respect of Man we may so apprehend them without offence because otherwise Gods Omnipotency cannot clearly be conceived by mans capacity But as to these words made framed and formed as they are notionally dist inct from Created they may be thus considerable viz. made into a Vegetative intimated by the dust of the Earth framed into a Sensitive life intimated by the breath of Lile and formed into a rational life intimated by a Living Soul so that in this notion we may apprehend also our similitude to God by a Trinity in Unity And that these words ought to be distinctly understood appears from the words in the second Chapter verse 2. And God rested from all his works which he had creaded and made and likewise in the fourth verse These are the Generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created in the day that God made the earth and the heavens And the words framed and formed are used in other places in different senses but I conceive the word made is most proper to be used here because it is onely applyed to Creatures of the greatest Eminency and that nine times 1. To the firmament 2. To the two great lights 3. To the stars and four times in the second and third verses of this Chapter where the word is exprest by way of Enumeration of what was created and made and then it is twice more named by change of the number as in the 27th verse Let us make and in the 18th verse of the second Chapter I will make Let us make denoting either the Trinity or Angels or the composition of his Qualities assimilating God And I will make denoting his peculiar care But however here 't is said The Lord God made man which are plural appellations though the verb be singular so that Let us make and the Lord God made do answer each other as to the Trinity or what concerns the eminency of mans being made Man If David ask'd the question § 4. Lord what is man so many hundred years after he was made and answered himself that man is altogether vanity or is nothing and his days as a shadow what can we imagine man to be before he was made he was nothing as the word Creation implys and being made he was made of little more then nothing for he was made of the dust of the earth and yet still continuing in this Compact of dust he is still but vanity or nothing And so we may Collect from his four names for he is called Adam Enoch Ishe Chebor the first name Adam signifies earth or red earth that seems to have some colour of a substance and yet when we see how changeable it is into other Elements the earth it self is but a momentary something Secondly Enoch which signifies sickness or calamity we feel something of that and yet that vanisheth for pain or calamity may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning The third is Ishe which signifies crying or laughing both of which are so oft exprest in one wind as the Proverb saith they are scarce distinguishable And for the last Chebor signifying Excellency it is said that man being in honour hath no understanding but is compared to the beasts that perish So that we may well conceive these four words signifie the four Elements of which he is Compacted Adam Earth the grosser part of his body Enoch Water the redundancy of which causeth sickness and deluges of Rhumes Ishe Air from whence allso unds are procreated and Cheber Fire which is the most excellent of all the Elements and so is either common and culinary or supercelestial consisting of Love or au intellect or such properties as belong to an Angelical Nature Of the dust of the ground Man is said to be made of the dust of the ground and in the ninth verse 't is said Out of the ground the Lord God made to grow every tree and verse 19th Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast c. Out here it is meerly out of the dust of the ground to shew that there was a difference between Man and other Creatures in their making so that by the dust of the ground is to be understood the superficial part of the earth of which man onely was made for all Creatures are said to be made out of the ground but not of the dust of the ground but Man of the dust of the ground or earth Now whither this dust was made by a peculiar omnipotent Calcination or other Rarification is not demonstrated but we may conceive it of the most attenuated part of the earth and therein the more Noble part because capable of the most activity for if we consider our commondust it flies like Atoms over the Surface of the earth oft-times being raised into as many dry Clouds as there are moist and by the co-operation of these two dry and wet those varieties of Naturals and Preternaturals which are so oft showred down upon us and seen among us as Moths and other flies Mice and other Vermine are produced And mostly they are Agile creatures whether we respect their volatile or reptile or aquatick natures which I mention to shew that if the ordinary dust produceth such agile Creatures we may collect that our Creator hath adapted to our more agaile body in relation to our Souls far more agile dust the to other Creatures For the Targum of Jerusalem adds to our honor that we are made ex palvere Sanctuarii i. e. of holy dust differing from all other dusts which should raise this Contemplation in us that as we are not like beasts or other Creatures in our Temperaments they made of the ground that is of the faeces or dregs of the Earth we of the Superficies or of some peculiar sanctify'd dust so ought the habits of our bodies to be sublime and alwaies ascending to an higher sphere and not to be alloyed and turned into various Corruptions And breathed the breath of life § 6. God at first breathed upon the face of the waters this was the first universal Vegetative and Sensitive life and motion which he infused into the Mass of Creation of which Man was also partaker But this breath which God breathed into man was of a higher nature not onely giving life and motion for Man had that by universal breath but by this man became a living Soul And as our bloud within us for all things have a bloud or spirit of the nature of bloud is said to be the Vehicle or Conveyor of the Vegetative or Sensitive life so the Air without us in which is the universal breath may be said to be the Vehicle of that life into us and the spirit or life is the vehicle of our rational life or of that divine Soul which flows into us for God works all things by fit Instruments so that our Soul is conveyed to us by this spirit or breath of life the spirit of life passes by
