1 2 Cor. 5.2 3. Then doth a Christian remove from an old rotten house ready to fall about his ears to a sumptuous Pallace Doth that Landlord think you wrong his Tennant or offer him hard measure that would have him remove out of a base Cottage into his own Mansion-house which he hath freely given him Shall the Believer be unwilling to come to the end of his race and receive the prize even an incorruptible Crown of glory 1 Cor. 9.24 This is the day of his Coronation for though now he be an Heir of the heavenly Kingdom yet he shall not be crowned till death with that Glory which is unutterable 2 Tim. 4.8 Seventhly The good man is taken away by death from much evil to come and hath he any cause to quarrel with such a freedom Truly the consideration hereof should make us love this life the less because the Clouds gather thick about us and we know not what fearful alterations may shortly befal us either in our outward estate or in matters of Religion either by domestick broyls or by forreign invasion Should not a Christian rejoyce exceedingly to be delivered from the continual malicious suggestions and stratagems of the evil Angels and from a vile wicked World that hates and persecutes the Image of Christ where-ever it is A World whose seeming felicities as Honours Riches Pleasures Trade Beauty Friends Children Relations and Acquaintance are but vanities full of labour and toyl accompanied with much vexation and affording no true rest or contentment to that man that enjoyes them neither can they help him in the least when death seizeth upon him All these things will be forgotten and there will be no remembrance of them with those that shall come after Eccles 1.11 What a priviledge is it therefore to be delivered from these vanities Yea which is more from that body of sin and corruption which a Christian groans under as his greatest burthen and is the more grievous and intollerable because it infects and spreads over the whole man soul and body and is an inseparable companion of this life causing a troublesome yea an irreconcilable war in the Soul and swarms of evil thoughts affections desires and actions besides innumerable diseases and distempers which attend the Body And should not death be welcome to us to set us free from all these evils and miseries Thus may a Christian reason and argue against the fear of death upon far higher and more spiritual Grounds and Considerations then a moral Heathen can and therefore he should not be afraid to dye Eighthly and Lastly That we may be the better fortified against the fear of death let us call to mind and improve the living speeches of dying Christians some of which shall be here mentioned The famous sayings of some dying Christians Good old Simeon Lord let thy Servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation Stephen the first Martyr Lord Jesus receive my Spirit and lay not this sin to their charge Polycarpus to the Proconsul urging him to deny Christ I have served him eighty-six years saith he and he hath not once hurt me and shall I now deny him Ignatius I am the Wheat or Grain to be ground with the teeth of Beasts that I may be pure bread for my Masters tooth let Fire Racks Pullies yea and all the torments of Hell come on me so I may win Christ Cyprian God Almighty be blessed for this Gaol-delivery Theodosius I thank God more for that I have been a Member of Christ then an Emperor of the World Hillarion Soul get thee out thou hast served Christ these seventy years and art thou now afraid of death and loth to dye Vincentius Rage and do the worst that the spirit of malignity can set thee on work to do Thou shalt see Gods Spirit strengthen the tormented more then the Devil can do the Tormentor Gorgius to the Tyrant offering him promotion Have you any thing equal saith he or more worthy then the Kingdom of Heaven King Edward the Sixth Lord bring me into thy Kingdom free this Kingdom from Antichrist and keep thine Elect in it Bishop Latimer to Bishop Ridley going before him to the Stake Have after as fast as I can follow we shall light such a Candle by Gods Grace in England this day as I trust shall never be put out again Bishop Hooper to one that prayed him to consider that life is sweet and death is bitter True saith he but the death to come is more bitter and the life to come is more sweet Oh Lord Christ I am Hell but thou art Heaven draw me to thy self with the cords of thy mercy Thomas Bilney I know by Sense and Philosophy that fire is hot and burning painful but by Faith I know it shall only waste the stubble of my Body and purge my Spirit of its corruption Glover to his Friend He is come oh he is come meaning the Comforter Gods Spirit John Bradford to his fellow Martyr Be of good comfort Brother for we shall have a merry Supper with the Lord this night If there be any way to Heaven on Horseback or in fiery Chariots this is it Lawrence Sanders I was in prison till I got into prison and now sayes he kissing the Stake welcome the Cross of Christ welcome everlasting life My Saviour began to me in a bitter Cup and shall I not pledge him John Lambert None but Christ none but Christ Baynam I feel no more pain in the fire then if I were on a Bed of Down it is as sweet to me as a Bed of Roses Priest's Wife to one that offered her money I am now going saith she to a Countrey where money bears no mastery And when the Sentence was read Now have I gotten that which many a day I have sought for Doctor Taylor when he came within two
