too Begin when you please I hope I shall not be unprovided for you But till then I am not obliged to incumber my Defence of the Soul's Immortality with needless Controversies 4. Though it should be granted That the Souls of Brutes are both Material and Mortal we are still sure that the Humane Soul is much more excellent than they as appears by those Operations in us which are not descernible in them I think it is ill done of those Philosophers who debase or deny the Sensitive Faculties of Beasts and make them meer Machines and I deny not that there is something in them which looks like Reason But what then These higher Operations of the Souls of Men which have a more immediate and direct reference to Immortality are such as we see no appearance of in the Inferior Creatures They know not God they love him not they have no apprehensions of a Future State no sense of Moral Good or Evil as Man hath and this is enough to distinguish us from them and to shew that our Natures are made for higher Ends than theirs as the Poet speaking of Religion says Seperat haec nos A Grege Brutorum And therefore to argue from the Mortality of the Souls of Brutes against the Immortality of the Souls of Men is every way to beg the Question 5. And thus again you carry the Controversy into the dark as the manner of such Philosophers is and plead Uncertainties against those things which are Certain not knowing the premises while you will needs hold the Conclusion and so abuse your Reason and lose the Truth and your Labour both together This method may indeed serve the ends of perverse Wranglers but is not the way to make any man wiser There is a great deal observable both in the Souls of Men and Brutes which the best Philosophers do not comprehend Must we therefore deny what 's plain because we are not agreed about more remote Difficulties This is the way to introduce Scepticism and unthankfully to reject what God hath made known to us because he hath not laid open all the rest The words of Tertullian in his Treatise de Animâ are very remarkable in the present Case Quis enim revelabit quod Deus texit unde sciscitandum est praestat per Deum nescire quia non revelaverit quam per hominem scire quia ipse praesumpserit pag. mihi 342. Your Masters have not yet satisfied the Learned World in any Account they have given of Sensitive perception and Appetite by reducing them to the Laws of Matter and Motion You must lay your Foundation better before you build so much upon it But Cicero and Laertius tell us That the Epicureans abandoned Logick and so do their Abettors If supposing would serve instead of proving there would be no great difference between an Ideot and a Philosopher Obj. 2. But Thinking Arguing c. which you ascribe to the Soul belong to the whole Compositum or contexture of Soul and Body which is the efficient proper cause of them pag. 2 4. Answ According to your own Hypothesis each part of the Compositum is not alike concerned in these Acts but especially the Animal Spirits and the Brain which you suppose to be a materia cogitativa but these are not the whole Compositum so that you must first reconcile your Philosophy to it self and then answer what I have said against the Capacity of these Material Corruptible Spirits for the production of such Acts before this Objection be at all valuable They very use which the Soul now makes of Corporeal Organs and Instruments plainly evinces That it doth exert some Action wherein they assist it not for it supposeth an operation upon them antecedent to any operation by them When therefore the Soul makes use of a bodily Organ its Action upon it must needs at last be without the ministry of any Organ unless you multiply to it Body upon Body in infinitum as a Reverend Author observes Blessedness of the Righteous pag. 205. Nullam vim virtutem aut aptitudinem ad ipsum intelligendi aut volendi actum purum formalem in se à spiritibus aut à sensu animus recipit Quomodo enim inferius vilius passivum virtutem activam nobilem Naturae superiori praestantiori activae communicare potest Method Theol. part 1.162 Obj. 3. Matter and Motion may do much as appears by a Musical Organ in the hand of a good Artist page 2. Answ The Instrument is not conscious of the Harmony produced by it as the Soul is of its own Acts and therefore your Similitude is far from running upon all four Obj. 4. Matter has a self-moving Power for if it be reduced to a fine Powder part of it will rise up into the Air like a thin Cloud pag. 7. 13. Answ The Air is a fluid body in which those little Particles are moved as Sticks or Straws are in the Water according to its motion and not by a self-moving Power of their own Though as our Author not observing how he almost confutes himself tells you in the very next words that they are apt to be moved with every little breath I believe indeed they are very susceptible of impressions from without but have no self-moving power within them If the Dust in the Streets fly into you Eyes will you therefore say it has a self-moving power stop it but close up in a Bottle where Wind and Air cannot disturb it and I will be bound for its good behaviour As for the nature of Fire you have light and heat as well as motion to give an account of which I fancy will put you hard to it Neither know you whence the Wind comes nor whither it goes nor what it is that puts it in motion and so we are not at all edified by your Assertion concerning it Obj. 5. The Spirit of the Egyptian whom David found at Ziklag in the field famished came to him again after they had given him Fruit and Water pag. 11. Answ No wonder that his Material Animal Spirits were refresh'd by suitable Nourishment but that proves not that he had no nobler Principle in him Neither do I deny that these Spirits are the immediate Instruments of the Soul 's Operations in its state of union with the Body But this is only ad modum not ad formam actus and therefore to say the Soul cannot subsist nor act in a state of Separation from them is an Argument à Bactdo ad Angulum And yet it is no wonder if it leave the Body when these Spirits are no longer fit to be a vinculum of vital union between them Obj. 6. It cannot be conceived how the separate Soul should think without the Brain see without an Eye c. Answ The Infant in the Womb hath no conception of these Actions which it shall perform when it is come into the World and grown up to maturity The Cases are much alike To conclude Except