Law of Reason and unless we return to his commands as well a rational subjection as a natural we submit as Irrational Creatures but not as Men and though possibly we cannot do otherwise then what is decreed yet to will to desire to endeavour the doing what we are commanded to do or prohibited from doing cannot but prove an acceptable sacrifice Cap. 2. Verse 17. For in the day thou catest thereof § 23. I cannot but admire that the God of Union should ordain Disunions seeming Sympathies and Antipathies Evening and Morning Day and Night Light and Darkness Life and Death Good and Evil But when I consider that the Morning could not be known but by the terminating it with the Even or the Day but by terminating it with Night or the Light but by terminating it with Darkness or Life but by terminating it by Death or Good but by terminating it with Evil I find that these terminations were agreeable to our knowledge for the several appellations of Light had been infinite and thereby not fitted for a manifestation to us and we must in their knowledge have been made coequal with God in glory and eternity if they had not been thus manifested But these appellations of Darkness were the Foils to set off the splendor of the Creation and Evil was no other then as the evening to the morn or as night to the day or as darkness to the light nor was death any other then the smooth transition to immortality without fear pain or trouble or onely a sudden rapture or exstacy in the ineffable change from terrestrial contentments to supercelestial beatitudes But from the breach of this command ariseth the evil of evils death of death evening night and darkness It is wonderful that Adam should so much erre in the first trial which God made upon his obedience and it is as wonderful that God did command Adam to forbear that which was the best piece of Mankind the Knowledge of good and the termination of it which was all the evil which then could be called evil But Man was forbidden it doubtless that he might not conceit within himself that he had attained Knowledge from the virtue or nature of that Plant but from the immediate gift and instruction of God for certainly God did inform him of the whole system of the Creation by what we may collect by the foregoing and following verses which was a sufficient Knowledge so that the Knowledge he had by this Tree was onely a Knowledge of Intoxication and Knowledge of the termination of Life and a confused Knowledge of Distinction between good and evil which Knowledges were forbidden his Knowledge before being a complete Knowledge consisting of a perpetual blessedness for his Knowledge thereof was onely this that goodness did now terminate by his disobedience and that life should have a period or termination which was a death for by this Knowledge he got a Critical Knowledge as we find by Eves Dispute that Disobedience was the extreme of Obedience Death the extreme of Life whereas whilest he was under Gods teaching and instruction he knew nothing but a quiet obedience and an innocent life free from thoughts of disorder or fear of what should happen but now he knew the termination of that life and that sentence In the day thou catest thereof thou shalt surely die Thou shalt surely die § 24. If it be true what some Divines affirm that Adam continued but six hours in Paradice three before the eating the Fruit and three after I should wonder how Adam should be made sensible of death seeing before his eating he was in a perfect and immortal condition for a Blind man cannot understand a Colour nor he that had never seen the separation of Soul and Body know the effects of it but certainly God did either shew him the Horary Plant or other Creatures of the like nature that hath its birth flourish and close in an hour and is never seen after or else taught him the way of Sacrificing Beasts and by their expiration to know his own in case he disobeyed this command or else the nature of the Death was represented unto him not as an immediate separation of the Soul and Body for we find he lived many hundred years after but his death feretold here was a certainty of a future dying Cap. 2. Verse 18. And the Lord God § 25. God is seven times repeated in the first Chapter and the eighth time in the 26th verse but in the second Chapter verse 7. where the Narrative of Mans Creation is more fully described it is exprest that not God alone but the Lord God said And so here concerning Woman the words Lord God are also used to testifie that in the Creation and Making of both of them God did assume another Title to himself then the single word God God seeming to be a name relating to all his Creatures but Lord more peculiarly to Man and Woman as before is hinted concerning Man onely Said § 26. This word said is repeated seven times in the first Chapter viz. verse 3 6 9 11 14 20 and 24. Now where it is thus expressed that God said Let there be we must apprehend rather as an act then a discourse or deliberation for though we discuss before we act proceeding from the imperfection of our Knowledge and want of power to act things being known to us onely in the abstract and when we do know them we are uncertain of our Abilities to put them in action yet God knows all things in the concrete and his perfect Wisdom and Power requires no discourse or deliberation so that it must be understood in the seven other places that God said and did at one and the same instant but in the eighth and ninth places the word said is not to be understood as a fiat onely but as a word of deliberation rather then action which is inferred from the words Lord God and Let us and I will for in all the entrances of the other parts of Creation it is said onely Let there be but in the 7th and 18th verses being the eighth and ninth time the Lord God said Let us make and I will make It is not good for man to be alone § 27. Man is a noble and sociable creature a secluse and monastick temper neither becomes him nor was safe in the primitive and most eminent time of Adam much less in ours for it oft produceth such prodigious Copulations or contranatural Restrictions as Nature is as much injur'd in the one as in the other therefore to be avoided as being not good for Adam nor his Posterity And of all Societies surely that is most complacent that consists of sutable Tempers Yet some of the Fathers hold that Man is never alone when he is alone Angels or Spirits that attend his most private meditations are such contenting Companions that though he converseth with no other body yet his Mind hath
