World who have ever and anon had new Instances of Apparitions and Communications with evil Spirits and fresh occasions of executing the Laws they had made against Witches and wicked Magicians 4. I should now pass to the second head I propounded could I abstain from touching a little upon the circumstances of the Birth of that famous Corrival of our Saviour Apollonius Tyaneus whose story writ by Philostratus though I look upon it as a mixt business partly true and partly false yet be it what it will be seeing it is intended for the highest Example of Perfection and that the Heathen did equalize him with Christ you shall see how ranck his whole History smells of the Animal Life and how hard a thing it is either in actions or writings to counterfeit that which is truly holy and divine For which end I shall make a brief Parallelisme of the Histories of them both in the chief matters of either that the Gravitie and Divinitie of the one and the Ridiculousness and Carnality of the other may the better be discerned 5. As in this very First point is plain and manifest which is dispatched in a word For in that Philostratus writes how Apollonius was of an ancient and illustrious Pedigree of rich Parents and descended from the founders of the City Tyana where he was born is not this that which is as sweet as honey to the Natural man and such as an holy and divine Soul would set no esteem upon Like to this is his Mother's being waited upon by her Maidens into a Meadow being directed thereto by a Vision where while her servants were straying up and down making of posies and chaplets of flowers O what fine soft pompous doing is here and her self disporting her self in the grass she at last falls into a slumber the Swans in the mean time rangeing themselves in a row round about her dancing and clapping their wings and singing with such shrill and sweet accents that they filled the neighbouring places with their pleasant melody they being as it were inspired and transported with joy by the gentle breathings of the fresh and cool Zephyrus whereupon the Lady awaking is instantly delivered of a fair Child who after his Fathers name was called Apollonius 6. The amenity of the story how gratefull and agreeable it is to flesh and bloud But how ridiculous is that dance and rountlelay of the musical Swans compared with that Heavenly Melody of the holy Angels at the Nativity of Christ For that if it could be true is but a ludicrous prodigie and presignification that Apollonius would prove a very odde fellow and of an extraordinary strein and serves only for the magnifying of his person But this is a grave and weighty indication of the Goodness of God and the Love of his holy Angels to men and a prediction of that peace and grace which should be administred unto them through Jesus Christ that was then born Behold said the chief Angel whose glorious presence surrounded the shepheards with light Behold said he I bring you good tidings of Great joy which shall be unto all people For unto you is born this day a Saviour which is Christ the Lord whereupon there was suddenly with this Angel a multitude of the heavenly Hoast praising God and saying Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace good will towards men CHAP. III. 1. That whatever miraculously either happened to or was done by our Saviour till his Passion cannot seem impossible to him that holds there is a God and ministration of Angels 2. Of the descending of the Holy Ghost and the Voice from Heaven at his Baptisme 3. Why Christ exposed himself to all manner of hardship and Temptations 4. And particularly why he was tempted of the Devil with an answer to an Objection touching the Devil's boldness in daring to tempt the Son of God 5. How he could be said to shew him all the Kingdoms of the Earth 6. The reason of his fourty daies fast 7. And of his Transfiguration upon the Mount The three first reasons 8. The meaning of Moses and Elias his receding and Christ's being left alone 9. The last reason of his Transfiguration That it was for the Confirmation of his Resurrection and the Immortality of the Soul 10. Testimonies from Heaven of the Eminency of Christs person 1. WE have done with the Birth of Christ we proceed now to his Life wherein we shall consider only those things that extraordinarily happened to him or were miraculously done by him till the time of his Passion wherein nothing will be found impossible to them that acknowledge the Existence of God the active malice of Devils and the Ministery of Angels But that which I intend mainly to insinuate is the comeliness and sutableness of all things to so Holy and Divine a person which that it may the better appear I shall after shew the difference of this true example of solid Perfection Christ and that false pattern of feigned holiness in that Impostour Apollonius whom the later Heathen did so highly adore 2. The chief things that happened in an extraordinary way to Christ before his Passion are these Three 1. The descending of the Holy Ghost upon him in the shape of a Dove at his being baptized and the emission of a Voice from Heaven saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased 2. The Temptation of the Devil upon his fasting and 3. His Transfiguration upon the Mount Concerning the First there is great reason for that Miracle For God having a design to set on foot the Divine life in the World by his Son Iesus Christ why should he not countenance the Beginning of his Ministery by some notable sign by which men might take notice that he was the Messias sent of God And Iohn the Baptist confesses himself assur'd thereof by this Indication And being there was to be some extraordinary appearance what could be more fit then this of a Dove a known embleme of Meekness and Innocency inseparable branches of the Divine life and Spirit and at what better time then when Iesus gave so great a Specimen of his Meekness and Humility as to condescend to be wash'd as if he had been polluted when he was more pure then light or snow and to be in the form of a disciple to Iohn when he was able to teach him and all the world the Mysteries of God Which may be noted to the eternal shame of our conceited Enthusiasts who phansying they have got something extraordinary within contemn and scorn the laudable Institutions of the Church which is an infallible argument of their Pride as this of our Saviour's Humility But while he humbled himself thus God did as highly advance him adding to this silent show an articulate voice from Heaven the better to assure the by-standers that he was the Messias the Son of God 3. As for his being tempted of the Devil it has the same meaning that the
are infinite swarms of Atheistical Spirits as well Aereal as Terrestrial belonging to the Kingdom of Darkness that either absolutely deny God or at least particular Providence and look upon the Divine life as a tedious and troublesome phansie and destitute of all future reward and if there be any present contentment in it they reckon it amongst such as accrews to men mad and distracted whose Imagination makes them many a fools Paradise to please themselves in and so say they does this Religious Lunacy to them that are tainted with it it having neither any real Object nor solid fruits but what a beguiled Phansy mocks their superstitious minds withall And though these Rebels may be well enough seen in the knowledge of Nature and Mathematical subtilties as also in all manner of Craft and State-policy yet their desires being so fully lulled asleep to all Divine things they can neither excogitate ought themselves nor allow of any Reasons from others whereby they might be brought off from that state of Darkness and Rebellion they are in to the true worship of the living God Nay it is probable they are obdurated to that height of boldness that they think themselves able to grapple with the Powers of the Kingdom of Light and that Superiority was theirs of old and is yet their due and may come into their hands again and that their Chieftain is the elder brother though cast thus low by the envy of the yonger which was the wilde conceit of the Euchites Ophites or Satanians CHAP. VI 1. His Tenth Assertion That there will be a finall Overthrow of the Dark Kingdome and that in a supernatural manner and upon their external persons 2. The Eleventh That the Generations of men had a beginning and will also have an end 3. To which also the Conflagration of the world gives witness 1. NOW in the Tenth place it is very uncouth and unusual that so resolved and unreconcileable opposition as there is betwixt the Two Kingdomes we speak of should not end at last in some signal overthrow with Victory on the one part or other But besides the undeniable right and justness of the cause which the Powers of the Kingdome of Light contend for will not onely procure of Him that fits Judge an End to their toyle and conflict but they will certainly carry it on their side and that not onely in a still Mystical Allegorical sense which these Atheistical Spirits will have no sense at all of nor any perception for they will resolve all into Nature Policy and good Fortune it may be into some more then ordinary influence