what the condition of the Body to which it shall be rejoined Lastly what will be the quality of its happiness then when it shall be received into Heaven with its Body there to live an eternal and glorious Life Whether the SOUL OF A BELIEVER Be indued With Perception after Death The First Discourse THat I may come to the Resolution of the first of these Questions whether the Soul of a believer be indued with perception after death I desire that I may be pardoned if at first I enter upon considerations a little Philosophical which nevertheless I shall endeavour to explain as briefly and intelligibly as I am able I lay down therefore as a foundation a thing which remains indisputable among Christians viz. that the Soul and Body are two substances in their natures marvelously differing and in like manner endowed with faculties altogether various for the Body is in its nature material and taken from the Earth and the other Elements the Soul is a spiritual substance almost of the same kind with those intelligences separate from Matter which we usually call by the name of Angels The Body hath indeed certain Organs as they are called by the mediation whereof it is capable of receiving the Images of sensible things and to judge of their qualities the Hearing the Seeing the Smelling and those other things which we name Senses are without doubt Corporeal powers in us and appointed to judge of Colours sounds odours and other qualities which attend and accompany material objects nevertheless 't is the Soul that Comunicates to the Body the power of using its own Organs and imploying its self in the use of those Senses and this appears manifestly because as soon as the Soul is separate from it all the powers of these Organs are extinct and there remains not the least shadow of their Operations moreover the body seems likewise to be the seat of certain appetites and passions For Choler and lust do very much affect and trouble it when they are moved and the part that the temperament of the Body hath in their motions is a proof sufficiently certain that they also are powers naturally bound and fastened with it the Cholerick would not be naturally subject to anger the Sanguin of good humor and mercy the Melancholick soure and sad the Flegmatick slow and little affected on the accurance of troublesome objects if this mixture of humors out of which the temper of the Body arises had not a marvelous power to give the byass and inclinations to the motions of the Soul But so it is that these passions are not moved but by means of some external object that touches the Phantasy and by the Phantasy moves the affections For 't is offence which awakens Choler and 't is the occurence of objects pleasant and agreeable which makes the bud of joy that lies latent in the blood to put forth bloom now 't is the Soul that gives assistance to the Phantasy to receive the Images as external things which either offend or charm our passions variously according to the difference of our humors and that which is more 't is the Soul that reasons with understanding upon those things that are presented to it by the interposition of the bodily Senses and which bestirs it self either to embrace or reject that whereof it hath endeavoured to know the nature and qualities by its reasonings in such sort that although objects have a great Connexion with our humors and our humors a great power to give a tendency to our motions the Soul nevertheless ought to be the Mistress of them and to put bounds to the efficacy of objects and to the motion of our humors and passions And that which I have already said of the Senses viz. that the Body destitute of the Soul utterly loses them experience obliges me to say also of all those passions which Philosophers comprehend under those two general names of the Irascible and Concupiscible that the separation of the Soul doth equally abolish them Whereof the discourses of reason do easily discover the Cause For be the Constitution of the Organs of the Body what it will be it for the use of the external senses upon the qualities of things sensible be it for the Operation of the internal senses as is the imagination so it is that seeing they cannot Act any further than the Soul moves them as when the main spring in a Watch foiles all the other movements stand in a moment it must necessarily be that when the Soul withdraws all the actions of the Organs cease so that both reason and experience with one consent teach us what we ought to think of the faculties of our bodies Touching the Soul we have no experiences visible and ordinary of what it doth or doth not after death and if we consult the discourses of our reason concerning it we find there difficulties great beyond comparison For first of all every one makes here this consideration which appears to them of no small consideration And 't is this though the Body and Soul be two substances very different nevertheless they are so united in man that they make but one subject so that neither Body apart nor Soul apart do constitute as they say any perfect Being or any compleat Nature neither the Body makes the Man nor the Soul but both together go to his Composition and when they are separated the Body holds no place among the particular kinds of Beings that exist absolutely without dependance on each other nor the Soul neither Of the one we say 't is the body of a man and of the other 't is in like manner his Soul of both if they come to be united we say and that properly 't is the man to whom they have this respective Relation Now it seems that imperfect natures produce no operations Every thing that you observe in nature be they such as have Souls forms which do inform and animate their matter as are Plants and Animals be they such as have only a form which in some sort supplies to them the place of a Soul as are Minerals and Metals if you imagin that after their dissolution the Form subsist a while so as the Matter do not exercise the functions of the whole Composition nor will the Form exercise them neither That is to say as the body of a dead Horse hath no motion his Soul if you imagin it to subsist some time after its separation will be as great a stranger to Horse-like actions and operations moreover as it is true that as long as the Soul of a man is in his Body it gives activity to his Senses so on the other hand it seems that it hath absolutely need of its presence and the mediation of its Organs for the forming of its own discourses and ratiocinations 't is the Soul that gives unto the Body the virtue of Seeing Tasting and Smelling and generally of knowing by the operation of the Senses those things that
face of God but even the memory of ever having seen him or learned any thing of him either in the Tabernacle or in the World If he understands by seeing the face of God seeing him as he is seen in Heaven how could David make this wish or holy aspiration if he were of this opinion that sleep should lock up the eyes of his understanding for so long a time Certainly this was not the opinion of David nor any of the faithful of that time or age their common opinion was that which is plainly expressed in the Book of Ecclesiastes That when man dies the body returns to the dust from whence 't was taken and the Soul returns to God that gave it Now to believe that the Spirits of the faithful can be with God without having any knowledg of his presence or enjoying one beam of his happiness is a thing altogether without reason or probability At such times as God promises some particular assistance to his faithful ones he says I will be with you And 't is also their common and ordinary wish for those to whom they wish grace and benediction the Lord be with you If God then cannot be with any person without giving him some taste of his favours how can our spirits be with God without enjoying some gracious effect of his presence Certainly though we had no other proof of the state of the faithful after death than those words of our Saviour to the Thief that was Converted upon the Cross this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise they would be sufficient unless we were willingly blind to assure us that they are at rest but 't is such a rest as is accompanied with much content and joy For that the word to day ought to be taken in the ordinary and common sense to signify the time that was immediately to follow the death of our Lord whilst his Soul remained separate from his body is a thing that cannot be doubted unless by those that out of jocundness of humours abuse their reason In what place of the New Testament doth our Saviour or any one else use it in any other sense And although the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews having met with it in Psal 95. 7 8. to day if you will hear his voice harden not your hearts Understands it of the time of the Preaching of the Gospel of Salvation is there any probability that in imitation of him we should expound those words of Jesus Christ after this manner Verily verily I say unto thee that in the day of the Resurrection I will receive thee to a participation of my own glory in Paradise If such comments be allowed will there be any thing certain either in the word of God or Language of men Doth it not plainly appear that our Lord seeing this Thief in anguish of Spirit through the fear of the judgment of God the execution whereof he expected according to the common sense and apprehension of Conscience immediately after death was willing to comfort him by the assurance of the pardon of his sins and hope of happiness which his Soul should enjoy assoon as it was separated from his Body Either the Spirit of Christ being dislodged from the body ascended into Paradise or not If it did not ascend thither our Lord promised nothing but that the Soul of this person should on that very day be present with his Deity in Heaven Now though our Lord were God blessed for ever there is no probability that he had any regard to his Deity in the speaking of those words For besides that his Divinity was not then so clearly Revealed as that from thence he should begin to give knowledg of what he was to that man who can doubt but that seeing both their Bodies in one and the same condemnation he was willing to raise the hope of this Wretch who in the midst of his anguish discovered some faith and expectation from him by the assurance that he gave him that within a few moments their spirits should be well near in the same Condition in a place of bliss and happiness But let it be granted that he understands his Divinity So it is in my opinion that it cannot come into a sound mind that Christ should promise to the Soul of this person to give it from that same hour the enjoyment of Paradise and yet notwithstanding it should have no knowledg of the glory thereof or the happiness that doth attend it Moreover it had been much more to the purpose to have been content to have consented to be mindful of him when he came into his Kingdom as he desired then by great words to give him occasion to hope for content and happiness near at hand and afterwards fill this Soul which he had made so desirous of happiness with nothing but darkness and forgetfulness If the spirit of our Lord ascended into Paradise doubtless it was not to sleep there for the little time of its separation from the body but to receive inexpressible Consolations in the bosom of his Father Otherwise to what purpose was it to transport it on high Had it not been more to the purpose to leave it buried in the same Tomb with the Body to the end that it might be there united again when the time should come Now if the Soul of Christ could be sensible of some Contentments after death ours may be sensible of them also And no inconsistance will be found between their separation from the Organs of their Bodies and the use of their Powers and Capacities But what need is there of so many Texts and of so much discourse in a case so plain that nature it self seems to have taught it us For certainly it is not more generally believed among men that their Souls are immortal and subsist after the Body than it is generally acknowledged that they subsist with knowledg and sense either of some felicity for those that lived in the practice of Piety and Vertue or of some punishment for those that have given up themselves to Impiety and Vice From thence comes the hopes of the Elysian fields among the Pagans and the fear of the Torments of Hell From thence is preserved among the Jews the expectation of Paradise and the fear of the bottomless Pit Thence is produced among the Turks the opinion of their Paradise and the fear of an infernal state and that without attending the Resurrection immediately after the dissolution of the Body and the separation of the Soul Lastly thence comes among Christians to some a belief of Purgatory to others a hope of a better life than this and to others dreadful frights concerning what will betide them after death when they are not in their Consciences assured of the forgiveness of their sins I say that nature it self teaches it Because things that are so universal and concerning which there is no controversy among Nations whose inclinations are divers whose professions are different and
nature hath indued with qualities that fall under their observation but in like sort if the Body do neither see nor tast nor smell nor in a word apprehend any thing that is sensible Without doubt the Intellect of the Soul will remain without motion and languish without action by default of matter whereon to apply and exercise its thoughts and as a Lute cannot sound unless there be some person to touch it nor a humane body move if there be no Soul to give it Action So it seems at first that as the Lutenist cannot perform the Office of his Art without a Lute furnished with its strings the Soul cannot reason without a well tempered and well disposed Body in short it it appears that as long as the Soul is in the Body it reasons on the Images of things which occur to it from Corporeal things which are formed in the Phantasy and there depurated and subtilised and made so thin small and luminous that they are capable of applying themselves to the Intellect to the end that it may compound divide and compare them one with the other and there make such reflections as are necessary for its ratiocinations in such sort that when the Soul is separate from the Body having no longer any Corporeal Senses to receive sensible things nor any faculty of imagination which is a Corporeal power to polish these Images and make them capable of being presented to the Intellect it seems that it hath lost the use of that understanding by which it is naturally adapted to contemplate on all such objects Nevertheless if we attentively examine these Reasons we shall find that they are by no means concluding For touching the first that which makes that among things without understanding such as are generally all Animals except men incompleat natures perform no Actions is not properly and precisely because they are incompleat but because they have no faculties for them the form being reduced to nothing when it is separated from the matter as doth the Soul of a Horse when it dies it loses its faculties necessarily with its being it being impossible that what is not should have any power of Action As to the matter 't is true it subsists after the form the body of the Horse remains after he is dead but simply under the notion of Matter it hath no power to perform any operations all the power that it had before came necessarily from its Form 't is the Soul of the Horse that gives action and motion to his body the matter therefore having not the form which it had before cannot act as it was wont to do And if it comes to be assisted or reinvested or informed with some new form as if Wasps or any other insects be ingendred out of the body of the Horse as it will have its faculties from thence its operations also will be conformable to the new Being that it shall receive from its new Soul to that instead of marching and doing like a Horse as before the matter whereof it was formed will it may be fly or creep and crawl after the manner of Caterpillars and Worms In man the case is not at all thus For the Body loses indeed its Actions because they depended upon the Soul which is no more there but the Soul is presupposed to retain those faculties which were truly proper and natural to it so that nothing remains but to enquire whether it use them at that time yea or no. I say then for a second Reason that although we should suppose that which neither is nor can be that