air the air by bloud and other parts adapted for such receprions so traversing the whole body by Circulation returns again to the place from whence it came for we see when the bloud and air which are more evident to us meet with any obstructions either by nature or accident the Soul thereby is deprived of all its faculties Into his Nostrils § 7. The Egptians were wont to signifie a wise and prudent mind by the figure of a Nose and of strength to his wisdom by the extension of the Nostrils for here it is that the breath of life first enters and consequently wisdom and strength The Anatomists call them Nares because the Spirits of the air do Nare or Swim continually in them nor is the mouth or pores fitted for such receptions The three properties of Inspiration Expiration and Respiration being peculiar onely to the Nostrils for if the Nostrils be not clear the mouth will be foul the breath stinking and the pores unapt for sudation for the Nostrils having through its little hairs suckt in the air free from commixtures it passeth from thence to certain spungy bones and from thence into Mammillary processes or things like the teats of Udders and so immediately to the Brain where the commonsense sits as Judge and resolves to pleasure the body with what is fit for the senses or by certain perforations does again distil into the mouth or throws them out by efflations as obnoxious Now it is certain as Anatomists find that there are two Nervous inductions which go from the nostrils to the very middle of the brain whereby the Life and Soul first enters by the help of the air into the Nostrils and thence to the brain and from thence by the breath of life is virtually transfused into all parts of the body but the Nostrils must have the honor of the first ingress of life and of the first infused Creation or Created infusion of the Soul And Man became a Living Soul § 8. The Arabick renders it a Rational Soul which properly distinguisheth it from the Soul of other Creatures But the word Living is sufficient for all Creatures have a share in the breath of life but Man onely is said to be a Living Soul or a Soul which is alwaies Living It lives here under a notion of Mortality in respect of the body but lives here in respect of it self under a certain notion of Immortality dying as to the body but always living to its self The bloud returns it through the brain and nostrils to the spirit of life that universal spirit of life to the peculiar spirit of humanity to be disposed into individual Glorifications Cap. 2. Ver. 8. And the Lord God planted a Garden Eastward in Eden § 9. The garden here is not meerly to be understood in our usual phrase a place of Flowers or Orchard for Plants but a place which contains all sorts of plants and Flowers from the Hysop to the Cedar from the least to the greatest as the Seminary and Nursery for all future Plantations and this place was Eastward which the Sun saluted in the morning to set us an example of our duty to all orderly motions A place where no Edifices were to hide our lazy or surfeited bodies a place where was no bed to repose on but the lap of our Mother Earth no Valences or Curtains but the shade of trees no covering to innocent nakedness but their leaves no mixtures to heighten our tasts all pure simples no Pensils to deceive or flatter our eyes all true natural and a perfect representation of what a Country life should be And this is as the word signifies the true Garden of Eden in which happy solitude or safe pleasure see what Adam enjoyed He had every tree that was pleasant to the sight or good for the taste but principally a tree for Life a tree for knowledge There was also flowing and enriching Rivers Besides there was gold and precious stones enough to satisfie a contented mind not Avarice And above all he had opportunity there to express a harmless industry it seems one of the pleasures of Paradise And there he put the Man whom he had formed § 10. Not the man whom he had Created out of nothing and by meer Creation could do nothing but being formed or a Soul infused into that lump of Creation he was thereby impowered to act and that he might have some materials to work upon he was there put or placed And certainly not onely Adam but every man hath his native Paradise every part of the World hath its varieties and may afford us satisfaction for the body and the mind And it is either the original Itch in us or want of true Education or Instruction or curious ambition or an uncontented mind or a continued punishment upon us mortals that no place no station where we are can hold us nor no Paradise or pleasure retain us from further inquiries It is not said he put the Man there whom he had created or made or framed but the Man that he had formed to shew that the Mind or Soul of Man wheresoever placed with the body might make any place contenting if it transgressed not its Rules and Boundaries Cap. 2. Ver. 9. And out of the ground § 11. Man as I shewed in the seventh verse is said to be made not onely of the ground but of the dust of the ground and here every tree is said to be made out of the ground but not of the dust so that Man hath a Constitution by himself and yet as made of the ground he partakes of all plants for homo est Arbor inversa i. e. man is a tree invers'd and is called homo because he is ex humo or ex humida parte terrae i. e. out of the humid part of the earth He hath his dust and moisture i. e. he is agile and apt for motion yet fixt in his materials whereas plants are not so they are fixed in the ground and have no motion but of Vegetation except what is said of the Mandrake and the feeding Lamb Perkinson p. 118. yet they also die if the fibras that oblige them to the earth be cut asunder And Man hath very little advantage when we consider that in all his postures sitting lying or standing still he is fixed to the earth or to some materials made of the earth swimiming in the water leaping in the air being but forced motions and of no continuance And this is called our Vegetative life although in a plant there is also a sensitive life 〈◊〉 as is seen in the sensible and other known plants of that nature Now as man is made of the dust of the ground plants are more proper out of the ground and they have two advantages over Man first in their heighth above ground 300 foot and more high and next by perforation in the ground some conceiving that the sap root of an Oak