of the Starres that begin to set a golden Age on foot again so little would a Reign of righteous men upon Earth convince the obdurately wicked but by a powerful Miraculous appearance whereby they shall be confounded in their outward Senses there being nothing else left for Divine Providence to work upon the Divine life and touch of Conscience being utterly lost in them and their Reason being perfectly lulled asleep to whatsoever concerns the true Knowledge of God and duties of Religion 2. Eleventhly The Generations of men had a beginning and will also have an end That they had a beginning is the general consent of all Philosophers Poets and Historians The Aristoteleans indeed dissent but upon such weak grounds that it is not worth the while to confute them But Cartesius his Philosophy is so favourable to this Opinion that necessarily it inferrs it Besides the History of Nature seems to confess it in that the Earth cannot bring forth such perfect Animals as she did at first as Lucretius has noted Lib. 2. de Rerum Natura Iamque adeo fracta est Aetas effoetaque Tellus Vix animalia parva creat quae cuncta creavit Secla deditque ferarum ingentia corpora partu The Earth who of her self at first brought forth Huge lusty men of Stature big and bold And large-limb'd beasts she grown effete and old Hardly bears small ones now and little worth Which as it must needs be an infallible sign of her Age so it is also of her once being young and having a beginning 3. Now besides that Axiom in Philosophy That what has a beginning will also have an end That Generation shall at last cease upon the face of the earth that ancient fame of the Conflagration of the world gives further witness to Of which direfull fate the Sibylls have sung long since and Pythagoras and Heraclitus given Testimony whom Ovid also has followed And the Stoicks men slow enough to believe great things upon slight grounds have taken it into their Philosophy adding also that the Souls of men subsist till then but that at the last they are extinguished in this Final Conflagration Others phansy a more benigne use of this Fire that it shall purge and fertilize the Earth and prepare it for a more happy Habitation as if the Divine Nemesis had a kinde design for the whole when she seems so cruelly severe to some part of the Creatures and that she did in this not onely an act of Iustice but of skilfull Husbandry burning up the barren ground with all the vermine therein to make the Field the more fruitfull according to that of Virgil in his Georgicks Saepe etiam steriles incendere profuit agros Atque levem stipulam crepitantibus urere flammis Sive inde occultas vires ac pabula terrae Pinguia concipiunt sive illis omne per ignem Excoquitur vitium atque exudat inutilis humor The fruitless field with its dry standing straw 'T is fit sometimes to burn with crackling fire For whether hence the Earth hid virtue draw And oyly moisture or she doth perspire And sweat out all corruption by this Law The bettered soil answers the swain's desire But God forbid that any mortall man should be so bold and unwise as to profess he understands so profound a Mystery of Providence All that I aime at is this That it is not onely the Opinion of Christians but of ancient Heathens and Jews that the Earth at length will be all set on fire and that there will be a period put to this present stage of things which I shall make a solid use of in the behalf of our Religion against them both CHAP. VII 1. His Twelfth Assertion That there will be a Visible and Supernatural deliverance of the Children of the Kingdome of Light at the Conflagration of the World 2. The Reason of the Assertion 3. His Thirteenth Assertion That the last vengeance and deliverance shall be so contrived as may be best fit for the Triumph of the Divine life over the Animal life 4. Whence it is most reasonable the Chieftain of the Kingdome of Light should be rather an Humane Soul then an Angel 5. His last Assertion an Inference from the former and a brief Description of the General nature of Christianity 1. MY Twelfth Assertion is That there shall not onely be a sensible
naturally expose them to the Tyranny of Satan 6. That their affectation of blinde impulses is but a preparation to Demonical possession and a way to the restoring of the vilest Superstitions of Paganism 1. WHat shall we say then is there no real difference at all betwixt Iudaism and Paganism Yes a great deal For though they both seem to agree in this that they neither reach further in their End then the gratifications of the Animal life it being indeed incredible that their Souls that are so low sunk that they cannot see beyond this present state should emerge to so high a pitch of Sanctification as is understood by that life we call Divine yet Iudaism has the preeminence far above Paganism First In that those rich discoveries of the Gospel are so exactly adumbrated and shadowed out in the Mosaical Types that a man may be assured that they were prefigured by them Secondly That the worship of God according to the Rites of Moses is more pure and devoid of all suspicion of Idolatry which the Religion of the Heathen was not as has been already declared 2. Lastly In that God himself was the Institutour of the Religion of the Jews whenas the Rites of the Heathen were found out and appointed either by Angels as some would have it such as were the Overseers and Guardians of severall Nations and Countreys who if they were good the Inhabitants of the earth it seems revolted from them and corrupted their primitive institutions so long ago that the knowledge of them never arrived to or hands or else at the best they were but the better sort of lapsed Spirits or crafty Political men or impure and malicious Devils And so far as History will give us light all the Religions of the World saving those of Moses and Christ have no better Authors then those of the Three last kinds as you may gather out of what has been already spoken and too many of them I suspect have been ordained by the foulest and wickedest of all the lapsed crew 3. For Mankinde being so much sunk and fallen from God by the temptation of the Devil like a Bird or prey he follows his prize and hunts there where his game is most hovering over the sons of men whom he having struck down to the earth le ts not his hold go but having once seized upon them keeps them as long as he can within his own power it falling to his share to domineer over men as naturally as wicked men to circumvent and domineer one over another I mean the more powerful and subtle over the more weak and unwise 4. Of which the whole New-found World seems to be an ample Testimony there being very few places in America but such as were discovered to be palpably and visibly under the power of the old Serpent their religious Rites and Ceremonies being as uncouth and antick and more bloody and cruell then those that Witches are known to be tied to here For the mind of these Apostate Spirits is that the Remnant of the Law of Nature and Light of Reason in man should be quite obliterated and that mankind should be wholy their Vassals and that they should forget the Nobleness of their own condition and stoop to whatsoever they require of them which are commonly such things as become none but Mad-men and Beasts 5. And therefore it is a very dangerous and false kind of Resignation in those that would pretend to a more then ordinary pitch of Religion to bid adieu to the Rules of Humanity and Reason under the pretence of the exercise of Self-denial For thus giving away their own Will in those things that are laudable and good they give room for the Devil to enter and to possess them Soul and Body and to drive them to the most vile sordid the most uncivil and ridiculous nay the most wicked and impious actions that Humane Nature is liable to as is too much already found in some of that Fanatick Sect of the Quakers who under pretence of crucifying the Dictates of Reason and Humanity and every thing they find their Spirit carried to smother that Lamp of God in them and being thus got in the dark are the scorn and laughing-stock of Satan that sworn enemy of mankind the Devil and delusive Spirits like so many Ignes Fatui lead them about in this bewildring Night that they have voluntarily brought upon themselves by not making use of that Talent that God already had given them but flinging of it away as an unholy thing 6. This is true of several of them by their own Confessions and things of a like Nature to these are evident in most of them whether themselves will confess it or no but let them pretend what they will most certain it is That that Spirit that leads them from the Scriptures from the use of Reason from common Humanity from their Loyalty to Christ that died for them and whom God has exalted above all powers and principalities whatever either amongst men or Angels that Spirit I say that seduces them from such indispensable points as these is none other then he that seduced man at first and would again bring him into a slavish subjection to himself by despoiling of him utterly of all those tender touches of Spirit and warrantable suggestions of Reason and Natural Conscience or the laudable Customes of his Education to act merely upon blind impulses of which no account is to be given that thereby he may be the easier possessed by him and be hurried to any vileness of wickedness to any cruelty or uncleanness without stop or resistance and that the Law of Christ being extinguished the most foul and barbarous forme of Religion amongst the Gentiles may be restored For the virulent enmity of this Sect against the Ministers of the Gospel is no obscure argument that they are acted by the Envy of the Devil whose Kingdome already has in part and shall still fall more and more by the hand of our Saviour whose Triumphs that we may see how just they are we must not passe over Paganisme so favourably as we have but discover the beastly and bloody Tyranny of Satan upon the Nations of the Earth in his more execrable Rites and Ceremonies the abominableness whereof demonstrates That they had no other Institutour but himself CHAP. X. 1. The Devil 's usurped dominion of this world and how Christ came to dispossess him 2. The Largeness of the Devil's dominion before the coming of Christ. 