miles of Hadley where he was to be martyr'd Now sayes he lack I but two Stiles and I am even at my Fathers house John Ardeley If every hair of my head were a man it should suffer death for the Truth of Christ Alice Driver when the Chain was about her Neck Here is a goodly Hankerchief said she Julius Palmer To them that have the mind linked to the body as a Thieves foot to a pair of Stocks it is hard to dye indeed but if one be able to separate soul and body then by the help of Gods Spirit it is no more mastery for such a one to dye then for me to drink of this Cup. Elizabeth Folkes embracing the Stake Farewel all the World farewel Faith farewel Hope and welcome Love Picus Mirandula Death is welcome to me not as an end of trouble but of sin Martin Luther Thee O Christ have I taught thee have I trusted thee have I loved into thy hands I commend my spirit Phillip Melancton I desire to depart out of this World for two causes one that I may behold the face of Christ in the Church Triumphant the other that I may be freed from the bitter contentions of Brethren Tremelius a Christian Jew Let Christ live and Barrabas perish John Buisson I shall now have a double Gaol-delivery one out of my sinful flesh another from a loathsome dungeon Lewis Marsake Knight seeing his Brethren go to their execution with Halters about their necks which they offered not to him because of his dignity Why I pray you quoth he deny me not the badge and ornament of so excellent an Order is not my Cause the same with theirs Henry Voes If I had ten heads they should all off for Christ God forbid I should rejoyce in any thing save in his Cross CHAP. XX. Shewing that humane Reason and the due exercise of it is a great mercy THat God should make thee a Man and not a Beast a Toad a Serpent that he should bestow upon thee all the internal and external Senses the Reason and Intellectuals of a man and should preserve and continue the same notwithstanding all the foggy mists vapours and distempers which the head and brain of man is subject unto this is no small mercy if we consider withal how many in our dayes are born Ideots blind and lame wanting the use of their Senses and Members yea and others who formerly had the free and comfortable use thereof are now deprived of this mercy without which all the friends riches honours and pleasures of this World are a burthen rather than a blessing Is it not a wonderful thing that mans brain and the exercise of his reason and intellectuals should be preserved by the Power and Goodness of God though many times there are as it were floods of water inclosed within his head and brain when he thinks but little of it which if the great God who sets bounds to the raging Sea did not restrain would presently distract and overwhelm him The flegmatick humour in man which is of the nature of water ascends up to the Brain by reason of vapours arising out of the Stomach like the vapour of a Pot boyling on the fire with liquor in it and like to vapours that ascend up from the Earth into the Air Now when these vapours are come up to the Brain they turn into the nature of those humours of which they were bred as the vapours that ascend up into the Air turn again into the same nature of water of which they were ingendered Thus we carry about us and within us floods of water which if they should be suffered to run with violence would overflow and bear down all before them bodily health and strength and the use of reason and understanding would be quite overwhelmed by them If we had no Examples of other Floods and Inundations of Earthquakes and many other Judgments of God whereby he punisheth this wicked World yet these Water-floods which we carry about us should put us in mind of our sin and misery and should admonish and induce us to bless the Name of the Lord for preserving us and our reason and understanding in the midst of these water-floods whereby many men are destroyed We read of a great King that was driven from the society of men and his dwelling was with the beasts of the field he did eat grass as the Oxen and was wet with the dew of Heaven till he acknowledged that the most High ruleth in the Kingdoms of men and giveth them to whomsoever he will Dan. 4.25 32 33. This was a sore Judgment upon Nebuchadnezzar thus to be deprived of his reason and understanding as a man He was not really transform'd into a Beast as Bowin and others imagine but he was smitten by the Lord with frenzy and madness of mind and deprived for a time of the use of his reason for it is said that his understanding returned to him And besides this his body was much changed and altered in feeding and living among brute Beasts his hairs were grown like Eagles feathers and his nails like Birds claws As we may read in several Authors of some wild brutish Men taken in Forrests that went upon all four as Beasts do they were swifter then a Horse and did howl like a Wolf and were covered all over with hair And thus it was in a great measure with Nebuchadnezzar till the Lord had mercy on him and restored him What are we more then others that God should deal more graciously with us then with them in giving us better intellectuals and more reason and understanding as men and preserving to us the use and exercise thereof In this respect truly God hath put a great excellency upon man and upon us in particular so that we may well say with the Psalmist Lord what is man that thou art thus mindful of him Psal 8.4 Man by the wise contrivance of God is a little World a curious piece of Embroydery an excellent piece of Workmanship wherein the Wisdom and Power and Goodness of God doth wonderfully appear I will praise thee saith David Psal 139.14 15 16. for I am fearfully and wonderfully made Marvellous are thy workes and that my Soul knoweth right well my substance was not hid from thee when I was curiously wrought in the lowest part of the Earth 'T is a speech Borrowed from those that work Opus Phrygionicum the Phrygian or Arras work which is curiously wrought and contrived Man in respect of his frame and constitution is like a piece of curious Tapestry or Embroydery First In respect of his body and the parts and members thereof which are curiously wrought and put together by the wise contrivance of God The forming and composing the body of man of so many bones veins arteries sinews is a curious piece of workmanship God hath with infinite wisdom disposed and placed the several members of mans body some members are called radical members as the Liver