may by art be made to represent the form of it self whilst it had an entire being This may be seen from the distillation of Plants that is the Extract of them As for example Make of Rosemary such a Liquor as we call the sulphur by some the essence or spirit of it and put it into a Viol or glass closed up as Chemists do after a little setling it shall by a certain kind of vapour or mist represent to the eyes the very shape of Rosemary And this may be more easily illustrated by another Experiment About the spring time when the bark begins to run take a young Ash and saw it off about a foot from the ground then make a Concave hole in it and cover it and the sappy juice or bloud of it will rise up and fill the hole then Lave out so much water as rises in it and put it into a glass and stop the glass as Chemists do by closing the Metal of the glass and every spring you shall discern in the glass as it were an Ash tree Now I cannot tell whether the Mist mentioned in Genesis was the Essence with which God then indued all Vegetables making them conspicuable to Man which before was not And by this we may judg of the rational and vegetative soul this had perfection of information from this Mist which watered the Earth The other from the breath of the Almighty And whether by this breath is meant a misty and waterish humour if with reverence we may so conceive of the divine breath or according to my former opinion is uncertain But if either then the Operations of the one may well advance the belief of the other And if this Experiment should hold in mans body as in Vegetables how easie is it to conceive the manner of mans resurrection when by God Chemistry the Essence of each man in an instant represents to God or to Man being made capable of such a sight the true Effigies and proportion of his body And in this notion why may not I make use of that Metaphorical Speech of David Put my tears into thy bottle O Lord which tears were the tears of Compunction and sorrow for sin proceeding from a Contrite heart and a devout brain not from the Redundancy of a salt humour so that I may call such tears the very Liquor of life Now whether such Cordial tears if they were put into a glass would represent Man David that understood the secrets of God knew best And the experiment were not unworthy the Tryal by a Penitent Christian to weep till he saw himself in his own tears But because there is seldom in man that true distillation or extract of tears which there ought to be the experiment may be fallible But that which may more easily be tried is to take a Starling and cover it with two wooden hollow dishes and it will weep it self to death and that Liquor were a fit subject for the Experiment of sensitive souls till we can meet with a more certain one for the rational But to go a little further with some notions or fancies concerning our Resurrection If by a Cabalistical Geometry it could be found out how many humane bodies the Earth could afford out of its bulk of which mens bodies were at first are still and shall be as it were remade allowing to each humane body such a proportion of its mould or dust as will make it suitable to the most perfect pattern for the best Divines hold we shall rise with perfect bodies and of such perfect dimensions as I have writ in a former Chapter in this book I believe the general resurrection might then be known If also by an Historical Accompt it might be given in how many such parts of the Earth have been already informed by souls and how much still remains to be informed But because Art may be fallible in so great a work of Phancy we must submit to Faith by which I believe that when the whole Earth shall be disposed into bodies that which we call the General Resurrection will follow And that when Heaven and Earth shall pass away the bodies of the wicked shall remain in the place of the Earth which shall be their Hell and the bodies of the just in the place of the Coelestial Orbs which shall be their Heaven This kind of Resurrection or resumption of our Earth doth not cross the Scriptures but confirm them which sayes the Earth shall be no more and that it shall be Consumed by fire for by this resumption or transformation the Earth shall as it were be turned into nothing because its parts shall become another thing And there is a necessity that fire should do this for we see how metals will admit several mixtures with other metals but let fire come once to dissolve them and they will all run with violence each to his proper kind Now seeing this I can easily believe that each body though divided into Millions of parts in the general Conflagration will run nimbly through all mediums to that soul which once in one bulk they own'd and which I still believe with a diffusive virtue constantly hovers over it in its dissections And in this dissolution or mutation to confine my speculations to what our Divinity imparts the godly being of a more refined metal shall run one way and the ungodly as David says shall be put away like dross Now that our Terrestrial bodies shall not be consumed or annihilated by this fire I have seen experimented in Iron Kilns where the Iron stone is dissolved there you shall very often find large pieces of Charcole fall down with the Liquid Iron into the Furnace This Charcole is made of the Withy-tree which grows frequently in Worcestershire where I first observed it and from thence when the Iron is let forth it will swim out with it but floting on the top of the Iron and those pieces of Charcole the fire hath no power over or doth not consume But that which gives a more delicate relish to the soul is another trivial Experiment that if a Combustible matter be joyned to that which is not so Combustible the less Combustible will preserve the Combustible from destruction As for example Take a piece of Thred and tie it close about a piece of Iron and the flame of a Candle will never burn it so out bodies though combustible being then joyned to our souls of a spiritual and uncombustible matter will be preserved from destruction and power of the Fire And though these Conclusions by Fire be pertinent to the manner of our resurrection in so many variations yet because the reunion of our parts is the knottiest piece of our belief I shall assist mine with two Observations concerning the Magnetick and concatenating virtue of most Creatures either entire or in parts by which may be seen their inclination to union As in the greedy society of men to men and sometimes fat men to lean