3. The Nation of the Iews the light of the world and what influence they might have on other Nations in the midst of the reign of Paganisme 4. That if our Hemisphere was any thing more tolerable then the American it is to be imputed to the Doctrine of the Patriarchs Moses and the Prophets 5. That this Influence was so little that all the Nations besides were Idolaters most of them exercising of obscene and cruel Superstitions 1. THat the Kingdomes of
the contrary being disadvantaged by leading a life and offering himself an example of manners that are either scorn'd or hated by every natural man who was still made more odious and contemptible by his suffering a shamefull death betwixt two groâ—s Malefactors I say if an high hand from Heaven had not carried on the affairs of Christianity that is if Christ had not done some such Miracles himself as are recorded if he had not risen from the dead ascended into Heaven and thence powred forth his Spirit upon the Apostles and enabled them to doe such wonderfull works as they did it had been utterly impossible that Christianity could have had any such success in the world as we see it has at this day So that the whole History of Christ is very congruous and coherent and such as according to the nature of the thing ought to be whenever the Messias was to come into the World CHAP. XII 1. Three main Effects of Christ his sending the Paraclete foretold by himself Iohn 16. When the Paraclete shall come c. 2. Grotius his Exposition upon the Text. 3. The Ground of his Exposition 4. A brief indication of the natural sense of the Text by the Author 5. The Prophesie of Christ fulfilled and acknowledged not only by Christians but also Mahometans 6. That the Substance of Mahometism is Moses and Christ. Their zealous profession of One God 7. Their acknowledgment of Miracles done by Christ and his Apostles and of the high priviledge conferred upon Christ. 8. What Advantage that portion of Christian Truth which they have embraced has on them and what hopes there are of their full conversion 1. IT would be too tedious a business particularly to prosecute that ample Success that the Passion Resurrection Ascension of Christ and his Sending the Holy Ghost had in the World but the most universal and farthest-spreading Effects thereof we cannot pass by in silence especially those Three which himself foretells of John 16. That when the Paraclete should come he would convince the world concerning Sin Righteousness and Iudgment Concerning Sin because they believe not on me Concerning Righteousness because I goe to the Father and you see me no more Concerning Iudgment because the Prince of this World is judged 2. All which as Grotius interprets the place in a Forensal sense is of a very large extension and acknowledged as well by Turk as Christian. For that learned Expositour makes Christ to send the Spirit as an Advocate to plead his cause against the World and indeed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly signifies so and nothing else and thereby to convince the World First of that great Crime of Infidelity and of killing of their true Prophet nay their expected Messias This properly respects the Jews who crucified him and they felt the Divine vengeance for so heinous a fact their City being sacked their Temple demolished and themselves scattered and made underlings in all places of the World Secondly of the Equity and righteous dealing of the just God with Christ who because he had suffered so wrongfully made him a compensation by making him a partaker of his Heavenly glory for the reproach and injury he bore upon the Earth Thirdly lastly of Iustice betwixt party and party and that therefore as the Devil excited the Jews to put Christ to death so by way of Retaliation Christ should put the Devil out of his present dominion and rule in the world by the destruction of Idolatry and the worship of those Apostate Spirits though the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seems something lame here the members being so heterogeneall one to another 2. But the Exposition will appear sufficiently ingenious for all that if we do but consider what he sets down for the ground of his interpretation That Sin Righteousness and Iudgment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answer to the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying publica judicia de criminibus but the other two privata judicia unum ex aequo bono which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 alterum certam ex lege formulam habens which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which assuredly comprehends such Laws as concern the right of Possession as well as that of Retaliation which Grotius so specially aims at in his citing Levit. 24.20 The Devil therefore being a mere usurper and having no right to the rule and dominion of the World the Action will lie against his Usurpation and thus the Interpretation will be unexceptionable And that the action is of this kind is plain in that Christ the Son of God is heir of all things as himself somewhere intimates and the Apostle also in plain terms declares 4. The sense therefore of the forecited Text in short is this That the Spirit which is called the Paraclete or Advocate when he comes should convince the World of the Veracity of Christ and the Infidelity and Cruelty of the Iews that crucified him who was a true Prophet neither Deceiver nor deceived and of the Equity of God that compensated his sufferings amongst the Jews by taking him to himself and crowning him with immortal glory and of the Iudgment of God against the Devil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that God has given sentence against him already that he shall be ejected out of his usurped dominions and that all the Pagan forms of worship shall be abrogated and destroy'd 5. This the Paraclete or Spirit of God coming upon the Apostles and assisting them and the Church so miraculously for many Ages has with such undeniable conviction made good that not only all Christendome is assured thereof but that vast Empire of the Turks and all the Mahometans whereever dispersed in the World So that after a manner the whole Earth is filled with the belief thereof which I thought worth the taking notice of that this Success may not seem less ample then it is 6. For though the Mahometans are not Christians but Pagans in too true a sense yet it is plain that much of the letter of their law is Moses and Christ. And to the confusion of gross Idolatry and Polytheism they profess One only God Creatour of Heaven and Earth and their great stress of their Religion lies upon this main Article with which they are so transported that they spend a great deal of their time in their Mosco's in chanting out this one Truth La illa ilella la illa ilella that is There is but one God as Historians relate But this is no more then the Jews believe nor upon so good grounds but they proceed further as if they were ambitious to make out that broken title that one gives them who calls them Semichristianos Half-christians 7. For partly in their Alcoran and partly in Zuna it is recorded how Iesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost and so born of the Virgin Mary That the Gospel is the way the light and salvation of men and