the Soul of a Horse subsists after its separation from the body the reason why it will not be able to exercise its actions will not be at all agreeable to that of a Man For 't is without doubt very true that the Soul furnisheth motion to the body of the Horse but so it is that this motion is Corporeal and cannot be found in any Being which is not Corporeal and Material they are the Legs of the Horse which are moved and all the parts of his body which are turned and wheeled according to the inclinations of him that Rides and governs him according to his will So that if his Soul were some Thing so distinct from the body that it were not at all Corporeal it self it were impossible that it should exercise such actions apart and by it self alone but as to the actions of the Soul of man whereof we speak at this time they are altogether of another kind and are found in Beings never joyned or united to any bodies For to understand and will and to receive pleasure or discontent from things that are understood willed or refused is a thing that is found in the nature of Angels Although then it be true that the Soul as long as it is in the body makes no use of its reasonable faculties but with the aid and by the mediation of Corporal Organs So it is that these Actions are not themselves Corporeal seeing they are found in Beings that have no Allyance or Communication with Body so that though it be very certain that the Soul of a Horse cannot all alone do the part of a Horse although it should subsist after the body And although the Soul of a man do not use any of his powers without the Organs of the Body whilst 't is lodged there it will in no wise therefore follow that it hath unavoidable need of them to exercise those powers when 't is lodged there no more And by the same method of discourse it may be proved that the comparison of the Lute and the Lutenist do not at all accord to this matter for 't is very true that the Lute cannot sound without the Lutenist nor the Lutenist play without his Lute because to play is to cause by the occurrence of the fingers and the strings of the Lute a certain harmonious sound which as it is Corporeal so it cannot proceed otherwise than from something Corporeal But as the Player on the Lute though he can produce no sound effectively because he hath no instrument proper for it doth not cease the ability of reasoning in his mind upon the measures the accords and diversities of sounds of which the harmony is made when he plays and in like manner on the structure of the Lute and composition of its parts so the Soul although it actually exercise not bodily actions because it is no longer there it is not disabled from discoursing and making speculations on the nature of the humane Body upon the use of its faculties and on all other objects which offer themselves to its consideration It cannot then cause the Body to be nourished or that it move from place to place or that it use its Senses but from thence it will not follow that it cannot make pleasant Contemplations upon the manner of perceiving the Images of things in the Senses upon the marvelous activity of those springs in the Body
for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory Which shews sufficiently that he hath some respect to the day of the full Revelation of our Salvation but that which follows of the destruction of this earthly Tabernacle can it be understood otherwise than of the dissolution of the body That which he writes immediately afterwards that as long as we are lodged in this body we are absent and as it were strangers from our Lord but that through the assurance that we have of our Salvation we desire rather to be strangers from the body and be with the Lord can it be understood of the blessed Resurrection Shall we be then absent and strangers from our bodies or rather will not our Spirits have thereon eternal Habitations I therefore think that the Apostle in that place opposes the time in which we are in this life to that in which we shall be in it no more and that he says that as long as we are in this life we are absent from the Lord but when we are dislodged we are present with him and because although this future time consist of two parts the one wherein we are stripped of our bodies by death the other wherein we are reinvested in them by the Resurrection it is to that in the one and the other our condition must always be the enjoyment of the presence of Jesus Christ he considers it not but as one and the same tract of time in the first part whereof our happiness begins and is compleated in the second which excites our desires and affections to be now stripped of these bodies that we may enter on the possession of those happy beginnings till the time of full and compleat perfection shall come Now this is marvellously far from the opinion of those that take from the Souls of believers all sense and perception whatsoever even that of their proper faculties and essence St. Luke reports that St. Stephen being about to die recommended his Spirit to our Lord Christ saying Lord Jesus into thy hands I commend my Spirit and our Lord himself commended his to his Father on the Cross To what purpose was this then It was not without doubt to secure it from perishing and being reduced to nothing For the substance of the Soul contains nothing of matter nor of the mixture of the Elements 't is of its nature incorruptible and imperishable as are the Angels Was it then to be protected from the Temptations and assaults of the Devil or to be put into the fruition of happiness and glory As to the first it can have no place if the Spirits of the faithful remain swallowed of a sleep so deep that they absolutely lose all use of their understandings For the Temptations of the Devil consist either in an Artificial external presenting to our senses such objects as are proper to move our desires and appetites or in this that internally he forms in our Phantasy such Images of things as may stir and provoke us and in favouring with his efficacy such as are already there or in moving our humours and by our humours soliciting the appetites and passions of our Souls what can these attempts do upon substances which are not at all subject to the motion of humours which in death have lost the faculty of imagination which have no Corporeal senses seeing they are not Bodies and all whose Spiritual capacities are so fettered in the excercise of their powers that neither exteriour objects can by any means touch them nor visions from within be get the least thought there As to the second there is neither felicity nor glory can happen to Spirits without the exercise of their understanding and will There is not a person to whom we say that the Spirits of the faithful gone hence are happy and glorious which doth not immediately conceive that they are so far from being swallowed up in a profound drousiness or sleep that on the contrary they have a very lively and notable sense of their happiness and glory I am much of the opinion of those that think that in the words of our Saviour John 11. 26. and John 5. 24. he that believeth in me shall never see death He is passed from death to life There is a particular Emphasis which makes much to our present purpose I very well know that in divers places it seems probable that what interprets these words by that promise I will raise him up at the last day Nevertheless if since the time wherein he spake those words believers that are departed hence have slept unto this day and must yet sleep till the consummation of Ages without any bodily or mental sense of their condition or essence I am not able to comprehend how the hopes of the Resurrection can perfectly satisfy and compleat the sense and magnificence of the words Although the body sleep after that manner if the principal part of man and that whereof the Scriptures sometimes speaks as if it were the man and the body nothing but its Habitation live and be awake and perceive and exercise with content and joy such operations as are worthy the dignity of his nature death is not properly death nor doth it seem to deserve a name so terrible and odious 'T is much rather a sleep as the Scripture sometimes speaks wherein man entertains himself with visions very pleasant and delightful But if the perception of the Soul and body both be equally extinct and that not only for a little time but for I know not how many Ages how comes it to pass that it is not called death but a passing from death to life And it will appear yet much more strange if we apply it to the Fathers and Patriarchs that lived in the first Ages Such as were Adam Noah Seth and Abraham For since the Apostle Heb. 11. Attributes unto them one and the same faith with us although the things which faith embraces were not so plainly revealed to them as to us yet they ought to produce one and the same effect with respect to them and us Jesus Christ being the same yesterday and to day and for ever Are those then passed from death to life who from before the deluge and soon after were as to their bodies reduced to dust and as to their Souls carried in a profound sleep and total insensibility Truly it seems manifest that they had other hopes and expectations When Jacob after too many afflictions and irksom and troubleous Pilgrimages comforted himself with this that he hoped for the Salvation of God Gen. 49. 18. If he had no hope but that of losing the sense of all good and evil for so long a succession of Ages he would have had more occasion to be afflicted than to rejoyce to fear death than to draw comfort from the near approach and prospect of it besides 't is here very considerable that as he was at a greater distance from the day of judgment
than we are now and as he did not perceive unless it were a far off in the darkness of what to come the manifestation of a Redeemer so also he did not see so clearly as we do the hopes of the Resurrection nor had not such distinct knowledg of the glory that attends us in Heavenly places I observe that David as he approached nearer to the time of our Saviours appearance did both receive from God and deliver to his Church much greater explanations upon these matters than did any of his Ancestors and yet nevertheless had experience of very different emotions of Spirit when he saw himself in danger or in likelyhood of death Sometimes in the Psalms he gives evidence that he was much afraid of death and desires of God with great earnestness that by his good providence and the power of his hand he would hinder his falling under it and these motions of his so frequently reported and repeated in his Writings accompanied with vows so ardent and praises so vivid and full of Devotion when God had rescued him from his dangers do sufficiently shew that this object when it presented it self unto him occasioned terrible agitations to his mind And nevertheless when he was to die he disposed himself to it with great Tranquillity and gave no Testimony of fear or any the least alteration If you enquire of those that think the perceptions of the Soul perish and die with those of the body why David feared death so very much they will say that he himself gives the reason of it 'T is because in death he makes no mention of the name of God nor sings unto him any Songs of praise Psal 6. which proves according to their opinion that death takes away at once both from Soul and Body the knowledg of all things But if this were the only reason why did he not fear death as much when he was old Will it hinder the loss of all sense and memory of objects to die old Or would it be a greater affliction to David when in the flower of his age to lose by losing life the means and opportunity of singing the praises of God than to be deprived of this pleasure and content by dying in a good old age It is therefore much more reasonable to say that David and other Saints of times past did think that God sent them into the world for two ends the one which respects his glory was to advance and celebrate it as much as they were able the other was to enjoy therein for a long time the Testimonies of his Faviour in those Temporal blessings the promises whereof he had given unto them When therefore any danger of death did threaten them before the time which nature seems to have appointed for it viz. seventy or eighty years or if there were in the time of David any other natural and ordinary term of life They were extraordinarily moved and troubled because it seemed that death before full age was a Testimony of the anger and curse of God So that to prevail with God to protect them from it after having begged the pardon of their sins they alledge this reason that otherwise he himself will in some sort be deprived of the end to which he had respect when he sent them into the world For it is as if some young plant should complain to the Gardiner or Master of the plants that having put him in the rank with others to bear some quantity of fruits he would nevertheless cut it off at the root when it began to bud and to give some good hopes thereof But concerning that great tranquillity of Spirit wherewith they received death when it came in such time wherein the untimeliness of it was no mark of the anger of God it came without doubt from hence that it was accompanied with the peace of God and some hope of happiness for their Souls Otherwise by the confession of those with whom I now discourse the being deprived of praising God after death and of perceiving any taste of his love towards them should have given them great fears and inconceivable aversions Some of the Pagans as Socrates have sometimes supported themselves by this meditation against the fears of death that either it did or it did not take from them all sense and perception of things If it did not those that die ought if they be honest men to hope for Contentments after death in the Conversation of those persons that had gone hence before them the company of Cepheus Museus Homer Hesiod Vlysses and Agamemnon without doubt as they imagined would give them incomparable satisfaction if it did there was no reason to fear death since it reduced men to a state of utter insensibility but these persons never tasted any thing of the sweetness of the peace of God nor of the Contentment that arises from the assurance of his paternal love Having therefore no experience of any other good things than such as this world affords they might well depart from life as they themselves do express it as from a banquet after they had been satisfied therewith without much complaint that they are obliged to leave the fruition and use of it to those that were to come after but as for David and other servants of God to whom he had given the beginnings and foretasts of his glory with what grief ought they to receive the news of death whensoever it should be if they had been not only reeling and staggering as were the Pagans between the hope of seeing Abraham Isaac and Jacob and the fear of losing all kind of sense and perception but deeply and fully perswaded that in stead of being put into the full fruition of what they had had some foretasts here below death would utterly ravish from them even the total memory of it This same David testifies in many places a very sensible and deep regret and trouble for being separated from the Ark of God because 't was there that God gave demonstrations of his presence in an extraordinary manner Nevertheless in Caves and Deserts and the wildest Forests he might entertain himself with God and derive from the Fountains of his own Meditations as it appears he often did abundance of pleasant consolations to allay the trouble which was occasioned by his estrangment and separation from it I pray you therefore if he had believed that death would have taken from him all knowledg and memory of God for so many ages what Lamentations would he have made Or could he have found words sufficient to express the anguish of his Soul on this occasion Ever and anon he enquires with some kind of impatience when shall I see the face of my God If by these words he understands the Ark how much more ought he to desire to see the face of God after his death and with what unquietness must he be filled when he considers that death takes from him not only the pleasure of seeing the
