Soul which are more eminently concern'd in the Acts of Adoration seem to be these Three 1. Our Reason 2. Our Imagination 3. Our Affections For we may be said to Praise the Lord with our Reason in these two respects 1. When it perfectly and freely submits to the High Mysteries of Faith or the Doctrines of pure Revelation 2. When it humbly and devoutly busies it self about the Nature and Attributes of God manifested in the Works of Creation and Providence and though they are objects of Revelation too yet have they a sure foundation in Right Reason and Natural Religion and therefore may safely admit of a modest and affectionate enquiry We may be said to praise the Lord with our Imagination when we study to adorn our Divine Conceptions with the most Excellent Idea's with the most lively Representations we can invent Lastly We may be said to Praise the Lord with our Affections when the whole Duty is perform'd with strong vehemency of Soul and intenseness of Spirit with the Unions of Love and Wonder and such like bright Affections as perfect and exalt our most Spiritual performances Of these in their Order 1. We may be said to Praise the Lord with our Reason when it perfectly and freely submits it self to the High Mysteries of Faith or the Doctrines of pure Revelation And is it not an especial Excellency of the Christian Religion that as all its Precepts for Life and Manners are so perspicuously deliver'd and so perfectly agreeable to the best conceptions of Mankind that the humble Person cannot mistake his way to Heaven so also there are such Hights and Depths in the recesses of our Faith as perhaps the Seraphims cannot comprehend And although these Propositions of our Belief also be as clear and Evident as History and Language can make them as infallibly true and certain as that God who has reveal'd them yet even in our modest contemplations on them the excessive glory of the Revelation is apt to strike back and scatter our Natural light into the Confusions of Broken Knowledge and Admiration into Humility Love Praise and Resignation thus perfecting our Natures whilst it confounds our Enquiries So that the most Speculative Mysteries of Christianity how Incomprehensible soever in their Intrinsic Natures are yet as serviceable and conducive to the Ends of Religion viz. the glory of God and the promoting true Holiness as the most practical and familiar Doctrines and encouragements of the Gospel Were indeed our Mysteries like those of the ancient Heathen whose Adyta and Penetralia were but so many Cloysters of Separated Impurity so many Concealments of Spiritual Craft or of Mystical and Appropriated Lust then the nice examining World might very well complain of the Impostures of Priests of the absurdities of a Superstitious Faith but when the Mysteries we pretend to are not such as are made so by Shrines Templecharacters and a Traditionary Caution but such as are expos'd to the promiscuous yet humble view of all men in Confessions Creeds and Catechisms and being thus expos'd they are no Incongruities to our Moral conceptions as most of the Heathen's were nor yet Contradictions to our Natural Reasoning as some would have them for they are not such objects as lye within its Sphere or within the reach of its common Axioms but are rather so many Humiliations of our Understandings so many Gracious Affrightments and incomprehensible indearments of our Souls unto Love and Obedience So that if the thoughts of a Trinity in Unity and a Unity in Trinity amaze thy mind thou may'st presently relieve thy self with this contemplation That all this Unconceivable Distinction of Subsistences extends it self to thy Benefit and Comfort to reach thee out of Perdition and thy Primitive Curse that all this Ineffable oeconomy of the Divinity is thy Redemption thy Sanctification in a Word thy Multiply'd Salvation And considering likewise that on one side we have the express Declarations of Holy Scripture the Definitions of General Councils the Writings and Devotions of Primitive Fathers the Blood and Consciences of Holy Martyrs to testifie and seal their early Antiquity their Venerable Certainty and most faithful Conveyance and then on the other side that there is nothing but Scholastick Subtilty and presumptions Enthusiasm to Weaken or Corrupt them bold Philosophy malicious Cavilling and impious Blasphemy to oppose them I say considering all these things what possibly can deter any good and humble man even in this perverse disputing Age from triumphantly embracing the Mysteries of Faith with a strong and heroical Assent with a noble captivity of Mind and the most vigorous Acts of Adoration Happy had it been for the Christian World if these Eminencies in Religion had been always guarded with a Flaming Cherubim and been only made the illustrious Themes of Praise and Adoration But now alas the Controversies of the Church about these higher points will hardly suffer us to speak Devotionally of our Mysteries Grammatical niceties and Socinian figures have weaken'd the Native Reverence of many Texts Every Dutch Systeme is arrogantly big with the bold Explications of the Mysterious Trinity and of those heights and depths before which the very Angels tremble and vail What if some holy Persons of old perhaps of more Piety and devout Affections than Learning and Phylosophy were admitted like Moses into the Cloud humbly to converse with God about this Dreadful Mystery to be a Bank and a Mound against an eager and impetuous Heresie then raging in the Church and to be a standing Authority against all future swellings of proud Contention yet there is no reason but that there should be some restraint also about this Mountain too to fence off the Multitude and Common Beasts and to keep the Viler Herd at awful distance lest they break through unto the Lord to gaze and perish Exod. 19. v. 21. 