be better For this Article of Infidelity among the rest keeps the Witnesses still dead in all the senses above-named Wherefore let every man reform himself and exhort and encourage his neighbour and witness the good witness of the power of God to the conquering and subduing of all manner of Sin For these times come not on by Rapine and Violence but by the increase of Righteousness upon Earth For the real and speedy advancement whereof there is nothing more effectual then the belief That God will now in these last times of all give more then ordinary assistance to them that will be faithfull in his Covenant and that the work of Righteousness will goe on with much more ease then heretofore and with infinitely better success Wherefore it is good striking while the Iron is hot and making use of this Day of Salvation lest such Prophecies of grace being conditionall it may fare with us as it did with the Israelites whose carkasses fell in the wilderness in a tedious delay and a long leading them about who otherwise had in their own persons entred the promised Land So I do not see that it is impossible or improbable but this Prophecie of the Churches change into so excellent a state may be foreslacked by the ill management and faithlesness of them from whom God more peculiarly expects that they should be industrious Labourers in this white Harvest of Apostolick Purity and Sanctity they having now for some time separated from the great Babylon to build those that are lesser and more tolerable but yet not to be tolerated for ever it being more then high time they should clear up into an holy City of God Otherwise I do not see but the success is likely to answer the endeavours of them that are chiefly concerned And the variety of numbring the period of time by Daies Months and Semi-Times seems to threaten some such matter And therefore according to that laxer computation by Months and Semi-Times there may lie hid a reserve of delay for thirty nay an hundred or two hundred years longer then God otherwise intended to commence this glorious Dispensation But the certainty of the Events of other Prophecies that precede in order if this Promise be not conditional to both Jew and Christian is a Demonstration that it will not fail to take effect This is the faithfullest Account that I can give of the affairs of Christendome from the pouring out of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles till Christ's coming again in the Spirit to renew his lapsed Church into true Holiness and Righteousness in the rising of the Witnesses and the reigning of the Saints upon Earth a thousand years The close of which will be The Day of Iudgment properly so called which after this long but not impertinent Digression if it be a Digression we shall now take into consideration BOOK VI. CHAP. I. 1. Three chief things considerable in Christ's Return to Iudgment viz. The Visibility of his Person The Resurrection of the Dead and the Conflagration of the World 2. Places of Scripture to prove the Visibility of his Person 3. That there will be then a Resurrection of the dead not in a Moral but a Natural sense demonstrated from undeniable places of Scripture 4. Proofs out of Scripture for the Conflagration of the world as out of Peter the 3 Chap. of his second Epistle 5. An Interpretation of the 12 and 13 verses 6. A Demonstration that the Apostle there describes the Conflagration of the World 7. A Confutation of their opinion that would interpret the Apostle's description of the burning of Jerusalem 8. That the coming of Christ so often mentioned in these two Epistles of Peter is to be understood of his Last coming to Iudgment 9 10. Further confirmation of the said Assertion 11. Other places pointed at for the proving of the Conflagration 1. IN the Return of Christ to Judgment these Three things are to be considered as very nearly annected and comprehended in it The Visibility of his Person and pomp of his coming The Resurrection of the Dead and Conflagration of the World But because all these things are doubted by some that do not profess themselves Anti-Scripturists I shall first produce such places of Scripture as do plainly assert these Points and then in the next place shew how Reasonable the Assertion is 2. The Visible or personal Return of Christ to Iudgment though it may be proved from many places yet I shall content my self with a few And I must confess I look upon the 24 of Matth. from the 30 to the 32 verse where the Son of Man is said to come in the clouds of Heaven with power and great glory and to send out his Angels with a mighty sound of a Trumpet to be a pregnant Testimony thereof But the 29 verse to be a description of the state of the World especially of the Roman Empire till the appearance of the sign of the Son of Man But whether this sign of the Son of Man be the same with the Son of Man coming in the clouds or some sign in the Heavens to be given long before his coming for the Conversion of the Jews I take not upon me to decide But from the 32 to the 36 verse I think there our Saviour may reassume his first Subject the Destruction of Ierusalem and therefore being within the view of the Temple and of the City he uses the pronoun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these things in his prophecie of them But in the 36 verse pursuing his prediction of the end of the World he saies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but concerning THAT day and so he gives wholesome precepts of watchfulness to his Church to the end of this Chapter Which sense is very agreeable to the following Chapter which most easily and naturally is wholy to be understood of the last Judgment But from the 31 verse of that Chapter to the end even they that would wind the former part of the Chapter to another sense acknowledg it to be understood of the last Day And there the Visible Pomp of Christ coming to judge the World is plainly set down viz. his sitting upon a throne with his holy Angels about him To these you may add the Testimonie of the two men clothed in white shining raiments that told the Disciples as they were gazing up into Heaven after Christ as he ascended that he should come down again in the same manner as they had seen him goe into Heaven As also that of S. Paul to the Thessalonians For the Lord himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout with the voice of the Archangel and with the Trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the Air and so shall we be ever with the Lord. These places are so plain concerning the Visible Appearance of Christ's
of Second causes partly Natural partly free Agents amongst whom the highly-exalted and supereminently-divine Soul of Iesus is the chief we discover a power able to effect more then we have declared concerning the Conflagration of the Earth And when this will suffice how over-evidently are we assured of the feisableness of this Atchievement from what S. Peter has suggested concerning the absolute power of the Word of God by whom all things are and who is a perpetual Spectatour of his Works For the spirit of the Lord filleth the world as the Wise man speaks and that which containeth all things has knowledge of the voice And it is as true that all things lye open to his sight and that the Earth is alwayes under the present eye of God Wherefore he that perpetually looks on is it hard to conceive that at last at some solemn period of time he may in a special manner step out into action if need so require and he be invoked thereunto 7. Wherefore the Faithful being gathered from all the corners of the Earth and carried up to Christ their Saviour and joyning with his Legions of Light there being then left in the Earth and in the inferiour Parts of the Aire none but obdurate Adherents to the dark Kingdome which shall now be made more externally dark then ever black pitchy clouds covering the whole face of the Sky and making Night fall upon the Inhabitants of the World even at mid-day in the midst of this sad silent and louring aspect of the Heavens He that in the flesh was heard and answered by Thunder when he prayed saying Father glorifie thy name shall by the same interest in the Eternall God cause such an universal Thunder and Lightning that it shall rattle over all the quarters of the Earth rain down burning Comets and falling Starres and discharge such claps of unextinguishable fire that it will do sure execution whereever it falls so that the ground being excessively heated those subterraneous Mines of combustible Matter will also take fire which inflaming the inward exhalations of the Earth will cause a terrible murmur under ground so that the Earth will seem to thunder against the tearing and ratling of the Heavens and all will be filled with sad remugient Echoes Earthquakes and Eruptions of fire there will be every where and whole Cities and Countries swallowed down by the vast gapings and wide divulsions of the ground Nor shall the Sea be able to save the Earth from this universal Conflagration no more then the Fire could preserve her from that overspreading Deluge for this fiery Vengeance shall be so thirsty that it shall drink deep of the very Sea nor shall the water quench her devouring appetite but excite it For such is the nature of some Fires as history every where testifieth 8. Wherefore the great channel of the Sea shall be left dry and all Rivers shall be turned into smoak and vapour so that the whole Earth shall be inveloped in one entire cloud of an unspeakable thickness which shall cause more then an Aegyptian darkness clammy and palpable to be felt which added to this choaking heat and stench will compleat this External Hell a place of Torment appointed not onely for the prophane Atheist and Hypocrite but also for the Devil and his Angels where their pain will be proportionated according to the untamedness of their Spirits and unevenness of their perverse Consciences CHAP. X. 1. The main Fallacies that cause in men