Selected quad for the lemma: opinion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
opinion_n	body_n	death_n	soul_n	2,773	5	5.8777	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A54177	The new witnesses proved old hereticks, or, Information to the ignorant in which the doctrines of John Reeve and Lodowick Muggleton, which they stile, mysteries never before known, revealed, or heard of from the foundation of the world, are proved to be mostly ancient whimsies, blasphemies and heresies, from the evidence of Scripture, reason and several historians : also an account of some discoourse betwixt L.M. and my self, by which his blasphemous, ignorant and unsavory spirit is clearly and truly manifested, in love to the immortal souls of those few, who are concern'd in the belief of his impostures / by a living true witness to that one eternal way of God, revealed in the light of righteousness W.P.	Penn, William, 1644-1718.	1672 (1672)	Wing P1326; ESTC R15258	38,470	64

Phantastick and Imaginary Persons is a Consequence of the former namely the Mortality of the Soul That the Soul and Body go to Dust and rise together at a general Resurrection That it is inconsistent with SCRIPTURE I prove First And the Lord God formed Man of the Dust of the Ground and breathed into his Nostrils the breath of Life and Man became a Living Soul Gen. 2.7 If the Breath of Life made a dead Body live then the Privation of the Breath of Life makes a living Body dead since the life it has was from and is whilst that Breath inspired remains in it and if so then not the Soul but the Body dyes 2. This is further proved thus If it was living Breath before it entred into the Body it must be living Breath after it is withdrawn from the Body since the Body makes no alteration upon it but it upon the Body as from a life-less Heap to a living Body and from a living to a dead Body again 3. Though some of those things which are living may dye because they live by the borrowed or lent Life of another yet very Life as Life cannot dye for since Life and Death are contrary as Light and Darkness because very Light can never in it self be utterly extinguished by Darkness so as to become very Darkness nor Truth Vntruths by Error it is impossible that the Breath of Life or Soul of Man can suffer death as here understood for that were very annihilation it self or being from an intelligent Something made Nothing Secondly And he cryed unto the Lord and said O Lord my God hast thou also brought Evil upon the Widdow with whom I sojourn by slaying her Son And he stretched himself over the Child Three times and cryed and said O Lord my God I pray thee Let this Child's Soul come into him again And the Lord heard the Voice of Elijah and the Soul of the Child came into him again and he revived 1 Kings 17.20 21 22. If the Soul was with-drawn when the Body lay dead as the place proveth then the Soul lay not dead from all Motion Life and Heat in the Body as one inseparable Lump But the Soul was separated and when it did return according to Elijah's Prayer and had resumed its forsaken dead Body it revived the Body again therefore the Soul dyed not with the Body nor at all inasmuch as if it had dyed when separated it could not have revived the dead Body when returned In short This place most expresly proves 1st The Body's death from the Soul's separation 2dly The Soul 's certain departure from the Body 3dly The Soul 's living after separation Thirdly Then shall the Dust return to the Dust as it was and the Spirit to God that gave it Eccl. 12.7 This place very evidently harmonizeth with the former and is a pregnant Instance to the Confutation of that Atheistical Opinion and as pertinent here as where mentioned For as Man is composed of Body and Spirit so they have two Originals the one from below Dust the other from above the Breath of Life They have also two Dooms the Dust to the Dust from whence it came the Soul to God from whence it came to be by him sentenced to the Blessed or Cursed State forever according to the end of that Chapter For God will bring every secret thing to Judgment from whence I argue 1. That only can properly return to Earth that came from it that is Dust But the Soul never came from Dust nor Earth as Reeve and Muggleton affirm p. 45. T.S.T. Therefore it is impossible that the Soul can truly be said to return to the Earth 2. That which returns to God is what more immediately and eminently came from him and that cannot dye But the Soul doth to the end aforesaid Therefore the Soul came from him and dyeth not neither can it with the Body return to Dust Fourthly Be not afraid of them that kill the Body and after that have no more that they can do Luke 12.4 If Reeve and Muggleton speak Truth then he that kills the Body kills the Soul too for he cannot kill the one without the other But Christ Jesus the Author of Truth and Salvation saith The Body may be killed by Man and the Soul remain alive therefore Reeve and Muggleton are Lyars against Christ and his Doctrine The Body's Death is Natural the Soul 's Spiritual Mans Power extendeth but to one and consequently the latter is independent of the former Fifthly For me to live is Christ to dye is Gain but if I live in the Flesh or Body this is the Fruit of my Labour yet what I shall chose I wot not for I am in a streight betwixt two having a desire to depart and be with Christ which is far better Phil. 1.21 23. From whence I plainly argue 1. If to dye