2. We may be said to Praise the Lord with our Reason when it humbly and devoutly busies it self about the Nature and Attributes of God manifested in the Works of Creation and Providence And although they are Objects of Divine Revelation too yet have they a sure foundation in Right Reason and Natural Religion and therefore may safely admit of a modest and affectionate enquiry Bless his holy Name Where by the Name of God is meant all that we are able to conceive of his Perfections his Nature and Attributes and those not as they are Metaphysically handled and jejunely mingled with the Definitions of the Schools but as they are most pathetically set forth in Holy Scripture by his miraculous works and gracious dispensations to Mankind Alas it is not the dry Skeleton of dead and shapeless Reason or the Scholastick joynting of prodigious Terms which represent an Image rather Gastly than Admirable that can excite and animate our Gratulations and our Praises but there must be the Life and Features and all the Moving Elegance of the Frame to give us bright conceptions of its Dignity And therefore we find that
Holy Scripture scarce ever meddles with an Attribute in its Absolute Nature but only in a Relative and endearing way and that Creation and Providence which are richly pregnant with all those Divine Perfections which most nearly concern us are the two chosen and most sublime Topi's on which the Eucharistical Psalms are chiefly spent And who among us can forbear from breaking forth into acts of Praise and Adoration when he considers how the Almighty was pleas'd out of his Infinite and Boundless Goodness according to the Freedom of his Eternal Decree I must not say to Empty but to Irradiate himself into this amazing variety of Beings this stupendous Fabrick of the World indefinite to our most Travelling Conceptions and only less infinite than He who made it Here we may behold his Wisdom in its Throne and praise him in the Firmament of his Power whilst we attentively recall how by his Word the Heavens were made and all the Host of them by the breath of his Mouth how he spread out the Sky like a Molten Glass and ordered the ballancings of the Clouds how he stretched out the North o'er the empty Place and hung the Earth upon nothing how he form'd the first Man out of the Dust of the Ground breath'd into his Nostrils the immortal Halitus or Breath of Life and made that last Imperial Draught to stand the Beauty the Dominion and the Sabbath of all his wondrous Works in a Word how ravishing a Reflection must the Creation needs be to Men and Angels too when God Almighty is Represented in the second of Genesis as it were sitting down Contemplating and with all intellectual Complacency surveying the Accomplish'd Miracle And as for Providence what fuller matter for our Celebrations have we than to consider how all the unaccountable Passages here below which seem so rugged and like wild Contingencies to us are notwithstanding particularly directed by the certain guidance of an Almighty Wisdom and in their proper seasons produc'd by a Beautiful Order of Causes that not only Universal Nature but Nations Cities Private persons their Policies Justice Thoughts and Contrivances are evermore Actuated Advanced or Confounded by the imperceptible streams of a Divine Prerogative And that all that multitude of strange Appearances which look like so many Monstrous and Extravagant Lines to us in this position will one day be reflected into a Regular piece and make a glorious Figure in the Beatific Vision I cannot well conceive how the Epicurean could ever be thought effectually to Praise and Worship the Deity only for the bare Excellency of his Being whom he fancied to be like some Persian Monarch Morosely Great full of himself and his one Solitude of a Cloyster'd Majesty or a Providence that never stoopt below the Heavens whereas the Stoic more truly tells us Nulla Majestas sine Bonitate and we are sufficiently satisfy'd that there was nothing so powerful to awaken Gratitude and reconcile men to the Sacrifices of Religion as that Transcendent goodness and particular Care which men evidently found to flow from what they Worship'd I grant the Sun by reason of its bright Appearance and resplendency will naturally excite a Transient Wonder in Beholders but yet I question whether ever it would have been Ador'd as it certainly was by the greatest part of the Heathen World and have had its own Frankincense offer'd it again if it had not been for that Annual and Experienc'd Course of Benefits which its continual Influences Hatch produce and perfect for the