the Misbelief of the Possibility of the Conflagration of the Earth 2. That the Conflagration is not only possible but reasonable The first Reason leading to the belief thereof 3. The second Reason the natural decay of all particular structures and that the Earth is such and that it grows dry and looses of its solidity whence its approach to the Sun grows nearer 4. That the Earth therefore will be burnt either according to the course of Nature or by a special appointment of Providence 5. That it is most reasonable that Second way should take place because of the obdurateness of the Atheistical crew 6. That the Vengeance will be still more significant if it be inflicted after the miraculous Deliverance of the Faithful 1. I Hope by this time we have prevailed so far as to perswade the Possibility of the Conflagration of the World in that sense we have explained it And truly I know nothing that should keep a man from assenting to it as possible but that dull Fallacie whereby we conclude That nothing can be done but what we have seen done or phansie we could doe our selves And this is the reason that makes the Atheist misbelieve Creation because he himself can make nothing but out of prejacent Matter and a settled course of things causes so deep an impression in our Senses that we can hardly phansie they will ever alter Which makes some men never think of Death especially if they have never been sick a flattering impossibility by reason of so long continuance of life stealing into their hopes as if they should never die And therefore that great Monarch was fain to have one to rub up his memory every day with a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Remember that thou art mortal Well may we phansie then such unalterable Laws of Nature as shall secure the Earth from such a destruction as we speak of when we are led unawares into so favourable a conceit of our own life or fortune after we have for a competent time been well settled in either as not at all to think of the mutability of our condition Wherefore I hope any one that is aware of this ordinary Fallacie will easily recover himself into so much use of his Reason as not to conclude the Conflagration of the Earth impossible because he knows not how to burn it himself or that it will alwaies continue unburnt because it has been unburnt thus long 2. But that which I drive at is to shew that the belief of a Christian is not only of things possible but reasonable which I have in some sort made good already by discovering the manifold treasures of the fiery and combustible principles in Heaven and Earth to which I add further First That Providence ordering all particular corporeal things by number weight and measure it is reasonable that the continuance of this present stage of things be numbred that is have its number of years set so that there be a full pause or Period a last Exiit and Plaudite to this Tragick Comedie 3. Secondly Whatever particular corporeal structure has a Beginning unless it be a Body inacted with a glorified Spirit will also have an End naturally of it self and that which will have an End is subject to decaying And for my own part I question not but that the Earth is of such a nature and that it waxes old by degrees will grow more more dry steril in succession of Ages whereby it
will become more kexy and loose of its Solidity For a Body that is porous and can imbibe moisture the more moist the more solid it is the more solid the Earth is the better it will keep its distance from the Sun as it is swung about him in this common Vortex of the Planets Wherefore the distance of the Earth lessening so as Astronomers observe might it not come from other causes would be a parlous Symptome and sign that the Earth grows old apace and much exhausted And the more it is exhausted the nearer still it will be wrought toward the Sun according to the Cartesian Philosophy So that at last what by its over-drieness and what by its approaching so near to the Fountain of heat not only Forrests and Woods which has happned already but the subterraneous Mines of Sulphur and other combustible Matter will catch fire and set the whole Earth in a manner on burning 4. I say therefore that the Earth will thus at the long run be burnt either according to the course of Nature of which manner of destruction these be the main concomitants That by reason of a long distemper and languishment she will be utterly unable or very wretchedly able to sustain either Man or Beast for abundance of Ages together before she be ruined and burnt up by this mortiferous Fever and after this death and destruction of hers far less able she becoming then but as a Caput Mortuum by reason of the long exhaustion of the life and heart of the soil before this lingring Conflagration or else by a more special or solemn appointment of Providence the Period of her Conflagration shall be shortned From which if any universal good doth accrue to the Creation it is not unworthy of the Son of God and his mighty and most glorious Host to be emploied in so weighty a performance For is not the whole Earth the Vineyard of the Lord a particular platt of his skillfull Culture and Husbandry 5. Thirdly and lastly There being so many obdurate rebellious Spirits as well among the Apostate Angels as Men that are so far revolted from God that they scarce retain any sense of him in their minds that peremptorily deny a particular Providence and stoutly phansie that if there be a Deity he takes no notice of the affairs of any particular Creatures that jear and flout at Religion and look upon the life of the Son of God when he lived in the world as a poor and contemptible Example of Pusillanimity and Dejectedness of Spirit that contemn all his true followers for moaped Fools but make their own Lusts their law in all things and therefore are insensible of whatever Injustice or Cruelty they commit or whatever Beastliness or Vileness they give themselves up to these being past all sense within but all of them sensible enough in their bodies or vehicles the Devils themselves not excepted how fitting nay how necessary is it that a fiery Whirlwind and Tempest of Vengeance should rattle upon their external persons and that corporeal pain should pierce them to the very quick and that all whatever they took delight in should be demolisht and that they should be smothered in tormenting Heat and Darkness of which they know no end 6. These Considerations which I have alledged make the Conflagration of the World not only possible but also very reasonable especially with that circumstance of not coming naturally for they would then look on it only as a common calamity but of being inflicted visibly by one whose Person and Laws are so much vilified and scorned by all the Powers of the Dark Kingdome And then again for further conviction and aggravation after such a time as they have seen the supernatural deliverance of the righteous before their eyes For this makes good that Promise and Threatning of our Saviour what difference he would make betwixt the Sheep and the Goats saying to one Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the kingdom and to the other Goe ye accursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels CHAP. XI 1. A Recapitulation or Synopsis of the more Intelligible part of the Christian Mysterie with an Indication of the Usefulness thereof 2. The undeniable Grounds of this Mystery The existence of God A particular Providence The Lapsableness of Angels and men The natural subjection of men to Devils in this fallen Condition 3. God's Wisdome and Iustice in the Permission thereof for a time 4 5. Further Reasons of that Permission 6. The Lapse of Men and Angels proved 7. The Good emerging out of this Lapse 8. The exceeding great Preciousness of the Divine Life 9. The Conflagration of the Earth 10. The Good arising from the Opposition betwixt the Light and Dark Kingdome 11. That God in due time is in a special manner to assist the Kingdome of Light and in a way most accommodate to the humane Faculties 12. That therefore he was to send into the World some Venerable Example of the Divine Life with miraculous attestations of his Mission of so sacred a Person 13. That this Person by reason of the great Agonies that befall them that return to the Divine Life ought to bring with him a palpable pledge of a proportionable Reward suppose of a Blessed Immortality manifested to the meanest Capacity by his rising from the dead and visibly ascending into Heaven 14. That in the Revolt of Mankind from the Tyranny of the Devil there ought to be some Head and that the Qualifications of that Head ought to be opposite to those of the old Tyrant as also to have a power of restoring us to all that we have lost by being under the Usurper 15. That also in this Head all the notable Objects of the Religious propensions of the Nations should be comprized in a more lawfull and warrantable manner 16. That this Idea of Christianity is so worthy the Goodness of God and so sutable to the state of the World that no wise and vertuous Person can doubt but that it is or will be set on foot at some time by Divine Providence and that if the Messias be come and the Writings of the New Testament be true in the literal sense it is on foot-already 1. WE have I think fully enough set forth the Reasonableness of Christian Religion in the Idea thereof it may be more fully then was needfull before we come to prove That it is more then an Idea We shall by way of Recapitulation contract the more Intelligible frame thereof into a lesser model that its due symmetrie and proportion may be better seen at once Which will be both a relief to our Memory and also a help to our Judgment when we shall have a more easie opportunity of considering the solid strength and handsome congruity of the whole Fabrick 2. And I dare challenge the most maliciously-wise and skilfull if he can find any rational exception against the structure of this so intelligible a