was Gain then he was not to enjoy less of that divine Consolation which he had living since to live was Christ But he that has lain Body and Soul One Thousand Six Hundred Years in the Grave and may for ought we know One Thousand Six Hundred more must needs have lost not only a little but all that he enjoyed Living instead of further Gain Therefore I infer Their Principle of the Soul's Mortality is contrary to the Testimony of the Apostle for with him to dye was Gain That this was the Apostle's sence I proceed yet further to make appear from his own words 2. The Reason of his streight was Whether to live to serve Christ or dye to enjoy him But this had been no streight if he was to lose what he had and not to enjoy him after departure in any sense as the Dead don't therefore it was not the Apostle's Judgment though it was Wicked Reeve's and Blasphemous Muggleton's That the Soul is deprived with the Body by Death of all Divine Enjoyments of God or Punishment from him till the Day of Resurrection For the Apostle counted it far better to depart and be with Christ which had been a Vain if an In-obtainable Desire as would follow from their Anti-Scriptural Opinion Sixthly And when he had opened the Fifth Seal I saw under the Altar the Souls of them that were slain for the Word of God and for the Testimony which they had held and they cryed with a loud Voice saying How long O Lord Holy and True dost thou not Judge and Avenge our Blood on them that dwell on the Earth Revel 6.9 10. If their Souls lived after their Bodies were Slain then they did not dye together but the Scripture proves their Souls lived after their Bodies were Slain for they cryed for Vengeance on the Blood-thirsty Inhabitants of the World therefore Souls are not Mortal as Bodies are In short Their Bodies were slain their Souls were alive their Bodies were in the Grave their Souls under the Altar worshipping God Day and Night forever and ever That this is against REASON I further Prove First

God whom to know were Life Eternal but this to whom Jesus prayed whom say Reeve and Muggleton was Elias saith Christ Jesus was that only true God whom to know is Life Eternal 3. This God to whom Christ prayed that he would glorifie him was the same Eternal God with whom he had Glory before the World began but Elias was Two Thousand Years or more after the World was made instead of being before the World began and consequently Elias was not that God and Father unto whom the Lord God made his Supplications Object But Muggleton will tell me That Elias was enthroned with that God-like Power Glory Wisdom and Majesty that rendred him all that which was needful to make able to answer all those Petitions and what ever else was necessary Answ If the Majesty Power Wisdom and Glory of God were left with Elias I would fain know what God had to dye with for 't is his Power Glory and Divine Wisdom that makes him God If Elias had them God left himself destitute of what made him God for how can a man leave his Properties alive behind him that truly man him and yet be said to dye in Reeve and Muggleton ' s sence which is That all those Faculties And Properties dye with a man would one not rather say that such one does not dye because that which makes him a true man lives So that their Conceit is spoiled in the over-turning of this one thing for shew the impossibility of God's dying and yet leaving his Power Wisdom and Glory with Elias and the whole Fabrick filled with their many Chambers of Imagery will fall to the Ground for say they without a God's dying and becoming from Immortal Mortal and from Mortal Immortal again the whole Heaven and Earth would be out of order and no right Knowledge or Salvation can be procured or arrived at Much might be urged from many other Scriptures as that God raised him and that he is set down on the Right-Hand of the Most High but let this suffice Thirdly Nor is there any thing in the whole Scriptures of Truth that so much as incourages any to believe the Mortality of the Immortal God 1. Even from Everlasting to Everlasting thou art God Psal 90.2 He that was from Everlasting and is to Everlasting never ceaseth to be as that which dyes doth but the true God was from Everlasting and is to Everlasting therefore Reeve and Muggleton's Mortal God is not the true God or the true God never ceaseth to be 2. Hast thou not known hast thou not heard that the Everlasting God the Lord the Creator of the Ends of the Earth fainteth not Isa 40.28 He that could never faint could never dye because Death is more then a Degree beyond fainting though fainting be a Temporary with-drawing of Life but the true God and Creator of the Ends of the Earth never could faint therefore the true God could never dye 3. And one of the Malefactors said Lord remember me when thou comest into thy Kingdom And Jesus said Verily verily I say unto thee To day shalt thou be with me in Paradice Luke 23.42 43. If Christ the Author of all Truth spake Truth as most unquestionably he did then both himself and the Malefactor were in Paradice that day and consequently it was untterly impossible that they should both dye from all visible and invisible Life Sence Understanding and Enjoyment But I hope none are so impudent as to say Christ spake not the very simple Truth and so would have deceived the poor man and yet I know not how far Muggleton will go in this matter since he told me that Moses in his Discourse of the Creation set the Cart before