as 't is altogether apparent how will it be possible that a Being effectively living endued with faculties so excellent and those faculties adorned with habits so comly should remain so many ages without being awakened in any manner to discover them by some Operations Is it not the property of habits to incline the faculties to action to facilitate the action to which they do incline them yea and in some manner to spur them thereunto And since that man is a being naturally active and that 't is the Soul that gives him this activity and since that which makes the Soul incline it self more to one thing than another in its actions is because its habits give him a tendency that way Why is it that the Soul cannot preserve in it self when separated the activity that it Communicated to the Body and that its proper habits should not have the power they had before to bend it in its actions that way to which they themselves are inclined But let us not fasten our selves on the teaching and institutions of nature Let us consult the Analogy of Religion Certainly all believers have Communion with Christ And this Communion on their parts consists in faith whereby they receive him and on his part in the Communication of his Spirit by which he comforts and sanctifies them Now this Communion is so strict and close that it never suffers any separation And as the death of the body in our Saviour did not hinder in him the personal union of the Divine nature with the humane so that the saying of the Ancient Church is true that what Christ once takes in that regard he never leaves so the death of our Bodies hinders not the mysterious union of our Saviour with us In such manner that those that he hath once taken for his members cannot but always remain so Therefore even after death the Communication of his Spirit of holiness and Consolation abides with us Now what is this Spirit of holiness and Consolation which doth never comfort or sanctify us Or what is this holiness and comfort if it gives us no sense of it self or us When any member of the body becomes mortified it is not reputed a member of it because 't is not esteemed a member but by reason of its Communion in the same life and with the same Soul which is the principle both of life and action If then the Soul do not partake in the Spirit of Christ who alone animates the whole mysterious body composed of himself and the faithful that he hath redeemed how can it be his member And how can it partake of him if it have no use of any of its faculties For the participation of the Spirit consists either in those actions to which it moves and excites us or in the habits which it impresses upon the faculties of our minds Now there is no action where the faculties are deeply asleep for 't is the property of sleep to arrest and intercept the action of our faculties and as to habits 't is neither reasonable nor imaginable that they should be preserved so many ages in a subject where they never discover themselves by any Operations the body may certainly in a sense retain the quality of a member of Christ in the dust of the grave although it feel no effect of the Communication of this Spirit because though it have immediately and by it self no connexion with the head it may have it at least by the mediation of the Soul which is the other part of the whole which both together they do compound For the Soul by the relation that it hath to it in that respect always considers it as a dependance or appendix of his essence in as much as without it it cannot constitute any subject and as an essence on which it self in some sort depends For as much as without it it cannot constitute a compleat man So that the Soul having an effective and immediate Communion with Christ by the participation of his Spirit the Body also retains some connexion with the head at least mediately and by virtue of the interposition of the Soul But if all connexion between Christ and the Soul comes to be broken which will certainly happen if the Spirit do not Communicate to it neither in habits nor actions the Soul will by it self cease to be a member of Christ and the body cannot be so by its intervention I conclude then touching this first point that the Soul separate from the body hath understanding and perception and by consequence that the Souls of the faithful departed hence do enjoy some degrees of felicity and glory Let us see whither it may proceed or what may be the degrees thereof as far as the word of God and the Analogy of faith will inform us What is the happiness of faithful Souls after their separation from the Body and what is the place where they are gathered together or assembled The Second Discourse BEcause the place whereinto the Souls of the faithful are assembled at the time of their separation doth contribute without doubt very much to their contentment and when we shall have decided where it is it will be much more easy to speak of the nature of happiness it self before we proceed to enquire into the degrees of the happiness of good men it seems necessary to search and examine what is the place which is appointed for their abode and residence To the end therefore that I may there begin my discourse it must be known that many have been of this opinion that the Souls of the Patriarchs and Fathers that lived under the Old Testament were not received into Heaven till the manifestation of the New and that by the ascension of Christ on high admission thither was granted to them And the principal foundation that they have for this opinion is that passage in the ninth Chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews where it is said Vers 8. that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest under the time of legal dispensation whilst the first Tabernacle was standing Having therefore banished Souls from the habitation of Heaven for all the time that ran by till the ascension of our Saviour and it being necessary to provide for them some certain habitation to the end they might not remain wanderers and vagabonds because they did not believe any place more proper to mark out for them than the bosom of Abraham of which our Saviour speaks in the Gospel they have made no difficulty to determine that is there they have made their abode all this long tract of time only they have found themselves much perplexed when they have been to determine precisely in what part of the World the bosom of Abraham should be For some have placed it in the near neighbourhood of Hell although our Lord put a great deep between them others have made it the Porch or Antichamber of Heaven to conclude others not knowing
the mean whiles passing its happy time in the company of those Saints and Angels which are in the same expectation The same thing is practised towards Embassadors who first enter as private persons into the capital Cities of those Empires whither their Embassies are addressed and soon after go forth to return again on another day in the glory of a great and courtly Attendance and at the Entry of Princes when they return from some Conquest or some glorious Expedition the same method of proceeding is frequently observed the Pomp and Magnificence is differred to some solemn day but in the mean while they live at home with their ordinary Court To conclude the same thing having been used towards our Lord Jesus it may not be thought strange if God make use of it towards Believers For first of all He fought upon the Cross and by his courage became victorious his Body being laid in the Grave his Soul ascended into Paradise and if I may so say without any noise and afterwards being returned and his Body raised he was carried up on high mounted on the Clouds and entred in triumph into Heaven among the applauses of happy Spirits and the acclamations of Angels in the mean time 't is no wonder if the Scripture speaks something more rarely of the reception of Souls into Heaven than of the glorious day of the blessed Resurrection for those beginnings of our happiness which we enjoy immediately after death are indeed very marvellous if we consider them precisely and in themselves but they are obscure imperfect and of little or no lustre if we compare them with the splendor and magnificence in which we shall see the accomplishment of it therefore as the promises of reward made to Jesus Christ for his obedience to the death of the Cross do properly respect his ascension into Heaven and his exaltation to the right hand of his Father in glory so that St. Paul refers it thither Phil. 2. that hinders not but that his Soul might obtain the right of entring into Paradise during the time of its separation from the body and that he did make use of it so that although the promises of Reward have a particular respect to the Resurrection that doth not infer that our Souls are deprived of the liberty of entring into the heavenly Sanctuary there to live in the expectation of it And if any of us according to the manner of the ancient Romans should adopt any one for his Child with resolution to declare this adoption publickly and according to Law upon some certain day to the end that he may be capable of succeeding to our Estate and Honours nothing hinders but that in the mean time he may lodge in our House though perhaps he may keep a little more close and private till the day apointed for this publick and solemn action or installation 'T is true there are some that make some scruple of lodging the Souls of those in Heaven that God hath raised up with purpose to permit them to live yet a while in the World as that of Lazarus and some others For what likelyhood is there say they of bringing them back from that place of glory and happiness to one so wretched as is that of our Conversation on this Earth Had it not been much better never to have given them any taste of the joys of Heaven than to pluck them thence and return them to live among the infirmities and inconveniencies of the present life They are therefore willingly enclined to say that it would have been more adviseable to have assigned them an Habitation in some place whereof the deprivation would neither be so sensible nor so prejudicial But methinks these men give themselves a great deal of trouble to no purpose For if there be any inconvenience therein is it not easie for God to appoint some particular Habitation for those and in the mean time receive all others into the Heavens to the end that none may go thence till on the final Resurrection A score of Souls it may be which were to be reunited to their Bodies by a particular dispensation must they give Law to so many Millions of Spirits as are not at all subject to it nor must have experience of any other Resurrection than that of the general and last day To which we may add that although they should have been received into Heaven seeing that in their first Creation they were made for the glory of God and on other accounts have so many obligations to him because he hath redeemed them they will have no reason to complain if they suffer something extraordinary for his service Scipio Africanus after very glorious Triumphs went to War for the obtaining of Forreign Conquests under the Authority of his Brother and in the quality of his Lieutenant for the sole love that he bore to him and to assist him in arriving at the highest dignities of the Common-Wealth In which he suffered some diminution of his own besides the incommodities which he received in his own person and the sensible griefs that he had experience of by the captivity of his Son The Angels themselves descend from Heaven where they enjoy the vision of God with unspeakable contentments to the end that they Minister to the Protection and Salvation of believers To conclude in whatsoever place those Souls be lodged which by a particular Resurrection return again to the Habitation of their bodies they are delivered from their infirmities as long as they are separated from them and it seems probable that they cannot re-enter there without some disadvantage by that change of condition Wherefore since they cannot return into the world without some abatement to their felicity it cannot be more troubleous to them to be brought back from the Heavens than from the Elementary Region If it were reasonable absolutely to decide this Question touching the place where the faithful are received after death by simple reasonings drawn either from the probability of things or even from the harmony that the parts of Theology and Religion have among themselves there are those that are clear enough and pregnant enough to perswade us to believe that they are received into the Heavens for since as St. Paul teaches us our Conversation is in Heaven and we have the honour to be Citizens thereof for what reasons are we so long exiled from our Country What sin remains unpardoned which should hinder our return to the place whence we are descended Since we are exhorted to tend thither and henceforth to think of nothing but Heavenly things why are we so long deprived of the fruit of our thoughts and desires How is it that the Gospel labours so powerfully to beget in us a desire after it if it give us not also the enjoyment of it Since we are dead to the World and our life is hid with Christ in God why do we not go to converse where our life is kept in reserve for us
very far from the place whereof he had raised in them very strange and pleasant hopes and expectations And this good God which hath had so much care by all means to provide for the comfort of our faith would not have commanded us to embark with so much Courage and Resolution upon a Sea so troublesome and full of darkness and Abysses as is death if he had not clearly shewed us the Haven where our Souls must arrive after such troublesome agitations The other point which concerns the quality and degree of the blessedness of those Souls that are gathered together in Heaven will put us to some little more trouble whether it be seriously to search what may be said concerning it from the word of God which speaks not so plainly of it or whether it be to contain our selves modestly within the bounds of what it hath revealed and of what we can comprehend by the Analogy of Faith without passing the limits of it I shall endeavour notwithstanding to do the one and the other I must lay down here for the foundation of our discourse that the Souls of the faithful are put by death into a state of perfect sanctification seeing they enter into Heaven For nothing enters there that doth pollute or foul In short seeing that sin either in Bodily affections such as the Schools call the Irascible and Concupiscible or in the habits of the mind it self and in the evil dispositions of the understanding and will death must enfranchise them from subjection to the one and the other For first of all the Soul being delivered from the body it can be no longer subject to its affections and that among others is the reason why we die that the affections and desires of our members which have not been perfectly mortified by the grace of God which we receive here below might entirely be extinguished by the destruction and dissolution of the members themselves which 't is like the Apostle would signify when he says the body is dead because of sin that is to say mortal or subject to death to the end that sin might be extinguished Moreover as to what concerns the habits of the Spirit as it was that of God that began to dissipate them here below to the end that he might introduce those that are better so it is he himself that doth altogether cleanse us of them after death and impress upon us a perfect and compleat sanctity Now compleat Holiness doth necessarily suppose some perfection of knowledg For we are so framed that the love and affection of our wills is generated by the light that is in our understandings and this Frame or Constitution being essential to our Souls and by consequence absolutely inseparable from them in what place or in whatsoever state they be it must be that they be such as well after as before their separation from the Body for it cannot be conceived either that we can love those things that we do not at all understand or that we cannot love those which we do know to be truly lovely or that we love more or less in proportion to the knowledg we have of them In the mean time the perfection of knowledg depends of two things the one is the object which is presented to us the other is the manner in which we receive it the object may have the advantage of being presented to us after an excellent manner but if we be not well disposed to receive it the effect which it ought to produce in our Souls is not produced at all And on the other side we may be well disposed to receive it but if it be not presented to us in good manner we cannot derive those lights from it which otherwise we might Now as to the disposition of the faculties of our Souls we do here suppose that after death they will be perfectly well