Selected quad for the lemma: law_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A30114
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Man in paradise, or, A philosophical discourse vindicating the soul's prerogative in discerning the truths of Christian religion with the eye of reason
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Bunworth, Richard.
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1656
(1656)
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Wing B5475; ESTC R176545
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21,633
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105
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finde it to be nothing else but a Systeme of rational precepts commanding or forbidding upon such proportionable penalties or rewards as are agreeable to the dictate of Nature or the Law of Reason Here we have an Eye for an Eye and a Tooth for a Tooth c. Double restitution is injoyned for Theft and Murther is forbidden upon penalty of Death And in like manner for Trespasses committed we finde in the Law such rational proceedings as honest and understanding men would contrive for the due administration of a Common-wealth as for example If men strive together and one smite another with a stone or with his fist and he die not but keepeth his bed if he rise again walk abroad upon his staff then shall he that smote him be quit onely he shall pay for the loss of his time and shall cause him to be thorowly healed Exod. 21.18 19. If a man shall cause a field or vineyard to be eaten and shall put in his beast and shall feed in another man's field of the best of his own field and of the best of his own vineyard shall he make restitution Exod. 22 6. Who can be so ignorant as not to understanâ— this to be reason If we look into other Precepts of the Law which do not concern any private controversie betwixt man and man nor are related to the happiness of any particular Common-wealth but onely to the beatitude of mankind in general we may observe the like rationality as for example Thou shalt not see thy Brother's Ox nor his Sheep go astray and hide thy self from them thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy Brother and if thy Brother be not nigh unto thee or if thou know him not then thou shalt bring it unto thine own house and it shall be with thee until thy Brother seek after it and thou shalt restore it to him again In like manner thou shalt do with his Ass c. Deut 22.1 2. Thou shalt neither vex a stranger nor oppress him for ye were strangers in the Land of Egypt Ye shall not afflict any widow or fatherless childe Exod. 22.21 22. Such-like Sentences of Humanity and Charity are so sweetly intermix'd with the other precepts of Equity thorowout the whole Law that the Law of Nature and the Moral Law seem both to intimate the same thing and both to be summed up in this rational Precept Quod tibi non vis fieri alteri ne feceris Do not thou unto another that which thou wouldst not have another do unto thee As concerning those Meats which are forbidden in the Law to be eaten they are also such most of them as even Nature would admonish all people to refrain of which sort are Eagles Ravens Kites Hawks Owls Bats Cuckows c. and on the contrary those Meats which are tolerated are for certain Physical Reasons the wholesomest food and also by natural instinct are suggested unto mankinde as esculent of which sort are the Ox the Sheep the Goat the Hart the Ro-Buck the Fallow Deer the Wilde Goat c. Some may object That if the Moral Law be the same in effect with the Law of Nature the said Moral Law must necessarily have been observed by other Nations before it was given by Moses unto the Children of Israel To which I answer affirmatively for it is not hard to prove by Scripture that almost every punctillo of the same Law though not as positive but as natural was observed before it was given unto Jacob's Posterity Murther was punishable by the Egyptian Laws as may appear by the second of Exodus where we read that Moses looked this way and that way and when he saw that there was no man he slew an Egyptian which was smiting an Hebrew one of his Brethren and so soon as he had done it expecting nothing but death if he had been found out he hid himself in the sand for his own safety and afterwards when Pharaoh heard of it he fled from Pharaoh out of Egypt into the Land of Midian because Pharaoh sought after him being the chief Magistrate to punish such-like offenders Adultery was also accounted an offence as hainous before the Law as it was afterwards which is manifest by the story of Abraham and Abimelech in the twentieth of Genesis where we read That Abraham supposing that the fear of God was not in the Land of Gerar denied his Wife because he knew that Adultery was so odious even in those places where the fear of God was not that they would rather slay him and then take his Wife then take his Wife he being alive they would rather do Murther then commit Adultery Another example we have in Gen. 39. of Joseph who would by no means sin against God in committing Adultery with Potiphar's Wife although there was no Moral or Positive Law to make Adultery a sin but onely the Law of Nature or the Rule of right Reason How severely simple Fornication was punished before the Law by Jacob's two Sons Simeon and Levi we may read in the 22 of Genesis That Theft was made a Crime by the Law of Nature may be collected out of Gen. 44. from the passage of Joseph and his Brethren concerning the Cup which was put into Benjamin's sack c. Add to all these Jacob's vow of the tenth of all he had unto God and his obedience to his Father and Mother which is in the 28 of Genesis By all which it is evident that the same Law which was afterwards given by Moses unto the Israelites had been anciently practised both by the Hebrews and the Egyptians which was at first written in the Heart of Man and was connatural unto him but by degrees being obliterated in process of time almost wholly defaced it was afterwards engraven upon Tables of Stone whereby it did change its property being before the Law of Nature which did sweetly incline and was more arbitrary but afterwards it became a positive or Moral Law strictly commanding and leaving without excuse Thus much shall suffice to have spoken concerning the Precepts of Holy Writ I come now in the last place to demonstrate the rationality of Miracles A Miracle is an effect produced out of the ordinary course of Nature From the notion we have of a Miracle or from its definition we may collect that it is not in the power of any Creature to perform a Miracle for the course of Nature is a Decree gone out from God which Decree it is impossible that any should have power to alter but he that made iâ— so that the exhibition of a Miracle is a ratiâ—nal demonstration that he that performs the same iâ— sent of God and hath hiâ— power from above From the observaâ—ion of the act we come to the knowledge â—f the agent We say That to produce such or â—uch an effect immediately to turn Water into Wine or the like is an action not natural but supernatural wherefore the agent cannot possibly be