And lastly Porphyrius divides the two Oriental parts of the Zodiack intercepted betwixt the Horizon and Meridian above and below into three equal parts apiece So many waies are there of building Houses or Castles in the Air. 7. That the Erection of a Scheme may foretell right the Fate of the Infant the time of the Birth is to be known exactly For if you miss a degree in the time of the Birth it will breed a years errour in the prognostication if but five minutes a month c. For which purpose also it is a necessary to know the Longitude and Latitude of the place 8. After the Erection of so accurate a Scheme they pretend to be able to foretell the time of the main accidents of mans life and that either by Profection annual and Transition or by Direction The last is the chief and therefore not to fill your eares over-much with the wretched gibberish of Gypsies when I have intimated that the first of the two former run all upon Aspects and that Transition is nothing else but the Passing of a Planet through the places of the Nativity whether its own or of other Planets or of the Horoscope c. I shall force my self a little more fully to define to you out of Origanus the Nature of Direction Which is the invention of the Arch the Aequator which is intercepted betwixt two circles of Position drawn through two places of the Zodiack the one whereof the Significator possesses the other the Promissor and ascends or descends with the Arch of the Ecliptick in the posture of the Sphere given The term from whence the computation is made is the Significator the term to which the Promissor As if Sol be directed to Mars Sol signifies Dignities and Mars the nature of those dignities and the distance of the time is computed by Direction I shall omit to tell you that all the Planets and all the Houses are capable of Direction if we would accurately examine a Scheme But the chiefest Directors or Significators are 1. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Arabians call Hylech from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Latines Emissor or Prorogator vitae 2. The Moon for the Affections of the Mind 3. The Sun even then also when he is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the condition of Life and Dignities 4. The Horoscope for Health and Peregrinations 5. The Medium Coeli for Marriage and procreation of Children 6. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Part of Fortune for increase or decrease of Riches 9. But the chiefest of all is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as respecting Life it self which is directed to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Interfectour or Slayer Which is suppose either some Planet which is present in the eighth house as Saturn or Mars or the Almuten of the eighth house or the Planet join'd to the Almuten or the Almuten of the Planet or the Almuten of the Lord of the eighth house But the huge mystery is and that a sad one that when the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 comes to the place of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Emissor unto the place of the Interfector then wo be to the brat that ever he was born under so unlucky Starrs for there is no remedie but he must die the death Nor will his Alcochodon or Almuten Hylegii avail him any thing when his Hyleck or Emissor is once come into the hands of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or that Celestial Butcher These are the most fundamental and most solemn Fooleries for so I must call them of their whole Art and I shall now set my self to demonstrate them to be so after I have answered those more general Plausibilities they would countenance themselves by CHAP. XVI 1. That the Starrs and Planets are not useless though there be no truth in Astrology 2. That the Starrs are not the Causes of the Variety of Productions here below 3. That the sensible moistening power of the Moon is no argument for the Influence of other Planets and Starrs 4. Nor yet the Flux and Reflux of the Sea and direction of the Needle to the North Pole 5. That the Station and Repedation of the Planets is an argument against the Astrologers 6. That the Influence attributed to the Dog-star the Hyades and Orion is not theirs but the Sun 's and that the Sun's Influence is only Heat 7. The slight occasions of their inventing of those Dignities of the Planets they call Exaltations and Houses as also that of Aspects 8. Their folly in preferring the Planets before the fixt Starrs of the same appearing magnitude and of their fiction of the first qualities of the Planets with those that rise therefrom 9. Their rashness in allowing to the influence of the Heavenly Bodies so free passage through the Earth 10. Their groundless Division of the Signs into Moveable and Fixt and the ridiculous Effects they attribute to the Trigons together with a demonstration of the Falseness of the Figment 11. A Confutation of their Essential Dignities 12. As also of their Accidental 13. A subversion of their Erection of Themes and distributing of the Heavens into twelve Celestial Houses 14. Their fond Pretenses to the knowledge of the exact moment of the Infants birth 15. A Confutation of their Animodar and Trutina Hermetis 16. As also of their Method of rectifying a Nativity per Accidentia Nati 17. His appeal to the skilfull if he has not fundamentally confuted the whole pretended Art of Astrology 1. WHerefore to their First general Pretence That the very Being of the Starrs and Planets would be useless if there be nothing in the Art of Astrology I answer That though there were certain virtues and influences in every one of them yet it does not follow that they are discovered in their Art and then again That though there were none saving that of Light and Heat in the Fixt Starrs it will not follow that they are useless Because the later and wiser Philosophers have made them as so many Suns which Hypothesis our Astrologers must confute before they can make good the force of their first Argument And for the Planets they have also suggested that they may have some such like use as our Earth has i. e. to be the mother of living Creatures though they have defined nothing concerning the natures of them whereby their opinion becomes more harmless and unexceptionable as it is in it self highly probable Forasmuch as the Earth as well as Saturn Iupiter and the rest moves about the Sun and is as much a Planet as any of them as the best Astronomers doe not at all stick now-adaies to affirm Which does utterly enervate the force of this first general Pretence of the Astrologians 2. To the Second I answer That the Starrs are but Lights of much the same nature as our Sun is only they are further removed so that their contribution is much-what the same And again
therefore because when things succeed ill they are said to go backwards and when we are weary we goe more slow or stand still to breath us or when we are most vigorous we run swiftest therefore must Station be two debilities Retrogradation no less then five but Direction must be five fortitudes Whereas in reason Station should rather seal on the effect of the Planet more sure But the truth is a Planet is neither stationary nor retrograde truly but in appearance and therefore these Debilities no true ones but imaginary The last Accidental Dignity is Configuration or Aspect the vain grounds whereof have been already taxed To which I add That it is utterly unreasonable to conceive that Sextil and Trine should be good and yet Quartil that is betwixt both be stark naught Nay it were far more reasonable to conceive that if Conjunction and Sextil were good that Quartil should be better then Trine as being further from Opposition and because the Planets thus aspected are in better capacity both of them to strike with more direct raies on the Earth then if they were in a Trine Aspect And therefore I know no reason imaginable that could move them to have so ill a conceit of Quartil aspect but because of the great unquietness of acute diseases that happens about every seventh day which is the time also of the Quartil aspect of the Moon and therefore the whole mystery of Aspects is to be resolved into this rash Misapplication You have seen now how little worth all the Astrological Dignities are and yet out of these huge Nothings of their fictitious Art is the whole fabrick built of whatever