Generations of Men. What weighty ingredients and commanding Subjects of Adoration were the Extraordinary Managements of Providence in behalf of the Jews and their Religion And accordingly we find the Royal Psalmist every where paraphrasing on those great and numerous Miracles of Egypt and the Desart in an exceeding sublimity of Phrase in all the Raptures of Eastern Poesie and here might be one reason given why the Inanimate Creation is so distinctly call'd upon in the Old Testament to Praise the Lord because so many of those Beings had started from their own Law and Natures to be either an Eminent rescue or a mighty Conduct to the Chosen people that in the Jewish oeconomy it is hard to determine whether greater Miracles were perform'd by the Ministry of the Elements or of the appointed Angels 2. We may be said to praise the Lord with our Imagination when we study to adorn our Divine Conceptions with the most Excellent Idea's with the most lively Representations we can invent for not only Reason and Judgment but also Imagination and Fancy not only the Firmament but even the Meteors too are call'd upon to praise the Lord. The Imagination is the chief Spring and Engine of our Affections it gives Sublimity Spirit and Vivacity to our Conceptions Beauty and colour to our Expressions and communicates all those agreeable Illustrations which serve to adorn the severity of Reason The exactest Science we are acquainted with cannot supply us with such cautious forms of Speech but that they are full of Solecism extremely defective and inadequate when apply'd to Notions concerning God and Heaven The most accurate wisdom of Words that can be invented cannot defend it self from many Absurdities when positively conversant about an Infinite Object and which cannot be fully comprehended because in such a case there is a greater Latitude of still shewing what a thing is not than what it is But then what we want of strict scientifical propriety in our Discourses concerning Divine subjects may be nobly supply'd by rais'd and figurative adumbrations And this is wholly the business of the Imagination which when it has warily receiv'd the Truth and Worth of its Object from a superiour faculty may be allow'd to raise the Mind into a nobler Amplitude of thought and to kindle it into vaster Conceptions and then to beautifie and set them forth with all those proper Ornaments which usually recommend a speculation to our Affections Fancy indeed is not permitted to give a Positive and definitive sentence or to close up its Period with an Anathema but it may search for lively Representations For such similitudes of things as may best suit with the Analogy of our Natures also for such transcendent and superlative Terms as are most apt to inflame the Soul and to shadow to us the spiritual secresie of Mysterious Truth And therefore the Holy Scripture has every where exhibited to us its heavenly Wisdom in Parables and sensible Types and proportion'd its Revelations mores to the Imaginations of Men than to their more subtile modes of Reasoning Therefore also God appeared to Moses in a Cloud and his Glory shone through a Veil that since the Prophet was not able to sustain his more open Appearance he might with safety understand his Infinity by the concealment of an indefinite and mysterious Declaration and more ardently desire a further Manifestation of those Excellencies which were but imperfectly revealed to him in remote and distant Scenes for no
man seem'd more acquainted with God than Moses and no man seem'd more importunate to know him better I beseech thee shew me thy Glory Exod. 33.18 Similitudes and Metaphors in Religion are those Clouds of Incense wherewith at the same time we both enter and obscure the Sanctum Sanctorum We receive those sensible Representations and gracious Condescentions which God hath been pleas'd to make us of his own Nature and the other World in the same manner as the Disciples did the Discourses of our Saviour going to Emmaus we have not a full comprehension of what is thus Figur'd to us but yet we are religiously affected we have a spiritual Sensation of its unutterable import and our hearts burn within us The Strength and Vehemency of the Imagination will sometimes carry forth the Reason and Judgment to make new Discoveries 't will excite them to take such Circuits and Travels in the contemplation of Eternal Beings till the Soul is ready to swim and grow giddy and the speculation turns almost Apoplexy it will sometimes actuate the mind to a stretch and emanation beyond its present Order to a taste and immature anticipation of unproportion'd Knowledge And this does not proceed from the heat and elevation of contemplative and splenetick Heads but it is the sober attestation and examin'd experience of more fix'd and solid Brains It is reported of a Metaphysical Divine of our own Church that by a long assiduity of thinking and a constant ardour of Meditation he could sometimes refine and sublimate a Theorem to that degree till it became too nice even for his own examination when he had abated of that Temper in which he first fram'd it that when the intellectual fire was out and his Brain was sunk into its ordinary dimensions he could not