the Horse and that if Paul were alive he would reprove him and so censure that holy Spirit by which he wrote Therefore it was not the Eternal Deity that suffered Death but that Body of outward Flesh subjected to all those natural Passions of Heat Cold Hunger Thirst Life and Death as ours are sin only excepted which the Eternal Infinite Creator had provided through which to manifest his everlasting Wisdom Councel and Mercy for the Redemption of Mankind That these three Branches of this sottish Opinion are all of them greatly repugnant to that Understanding God has afforded men to measure and distinguish things by I prove First It was impossible for God to transubstantiate himself from an Immortal Deity to a mortal Man 1. It must suppose God's begetting himself which is absurd and impossible since being begotten supposeth him to have had a Beginning that gave Beginning to all and to beget supposeth him to have been before he was begotten and so before he was 2. Such as is the Begetter such must the Begotten be We see Men get Men Horses Horses Fish Fish and every Seed has its own Body as say Reeve and Muggleton then by good consequence the Immortal God must have begotten himself an Immortal God one that could not dye by the Hand or Cruelty of his own Creature 3. It is as impossible for God to become a Creature or to dissolve his own Infinite Immortal Eternal Nature into a Finite Mortal Created or Generated Nature as for a Mortal Created Nature to be refined preferred and transmuted into an Infinite Immortal Creating Nature In short It is as impossible for God as God to become a dying Man as for a dying man to be changed into an Immortal Eternal God They are reciprocally impossible and Blasphemous Secondly It is absurd and Untrue affirm that Elias was God's Deputy and he to whom Christ prayed when in that Body of FLESH 1. He that is Infinite is every where and circumscribed to no particular place but Scripture Reason and Reeve and Muggleton yet they are seldom of one mind own and declare the Infiniteness of God therefore God is every where and if every where then not excluded Heaven the Habitation of his Throne and consequently Elias was not God's Deputy neither was it any wayes needful that he should be 2. That which in any sence may be said so want is not God who is all in all to himself but who needed a Deputy neither was Omnipresent nor Almighty and therefore not the only True God 3. Either Christ did not stand in need when on Earth or he did if not then he was not sincere in his Supplications if he did then the Omnipotency was with Elias he that supplies Wants is greater then he that is supplyed and consequently he that cryed was not that Everlasting God and Father but Elias 4. Elias was not so considerable as Moses who was the first Grand Commissioner of God's Dispensations to the Sons of men as Reeve and Muggleton affirm why then should Elias be preferred to Moses a Meek Man Israel's Leader and who said of Christ himself That a Prophet like unto me shall the Lord your God raise up unto you him shall you hear in all things then not Reeve and Muggleton in any

so span the Heavens with a great Hand and rid with a mighty Body upon the Circle of the Earth which how ridiculous and false soever it is is as true as Reeve's or Muggleton's Conceit Thus far indeed they would be in the right by such a Consequence That Almighty God would have a Body but they would grosly lye in the dimensions of it who say 'T is no bigger then a middle statured man Thus much If not too much upon this piece of old vain Anthropomorphitism That this idle Opinion is against that Understanding which God has given Men to judge of the Difference of Things we also prove First If God were a Person of mans stature it would destroy his Ubiquity or Omnipresence which is one of his most divine Properties rightly attributed to him For how is it possible so inconsiderable a Body can be at all places at one and the same time by which to see and understand all things or to administer Strength and Comfort to his scatter'd Flock throughout the World Secondly If they would say he is present by his Spirit as read Reeve's Epistle to his Divine Looking-Glass I affirm against all Muggletonians upon Earth That then not that Body but that Omnipresent Spirit is the truly in infinite God Thirdly But I would fain know how God and his Spirit can be divided or separated Can any man be truly such whose spirit is absent from him What Body is a living Body without a spirit any more than Faith can be living without Works How then can God's Body no bigger then a Mortal Man's be contained in Reeve's and Muggleton's conceited Heaven and his Spirit every where Where God's Spirit is God is he can never be divided from his own Life and Spirit for God is that Spirit or that Spirit is God they are synonimously or equivolently to be taken This the Apostle believed when he told the Athenians That God was nigh to every one of them and in him they lived moved and had their Beeing Fourthly How was it possible for Reeve to hear God speak with a Voice of words from beyond the Stars as one Body speaks to another and no Body hear besides himself nor the visible Firmament or Air to receive any Alteration or Disposure as ever was when Voices of Words have been uttered whether to Moses or of Christ or otherwise If any say It was a spiritual Voice such talk sottishly no Carnal Ear can hear a Spiritual Voice as Reeve himself teacheth page 