Predictions they pretend to So that we may be assured that all is vain and ridiculous 13. Concerning their twelve Houses of the Nativity the division is arbitrarious and their erecting of a Scheme so many waies and that with like success an evidence that the success is not upon Art but fortuitous The Configuration also of the Houses and those Septennial 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Alfridarii do intimate that the whole business is but a Figment going upon that false Hypothesis of Ptolemie That the Planets and the Earth have not the Sun to their Centre But this is not all we have to say against these Celestial Tenements For either the Earth is pervious to all the raies of the Planets and Starrs as well beneath as above the Horizon or only they above the Horizon shed their Virtue on the Child If the former be true all Nativities are alike If the latter why have they any more then six Houses and why any at all under the Horizon And in good sadness what is the meaning that their Horoscope and the sixth House being Houses of so great concernment should be under the Horizon especially when they are pleased at other times to pronounce that a Star or Planet that is Vertical is most efficacious And can it be thought any thing but a mere phancie that led them to make the Horoscope the House of Life namely because the Starrs arise from thence and are as it were born into the World whence as I have shewed their custome to be in other things they have feigned the rest of the Houses at random And that you may still be more sure that there is nothing in these Houses or rather that the Houses themselves are nothing they are but the Distribution of that imaginary Zodiack and Heaven which I told you before the errour of Ptolemy brought into the World into twelve imaginary Sections beginning at the East point of this Zodiack So that their Art is perpetually built upon Nothing 14. Now for the exact time of the Nativity That one should know the very moment when the Child is born I say it is a Curiosity nothing to the purpose For first if the hard and thick Earth be pervious to the raies of Heaven how easily may those thin coverings of the Womb be penetrated continually by the power of the Starrs and therefore even then is the Childe as much exposed to them as when it is newly born Or if it be not why may not it some moments after its being born be still as liable to their influence as in the moment when it was born For cannot these Influences that penetrate the very metalline bowels of the Earth pierce a Child's tender skin without any resistance But supposing this Curiosity to be to the purpose how hard and lubricous a matter is it to come to that exactness that they pretend to be requisite For first they must know the exact Longitude of the Place a thing of extreme uncertainty or else the exactness of Time will doe them no good And yet again their affectation of exactness seems ridiculous when we cannot well determine the proper Time of his Birth For he is born by degrees and few or none come out after first they appear in a shorter space then half a quarter of an hour Wherefore their Head being exposed to the starry influence why should not that celestial infection pervade their whole body But suppose that to be the moment of their birth wherein the whole body is first out how shall this moment be known By an exact minute watch such as Tycho had and Sir Christopher Heydon professes himself to have had which would exactly give him the minute and second Scruple of Time But how few Nativity-casters can boast of the same priviledge Or if they could to what purpose is it when it seldome happens that they are in the same house much less in the same room where the party is delivered Wherefore the report of the Midwife is the best certainty they have and how many Nativities have been cast without so much as that And yet they will confidently predict Fates and Destinies upon an uncertain time given them For they can say they correct it and reduce it to the right moment of the Nativity and that by no less then three several waies by Trutina Hermetis Animodar and Accidentia Nati which how bold and groundless a boast it is let us now see 15. Trutina Hermetis goes upon this ground That that degree of the Zodiack the Moon is in at the time of Conception the same is the Horoscope of the Nativity But what a foolish subterfuge is this whenas the exact time of Conception is as hard to be known as that of the Nativity And if it were known there is yet no certainty some coming sooner some later as every Mother Nurse or Midwife knows full well nor will any of them presume to tell to a day when a woman shall be brought to bed In Animodar the Nativity is either Conjunctional or Preventional that is either after or before the Conjunction of the Sun and Moon If the Interlunium precede the time of the birth the degree is to be noted in which it happens if the Plenilunium that degree in which that Luminary is that is above the Horizon in
understand the Providence of God the purpose of Prophecies and the Authority of that Religion which God has peculiarly appointed us to walk in without external assistances How can you make a due judgement of the Truth of Christianity without a rational explication of the Prophecies that foretold the coming of Christ without weighing what may be said concerning the authentickness and uncorruptedness of his History in the Gospels and without considering the Reasonableness of all those Miraculous matters there recorded concerning him and of what is behinde for him to perform at his visible return to judge the quick and the dead No light within you unassisted of helps without and of the knowledge of History Tongues and Sciences and carefull exercise of Reason that excellent gift of God to mankinde can ever make you competent Judges of this matter 9. And as you do thus forfeit the knowledge of the Truth by this sullen Self-sufficiency of yours within so do you also endanger your eternal Salvation For you cannot justly excuse your selves by the close following the light within you if you do it in such a contemptuous manner that you will listen to nothing offered you from without though never so accommodate and agreeable to those rational Faculties God has given you Wherefore it being no necessitated ignorance but your own wilfulness that has made you Apostates from the Law of Christ your unbelief is no abrogation of that Law to you but stop your ears as hard against it as you can yet you shall be judged by it at the last day when you having not served God as he would be served he will assuredly reward you as you would not be rewarded For there is no other Name under Heaven whereby we must be saved but that of Iesus Christ of Nazareth whom the Iews crucified and God raised from the dead Wherefore you who make it the chiefest point of your Religion to crucifie him again by celebrating that execrable Pascha or Phase which is your detestable killing of Christ according to the flesh that it to say according to the Letter or History which is to put Christ out of all his Offices assigned to him by his Father and to turn mere Pagans and Infidels think as smoothly and favourably of your selves as you will that doom must pass upon you at last not according to your self-flattering Mysteries but according to the truth of the Letter which shall adjudge all the wicked to that everlasting fire which is prepared for the Devil and his Angles CHAP. XIII 1. The Authours application to the better-minded Quakers 2. He desires them of that Sect to search the grounds and compute the gains of their Revolt from Christ. 3. That there are no peculiar Effects of the Spirit of God in the Sect of the Quakers but rather of Pythonisme 4. That their Inspirations are not divine but diabolicall 5. The vanity of their boasting of the knowledge of their mysterious Allegories 6. The grounds of their insufferable bitterness against the Ministers of Christ. 7. That he was urged by the light within him to give witnesse to the Truth of the History of the Gospel and to admonish the Quakers His caution to the simple-minded among them how they turn in to Familisme 8. His ease and satisfaction of minde from disburdening himself of this duty 9. The compassionablenesse of their condition 10. And hope of their return to Christ. 