their Numberand Measure Geometrical Proportion as shall be further shewed These two the first and last Proportions are This fully explains that the Circular proportion hath reference to the Superior part of the body the Triangular to the inferior calling them the first and last proportion The one Immortal Perfect Masculine Now in the first Superior or half Circular proportion which is from the head to the Navel is properly seated the Soul although virtually it opperates in all other parts of the Body and therefore is called the Immortal Perfect Masculine part The other Mortal Imperfect Feminine In the last inferior or Triangular part which is from the Nave to the feet alluding to the flesh is nothing but Corruption Imperfection and the excrementitious parts of Nature and may justly be called the Mortal Imperfect Feminine And 'twixt them both a Quadrate is the Base Composed equally by Seven and Nine The Exterior extensive parts of Man being thus composed and described by a Circular and Triangular sorm here he shews the proportion both of Man and Woman for for as Hercules his whole body was delineated by making use only of his Thumb so may every mans the exact length of his Face being once known for every body is eight nine or ten times as long as his face according as he is nearer or further from a true proportion But the most famous Arcists agree that the exact length of a man ought to be but nine faces of a woman but seven that is the body of man from the Chin ought to be eight times as long as the face and of a woman six times And lest the Error of the face should give an Error to the body the face ought to be so composed that from the top of the forehead to the dint of the Nose and from the dint of the Nose the length of the Nose and from the bottom of the Nose to the turn of the Chin should be of an equal measure and distance And so likewise from the dint of the Nose to the exterior parts of each Eye and from that part of the Eye to the setting on of each Ear of the same distance the rule for the proportion and measure of which distance ought to be from the top of the thumb to the second joynt of the thumb Then his bredth stom side to side and thickness from back to stomach is answerable And this symmetry is not onely in the outward Lineaments but in the inward for the Guts of Man do also confirm this proportion of seven and nine being nine or seven times the length of the body Had not this exactness been observed the sixteen Italian Artists had never agreed who resolving each man to make a sixth part of a Man without seeing each other or any model given but what was apprehended by them to be the just proportion of Man when each of them brought their part to be joyned together it seemed as the Act of one intire Artist and Workman and not of many And 't is not onely thus in number and measure but in weight for the Heart as I have shewed elsewhere by the Conjectures of some for it cannot otherwise be demonstrated weighs two strains at the Birth and increaseth to fifty grains and then decreaseth by two grains as he declines in years to his Infant Age if the Almighty thinks fit to give him such a Continuation And not onely man but woman is made by this Geometrical proportion of seven and nine which numbers being conjoyned make sixteen that is a Quadrat a Quadrat number being that which is formed of its own parts and there is a proper and improper Quadrat because it consists of odd parts as three times three is nine which is an improper Quadrat but four times four is sixteen which is a proper Quadrat because it consists of equal parts which is the Quadrat here meant and this Quadrat is called Base which if it be meant according to the English word Base id est vile or beastly this Conjunction of Man and Woman so improperly used or with such immoderacy that thereby we weaken or abuse our Castle of Alma or Temperance it is most base sordid and beastly Or if from the Geometrical or Musical word Base or Basis which is most significant then if this ground-work or Foundation or Musical Key be compacted by a divine chaste and solemn compact we make a proper Quadrat and perfect Diapase Nine is the number set in Heavens place All which compacted make a goodly Diapase And this compact is made when nine stands in Heavens place for Man being understood by nine consisting as I said of nine parts is oft called God and as God being himself a Trinity governs Man so Man an Inferior God having in himself a Triple Trinity nine or three times three should govern the Woman by keeping the proper distance above seven of which proportion Woman consists which God hath allowed him that is two seven being so many short of nine rather allowing her one to make her even with him then either by too much subtracting from himself and giving her a number above him or robbing her of less then she should have But this fair compact by allowing her one out of his number God himself allowed when he made her of one of his Ribs by the addition of which one the seven becomes eight so there is two eights which makes the goodly Diapase The sweetest the most Harmonious and Mystical concord in Musick as we see by two Lutes or silver Bowls the one being struck the other answers an eight without striking Thus numbers from oddness become even when Circles Triangles Genders Perfection and Imperfection Mortality and Immortality concurred and were combined in so Divine a Work But to return to the word of our Translation The Lord God Made Translators do promiscuonsly render these words viz. § 3. Made Formed Framed and Created But where the word Created is used after the general Mass of Creation as in the zith verse God created the Whale and in the 27th verse God created Man it is to be understood that God created some singular and more eminent Piece besides the original Mass and so saith the Targum of Jerusalem Creavit eum duabus creationibus i. e. He created Man by two singular and universal Creations Now the word Made signifies a Temperament of that singular Creation with the universal Framed relates to the proportions and Formed to the Life or Soul of the thing created so that Man was created with other Creatures out of the main Mass then he was created with some peculiar additions after which he was made into Quantities and Qualities in gross then Framed into certain regular dimensions and proportions and lastly Formed or as the Schools call it informed with a Soul Now whether God did all this in order of Time I shall not dispute for in tespect of Gods Works they have no distinction of Time but in