constituted since they will be delivered from sin by the extinction of the lusts and desires of the Body and be rendred incomparably more strong and luminous than naturally they could be by the presence of the Holy Ghost It remains now that we consider what may be the objects that present themselves to the contemplation of Souls thus qualified and prepared It seems to me that we may boldly say they are necessarily of three kinds The first are such as our Souls may have had some knowledg of whilst we lived and whereof we continue to retain the memory The second contain those works of God which are presented to their eyes The third are the persons that will there be seen and the Communion which they will have on high with those other Spirits which are found there Now as touching memory I think there is no person which doth not easily conceive that we have two sorts thereof For their is one that consists in the retention of things sensible and singular with their circumstances and particularities according to which our memories received the images of them which we recal in our Fantasy when occasions are presented or our Spirits engage themselves in the search of them for there is no person that knows not by experience what it is to review his memory there to recover the Idea's or Images of diverse sensible things which are there laid in reserve almost as a person passes his eyes over the Books in his Closet to find one there that he hath present use of But there is another also which consists in things more universal and which have their foundation in reason and discourse For there never were men which have not or might not make this Observation in themselves that after having as it seemed so forgotten certain conclusions which at some other times we had known that at the first attempt they did not present themselves to our thoughts but when we come attentively to consider the principles whereon they depend immediately we find the foot-steps of our reasonings and without any great difficulty return to the consequences that we had drawn from them in such manner that there is a like difference between a man that never knew science and another that hath had knowledg of it but the discontinuance of Meditating thereon hath a little obscured the Idea's thereof in his mind as there is between a man which never was in a Country and another who after having exactly known it hath been a stranger to it for some few years the one finds much difficulty in obtaining the knowledg of it and if he wander never so little from the beaten rode behold him utterly bewildred the other immediately recollects himself and the least thing which presents it self before his eyes replaces in his memory the Situation of the whole Country and if I may so say repaints in his mind the Map of a Province As to what concerns this first sort of memory 't is a corporeal faculty in us whereof I desire no other argument but that 't is found among beasts 'T is very true that as the
most part of those faculties that we have in common with beasts are more excellent in us our memory without doubt is more strong and of larger capacity than theirs and our imagination more clear and full of Light but so it is that Dogs and Horses and Elephants and Foxes know infinite things by their figures and colours and other sensible marks of that kind and 't is also seen that sometimes they act by simple memory although they have no objects before their sences Therefore seeing 't is a Corporeal faculty 't is to be presumed that death hath great power upon it when it dissolves and universally ruines all the Organs of the Body So that I do not doubt but that our Souls do forget an infinite number of the little singularities and particularities of sensible things at their departure hence which we easily remember whilst we are living here But as to the other because 't is a power of the Soul it self as endowed with reason it must most necessarily remain So that we may by no means doubt whether they do remember that they have here seen a World and learnt by the Preaching of the Gospel that the Sun of God came thither to save sinners They will Remember that there is a Church on Earth and that they were members of it having believed in this Redeemer And generally all the Doctrines of the Gospel wherein they had been instructed for their Consolation and Salvation will remain most firmly impressed upon their memories and that 't is so appears by the Book of the Revelation where the Holy Spirit attributes unto them the memory of their Martyrs and charity for the Church and gratitude towards God and the Lamb for the benefit of their Redemption and other things of like kind Concerning which I conceive it will be necessary to make two Considerations The first is that if in the ordinary Preaching of the Gospel or in the study of things that do concern Religion the minds of the faithful have received any impressions less true than might be desired as there is none so advanced in the knowledg of this Divine truth who is not deceived on divers occasions at death they shall be delivered from those errors For that which occasions our mistake in these matters is that although we very well believe the principal and fundamental Articles of Religion and if we know well how to draw our Conclusions from these principles we should certainly preserve our selves from these false impressions so it is that we commit many faults in the conduct of our reason and joyn together perswasions that do not well agree Whereof we do not see the discord and contradiction for besides that naturally since the fall there is some weakness in our discursive faculty especially when there is any Question of things that are a little distant from their principles we there mingle our passions and our interests and permit our selves easily to be carried to that natural obstinacy which causes us to hold fast the things that we have once preconceived even without any appearance of reason The Souls of the faithful being therefore delivered not only from the trouble of the Body but also from all sorts of vices and passions and endued by the presence of the Holy Spirit with a light totally new they then find no difficulty to discern truth from falshood and by consequence to deliver themselves from all false opinions wherewith they may have been prepossessed The second consideration is that although we have been instructed in the belief of the fundamental truths of the Gospel nevertheless we do not as yet comprehend them perfectly enough there remains always some darkness in our conceptions some remnants of incredulity which shake sometimes this way and sometimes that way the things that the word of God hath established in our belief Whereas separate Souls see all these truths so clearly that there remains no darkness in their knowledg of them So that they lose their errors if they had any before they retain the belief of things certain and veritable which they had already received into their minds and those very objects which they had known before they shall perceive by a view incomparably more distinct more perfect and more clearly enlightned As to what concerns the Works of God which are presented to their Contemplation if they were to remain within the compass of this Elementary World it were to be presumed that active and awake as we suppose them they would employ themselves in a great measure in the Contemplation of the most excellent things of the Universe to the end they might observe the marvellous Perfections of their Author Even as I believe that 't is not to be doubted that the Angels that God employs here and there in all parts of the World have derived an infinite number of good and excellent knowledge thence I know not whether I may dare to say that as the Apostle teaches us that the Angels are present in our Assemblies for which reason he commands that women behave themselves there with humilty that they may not offend their eyes by any indecency Souls may be found there voluntarily present to entertain with us a holy Communion as far as they can but we have already said and proved that they are assembled in Heaven and even in that Heaven where our Lord Jesus is in magnificent glory Now it is not my intention carefully to enquire how this Heaven is made and those that permit themselves to be transported by the elevation of their thoughts do much more deserve the blame of rashness and presumption than the praise of subtility or sublimity in their Speculations I will only say two things which cannot be accused of too much curiosity the one is that as if ascending from Earth to the more raised parts of the World we find that progress is made for the better The Water being more transparent than the Earth the Air more transparent than the Water the Fire more pure than the Air and yet the Heavens more pure and luminous than the Fire we should imagine as it is very reasonable that things always advance after the same manner and proportion certainly the Heaven of Heavens must be incomparably beautiful and of a structure most excellent The other is that God having built this lower World to be the Habitation of man nevertheless made it so beautiful that on which side soever we turn our eyes if we be attentive we find not only matter of satisfaction but also of admiration surely seeing he hath chosen this Heaven for his Habitation it must be that the whole Constitution thereof must be infinitely more glorious whereupon I make this Consideration A Pagan Philosopher sometimes entertained this Meditation that if some one had been nourished till the age of five and twenty years in some Cavern where he had never seen the light and where he could learn nothing of the form of the World nor of the things that
beloved thereof The believing Soul therefore ardently loves the happy Spirits which are received on high and likewise the Holy Angels and being likewise reciprocally loved by them and loving our Lord Jesus with an affection far above what it bears to Angels and Spirits and being much assured that it is yet much more beloved of him and to conclude seeing in its Habitation in the Heavens in the aspect of the marvellous things that are there in the company of Holy Spirits in the Society of Angels in the presence and Communion of Jesus Christ so many and such irrefragable Testimonies of the love of God towards it it plunges and drowns and totally swallows it self in the love that it bears to him and finds in all these motions a sensible and sublime taste of unspeakable felicity What it is that the Resurrection will add to the blessedness of the believing Soul The Third Discourse THis which I have said hitherunto very imperfectly concerning the happiness of the believing Soul after it is separate from the Body may enable us to conceive something of its grandeur as by the lightning that passes before our eyes we do in some manner judge of the quantity of fire that is wrapt up in the dark clouds But although there be attractives enough in what we understand of it to excite the desire and admiration of it in our hearts yet it falls far short of its perfection as long as man remains deprived of the other half of his essence For the believer of whose happiness we are now discoursing may be considered after three manners First in himself then as the world hath some Relation to and Connexion with him And lastly as he hath some Relation to the Church as a member hath Relation to his Body Now to consider him in himself seeing he is composed of a Soul and a Body to whatsoever perfection the Soul be advanced so it is that whilst the Body remains under the power of death its happiness is not compleat To consider it in the Relation that it and the World have between each other forasmuch as the World was made for-man and hath been made subject to vanity by reason of him when man shall be placed all entire in perfect happiness as far as precisely concerns himself nevertheless he cannot be said to be absolutely and entirely happy as long as the World remains subject to misery by reason of him and by occasion of him bears the marks of the cruse of God Lastly to consider him after the third manner Forasmuch as he is a part of that whereof the Church is the whole although he should behold himself perfectly happy in himself and although he should see the World delivered from the curse that it incurred for his sake nevertheless he cannot be said to enjoy a full felicity until the whole Church on its part partake in the enjoyment of it If Esther esteemed her self miserable although she were advanced to the glory of a great Empire whilst she beheld her Nation in danger of desolation the Believer may not account it self happy whilst some of his brethren are fighting upon Earth and others with respect to their Bodies are under the power of death and rotting in their graves Forasmuch then as the Soul in that beatitude that it enjoys in the Heavens hath sufficient knowledge of all these Relations 't is impossible that it should not desire the Resurrection of its Body to the end that it may be united with it and the deliverance of the World out of its misery and vanity so that it may no longer be subject to corruption for its sake and the glorification of the Church in a perfect felicity so that the state of that wherewith it hath such inviolable ties may not divide its thoughts betwixt grief and and joy Now he is not happy perfectly that doth desire and hath yet reason and subject to desire something 'T is very true the desire of the Soul in all these regards is without inquietude and anxiety for these passions are generated either from the impatience of our spirits or the uncertainty of the event of what we desire or from hence that although the event that we expect is sure yet the condition that we are in in the mean while is troublesome in it self and uneasy to be born As to what concerns impatience there is not the least string or fiber there-of in the Souls that are on high they are endued with all sorts of Virtues principally they are all swallowed up in a profound respect to the providence of God And as to the assurance of their hope they are more than most assured that it will never fail them since God hath promised it and the power that he hath to execute his Counsels finds no where either difficulty or impossibility to arrest or hinder it to conclude as to what respects their condition the little which I have above reported of it represents it capable of swallowing up in the sweetness of its contents all resentments they may have for the length of their expectations When the Holy Ghost in the Revelation causeth us to hear them cry how long Lord wilt thou not avenge our blood we may not take that for any mark of inquietude of mind any more than for an inordinate desire of vengeance Forasmuch as in this place they consider their enemies as reprobated and adjudged by God to the suffering of punishment and are no longer obliged to have any charity for them Our charity having none for its object but such as may have some access to the mercy of our Heavenly Father Is the gate then closed upon any one Yea as it hath been from the beginning upon Devils or on those that have sinned against the Holy Ghost or on those against whom God hath pronounced an irrevocable sentence of death and condemnation our charity remains utterly extinct in respect of them And to desire the Execution of this condemnation as the Souls of the faithful do is nothing but a conformity to the Divine Justice and will So that the words how long are purely and simply a Holy breathing of Zeal which they have to see the glory of God shining in the Execution of his judgments which doth not pass the bounds of respect which they owe to the conduct of his wisdom Nevertheless although they be without inquietude so it is as I have said they are not without out desire Now he which desires gives evidence that something is wanting to his condition and by consequent is not accomplished in all things And 't is for this reason that we must see what will be the happiness of believers in these three respects at the last day For the first it seems that there are principally two things to be considered that is to say what will be the quality and condition of the body when it shall be raised again and then what will be the estate of the Soul when it shall be rejoined unto