1. KNowing therefore the terrour of the Lord we were earnestly moved in minde to forewarn you and exhort you I mean as many of you are curable and reducible to the Truth For some have celebrated that accursed Pascha so fully and obdurately that they are become past feeling having not any sense nor hope left of the concerns of another life God having justly given them up to a reprobate sense for the denying of the Lord that bought them But for you whose defection is not compleated nor your eyes sealed up to perfect infidelity let me desire you to make a stand awhile to lay your hands upon your own hearts and impartially examine your selves what you would have where you would be and what good thing you would seek that is not plainly exposed to your view in the Gospel of Christ. You had begun well Who has hindred you What has tempted you out of the way Do you now sincerely seek the kingdom of Heaven or gape after a booty upon Earth Examine your own Consciences and answer to your selves I desire not to broach your shame But I hope you will not account me injurious if I take notice of such things as you conceal from none 2. Search therefore your own hearts and try your selves what manner of Spirit has taken hold upon you since you have been so imbittered against the School of Christ. There is no Vertue you can pretend to that is not comprehended in his Life and Doctrine in the highest perfection and clearnesse How can you then take a new guide unless it be to be led into some pleasing errour And truly it is no small pleasure to the proud to have something separate and peculiar of their own to seem wiser and holier then other men And I desire you to appeal to your own Conscience how great a stroke this Vice has had in furthering on your Apostasy and beseech you to compute if you be still serious in Religion what you have gained by your revolt Is your Reason any thing more improved nay certainly that ye have cut off and cast from you as carnal and unholy Are you more humble and more charitable If you be you do ill to conceal your Vertues who would have the World believe so highly of you You affect indeed to be very homely and sordid in your habits but you do not perceive how sowr your affected sordidness smels of the leven of the Pharisees who loved to be seen of men and how you have but licked up what Diogenes that Pagan Sophist left in his Tub and have chosen rather to be proud Cynicks then civil Christians And if your Humility have so strong a sent of Pride how noisomely does your Pride it self stink in the nostrils of all men your disrespect to your betters your sawciness your censoriousness quite contrary to the precepts and practice of all holy men in all Ages Your Humility therefore being so little your Charity certainly cannot be great For indeed you count all besides your selves a rude unsanctified mass the Weeds of the World fit for nothing but the fire of your Fanatick wrath to burn up I but you will say though you have forgone your Reason and good manners yet you have the Spirit of God amongst you which is worth all If you have shew me the fruit thereof For Pharisaical sowrnesse Contest with the Magistrate affronting the Minister in his publick Function these are no fruits of the Spirit of God but these alone with certain clownish forms of calling Thou for You and keeping on the Hat
Theologers by so muchâ— the more pleasant to the ears of the Atheists 2. That the Resurrection in the Scholastick Notion thereof was in all likelihood the great Stone of offence to those two Enthusiasts of Delph and Amsterdam and emboldened them to turn the whole Gospel into an Allegorie 3. The incurable condition of Enthusiasts 4. The Atheists first Objection against the Scholastick Resurrection proposed 5. His second Objection 6. His third and last Objection 7. That his Objections do not demonstrate an absolute impossibility of the Scholastick Resurrection with the Author's purpose of answering them upon other Grounds 221 CHAP. IV. 1. An Answer to their first and last Cavil from those Principles of Plato's School That the Soul is the Man and That the Body perceives nothing 2. An Answer to their second by rightly interpreting what is meant by Rising out of the grave in the general notion thereof 3. That there is no warrant out of Scripture for the same numerical body but rather the contrary 4. The Atheists Objection from the word Resurrectio answered whose sense is explained out of the Hebrew and Greek 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what the meaning of them is in that general sense which is applicable as well to the Resurrection of the unjust as of the just 223 CHAP. V. 1. An Objection against the Resurrection from the Activity of the Soul out of her Body with the first Answer thereto 2. The second Answer 3. The special significations of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first belonging to the unjust the latter to the just 4. That the life that is led on the Earth or in this lower Region of the Air is more truly a Death then a Life 5. The manner of our recovering our Celestial Body at the last Day 6. And of the accomplishment of the Promise of Christ therein 226 CHAP. VI. 1. That he has freed the Mystery of the Resurrection from all Exceptions of either Atheists or Enthusiasts 2. That the Soul is not uncapable of the Happiness of an Heavenly Body 3. And that it is the highest and most sutable Reward that can be conferr'd upon her 4. That this Reward is not above the power of Christ to confer proved by what he did upon Earth 5. That all Iudgment is given to him by the Father 6. Further arguings to 〈◊〉 same purpose 228 CHAP. VII 1. Caecilius his scoffs against the Resurrection and Conflagration of the World That against the Resurrection answered already 2. In what sense the soberer Christians understood the Conflagration of the World 3. That the Conflagration in their sense is possible argued from the Combustibleness of the parts of the Earth 4. As also from actual Fire found in several Mountains as Aetna Helga and Hecla 5. Several instances of that sort out of Plinie 6. Instances of Vulcanoes out of Acosta 7. The Vulcanoes of Guatimalla 8. Vulcanoes without smoak having a quick fire as the bottome 9. Vulcanoes that have cast fire and smoak some thousand of years together 10. Hot Fountains Springs running with Pitch and Rosin certain Thermae catching fire at a distance 230 CHAP. VIII 1. A fiery Comet as big as the Sun that appeared after the death of Demetrius Comets presages of Droughts Woods set on fire after their appearing 2. Of falling Starres Of the tail of a Comet that dried up a River 3. Hogsheads of Wine drunk up and men dissipated into Atoms by Thunder 4. That the fire of Thunder is sometimes unquenchable as that in Macrinus the Emperours time and that procured by the Praiers of the Thundering Legion 5. Of conglaciating Thunders and the transmutation of Lot's wife into a pillar of Salt 6. The destruction of Sodom with fire from Heaven That universal Deluges and Earthquakes do argue the probability of a Deluge of Fire 7. That Plinie counts it the greatest wonder that this Deluge of fire has not haâ—â—ed already 233 CHAP. IX 1. The Conflagration argued from the Proneness of Nature and the transcendent power of Christ. 2. His driving down the Powers of Satan from their upper Magazine 3. The surpassing power and skill of his Angelical Hosts 4. The efficacy of his Fiat upon the Spirit of Nature 5. The unspeakable corroboration of his Soul by its Union with the Godhead and the manner of operation upon the Elements of the World 6. That the Eye of God is ever upon the Earth and that he may be an Actour as well as a Speculatour if duly called upon 7 8. A short Description of the firing of the Earth by Christ with the dreadful effects thereof 236 CHAP. X. 1. The main Fallacies that cause in men the Misbelief of the Possibility of the Conflagration of the Earth 2. That the Conflagration is not only possible but reasonable The first Reason leading to the belief thereof 3. The second Reason the natural decay of all particular structures and that the Earth is such and that it grows dry and looses of its solidity whence its approach to the Sun grows nearer 4. That the Earth therefore will be burnt either according to the course of Nature or by a special appointment of Providence 5. That it is most reasonable that Second way should take place because of the obdurateness of the Atheistical crew 6. That the Vengeance will be still more significant if it be inflicted after the miraculous Deliverance of the Faithfull 239 CHAP. XI 1. A Recapitulation or Synopsis of the more Intelligible part of the Christian Mystery with an Indication of the Usefulness thereof 2. The undeniable Grounds of this Mystery The existence of God A particular Providence The Lapsableness of Angels and men The natural subjection of men to Devils in this fallen Condition 3. God's Wisdome and Iustice in the Permission thereof for a time 4 5. Further Reasons of that Permission 6. The Lapse of Men and Angels proved 7. The Good emerging out of this Lapse 8. The exceeding great Preciousness of the Divine Life 9. The Conflagration of the Earth 10. The Good arising from the Opposition betwixt the Light and Dark Kingdome 11. That God in due time is in a special manner to assist the Kingdome of Light and in a way most accommodate to the humane Faculties 12. That therefore he was to send into the World some Venerable Example of the Dâ—vine Life with miraculous attestations of his Mâ—ssion of so sacred a Person 13. That this Person by reason of the great Agonies that befall them that return to the Divine Life ought to bring with him a palpable pledge of a proportionable Reward suppose of a Blessed Immortality manifested to the meanest Capacity by his rising from the dead and visibly ascending into Heaven 14. That in the Revolt of Mankind from the Tyranny of the Devil there ought to be some Head and that the Qualifications of that Head ought to be opposiâ—e to those of the old Tyrant as also to have a