him for their Creation wherein he is said to have rested and is in the course of nature a pause period or full stop wherein most actions do commonly terminate according to the observation of Philo Judaeus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I say although all Creatures do owe continual praises to God for their Creation and do in an obscure manner perform their service therein having also certain secret Sabbatisms in all their actions yet man in a more especial and particular manner hath an Ingagement to perform an immediate service to God being the worlds high Priest to offer sacrifice not onely for himself but also for all other Creatures which are subjected under him according to that of Mr. George Herbert sometimes Oratour of the University of Cambridge Man is the Worlds High Priest he doth present The Sacrifice for all while they below Unto the Service mutter an assent Such as Springs use that fall and Winds that blow Man who is the High Priest of the World hath the Scripture as a Light to direct and guide his Soul to the high Altar the Word who is also the High Priest of man-kinde Now it is necessary that there be some proportion betwixt the Light and the Eye otherwise the Light would rather dazle and blinde the Eye then help it in its performance If the Holy Scripture were not rational and in some sort proportionable to the humane intellect it might rather induce incredulity then enlighten the understanding Thus doth the Soul discourse Then doth she attempt by reason to understand the written Word of God conceiving it a contradiction that any thing should be presented as an adequate object of the humane intellect not under the notion of rationality Herein she first observes the goodly order of the Creation according to the description of Moses to be much conformable to Reason As that the Elements should be created before mixt bodies and that out of the Elements there should be procreated all mix'd bodies in such an order and method as doth correspond the logical series in the predicament of substance that Creatures more perfect should require greater time for their production out of the Earth then Creatures more imperfect That first vegetables should be produced then living Creatures viz. those indued with sense last of all Man who is the most perfect of all living Creatures and that in the Creation of each species there should be also a gradual ascent answerable to the scale of Nature as of Animals first the Fish then the Fowl afterwards the four-footed Beasts and so of Vegetables first Grass and Herbs then Shrubs and Trees That Man should be at first made up of such matter contained in the Bowels of the Earth as is the Embryon in the Wombe viz. of red slime which is analogous to Blood the thinner parts whereof are by vertue of its innate heat resolved into Spirits whilst the grosser are converted into flesh and so all the diversity of parts made up answerable to the heterogeneity of the matter After the Heaven and the Earth were finished and all the Host thereof the Scriptures tell us That God saw every thing which he had made and behold it was very good The very same we read in the Book of Nature For Reason doth dictate unto us that all things are good not onely because every thing in the whole world beareth some proportion or similitude with God who is the original of its being but also because there is no one thing in the whole world which is not agreeable and convenient to some other thing Wherefore seeing that goodness is defined to be the congruity of one thing with another it follows that every thing in the world is good There was no written positive or Moral Law given for the space of above two thousand yeers after the Creation then afterwards the Law was given by God unto Moses and from him delivered unto the Children of Israel There was reason wherefore the Law should be so long omitted and afterwards there was reason wherefore it should be then given Why it was so long omitted may appear by the Contents thereof for he that reads the Moral Law and considers all the particulars therein may observe that the main scope thereof was to establish the Children of Israel into a Commonwealth and to preserve the same Commonwealth by defending each man 's propriety that so they might as a peculiar people comfortably serve the Lord who had delivered them out of captivity Now there are three things required to a Commonwealth first that there be a competent number of people secondly that this people be entire and free neither scattered at a distance nor intermix'd with other people and thirdly that there be propriety of possessions whereby one man may call somthing his own which is not another mans Before the Posterity of Jacob had these three Conditions it was impossible they should be capable of that whole Law which was afterward given unto them Although when they were in Egypt they did increase and became numerous yet they could have no Law unto themselves in regard they were not of themselves a free People but were strangers in the Land of Egypt and consequently Servants unto the Egyptians who had Task Masters over them as the Scriptures do inform us And afterwards whē they were delivered from the Egyptian slavery although they were in the wilderness not onely numerous but also a free People and entire to themselves yet the whole Law could in no wise belong unto them because they had no propriety of possessions To impose a Curse upon him that should remove his Neighbours Land-mark would have been non-sense to the Children of Israel before they had marked out their Lands and taken to themselves proper possessions and so to impose proportionable penalties if peradventure their Oxen should hurt or gore one another or hurt a man would have been absurd before they had any Oxen belonging unto them By this may appear the necessity wherefore the Law was so long omitted Now although the Law was written whilst the Children of Israel were yet in the Wilderness yet it could not be in force until their Common-wealth began but so soon as they had a Common-wealth they could not possibly be without a Law for the Law is the Soul thereof which doth both constitute and preserve the same whereby their confused multitude was digested into a Re-publick and their Re-publick was continued entire without division or confusion The multitude indeed might have been continued entire without so much circumstance of Law whilst it did subsist as an Army and was preserved by one common food Manna which did cost them onely the taking up yet could it not possibly have subsisted as a Common-wealth wherein there is propriety of possessions without the Law which doth by defending each mans propriety preserve the whole Common-wealth in the same state and condition wherein it was first established If we look into the Law we shall