to us which Adam well understood before God said in express terms Adam where art thou And doubtless the invisible expostulations between them were to this effect How now Adam Thou whom I created from nothing thou whom after Creation I made superintendent of all Creatures and for whose sake I made them all to be a pleasure to thee thou who wert to Prune Dress those delicacies which I had Planted in the Garden Thou who hadst the freedome of Art to imitate and imbellish what I had fixt in the nature of each Plant Thou who hadst the Knowledge of all Creatures and a more particular neerness to the Creator must thou so seclude thy self that I must say Where art thou Art thou performing thy duty art thou injoying what I allow thee or doing what I Commanded thee And to this effect did the voice of God speak to Adam who answered Cap. 3. Verse 10. And Adam said § 19. I heard thy voice in the Garden c. It is not enough to heare Gods reproving voice but Divines say that to repentance there belongs Confession Contrition and satisfaction He confest his fear but not his fault nor was there any Contrition but for his Nakedness not his Crime and for satisfaction it was impossible for he having disobey'd in eating what was forbidden he could not satisfie by uneating what he had eat Vomit is not a discharge of drunkenness but an additional Crime Charitable Actions do not satisfie for extortion but rather adds a greater Crime by getting and dosposing of that which ought not justly to be at his disposition So that he heard Gods voice and shewed his Terror but no Confession de discovered his guilt but no Contrition he gives Excuses but no satisfaction to a God who had been so kind so liberal so indulgent to him And I was affeard The proper English word expressing Fear is affeard not affraid for affraid comes from Fray or Fraction of that Unity which ought to be with men but affeard is from auferre or a supposition that something shall be taken from us And the Latin word for Fear is timor that is a present apprehension te mori that the object of fear will produce death to the event for though we do not discoursively as here dilate upon the Circumstances yet whatever happens to a man by loss or cross yet the result is immediately in the breast of man timor or te mori that such an accident will occasion death And I find it in the Syriac of which I have writ in my Preface to the Proverbs where 't is said The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom 't is translated Timor Mortis The fear of death is the beginning of wisdom And this was the beginning of Adams Wisdom in his imperfections for whilst he was in Perfection he neither feared nor was ashamed of his Actions or that Death would ensue And Doubtles the nearer our Actions are done to such uprightness the nearer wee are to his primitive perfection But sin or disobedience either to God or Man causeth both shame and fear Now the reason of his fear is given Because I was naked § 20. He was deprived says the Chaldee De veste Onychina of his garment of vertue which was restrained to obedience in not eating the Fruit or forbearing to do what was forbidden in not dressing the Garden or pursuing just honest and beneficial imployments to himself and others and thereby not doing what was Commanded and being sensible that he had divested himself of his garment Perfection and that he had no defence for his disobedience he tryed what the Shades of the evening and the trees would do And I hid my self § 21. The Text saith not in what manner he hid himself but it is much that neither the Tincture of his former perfection nor the fear of God which is the beginning of Wisdom which certainly he knew as well as Solomon And we may see by this Text that he had the fear of the Lord yet it did not teach him Davids lesson If said he I ascend up to Heaven thou art there if into the deep thou art there also c. For then he could not have been so ignorant of Gods omnipresence as to think that a few trees or bushes or caves or the night could hide him For my part I think his hiding an additional sin equal to the eating the Fruit first by distrust of Gods kindness who might have pardoned him if he had not fled from the offence for this in our Laws Consummates the Crime and next as great a distrust that God could or would not cloath him in his nakedness And it continues still an Error in his posterity who in Want or Poverty or in our offences betake our selves to subterfuges which aggravates the crime even with God and Man Cap. 3. Ver. 11. And God said Who told thee that thou wast naked § 22. Hast thou eat of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat This word Who might be an argument for the Prae-Adamite as if there were some other man to converse with had not God explained himself in the sequel of the question Hast thou eaten of the tree c. To shew that even dumb Creatures may convince us of our errors and the virtues which are in them correct us of our vices Things which are of a sanative nature tell us our charitable duty to others things of a destructive nature tell us we are to avoid the doing of what is prejudicial to others And it seems this tree had a double nature it had a virtue to tell him the goodness he had lost by his disobedience and an evil quality to teach him excuses And 't is no wonder this tree should have this double quality when we see the Bee suck out of every herb Honey full of good and medicinal virtues and supplies her sting with a matter poisonous hurtful and evil And the truth is not this Tree onely but all individual Creatures have their good and evil in them The good of the Tree was in the present pleasure to the eye and taste the evil was in some poisonous quality which not onely infected him and Eve with all their infirmities but by a traductive quality hath made us desire and do those things we should not Nor need we wonder at this continuing quality when we see the Gums of Trees continue a Balsom for an hundred years And the Italians hold that the longer some Poisons are kept they are the more efficacious And both of them have not onely power over the Body but the very Mind which is very near of kin to the Soul So that the virtues of some things make men good by rectifying their tempers the vicious quality of the same intoxicate and make men mad or worse Nay the virtues of the same individual Creature restores to life the vicious part a present death But that which is more