47. T.S.T. concerning which something may be fitly hinted else-where Fifthly But I would add from their wicked Principles That if Man be God's Image in reference to his Body then because Reeve and Muggleton declare that a select number of men's Bodies and Souls are pre-ordain'd to be eternally damned therefore God has decreed his own Image to everlasting Vengeance and that to glorifie himself too which one Horrible Impiety I desire all to weigh and then there needs no farther undertaking to his Confutation That this OLD and also Exploded HERESIE I prove This wonderful dark Secret is to be read in Theodorus of Heresies the 4th Book and 10th Chapter where he speaks of one Audaeus who lived in Coelosiria in the time of Constantius the Emperor and grounded his Conjecture upon these words Let us make man after our Image Also several Monks inhabiting Aegypt conceited the God that made Heaven and Earth to be no bigger then a Man Of which Opinion with Muggleton was one Theaphilus of Alexandria they were called Anthropomorphits as may at large be seen in Eusebius Pamphilus his 6th Book and 36th Chapter also in Socrates Scholasticus his six and seven Books this was about the Year after Christ 403. and One thousand two hundred sixty nine years since Secondly THeir second Secret is That God did not create the Heavens and Earth out of Nothing but the Substance was with God from Eternity T.S.T. p. 12. That this also inconsistent with SCRIPTURE we prove First In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth and the Earth was without form and void Gen. 1.1 2. If they were created before they were formed as saith the place then Creation and Formation are not one and the same thing as Reeve and Muggleton assert in their Transcendent Spiritual Treatise p. 16. so that either the Authority of Scriptures must be denyed or else Creation is first a bringing forth of the Chaos or rude Substance and Formation the Disposition of it into such Parts and Designation unto such Ends or Services as that all wise Creator might think most befitting his great Work Enough might be said on this one particular to confute all with whom the Scriptures remain of any force Secondly Hearken unto me O Jacob and Israel my called I am he I am the first I also am the last my Hand also has laid the Foundation of the Earth Isa 48.12 13. To be first and to have laid the very Foundation of anothers Beeing supposeth that thing neither to be before it nor so much as in time equal with it and therefore denotes priority and superiority Wherefore thus I argue If God was before so much as the Foundation of the Earth was laid then was neither the Earth nor Foundation of it from Eternity with God But the Text affirms That God was first or before the very Foundation was ever laid therefore neither the Earth nor Superstructure as to its Form nor yet its Foundation or first material Principle was Co-eternal In short Nothing can be said to create any thing that is equal in time with it because such Creation supposeth the one to receive its being from the other and since God gave its Foundation or first bottom the very material Principle it follows there could be no Co-eternity betwixt them Thirdly And the Word was God All things were made by him John 1.1 13. If all things were made by him then both Heaven and Earth because they are part of all things were made by him but the place says all things or whatever has beeing were made by him therefore a●● Co-eternity of Earth or Heaven with the Everlasting God is excluded and refuted To this answers that Passage of the Apostle Paul in the Acts God that made the World and all things therein c. Fourthly To c●nclude this Head For by him were all things created and 〈◊〉 before 〈◊〉 things and by him all things c●n●●st Collos 1 16.17 And thou Lord in the beginning hast laid the Foundation of the Earth and the Heavens are the Works of thy Hands Heb. 1.10 That which had a Beginning which was made and which was and is upheld by another neither can have been contemporary nor co-eternal with that from which it received its Beeing but that did the Heaven and the Earth and from Almighty God as the place proves Therefore not Co-eternal with him Nor can their idle shift any wayes secure them from the dint of these Scriptures nor the Arguments built

There is nothing Mortal that is not Elementary or composed of visible Matter or Substance but the Body is that only part of Man which is so composed And consequently the Body is the onely Mortal Part of Man Secondly That only can be subject to visible and material Generations Agitations Motions Privations Diminutions Increases Alterations Operations and Corruptions which is of a Visible Elementary and Corporal Substance for an Invisible none ever saw subject to any one of them but of such is the Body and not the Soul by Reeve and Muggleton their own assertion of Man's Nature to be of the Faith which is God's Nature Therefore the Body is subject onely to Generation and Corruption and not the Soul That the Soul is not of the same Nature of the Body I thus prove Thirdly That which is intellectual which in its pure Nature knows comprehends governs and orders all visible elementary and corporical Beeings and yet is Invisible Spiritual Rational and Internal as is manifest from its Heavenly Meditations its secret Thoughts its serious Reflects acute Memory and profound Reasonings about the Causes and Effects of all things cannot but be of a