that serve for the local motion of its members and on the incomparable disposition that nature hath established among the parts which are to digest distribute receive and appropriate that which is necessary for their nourishment To conclude the last reason hath no more force than the precedent For seeing Angels which are as I have said Beings totally separate from Matter or Body have nevertheless certain means which in truth we cannot easily comprehend but yet certainly believe of knowing things sensible and Corporeal and forming excellent discourses upon them whereof the Scripture furnishes us with indubitable proofs wherefore the Soul being a substance well nigh like that of Angels should it not be capable of the same operations let us imagin that by the power of God an Angel should be incarnate in such manner that he become the form of a humane Body and that he animate it after the manner of a reasonable Soul without doubt whiles he lodges there he will see and perceive things Corporeal by the Organs of sense and reason upon the Images which are brought from and perfected in the Phantasy as we now do And if actually he become the Soul of this body it will be as much subject to the use of its Organs for the exercise of his understanding as our Soul is at this time for the exercise of its most excellent faculties but if after this it should please God to disintangle it from the bonds of of the Body will it lose the use of those powers wherewith he served himself so advantageously without the use of Organs before it was made to serve there But there is something more 't is a constant truth and all the World assent to it that there is nothing in the understanding which was not in some manner first in the sense but this which is so indubitable to speak generally is not without difficulty when it comes to be explained because it may be taken in this sense viz. that universally we can have no other Idea's of things in our minds than such as have proceeded from things material and which our eyes or our ears or our other senses have been capable of receiving and again it may be so explained that although these be in our mind Idea's purely intellectual and which retain nothing of the nature of Body yet so it is that they are not formed but by occasion of the Images of Corporeal things which are received in the Phantasy upon which the Intellect makes its first Reflections And I think that if a man make but little use of his reason he shall find that 't is in this second manner but the aforesaid truth must be understood For to say nothing of our passing from Physicks or natural Philosophy to that of Metaphysicks or which is above nature by the means of certain obstructions which conduct the Spirit of a man from the Contemplation of Bodies to that of Spirits and things Immaterial I think Religion puts the thing out of all controversy and doubt For 't is indeed by the interposition of our Senses that we see the Heavens and the Earth and that we hear the word of God Preached and 't is upon the Idea's which the exercise of our senses introduce upon our Phantasy that we put our selves upon reasoning concerning the Deity But 't is a thing known by our proper experience that when we have sometimes seriously applied our selves thereunto from the consideration of things sensible which have given us the first notions or knowledg thereof we ascend to speculations concerning the nature of God and his properties which are entirely and absolutely separated from the qualities and matter of Bodies Although then our minds produce no operations whereof things Corporeal have not presented them the occasions as Saint Paul says Rom. 1. that from the workmanship of the World we come to the knowledg of the eternal power and goodness of the Divinity or Godhead nevertheless there are some actions of our minds which are purely Spiritual and which in no wise depend on Bodies any further than that Corporeal objects do furnish us with occasions to produce them by discourse now if there be any of the actions of our minds which to speak properly have nothing in common with Bodies even during the time that they inhabit there and are in some kind fastened and bound to their instruments why should they not be capable of producing them without the service of the Senses then when they are altogether losened from the bonds that have joyned and united them if then we can have any proofs from the Scripture that Souls use their faculties after the death of the Body that Divine Revelation ought not only to have sufficient Authority to impress this belief upon our minds notwithstanding the contradiction of the pretended discourses of our reason but these difficulties which some persons think to be in the thing it self ought not to leave in our minds the least hesitation or suspition Let us see then what the word of God doth teach concerning it Those Divines which have attempted to derive a proof of this verity from the Parable of the wicked Dives and Lazarus have received this contradiction on the part of those who believe that the Soul loses the use of its faculties in death viz. that what our Saviour says there is no History but only a Parable and that it is an impertinence to endeavour to make such discourses pass for narrations of things effectively accomplished And thereupon there is much and great Contestation because on one hand there is no other Parable in the Scripture where the persons that are there introduced are designed by their names and represented exactly by many circumstances as Lazarus is described in that place or Paragraph and on the other hand the discourse which our Saviour reports that Abraham and the Rich man had the one with the other or cross the great Gulph or Abyss hath no appearance or likeness of an Historical narration to commend it to acceptance as a real truth Wherefore seeing it may be in part an History and in part a Parable let us examine it briefly under this last Consideration in all the Parables which our Saviour makes use of in the Gospel we must have regard to the end whereunto it tends and also to what he says that he may come to it as to what concerns the end of this Parable 't is sufficiently apparent by its Conclusion that our Lord had in design to shew that the obstinacy of mans mind in opposition to things proposed unto him on the part of God is so great that neither Revelations made by the word of God nor Miracle laid open before our eyes is capable of moving or affecting us In such sort that although the dead themselves should rise we should give no more credit to their Testimony than we do to the writings of Moses and the Prophets if God touch us not inwardly by his Spirit All the rest
of this discourse is imployed to come to this Conclusion as we set shadows and leaves round about Pictures which serve for nothing but to fill up the void space and give some little Ornament to the Table so there is something in this discourse of our Lord the use whereof consists wholly in making the Parable more full bright and luminous 'T is therefore to be Considered whether it were the common opinion of the Jews that the Souls of unbelievers are tormented immediately after death or that being deprived of all perception and use of their faculties they remain as if they were in a profound sleep if it were the last of these our Lord did not it seems a thing worthy of his wisdom to establish his Parable upon an Hypothesis contrary to the common belief of the Jews For if a parable be not taken from a truth really and indeed accomplished at least it ought not to contradict the common conceptions of men And our Lord never proposed any in which we might not easily see much reason and appearance of possibility and by how much the more of difficulty there is to comprehend for these two persons could reason together there being too great a gulph between them by so much the rest of the Parable ought to be accommodated to the sense and apprehension of the Auditors to the end that they may not accuse him that speaks of giving them instructions built upon false and extravagant opinions If it were the common opinion of the Jews that Souls enjoy perception after death our Lord sufficiently confirms it not only in that he makes no opposition to it but moreover in that he builds thereupon instructions excellent and full of wisdom I make no doubt therefore but that he gives us to understand in this Emblem that the Souls of the wicked are tormented from the time they go out of this life and that the Souls of the faithful do receive Consolation which cannot be without some notable sense or perception nor can there be so notable a sense if they have not their faculties active and awake When the Apostle St. Paul tells us he was caught up into Paradise where he heard things that could not be uttered 't is true he tells us that he knew not whether'twas in the body or out of the body So that although it be not without probability that it was rather out of the body yet it would be great boldness positively to determine concerning it since he himself would not do it But 't is clear that he supposes that it might be done out of the body and by consequent that Souls can make use of their faculties when they are separated from it for in that estate in which he supposes his Soul was or might be they could not hear things unspeakable soon after without some use of their understanding moreover it must be an excellent use thereof as well because of the greatness of the object which without doubt could not be comprehended unless by an understanding very active as because it so vehemently applyed it self unto it and it received such deep impressions from it that after it was rejoined to its body and again offered unto its Organs as before it nevertheless retains the memory thereof Now it is enough that St. Paul supposes that it might be to rescue our minds from all difficulty and doubt in this matter The Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews representing in a stately manner the condition whereunto Christians are called says that it is to the Heavenly Jerusalem to thousands of Angels to the assembly of the first born who are enrolled or whose names are written in Heaven and to the Spirits of just men sanctified I will not stay to search out what is signified by those words enrolled in the Heavens although it seems to be a manner of speech taken from publick Registers and Rolls wherein are written the names of such Citizens which ought to have the right of Free-men and to partake in the priviledges of the Corporation Which will signify that these first born are already received into the Heavens a place of abode not at all proper for a sleep so profound and void of all perception as is that to which some condemn Souls till the day of the Resurrection I will only say that this word the Spirits doth signify without doubt Souls separated from their Bodies and that the word which we Translate Sanctified signifies properly perfect or accomplished A Title that in the New Testament is not given unless it be to those which be it in knowledg or holiness have obtained that degree of perfection whereunto before they did aspire and whereunto those that they have left behind them are not yet arrived Thus we are said to be perfect in comparison with the Jews who lived under the dispensation of the Law but imperfect in comparison with them that have obtained that knowledg whereunto we cannot come in this life so that these just men made perfect concerning the Spirit of whom he speaks in this Text are those that have obtained a degree of perfection which we have not as yet which cannot be obtained without an excellent use of those faculties which are called Understanding and Will In the Book of the Revelation Chap. 14. Vers 13. It is said that the Spirit declares those happy which are dead in the Lord now happiness and the privation of the use of all their faculties are inconsistent Aristotle himself says that happiness cannot properly be attributed unless it be to such who are actually in the exercise of the most excellent operations of their noblest and most excellent powers and vacant in the contemplation and love of the bravest and sublimest Objects and to the end that we may not think that they are called happy because they are appointed to the injoyment of the happiness which is to be revealed at the last day as the same Philosopher says we call little Children happy by a kind of hope when there is much of probability that one day they will obtain it 'T is said that they rest from their labours and their works follow them Now 't is true indeed that we call sleep by the name of rest in opposition to the labours and troubles of the day but nevertheless if speaking of a person that is returned into his Country after great and memorable battels fought in Forreign Lands we should say that henceforth he rests from his labours I do not think that any one would understand thereby that he had slept for a long time but that he enjoyed in peace and tranquillity the fruit of his former pains and labours and indeed these words and their works follow them do mean they enjoy their reward For because the work and the reward are inseparable by the appointment of the good will of God and the holy Spirit being willing to inform us that believers shall not lose their labours in the good works that they do
whose Religions in all other things are directly opposite must have without doubt some common Foundation and it cannot be common in such sort as it is unless it be established even in the very nature of things So that although it be not possible clearly and distinctly to explicate the reasons of it yet they may be sufficiently seen darkly and in gross to impress upon the mind an indelible perswasion of it For there are multitudes of persons that would find themselves much perplexed if you should oblige them to discourse particularly the reasons that have perswaded them that there is a natural difference between Vice and Virtue the most able among the Philosophers have found some difficulty in freeing themselves from the natural reasons that do either prove or deny the immortality of our Souls And among Christians there are none but Spirits much exercised in discourse which are fit by natural reason to dispute for the Being and Providence of a God against Atheists and yet nevertheless these things prove themselves so smartly to our understandings that the ignorant and vulgar themselves have an abhorrence for those that make any doubt of them Certainly the holy Scripture as I said in the beginning is the only place from whence we may draw lights sufficiently clear to perswade our selves of this truth by a perswasion that will deserve the name of faith and may be capable of giving any sound Consolation to our Consciences But nevertheless I shall not scruple to say that if the holy Scripture had not spoken it so clearly the belief of the immortality of our Souls would have been sufficient to have satisfied our reason that they make use of their faculties though the body should supply no Organs unto them For it is easy to conceive that there is in man whilst he is compounded of Soul and Body an understanding faculty which for some space of time doth not exercise its own proper Operations Since this conjunction is made in such sort that the Organs of the one must serve to the Operation of the faculties of the other and that they do Operate either always or for the most part by their Mediation when the Organs come to be disordered or hindred 't is necessary that the Operations of the mind do cease of themselves But that there is a substance that doth actually exist separate from the Body which is endued with an understanding faculty and nevertheless cannot use it because it hath no Body is a thing in my apprehension absolutely inconceivable For it cannot actually exist unless it live nor can we conceive any sort of life in it which doth not include in the same thought the use of its faculties You may easily conceive that the Body lives though the man do neither see nor discourse Because life may subsist in a man without seeing or discoursing But you cannot imagin that the Body of a man lives but you must likewise imagin that it is nourished and that his heart beats or at least that the Spirits have some heat and motion in the seat of life So that the faculty wherein life consists will move and Act though all the rest should be laid to sleep in the reasonable Soul then when 't is separated from the Body what power will act if it have no use of that of the understanding For there 's in them no power vital animal or natural like to those of our Bodies and as to that which we call the Locomotive that is to say the power by which we move from place to place if it have no use of its understanding there is no reason to imagin that it will have any power of