justifie that speculation to his cooler review which he was certain had an exact conformity to his more rais'd Capacity However we need not fear any Illusion any Phanaticism from the innocent Excesses of the Fancy whilst they are only made the private Nourishment of an Holy Life whilst they only promote our Adorations not determine our Opinions whilst they only enter our Closet-Devotions not our Publick Services or Creeds It being also easie to distinguish by the concomitance or absence of Humility and Love when our minds are gently fill'd with Divine Images or when they are Enthusiastically possess'd with presumptuous Enquiries And thus the Imagination the meanest and most trivial faculty of the Humane Soul under a good management may be an admirable Instrument and incentive of Divine Praise and Adoration even as God Almighty thought fit to chuse the Rainbow that Circle of phantastic colours for the Symbole and Sacrament of his Beloved Attribute his Mercy 3ly We may be said to Praise the Lord with our Affections when our Adoration is perform'd with strong vehemency of Soul and intenseness of Spirit with the Unions of Love and Wonder and such-like Bright Affections as perfect and exalt our most spiritual Duties The Will is also comprehended in the Affections For as the Common Passions in their worst acceptation are the Deformities and Turbulencies of the Animal Nature so the Affections are only the fresher gales of Virtue the more enliven'd Acts of the Rational and Superiour Will and as the former raise commotions and irregularities in the Blood and Humours of the Body so these latter invigorate the Faculties of the Soul making them Heroical and Divine in their Emanations Now as the capacity of the Intellect is much larger than that of the Senses so the amplitude of the Will and Affections far surpasses that of the Understanding and therefore God has requir'd that our Desire and Love of him should be more perfect and complete than our Knowledge of him for we are bound to entertain his Perfections with the closest adhesion of Heart and Soul though we can apprehend them onely with a Partial and enigmatical Knowledge Let men therefore boast of their Mighty Reasonings their close Deductions their strong link'd Consequences and their elaborate Demonstrations in Religion when they have done all to justifie themselves in a cautious advance towards Heaven they will find that the Best Divinity consists in Love and Wonder and that there are such enlargements of the Soul arising from these Affections as none can signifie none can conceive but those who have lain under the Blessed Experience III. I will endeavour to point out some of those Benefits which will arise from a worthy performance of the Duty Now this Holy Exercise being worthily perform'd will exalt our Faith beyond the reach of Sophistry or Prophaneness 't will establish in us a permanent love to Goodness and a temper of antipathy to the contradictions and contumelies of Vice 't will convey our fervent Meditations to such safe and peaceful Heights till the false Beauties of the World make no Impression on us and its keenest Temptations are out-distanc't It will secure all the stages of an holy Life and reduce that Barbarous Warlike Stubborn and Malicious Religion which is now in Vogue to the truly Ancient Primitive Christianity to a cheerful and serene Principle of Meekness Humility constant Obedience and Universal Love When the Soul is made tender with this Heavenly Converse made apt to kindle at every representation of Divine Goodness to meet and embrace with every attribute how vile and loath some must the deformity of Sin needs appear The very Transports of Adoration whilst they continue upon us are a natural preservative against the Encroachments of Vice and when the Holy Agitation is ceas'd it commonly settles into a lively calm of lasting Gratitude and Love But to speak more particularly Praise and Adoration are actions perfective of those very Faculties which perform them For they give a Divine Brightness to our Reason free it from the illusions of Sence and Passion fix it on useful enquiries and in all its Discoveries make it serviceable to the Sanctuary for not onely Religious but even Natural objects may be contemplated and examin'd by the humble Adorer into Mysterious subjects of Devotion and Wonder The True Christian Philosopher even from his common observations in secular Learning will by a due Analysis of Meditation open to himself a delicious prospect of Heavenly Glories pursue every Motion and Effect to its first Cause and Author till he finds his Scale of Contemplation to look like Jacobs Ladder with Angels ascending and descending whilst the proud Enquiring Naturalist who sacrifices more to his Hypothesis than his God will reap nothing but Presumption and Contempt of Heaven from his Conversation even with the Divinest Objects He will call a True Miracle the Luxuriancy of Nature an Extraordinary Act of Providence onely the sudden eruption of a Natural though hidden Cause or at least he will debase these immediate Operations of the Almighty to some cheap piece of Motion and Mechanism that may serve to ease and pacifie his Wonder thus loosing the improvement of his