Nature more refined exellent and noble then to fall under the same Generations Revolutions and Corruptions those inferior visible Beeings are subject to But such is the Nature of Man's Soul as daily experience manifests to all that will not wilfully Blind their Eyes therefore though Man's Body be Mortal as being of that grosser Substance and elementary Nature yet his Soul is of an immortal Nature and can receive no Alteration of Being by any that may or can happen to the Body which is but a Well Organz'd and disposed Instrument for the Soul to exert or put forth it self by according to the good Pleasure of God and that creaturely Prudence necessary to be eyed in and about all Worldly Concernments Thus much and enough to this Point That this is as Gray-headed as Atheism we may suppose and that it is not only their only Revelation I prove John the 22th Bishop of Rome and some in the Countries of Arabia held this very Doctrine affirming That Souls and Bodies dyed and rose together of which read Origen and Eusebius Pamphilus lib. 6. chap. 36. nor can any be ignorant that converse with Story that long before since and at this day where Reeve and Muggleton were never thought on this wretched Opinion is but too rise Anno 249. 1423. years since Fifthly BUt their most admirable Secret of all is That God descended with his Body in the shape of a Man and dissolved himself into the Virgin 's Womb and so brought forth himself a Man who after he had lived to such an Age was Crucified and really dyed or ceased to be either God or Man for Three Dayes and Nights That this is in three Paticulars highly inconsistent with Scripture I prove First God did not so transmute his divine Nature into Fleshly Mortal Nature 1. Your Father Abraham rejoyced to see my day Then said the Jews unto him Thou art not yet Fifty Years old and hast thou seen Abraham Jesus said unto thems Verily verily I say unto you Before Abraham was I am John 8.56 57 58. If that which was before Abraham and yet then in beeing the same was God as none that own the Scriptures do deny then because that outward visible Body was not before Abraham that was not God The first all grant the second none reasonably doubt for Christ was crucified about the Three and Thirtieth year of his Life And then I hope none will believe the Eternal Deity was Transmuted or Transubstantiated into that Visible Body for so Christ's Answer would not have been true for that Mortal Body which say Reeve and Muggleton was the Eternal God had a Beginning and was not of that Age the Jews said it to be 2. Whose are the Fathers and of whom as concerning the Flesh Christ came who is over all God blessed forever Rom. 9. 5. If Christ as concerning the Flesh was not God as the Text manifestly implieth by a Distinction betwixt his Appearance in that Body of Flesh and his Divine Essence or Beeing with their Originals then that fleshly Body was not God or the Eternal God was not Substantially Transmuted into that Fleshly Body Secondly Neither could Elias be God's Deputy to transact in his stead the Affairs of Heaven during that Journey which these Impostors affirm God to have taken from any Scripture Evidence 1. For my Father is greater then I John 14.28 And he kneeled down and prayed Father if thou be willing remove this Cup from Me nevertheless not my Will but thine be done Luke 22.41 42. If Elias was that Father which Christ spake of and prayed and cryed to as Reeve and Muggleton assert then either he that cryed to him was not God but Elias really God and so they both contradict their own Doctrine who tell us That he that was born of the Virgin and dyed on the Cross was the Everlasting Father or else that which needeth and cryeth for help of another was greater then that which was able to succour and deliver it which how absurd it is let all sober men judge therefore he to whom he cry'd and pray'd in all Streights and whom he had affirmed to have received all his Doctrine and Commission from and who was greater then all was the only true God and not any glorified Creature For God could not leave Elias his Deputy and not leave him his Power which if he did be left Himself since without his Almighty Power he were not God Secondly I thank thee O Father Lord of Heaven and Earth because thou hast hid these things from the Wise and Prudent and revealed them unto Babes The Hour is come glorifie thy Son that thy Son also may glorifie thee And this is Life Eternal to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent And now Father glorifie thou me with the Glory which I had with thee before the World began John 17.1 3 5. On this place I raise these three brief Arguments 1. If Elias was not the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ nor Lord of Heaven and Earth but a created Being as all confess then it was not unto Elias that Jesus returned that Heavenly Thanksgiving but to his own Father greater then all who is Lord of Heaven and Earth 2. If he to whom he prayed be that only true God and that to know him and Christ Jesus whom he hath sent be Life Eternal then was it not Elias to whom he prayed because all grant that he is not the only true God nor did he so love the World as to send his only begotten into the World that through believing in him it might obtain Eternal Life This most plainly knocks down all Conceits of a Deputed God that Christ should pray unto because supposing that such a thing could be yet he could not be that only true