removing it self from one place to another a thing whereunto nature it self will furnish us with a Testimony sufficiently evident and authentique in as much as it hath not given to any living Creature this power of moving it self unless it be to Animals endued with Phantasy and certain appetites which do necessarily require the removal of the Body for their satisfaction in such manner that if there be in the Soul neither understanding nor appetite it will be against all reason to imagin in it any use of the Locomotive faculty So that it will be the same thing to say that the Soul dies with the Body and will rise again with it as to say that it lives and yet nevertheless performs none of the actions of life But this is not all in this power of understanding that we here possess are imprinted certain habits which without doubt have nothing common with the Organs of the Body unless it be as I have said above that they have given occasion to the intellect to exercise Contemplations and to form those ratiocinations and discourses by which these habits are obtained Such is for Example the habit which in Philosophy we call by the name of wisdom which consists in a clear and certain understanding of the first principles of things and in the knowledg of Conclusions that depend thereon in objects the most Excellent and Noble that can be presented to the mind of Man For that this is an habit purely intellectual reason teaches us and experience consents unto it Because on the one side it performs its Operations on objects that have nothing of the nature of Bodies and on the other side it is not found in any subject of the nature of those that have no powers but Corporeal For there was never found neither Horse nor Elephant nor any other Animals devoid of Reason in whom appeared the least ray of that which we call wisdom Either then these kind of habits are wholly razed out by death or they remain in the Soul now there is no good reason why we should say they are obliterate For though I willingly grant that in some sort they intered the intellect by the means of the Body and that the Organs of the Body have contributed something to those reasonings by which they are formed nevertheless they are in themselves totally intellectual and have their proper seat in the reason it self as on the contrary although it be by the conduct of the intellect that the body learns to accustom it self to certain motions directed by measure and art as is for example the habit of Fencing well or Riding the great Horse the habit is nevertheless Corporeal So then when the reasonable Soul comes to be separated from the Body if the body by the presence of the sensitive Soul alone can subsist alive without it there is nothing can hinder but that it may preserve some of those habits which it obtained by the direction of the understanding as they say there are some Horses so well trained that they will of themselves move regularly though there be no Rider to govern them 'T is much more likely that the Soul remaining alive and subsisting after the Body the habits which are so perfectly proper to it should also remain and subsist with it If then they do subsist
Since our head is there and the Communion that we have with him is so strict and indissoluble wherefore doth not he assemble his members about him although by his wise dispensation some part of them remain yet a while on Earth Since he hath prayed that where he is we may be also why is the fruit of this prayer which without doubt God did hear differred for so many ages Since he hath said that he went thither to prepare a place for us why should we doubt that he doth receive us to the place that he hath designed and marked out for us To conclude since he shews himself to those that enquire not after him why doth he depart or withdraw himself so far from those that seek and desire him with so great passions and affections When Mary cast her self at his feet to embrace him he said touch me not for I am not yet ascended to my Father Without doubt because this woman transported with the pleasure of seeing him raised again was willing as we say to rejoyce and congratulate with him in so glorious a Victory and because she and his other disciples had hitherunto had some hope that the Lord would remain on Earth with them to re-establish the Kingdom of Israel she was ravished with joy as if henceforth there were nothing that could hinder but that she might enjoy his presence according to her wish and content there with all the desires of her Soul For that reason he repressed this heat and ardour and tells her that 't is not yet done it remains as yet that he ascend on high ere they must see the accomplishment of their expectations For according to his admirable goodness and wisdom he knew so to dispose his actions and discourses to his servants and to accommodate them for a little time to the quality of their knowledg and understanding but at this time that he is ascended upon high wherefore in expectation that he will descend thence to raise our Bodies should he not permit our Souls to go cast themselves at his feet and refresh themselves with the pleasant enjoyment of his presence all these considerations certainly ought to make very great impressions upon our minds but that which ought fully to perswade them is that the holy Scriptures given us most evident and indubitable instructions concerning it Let us therefore chuse some passages very express and which will render the thing wholly manifest St. Paul in the place that I alledged above saith that if the earthly House of our Body be dissolved we have a Building of God an House eternal in the Heavens And we have seen above that he speaks of what happens to the faithful immediately after death and not only of what they expect at the last Resurrection Will any one say that these words in the Heavens do not signify the place but the condition that is to say that Habitation is called Heavenly not because 't is in the Heavens but because 't is very holy and happy Certainly this neither can nor must be For besides that we may not have recourse to interpretations which seem a little forced without an absolute and invincible necessity he says 't is an house Eternal in the Heavens Now the Court of Heaven which is appointed for the faithful may well be called Eternal although it be necessary that Souls leave it for a moment at the time of the Resurrection Because things that are done for a very little space of time and only by dispensation are not at all considered and so small an interval hinders not but that we say they have always continued in that same place Even as we do not quit our dwelling by making a voyage into the Country and although the Angels come sufficiently often on Earth yet we do not cease to name them the Angels of Heaven but if Souls be in any place out of Heaven until the day of the Resurrection that Habitation being to be abandoned for ever it cannot in any wise be said to be Eternal The same Apostle says that he desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ Forasmuch as it was much better for him without doubt Jesus Christ is in the Heavens and if St. Paul had not believed that he should go thither when he died but that he must be confined in some other place of the world wherever it be out of the presence of our Lord he had not served himself of such expressions our Lord promised the Thief that he should that day be with him in Paradise now Paradise is in Heaven and although our Lord did soon redescend from thence to reunite himself to his body the thief without all controversy continued there having no need or occasion to return to this Earth In the Book of the Revel Chap. 14. Vers 4. All the faithful departed hence are represented under the number of an hundred and forty and four thousand gathered together in the Heavens in the company of the Lamb and following him whithersoever he goes Now there is no probability that God would represent to his Prophet Visions of this nature for the confirmation and consolation of his Children if they were contrary to the truth of things In the Epistle to the Hebrews 't is said that we are come to the assembly and Church of the first born whose names are written in Heaven Now 't is not the manner to enrol and make men free of a City and soon after exile them for a very long time into the Countrey Besides 't is apparent that this word written or enrolled signifies in this Text assembled for here are no publique Rolls or Records in the Heavens where the names and qualities of believers are actually written But because those that are admitted to the priviledges of Freemen in a City are wont first of all to be Enrolled after that manner of speaking which I have before remarked where that which goes before is put for that which follows and that which follows for that which goes before the holy Apostle calls those written or enrolled which are actually received into the possession of their Heavenly freedom and truly it seems to me that there is no reason to doubt of a thing whereof God hath been pleased to give most express assurance in all the periods and parts of the holy Scriptures For why think we did he raise and Translate Enoch before the Law Elias under the legal Oeconomy and Jesus Christ under the Gospel so apparently and manifestly that no man could doubt but that they are carried to Heaven if it were not to this end that we might raise our desires thoughts and affections thither after them I very well know that these things have a particular regard to the hope of the Resurrection but I do also maintain that God would not have drawn the hearts of men so visibly to himself if he had had any intention to command their Souls separated from their Bodies to remain I know not where
are done there and that if all of a sudden he should be taken thence and the Heavens and the Earth the Sun the Moon the Stars the Clouds the force and power of the Winds and in general all that is peculiarly worthy of knowledge in all the parts of nature be shewed unto him 't is indubitable that he would fall into a very great admiration and that he would immediately cry out this is the Work and Habitation of the Gods themselves And there is no Person that Considers the thing as it ought which doth not easily apprehend that this Philosopher had reason For although the custom of seeing all these marvellous Objects diminishes the admiration of them 't is nevertheless from thence that all Nations have first learned that there is an infinite Being that by the wisdom of his understanding and power of his hand hath given being to all these things What may we then think of the ravishments that the Souls of the Faithful have experience of then when being delivered from the chains of the body and carried on high between the hands of Angels after having passed all the extent of the Air and gone through the vast and immense spaces of the Celestial Orbs and considered near at hand the vast and prodigious greatness the marvellous splendour of the Sun and other Stars they come to enter that stately Palace where God and our Lord Jesus dwell in glory When Jacob saw a Ladder which reached from Earth to Heaven and the Angels that ascended and descended from above he cried out this is the House of God or at least it is certainly the Gate of Heaven and testified that this place so venerable filled his Soul with fear and wonder both together David placed among his most earnest desires that of entring into the Tabernacle of God and of seeing on all sides the marvels that shined there And truely I do not doubt but that Spectacle was capable of overwhelming the Spirit with unspeakable content the matter it self was illustrious and amazing but the work and design much exceeded the matter But what is all that in comparison of what we may presume concerning the Heavens and the wonders that on all sides shine and sparkle there When we view the palaces of Kings the costliness of their Houses the stateliness of their seylings the variety of their Pictures the richness of their Tapestry the rarity of their Statues the lofty grandeur of their Pillars and Arches give a pleasure marvellously sensible and affecting to all men that have eyes and have not their internal senses marvellously stupid and blockish those that are knowing in Arts and well understand Building Painting Carving Embroidery and other things of that nature do there take much more content than others because they discover all the beauties that are in those Objects the most curious stroaks and the most delicate devices cannot escape them Whereas the generality observe nothing there but the various sparkling of Colours some order and general harmony and proportion which the most gross cannot be ignorant in and in such or such a Picture some likeness to persons that at some time they have seen If there be either Histories or Emblems Riddles or Devices in the Tapestries or Pictures those which are conversant in good Learning and pride themselves either in quickness of wit or the knowledg of Histories and Fables do there receive yet more satisfaction if they can lay open what is wrapt up there and go to the bottom of what others see nothing but the bark And if with so many other things the Spirit of Prophecy had given to David some understanding of the Mysteries which were vailed under the Types and Allegories of the Old Testament I do believe that in the contemplation of the Tabernacle neither the price of the matter whereof it was composed nor the Divine industry that Bezaleel and Aholiab employed there did never so much content either his senses or his understanding as he felt of ravishment in the marvellous wisdom wherewith God directed the design of all these things to represent by them others incomparably more excellent which were yet hid in the darkness of time to come Imagine you therefore a Soul first of all ready instructed in the truths of Christianity and purified from all false impressions which may have been mingled with them then afterwards extraordinarily illuminated by the Spirit of God and by that means made capable of all that the most sublime intelligences are capable of to be introduced into this place so full of Magnificence and splendor and there finding the substance of that whereof the Sanctuary of the Tabernacle was heretofore but a shadow If you do so I assure my self that you will fall so short of being able to conceive all the contentment that it will find there that you cannot attentively affix your Spirit thereon but it will remain swallowed up and fall and faint under the admiration of the knowledg that it will obtain there although you be not able to comprehend it There remains the third of these objects which is the presence of our Lord Jesus and our Communion with happy Spirits and Holy Angels To begin there as I believe that there is no reason to doubt but that Angels can communicate among themselves So I hold for certain that happy spirits can do the same and that Angels and Souls can mutually entertain each other What is the manner of this communication is a thing as difficult to explain as is the nature of Angels themselves and the substance of Spirits For such as is the nature of things such is the manner and quality of their Operations and no man will ever well explain the one if he have not first of all perfectly comprehended what may be understood of the other But although we do not well understand the manner nevertheless we do not fail to be fully assured of the thing it self Every understanding Being is enclined to society as on the other side no Beings have any society among themselves but those that are endued with understanding 'T is for that reason that among Animals man alone is Politick and Sociable as therefore with an understanding but which is inclosed in a Body God hath given us speech which is a Corporeal means of mutual Conversation so to substances separate from Body but nevertheless endued with understanding he hath given some power to entertain society and converse although it be not Corporeal And those that imagine that neither Angels nor Souls can move themselves unless it be by the means of a Body nor discover their thoughts and sentiments to each other unless it be by some Corporeal medium to say no more pretend to know what they do not at all understand For seeing they dare to determine the nature of the faculties of Spirits and the manner of their Operations they must be presumed to have an exact and perfect knowledg of the nature of substances purely Spiritual Therefore