Lightning which vanisheth with its sight Advancements to Honour do but tumble us so many degrees lower Riches sill us with cares Plenty with diseases Pleasures with sorrows and the same dust that in the Sunshine of Prosperity is raised beyond its centre is by the Showres of Adversity turned into mire and dirt and made so contemptible that all passers by do shun it And thus by a circular motion we are made exhal'd deprest and involved in the restless common mass of earth undistinguishable from all things But in our souls which seem to have nothing to do here but to attend the motions of our dust and to give an account of every atom thereof when the Cherubims shall be permitted to admit us into that heavenly Paradise which we believe is reserved for us Cap. 3. Ver. 24. So he drove out the man § 42. and he placed at the east end of the garden of Eden Cherubims and a flaming sword which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life The Arabick Translation saith Angels instead of Cherubims which word Angels in a general notion includes all the Degrees of Angels now the Schoolmen agree that there are nine Orders of them viz. according to Dionysius Seraphims Cherubims and Thrones Archangels Angels and Vertues Dominations Principalities and Potestates Yet they do not all agree in the ranking them for some place Cherubims in the last Order but one but whether first or last we find the Order of Chetubims onely appointed to this service And as for the Flaming Sword the word Versatilis is used here for Turning every way and is the same word which described the Serpent that tempted Eve viz. Serpens versatilis and thereupon it may well be conjectured that by this flaming sword c. is meant an order of evil Angels appointed also to guard the way to the tree of life For as there are Nine Orders of good Angels so the Schools make nine Orders of Evil Angels viz. Belzebub Diabolus and Belial Asmodeus Sathan and Merim Abaddon Asteroth and Mammon Now of these Merim the sixth Order is called Daemon Igneus and is that Order say they which guides the Lightning and Thunder and all ignital motions and the study of Divination by fire is called Piromancy So that this Tree being kept by Evil Angels Intimates to us that Immortality should not be gained by any of the race of Humanity untill God thought fit to open the way to it and dismiss those Guards and then the Good shall eat of that tree of Life and the one thereby enjoy their endless felicities and the others their endless miseries if Origens Opinion be not more favourable to the latter But concerning Angels I have written elsewhere Cap. 4. Verse 1. And Adam knew his Wife § 49. and she conceived and bare Cain and she said I have gotten a man of the Lord. The Arabic Translation saith Coivit instead of Cognovit however both words signifie the Doing the Act of Generation which is still but a Tilling of earth according to command For how many have died in the very act either by suffocating of the Spirits or too violently transmitting them But I observe that the word Cognovit is used by almost all Latine Translators and I conceive justly rendered from their Original which comes from Cognitio Knowledge And therefore we need not wonder that so many Philosophers did contend that the Venereal Sense should be ordained a Sixth Sense because as I suppose all our Knowledge is made Derivative by that act Besides the commixture of Spirits in Coition make such Congratulatory expressions to each other that their very souls seem to be in an Extacy whilst the spirits are thus in Communication and mutually imparting as it were the Method of Creation now in the instant to be traduced into a procreation By the way I observe 't is said that God drove out the Man but the Womans expulsion not mentioned yet here she shewed the first example of her goodness and kindness without Cumpulsion to follow and accompany him in all his labours and misfortunes which is the most excellent property of a wife yet she was no sooner come into the wide world but she shewed her Ambitious mind for the Targum of Jerusalem reads this and Adam knew his wife who desired an Angel and that Targum saith that she Conceived and brought forth Cain and said I have got a Man or Angel of the Lord from whence that opinion might arise That Mens bodies were only prisons here below for Angels and that which we call souls are no other then imprisoned Angels and that after this Confinement they return again to the Beatifical vision However her ambition was punisht in her production of Cain who set the first bad example of Cruelty and Imhumanity Cap. 4. Ver. 2. And she again bore his brother Abel § 50. and Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain a tiller of the ground We find nothing in this Text of the Education of Adams two sons in their Infant years but so soon as they were fit for imployment Adams discretion guided the choice and Eves fondness did not obstruct it which is a good rule for mothers He saw the mild nature of Abel and robustous nature of Cain as is evident by their story And it is said here by the Septuagint Fact us est instead of Fuit Abel was made that is Abel by that nature which God had infused into him was made fit for that Imployment And Adam perceiving his sons temper pursued it and made Abel that is imployed him in that calling which was sutable to his nature And the like Adam did by his son Cain according to his nature We cannot force the temper or natural inclinations of our children but when we know them we should rather improve then divert their honest inclinations and certainly these two Imployments as they were at first insused into the two sons of Adam so there is room enough for all their posterity to take a share of them For if we consider the Pastorul life of Abel which is not onely restrained to Sheep for pastor is as well a Herdsman as a Shepherd but hath a latitude of inspection into all such Creatures as keep together in Flocks and Herds which indeed is most usual in tame beasts and from thence we learn Wisdom Sagacity Sobriety Temperance and almost all Moral vertues by them we come to know Government the effects of Union which keeps them from danger and indeed almost all Physical Notions as well Terrestrial as Celestial and therefore it is no marvel that a Pastoral life hath such real and universal Encomiums seeing it affords not onely all the varieties that Contemplation can afford or administer to us but withall so multifarious a mixture of the Active life that nothing can be more satisfactory to us especially if we consider the Products of those Creatures which are under their Tuition whether alive or dead