infirmities into glory This is he that conversed here below in mean condition among men and behold him raised above the magnificence of all the Angels This is he that suffered the contradiction of sinners but receives now the applause and veneration of all the Inhabitants of Heaven This is he that ignominiously hung upon the Cross but now all Creatures behold him with reverence and trembling This is he that here below suffered death but who now holds in his hand the life of all things and the subsistance of the universe This is he that was seen laid in a dark Tomb in comparison of whom now the splendor of the Sun is but as a shadow This is he that was thought unworthy that the Earth should bear him who now walks upon the Heavens and under whose feet the whole Fabrick of the World doth Tremble This is he in whom sometimes I believed indeed but with a faith always imperfect always spotted with some darkness always mingled with some remainders of incredulity whom I now see fully and manifestly and to whom I have liberty to approach without fear and behold him face to face After having in some sort represented what is the excellence of the knowledg which the believing Soul obtains when 't is received into Heaven there is no need that I should stay long to examine what is the measure of the happiness that it there enjoys For happiness consists as well in the absence of evils as in the fruition of good which are inconsistent or agreeable to the nature of those Beings which we call by the name of happy As for evils there are none that enter the Kingdom of Heaven which is a marvellous happiness to a nature sensible as ours is As for good things what may they be which are suitable to a reasonable Soul notwithstanding 't is separate from the Body Certainly as the happiness of the eye consists in seeing agreeable things and as the happiness of the ear in hearing pleasant and harmonious sounds and generally the happiness of all the other senses in exercising themselves upon those Objects whereunto nature hath appointed them with pleasure and content the happiness of the separate Soul consists in a suitable exercise of its faculties upon the most excellent Objects which can be presented to it and in the joy that is consequent thereunto It s understanding therefore being both perfectly purified in it self and filled with the presence of Objects so admirable its happiness in this respect is proportionable to the excellency of its Operation and those contemplations in which it is perpetually employed If those therefore that have any spark of generosity and any thing brave in their Souls do esteem those happy that have obtained any skill in those Sciences to which men ordinarily apply themselves and yet nevertheless an excellent Philosopher had reason to say that one drop of the knowledg of the nature of Celestial Bodies is more to be desired by reason of the nobleness of their essence and the advantage of their utility than all the Sciences that men have formed upon the other Beings of the World how happy must that Soul be that perfectly knows those things whose excellency as far surmounts the Sun and other the Stars of Heaven as they are to be esteemed more worthy than all the other Bodies of these Elementary Regions And if none of our faculties do employ themselves in their Operations in a suitable manner upon those subjects that are proportionable unto them without receiving some sensible pleasure what may be the satisfaction that a faithful Soul receives in being incessantly exercised in such marvellous Operations Certainly the pleasure of the eyes and ears is great when they are filled with such Objects whose colour or figure or harmony and justness of proportion is capable reasonably as satisfying the hunger that uncorrupted nature hath placed in those Senses For pleasure properly consists in this that now when the Objects that are without do occur unto our faculties and apply themselves to the desires or capacities that are there with so much proportion and equality that the motions that they make there be neither too languishing nor too violent but in an agreeable measure The pleasure of the mind when it employs it self with success in the contemplation of things intellectual is much more great than that of the eyes or ears because 't is a more noble faculty and things Spiritual are more excellent than Bodies and by consequence Operations more exquisite and curious do arise from the occurrence of them From whence it follows necessarily that when the faculties of the Soul are come to that point of perfection in which they do as it were as much surpass themselves when they were in a state of nature as in this state of nature they did surpass the eyes and ears and that when the Objects that are presented to them have as many or more degrees of excellency above those things intellectual which we ordinarily apprehend as they have above sensible and Corporeal Objects it is indubitable that the joy and content that doth accompany Operations so Divine must infinitely excel that which can be Ministred by the knowledg of the most perfect and sublime Sciences The understanding being filled with such excellent knowledg it must necessarily be that the will be full of love marvellously ardent towards those Objects from whence it doth derive For things that are excellent do draw our affections for their own sake and deserve our love by the sole respect of their beauty And the content that we take in the knowledg of them is a cause that we love them also for our own sake because we love our selves it cannot be that in that respect we should not love those things that Minister to our satisfaction Besides we are so naturally disposed that we do not only love those Objects from whence such excellent knowledg derives but we singularly esteem the means by which we do enjoy it and 't is for that reason that some have said that we have our eyes above our other Bodily Senses because they discover to our knowledg a far greater multitude of things than our others and under greater variety And experience teaches us that of all visible Objects light seems to be most beautiful and pleasant which comes to pass not only from its natural constitution in that it seems to be the Object which hath the most proportion with the faculty of seeing but also because 't is that which renders other things visible and which if I may so say doth colour even colours themselves and give the form and figure to the forms and figures of Bodies So that we may not doubt but that blessed Souls are wholly inflamed with the love of the persons and things which on high are perpetually presented to the eyes of their understandings Now love is of it self a thing full of contentment and joy when we enjoy the thing we love and know that we are
it Touching the Body 't is beyond comparison more easy to tell what it will not be then what it will be For we see very clearly what things it must necessarily be delivered from but we do not see in the same manner the things wherewithal it must be endued on that very happy day There are in us two sorts of infirmities whereof the one are so very natural that we should have been subject to them though we had continued in the state of our integrity The others are so far natural that we are subject to them from the womb and from the first principles of our being and yet notwithstanding they have come upon us since the constitution of our nature and had never come into the world but in consequence of sin with regard to these last such as is the deformity of members the ugliness of the visage the want or weakness of any sense maladies wounds ill proportion of stature and to conclude liableness to death since they have no other cause nor original but sin it must necessarily be that sin being entirely and absolutely abolished all these infirmities will necessarily cease of themselves So that though we had nothing else to expect from the Resurrection it must however replace us in a condition not less excellent in what appertains to the constitution of the Body than was the condition of Adam at the hour of his Creation For 't is neither agreeable to the wisdom or mercy nor it may be to the justice of God that having absolved our whole and entire persons from all kind of sin by justification and having delivered our Souls from all evil habits by Sanctification he should notwithstanding leave on our Bodies some trace of those infirmities which had never come there but for the punishment of sin or which are necessary and indubitable dependances of it Imagine you then the most beautiful man upon earth and the most perfectly composed endued with the most lively and vigorous and exquisite senses that can be imagined free him from the danger of all kinds of incommodities in his health make his vigour always equal and flourishing and suppose you that no consequence of years can ever alter or change him and to conclude give him assurance that he shall continue so everlastingly and you will after a sort have conceived the first beginnings of the perfection which we expect in the happy Resurrection Touching the first sort of infirmities which are absolutely natural they consist in the desire of meat drink and sleep and in all those things which are either in some manner like unto them or depend upon them For without doubt Adam desired all this and this desire in a State so Holy and Perfect as was his is an indubitable argument of need and need a necessary consequence of the estate of nature in which he was placed and which the Holy Scripture expresses by this manner of speech he was made a living Soul that is to say that in this respect he was like to other Animals in which the living Soul which the Scripture also attributes unto them derives all these things in consequence to his being Now we ought also to be delivered from these kind of infirmities For the Heavens whither we aspire are not an Habitation agreable to these things although it be said that we shall be there at the Table with Abraham Isaac and Jacob that we shall there be satisfied with the fatness of the House of God and moistened with the Rivers of his pleasures that doth not mean nevertheless that we must make feasts there or to take it according to the Letter that Rivers of pleasure do actually run there But because as long as we are here below we conceive nothing almost but under the Images of things which we see the Scripture accommodating it self unto us as we do to Children doth as it were cover the Heavenly pleasure under the shadow of those that are earthly And as to what concerns generation For as much as it was not instituted in nature unless first of all for the multiplication of single persons for the peopling of the universe and afterwards for the preservation of the species when death removed the individuals the necessity of these two causes then ceasing 't is no wonder that our Saviour hath told us that in that respect we shall be like the Angels Now 't is no disadvantage to be deprived of these things when we have no need of them But to subsist in our being and to exercise perfectly the Operations which are agreeable to our most noble faculties and nevertheless to be delivered from that condition that makes all these base and wretched Actions of our Bodies absolutely necessary is without lying an Estate that ought to be judged very advantageous by those that are compounded more of Spirit than Body and have a Soul a little roused and generous if therefore you add this to those other perfections of which I have made mention you will yet much advance the excellence of that Estate whereof I have formed the Idea In the mean time all these infirmities have their root in us in that we have a Body compounded of the Elements in the same manner as are the Bodies of all other Animals and in that we are endued with a Soul sensitive and vegetative as they speak which hath faculties altogether like to the faculties of the Souls of beasts unless peradventure we be above them in some higher degree of perfection and this composition of the Elements and of a Soul vegetative and sensitive in the constitution of our essence is a cause that although the providence of God should hinder as it did in our integrity our being sick or wounded so it is that our Bodies in themselves would be capable of the impression of the causes of all these alterations and that although God should perpetually preserve us from death nevertheless the constitution of our Body in it self would be perishable and mortal for that the first man had been exempt from all these evil accidents and immortal if he had persevered in his innocence would have proceeded from the care of the Divine Providence and not from the temperature of his Body 'T is therefore necessary that although our Bodies be raised again and remade of the same matter of which they are now compounded the constitution of them must nevertheless be so changed that nothing must remain of all its natural qualities or of that Animal life which we have in common with Creatures endued with sense and destitute of Reason Let us therefore oppose a little those things that depend on this natural complexion of our Bodies to those qualities that are contrary unto them and so let us Endeavour to come to some knowledg of the perfection of the Estate that we expect our Bodies are now in their nature capable of all sorts of evil accidents and impressions which cause incommodity and grief unto them then they shall be so
no more They are at this time corruptible and mortal then they shall be incorruptible and immortal They are now heavy by reason of the Earth that doth predominate in them there they shall be agile beyond all imagination they are at this time capable of being wearied there they shall be indefatigable they are at this time dark then they shall be bright and shining to that degree that the Holy Scripture compares them to the Sun they are at this time perpetually subject to repletion and excretion then they shall be in a Constitution perpetually uniform they are at this time defective in their conformation many ways then the proportion of their parts shall surpass all the measures of nature and art Here they are troubled with the ill taste of their pleasures there their contentments being perfectly pure they will have always a Savour exquisite and eternally agreeable They are now a burthen and hinderance to our minds then they will assist to the vigour and quickness of their Operations In a word they are at this time marvellously earthly then they shall be altogether Heavenly As to what concerns the Operations of the senses and the motions of the affections which as we have said above have their seat in the Body forasmuch as it respects rather the Estate of the Soul when it shall at some time be reunited there and doth not respect the qualities of the body it self I shall speak but one word of it here and 't is this the objects that are perfectly well proportioned to them do indeed delight them but others do offend them so that light it self which in its own nature is so lovely and agreeable offends the eyes if it be but a little too lively and sparkling Instead whereof then the constitution of our senses will be such that they will be impassible and unalterable by grief whatever be the nature of the Objects that do occur unto them and that is it that the Apostle would teach us when he says there is a natural and there is a Spiritual Body For by Spiritual he doth not understand that which is entirely separate from matter otherwise since he calls it matter his words would imply a contradiction but he understands that which although it be matter hath notwithstanding those qualities that follow the nature of Spirits such as are to be immortal incorruptible and impassible When the wife of Lot became a Pillar of Salt if this change were made by degrees and by little and little she was marvellously astonished to see all the colour of her skin and all the substance of her body change and yet more when she perceived all her members to grow stiff in that manner that at last the obduration proceeded even to her very bowels If a while after she had seen her natural constitution to return little by little her Body to become soft and supple her skin return to its former colour and her members retake their precident pliableness in proportion to the horrour that she had of her self in her change in the same proportion will she have experience of ravishment and joy But if immediately after she had seen her self re-established in her first Estate she had begun to perceive an extraordinary strength in her person an Angelical beauty in all her Fabrick and Composition a vigour