Exorbitancies which grew up with the exuberancy of the world Besides we see even in our times to what great Ages Men and Women have arived even to two and three hundred years though Climes constitutions vitiations by food and other inordinacies do distemper that harmony of nature by which our forefathers did subsist Now nine hundred and thirty years want but seventy of a thousand and a thousand are but as a span the span is but what it can grasp and why should we labour to grasp that which whether we hold or not is equal at present but disadvantagious not only in the riddance of Anxieties but also procrastinating those happy Expectations which even Common Reason guides us to believe For though there is no mention made in our Translations how Adam was disposed of after he died yet the Targum of Jerusalem says Mortuus est collectus fuit e medio Mundi And it is sufficient he was taken out of the midst of the troubles and anxieties of the world And there can be no doubt but that he who was imprisoned here nine hundred and thirty years for his offence and had worn the badges of mortality in the skins of dead Beasts for his cloathing and digg'd his grave so oft in cultivating the Earth as a reward for his frugality and industry after his death enjoyed such quiet felicities as I hope will be given to all such as shall live and die here in a clear submission to our Creators Will. And he died § 55. We read of three sorts of death the Violent which befel Abel the Natural Adam and the Transmutative Enoch yet these distinctions relate only to the manner for death is the same to all and as the Poet saith there are a thousand ways to it If it be forced 't is still a death or transmuted which is a kind of insensible force it is still a death or according to the extent of Nature when she or the soul being weary of the confusions of this life retires and hides it self from performing any further offices to the body it is still a death And though Adam is said to live nine hundred and thirty years which is three hundred thirty nine thousand six hundred thirty six days in which I compute the Bissextile days and if those days be accounted by hours and those hours by minutes yet it may truly be said that so many minutes as he lived so many minutes he died for the Casualities which occasion death are as many as those which attend our lives and therefore he which lives longer than another passeth by only so many more Casualties his life is not the longer though prolonged because death hath still an Interest in every prolongation and is so clearly concerned that 't is not to be judged who is living or who dying At our Birth we break the Prisons of Death and lie at the mercy of Midwives or other Keepers for our Evasions in our Infancy Nurses and Tutors in our Youth our Extravagancies in our riper years our discretion and indiscretion madness and sobriety are equal attendants in Age diseases and infirmities are ready to usher us to the Grave a more severe Prison and yet with little difference for the grave of the womb gives life to us and the other by our death gives life to multitudes of vermine they by Corruption enrich the Earth the Earth by that fertility affords us food that food supports life And so there is a Circulation of Generation and Corruption and those possibilities being in either 't is hard to judge which is living which dying And it is not only thus in Terrestrials but even in Celestials The day dies the night produceth another that dies again And so in those glorious Creatures in the heavens there is also a visible Rotation of living and dying and our life and death is but as night and day And it seems an incivility towards God or rather an affront to his disposure to desire a long life as if we would afford no room to our successors or permit God to be seen by any but our selves in his unexpreffible variations And therefore the most consonant way to our Immortality is to live in a continued mortification For so we shall live by dying and die by living Of Life Death Resurrection and Immortality As also of the Chemistry of Nature operating in our souls and bodies by which they are forced to rejoyn 1 Cor. 15.22 FOr as in Adam all die so in Christ the second Adam all shall be made alive or have resurrection from the dead The joynt operation of mans soul and body is called Life the Cessations of those joynt motions Death The operations and constant exchanges which Nature admits of are perplexities for nothing in life is pleasure but the enjoyment of an equal and contented mind knowing our selves totally or in our particles to be every minute hurled about with the vicissitude of Constitutions the Cessation or at least our want of knowledg what is done in the grave seeming to be our quiet But how far or how long it continues 't is hard to judge seeing our corrupted parts are hourly traversing into various Productions of which we consist and into which we return again But by reason of this Cessation or seeming separation not only of soul and body but of the parts of the body into millions of forms we to support our belief in the union of our parts seek after the progresses and inclinations of other Creatures to theirs notwithstanding their several Contingent obstructions and therefore I think fit to set down several observables And in the first place that Experiment of reviving a Plant out of its ashes is a noble piece of Chemistry Dr. Browns Religio Medici and serves well to this purpose And though such a revived Plant may want some of its Accidents yet the very revivification of it if it gains not a full satisfaction to Immortality yet it affords us a fair testimony of the possibilty of our Resurrection for then all the Accidental defects of nature shall be volatile but the virtues and perfections of nature fixed Indeed if we could find out by art a revivification of Vegetables in all their accidents we should make Immortality too common it is enough if a man can make any experimental inducement to his faith and give an imitation to future perfection The whole Art of Chemistry what is it as I conceive but to dissolve the nature of a Creature and to recollect it again if not into its superfluous accidents yet into a noble Evidence of its virtues And this is done not so much by the force of Arts as by the secret instinct and greediness of its own disposition to unite its scattered nature And that which is worthy of obfervation for our use in this Art is Let the gross body of any Creature be dissolved or dissected into many parts that remaining part which is visible to us after its dissolution