unknown before in all the Organs of her senses a nimbleness more agile than that of Birds in all her motions and that Majestick aspect that we suppose to have been in the female Hero's of time past implanted in all the comportment of her Body and on all the lines and stroaks of her countenance neither the word joy nor that of ravishment are capable of representing the emotions that she would have thereupon in her Soul Now the change that happens in our Bodies by death is much worse than a Transformation into a pillar of Salt and the condition into which they will be re-established in the Resurrection incomparably more Excellent than all that at this time can be imagined concerning it From whence 't is easy to conjecture in some manner what a spectacle so marvellous will produce in us Concerning the Soul and the condition wherein it will be found then when it shall be reunited to the Body if from these goodly lights wherewithall it is filled and encompassed in the Heavens it should be brought back into a Body incommodated with the trouble and confusion that is found in the affections and Organs of ours at present without doubt it would receive much disadvantage thereby this would be well nigh as if you should recal an excellent Philosopher from the top of an high Mountain where he did contemplate the Heavens and the Stars which are there and saw the Clouds and Fogs under his feet and make him descend to the bottom of it where he can contemplate nothing but through the darkness of the Clouds But the thing that happens to the Body will place it in such a condition as will in no wise incommodate the actions and Operations of the Soul Let the nature thereof be what it will 't is necessary that besides the Operations of understanding and reason that it now attend to the Conservation of the three faculties which we have in common with beasts The vital the natural and the animal As to the vital faculty our Soul will then so animate our Body that it will no longer hold it fast unto it self by the bond of that Coelestial heat and those Spirits that continually beat in our hearts it will be there even as light is in the Body of the Sun and will not keep it self there by any other bonds than it self the Body such as we now have is too far removed from the nature of Spiritual substances to be capable of being joined with them so closely unless it be by the means of something more subtil and less Earthy but the qualities wherewithall it will be reclothed by the Resurrection will purify and subtilize it in such manner that it will be further removed then from the gross qualities which we observe therein than now are those little Bodies which we call by the name of Spirits which serve as a bond and medium between our Bodies and Souls As to the natural faculty our Soul will be neither imployed in the Concoction as they call it nor in the assimilation of nourishment as now it is obliged to do to preserve unto the parts of the Body their just vigour and stature For in the frame wherein the power of God shall place them at first they shall remain for ever without any need of reparation in their substance or in their powers Such well near as is the nature of the Stars according to the Peripateticks whose matter is so pure or form so perfect or the bond that joins the matter to the form so strict and indissoluble that they can never suffer any alteration according to the opinion of those Philosophers As to the Animal
faculty which displays it self chiefly in the Operations of sense and motion I know not at all what will be then the constitution of our Organs nor what will be the nature of the Operation of our Soul upon them nor how the species of sensible things will be received by them And what is more I am not afraid to be esteemed an ignorant on this account at least for certain I shall have many Companions to partake with me in the blame thereof For I do not believe there is a man upon Earth that knows it But so it is that I very well know all will be otherwise than now it is the constitution of such Organs as now we have and the dispensation of Spirits whereupon depends all their Operations being a certain consequence of the passible and corruptible state of nature Now that which is natural will be swallowed up with that which is supernatural as that which is sensual by that which is Spiritual and that which is mortal by immortality and life And although we do not know the manner after which the Soul will be then joined to the Body for its Operations they will not be for that either the less certain or the less decorous If the measure of our knowledg were the measure of the Existence of things the greatest part of the objects of our faculties and their Operations would suffer very notable diminutions in the qualities of their Being yea some would be even absolutely expelled out of nature And I do not know whether we have used any of our senses as we ought That is to say whether of any of them we have very exactly and distinctly comprehended what it is that the Soul doth in their Operations what is the agency and activity of the Spirits And lastly what it is that the Organ it self contributes thereunto how ever it be the Organ after what manner so ever it be constituted the Soul after whatsoever manner it operate there will exercise so admirably each one what is proper to it self that they will do it without offence impediment errour or weariness with a vigour and clearness with an exactness and perfection wholly beyond imagination In conclusion to say something also of the appetites which have properly their seat in the Body and which as I have said are included under desire and anger these are passions which forasmuch as they are Corporeal will be so extinguished by death that they will return no more to life by the Resurrection And if it be true that there be virtues which have their seat in these passions as 't is apparent that Philosophy hath there placed those that they call properly moral either they will be no longer necessary because there will be no objects upon which they may be exercised or they consist not in the moderation of those appetites but in an excellent and invariable temper of the mind and will which will then be irrevocably fastened to all sorts of excellent objects by the light of the understanding All these impidements being removed if there were nothing else the reasonings of the Soul must be supreamly excellent For a good part of the failures which happen to us come either by the errour of our senses in the report that they make to us concerning sensible things or from the fumes of our passions which blind our understandings or from this that the aliments being not well concocted the Spirits which are formed out of part of their substance do retain something of their grossness and impurity wherewithal they infect the Organs which serve for the use of discourse or from this that from their first conformation there was some fault in their natural temper and construction But the same change which will put all the other parts of the Body into so excellent a constitution will put also those into the same condition wherein the intellective power of the Soul hath its seat and where it will form its ratiocinations This will be done the rather because all the other parts of the Body are not to be restored unless it be for their own proper felicity these are to serve the Operations of the Soul on which depends the happiness of the whole entire man and all the parts of him the Soul therefore being otherwise full of the illuminations of the Divine Spirit and strengthened by his presence far above the natural vigour of its faculties and coming to be lodged in a Body all whose power will be admirably perfect and bringing thither the impression of much excellent knowledg which it had already gained during the time of its residence in the Heavens it cannot effect any thing but productions worthy of its marvellous essence And as if during the time of a long separation the husband and wife had equally encreased in beauty and virtue and all other advantages they would receive incredible contentment if they might return to each other to enjoy long one and the same common felicity The Soul will rejoyce in its reunion to the Body and the Body will rejoyce in the presence of the Soul and both together composing one onely essence will be equally ravished with the happiness of their condition and with the assurance that they will have that it will be Eternal The second respect according to which man hath a Connexion and Relation to the World will deserve very attentive Consideration many things do manifestly show that the world was created for man The dignity of his nature which raised him infinitely above all other Creatures if he had remained in his integrity would not have permitted that he should have held any other place than that of an end to the use whereof other things were appointed The Empire that God gave him over all Plants and Animals at the beginning when he placed him in the Terrestrial Pardadise confirms it evidently For God would not have so ordained it if it had not been agreeable to the nature of the things themselves But nothing Teaches it unto us more expresly than the misery whereunto the world is subject on the occasion of mans sin For that 's it which the Apostle means when he says that the Creature is made subject to vanity not of it self but by reason of him which hath subjected it Rom. 8. 20. And if it be lawful to illustrate this by a Comparison taken from things Pagan the World was in regard of God as the statue of Minerva in regard of Phidias and man which is the image of God in the middle of the world as the image of Phidias in the middle of her Shield So that all the parts of the Statue were so aptly placed by their Jointures and Colligations that they met all together in the image of the workman in such manner that if it were plucked from thence all the work would fall in pieces all the parts of the World do so Abutt on this image of God that it cannot be corrupted by sin but the whole compages of
Saint John Collects the brief sum of our happiness in these few words we shall be like him in as much as we shall see him as he is Certainly to see God as he is is to acquire the supream degree of perfection in matter of knowledg and understanding and to be made like unto him is to attain the supream pitch of Holiness and Virtue Forasmuch therefore as the first is the cause of the second and that on the knowledg of God as he is depends necessarily our transformation into his likeness it behoves us to enquire what is meant by seeing God as he is and what is the nature of that knowledg Because God is a Spiritual Essence and totally separate from the matter of Bodies 't is absolutely impossible that he should be seen as he is with our bodily eyes and therefore 't is necessary that we refer the word see by a Metaphor to that faculty of our minds that consists in understanding Now although the nature of God be marvellously one and simple so it is that according to our manner of conception we distinguish his virtues and Properties from his Essence Concerning his properties we conceive them under very different respects and pretend not when we say that he is merciful to beget an apprehension in the minds of those that hear us that he is just or when we say that he is wise to give occasion to think of his power and might as his Attributes have very different Objects so we comprehend them in our understandings under very different Idea's But then when we speak of his Essence we make a kind of abstraction of it from his Properties and represent it as a single and simple thing in which all his Attributes exist as in a common Subject As to what concerns his Attributes we see them in some sort in this life in that we understand at least in some degree what is the nature of those Operations by which they display themselves upon their Objects For we are not perfectly ignorant what may be that inclination in God of pardoning sins to the penitent and punishing the obstinate and impenitent and things of like nature But as to his Essence there is no man that doth not acknowledg that we understand it not at all in this life that is to say we are not able to form any conception in our minds which hath any respect to the nature of his Essence only some think that when we shall be received into the Heavens our supream happiness will consist in the vision of this Essence which certainly seems extream difficult to be imagined for since the question here is not concerning the Corporeal Vision seeing God is absolutely invisible after that manner But concerning the Vision of the Mind our understandings here below know not in any wise the Essence of things but fix themselves alone on the Contemplation of their Properties so that it is not at all possible for us now to comprehend how this faculty of understanding shall be so changed in the Heavens that not fixing it self on the Contemplation of the Properties of things it should pass on to the very Essence it self Add to this that if there be any Being in the World whose Essence is incomprehensible 't is that of God for all others have at least this conformity with us that they are Created and by consequence there being some proportion between their Essence and ours it will not be so strange if there should be some proportion between them and the operation of our faculties whereas God being an Increated Being which exists by it self it is more than difficult to conceive how created faculties can attain to the comprehension of his Essence as long as we are encompassed with this body although we be Spiritual as to the most excellent part of our Essence so it is that we know not at all what is the nature of Spirits and however subtilly we do contemplate however precise and delicate be the Abstractions by which we endeavour to withdraw our minds from all Commerce with matter in our Contemplations so it is that if we try to form any conception in our minds as they speak which we will accommodate to the nature of a Spirit we know not how to hinder some Corporeal Idea from gliding insensibly on our thought and imagination Now I am of this opinion that though our Souls be truely Spiritual if you compare them with the nature of bodies nevertheless they are in some sort Corporeal if you do compare them with the nature of God that is to say there is as much disproportion betwixt the simplicity of the nature of God and the quality of our minds as there is between the nature of our minds and the quality of that part in us that is Corporeal and for that reason there seems to be a like impossibility for our Spirits to comprehend the nature of the Essence of God as there is for us whilst we are clothed with this body to conceive the nature of our own Souls and that of Angels Lastly The Divine nature cannot be Divine that is to say endued with the Perfection that becomes the excellency of its Being if its Essence be not altogether infinite Either then this conception of our minds by which we comprehend the Essence of the Deity equalleth it self to the whole extent of this Essence so as entirely to comprehend it or else it comprehends only as much as is proportionable to its capacity and to its extent to that same Essence if it be equal to the nature of God it will become infinite and we shall become so many Gods which is too absurd and erroneous to be received by any understanding of regular apprehensions if it comprehend only what will be proportionable to its capacity seeing this capacity is finite and that between finite and infinite there is no proportion there will always be an immense disproportion between the Essence of God and what we comprehend concerning it I know well that here are alledged certain subtil distinctions which put us to as much trouble to confute them as they give us trouble to understand them For some say that we see the Essence of God all entire but that we do not see it entirely Well near as if we said that on the Sea Shore we see the Sea in whole but not in all its latitude and extension for we see it in whole or in its integrity in that it is the Sea and because in all the parts of the World it hath no other nature than that which it hath upon our Shores But we do not not see it in all its latitude because our sight cannot extend it self so far as the extent of our Horizon so far is it short of being able to see what is at the Antipodes But this doth not at all weaken my Argument for if the word Sea signifie nothing but a certain kind of water salt in its original and which by hidden