delight when it hath found it Contemplative Persons know this to be true which makes them so unwearied in their Studies and pleased with any discoveries they can make for the advancement of Knowledge This made divers of the Ancient Philosophers travel into remote Countries that they might converse with Learned Men and glean up any Fragments of Knowledge where-ever they could find them So did Apollonius Plato Pythagoras Thales c. and the Queen of Sheba came from the uttermost Parts of the Earth to hear the Wisdom of Solomon Seneca thought that Man buried alive who lived without Books And Lipsius thought himself on the top of Olympus when he read Seneca Aristippus thought a Man had better be a Beggar than unlearned Laert. in Arist 50. And what unaccountable delight had Julius Scaliger in Luâ—â—â— who â—â—ought twelve Verses in him better than all the German Empire So ravishing are intellectual Pleasures Impressions from without are made upon the Organs of Sense various according to the variety of Objects and hence correspondent Ideas are formed in the Imagination and laid up in the Memory But there is something higher which sports it self with these Phantasms compounds and divides them at pleasure and makes new ones out of them as of Centaurs Syrens little Boys with Wings and what the Painter pleaseth which have no pattern in rerum natura to answer them What is it which abstracting from the individuating Circumstances of singular Beings forms universal Notions entia Rationis inadequate Conceptions of those beings and so rangeth the World of Entities under the several Species to which they belong by observing wherein they agree or differ from each other and considering their mutual Analogies and Respects What is that which withdraws the Imagination from attending the Organs of Sense insomuch that a Person intent upon his Studies is sometimes as if h◠〈◊〉 in a Dream though awake 〈…〉 not what you say to hi◠〈…〉 the Time goes on though the Clock strike near him What is it that from suitable Premises infers certain Conclusions and thus argues it self into a firm assent to many things above the discovery of Sense yea and contrary to sensible appearance Of which more hereafter And what say you to Mathematical Speculations how far are they beyond the reach of Sense or Imagination The Ingenious Descartes in his Sixth Meditation de Primâ Philosophiâ sets himself to examine the difference betwixt Imagination and pure Intellection and thus proceeds I can imagine a Triangle as distinctly as if I saw it and with some more difficulty a Pentagone but when I come to consider a Figure with a thousand or ten thousand Angles I can form no such distinct Idea of it in my Imagination and yet I can easily understand that such a Figure there may be as well as either of the other and so he goes on Thus you see how soon the Imagination is jaded and tired out but the Understanding can demonstrate the Properties of those several Figures and argue it self into a satisfactory assurance of many Mathematical Truths which at first seem extravagant and unreasonable And hoâ—e it spends upon its own 〈…〉 and deaves Sense and Imagâ—â—â—◠〈…〉 it and many of the Precepts of Geometry are utterly unimitable in the purest matter that Phansy can imagine And yet with what unspeakable satisfaction doth the Mind acquiesce in these Demonstrations so abstract from matter and incompetible to it And when it hath thus by abstraction as it were unbodied them it takes them for its own and hath a perfect understanding of them and makes both Sense and Imagination know their distance and if they will be too busy it silenceth and controlls them by its Sovereign Power and pursues its search with so much earnestness that it knows not how to give over Hence the Mathematical Sciences are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Purifications of the Reasonable Soul Archimedes was so intent upon it that when the City was taken he observed it not and when the Soldier that killed him came into the Room where he was busy at it he bids him have a care of disordering his Figure It were easy to enlarge much on this Particular but I am very confident that no Mathematician who seriously considers what hi◠〈◊〉 â—â—s when intent upon Demonsâ—â—â—◠〈…〉 possibly persuade himself 〈…〉 a piece of folly as 〈…〉 â—â—â—â—le Wheat-meal in two or three days time should become capable of such Speculations as these It were every jot as irrational as to conclude with the Comedian That if the Blood of an Ass was transfused into a Virtuoso there would be small difference between the Emittent Ass and the Recipient Philosopher Shadwell But follow me a little further and you shall see yet greater things than these The Understanding is not satisfied with the knowledge of lower or less important Truths but it riseth up from visible Effects to the invisible Causes and Springs of Action and resteth not till it come to the Ens Entium the Cause of Causes the Fountain of Being and so contemplates him who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One and Truth it self as Plato speaks Crit. pag. 57. It considers its Relation to God its Dependence upon him its Duty to him It understands moral Good and Evil Right and Wrong Vertue and Vice which fall not under the Laws of Matter and Motion It studies the Nature of Spiritual Substances ad intimas rerum Spiritualium quidditates penetrat aut penetrare contendit Scheibler's Metaph. â—â—b â— â—â—g 272. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈…〉 of the Understanding differ 〈…〉 sensible Objects as the I 〈…〉 â—om Sense Max. Tyr. Dissert 1. pag. 9. We have many abstracted Notions and Idea's of immaterial things which depend not on Bodily Figures And in what Subject can these Notions be lodged but in one that is Immaterial Therefore I say Si renunciatur tanto bono Immortalitatis c. If we renounce the Immortality of the Soul so great a good we must also renounce our Wit Reason and Mind by which we are Immortal Lud. Viv. de ver Fidei Lib. 1. pag. 147. And now let the whole Herd of our Epicurean Novelists who cry up the unconceivable power of Matter and Motion muster up their Forces and fairly deduce from the Principles of their Hypothesis a rational intelligible account of those Operations of the Intellect which are so spiritual and abstract from Matter What say you Can Matter and Motion contemplate the Glorious Attributes of God Can a Spiritual Object be apprehended without a Spiritual Act And can such an Act be produced without a Spiritual Power And can such a Power be radicated in meer Matter â—â—â—â—â—â—r modified or moved Must 〈…〉 be an Analogy between the 〈…〉 the Object Can any Eye 〈…〉 â—â—â—h is spiritual and Inâ—â—◠〈…〉 â—ho is a Spirit and Invisible Can Matter and Motion contemplate that Perfection which excludes all Corporeal Imperfection Is not this to act extra Sphaeram Does not
unequal Tenuity and that Snow is white though when the Eye is affected with bilious Humours in the Jaundice it seems yellow and that the Heads of our Antipodes are as erect as our own whatever our imagination obstinately suggests to the contrary Now if the Mind was of the same nature with the corporeal Faculties their Judgment would be uniform Therefore how much soever Matter and Motion may be concerned in these erroneous Impressions which are made upon our Senses and Imaginations it must needs be some nobler Principle in us which supplies these defects and corrects the Errors which proceed from them Can Matter and Motion make such gross mistakes and rectify them when it has done This is to act above it self to do and undo and is altogether unconceivable and incredible to those who will not be imposed upon by an empty sound of words If you cannot explain the manner of Sensation it self by meer Matter and Motion how will you solve those Phaenomena which transcend the power both of Sense and Imagination What is that in Man which will not form its judgment of things according to the rude Votes of the Senses but consults some clearer Principle within it self Speak to the purpose or not at all 6thly The Soul has a Power of restraining and controlling the inordinate Efforts of the material Animal Spirits which argues that it is a Substance distinct from them The frequent Conflicts between Reason and the sensitive Appetite fully prove that there is in Man a Power superior to that of Matter and Motion The material Animal Spirits are much concerned in the disorders of Passion and Concupiscence But what is that Regent Predominant Principle which condemns and checks these unruly Motions of the bruitish Appetite and chuseth sometimes the most distastful things to Sense yea and can give the Body to be burned for high and weighty Reasons notwithstanding all the Recoils and Tumults of the Material Animal Spirits and useth the Body as its Instrument to serve its own Will and Pleasure What can this be but the Rational Intellectual Spirit which is capable of subsisting without the Body or else would never so consent to its Destruction But on the other hand when the Soul of a Man is so immers'd in Sensuality that it lets loose the Reins to Lust and Appetite and forgets its own Dignity and Prerogative we justly say the Beast rules and not the Man And I believe it will prove at last that the Soul must be accountable to its Maker for such mismanagement and so gross a neglect of its Duty To conclude this Argument If both the Sensitive and Intellectual Powers arise from no higher a Spring than Matter and Motion How come these Material Spirits so to struggle one with another and one part of them side with Reason the other fight against it If you think all this is nothing else but the striving of the ambitious Particles of Matter for superiority and pre-eminence you may think so still for me I am not at leasure to fight with Shadows 7thly There is in the Soul a natural apprehension of its own Immortality and by this God rules the World who needs not will not rule it in a way of deceit The belief of the Souls capacity of subsisting in a state of Separation from the Body is so apt to insinuate it self into the minds of Men and hath been so generally received and entertain'd in the World that it may justly be reckoned amongst the Notitiae Communes or natural Notions which are imprinted upon the minds of Men by the Author of Nature 'T is a Notion which hath endured the Test of all Ages and still prevailed Good Men believe and rejoyce in it Bad Men cannot shake off the fears of it Those that are of contrary Factions Opinions and Interests in other respects are yet agreed in this That the Soul is Immortal The illiterate Vulgar who are guided by the more simple Dictates of Nature have more deep impressions of this great truth than some of the Learned themselves who by their laborious trifling have disputed themselves into greater Ignorance and raised Devils which they have not the Wit or Honesty to lay again Not only the Civilized Greeks and Romans but the Barbarous Scythians Indians c. have believed it And what Salmasius says upon another account de Comâ is as applicable to the matter in hand Quanto magis Barbari tanto felicius faciliusque Naturam Ducem sequi putantur Eam detorquent aut ab eâ magis recedunt politiores Gentes The most Eminent of the Philosophers who have taken pains to cultivate their Understandings and to rescue them from the mistakes which Education Example or Inconsiderateness had betrayed them to have still seen Reason to stand up for this great Truth except a few self-conceited Epicureâ—ns who have been the scorn and by-word of all the rest and the Sadducees whom the Jewish Writers reckon among them Cicero observes that there is in the minds of Men Quasi saeculorum quoddam augurium futurorum Tusc Qu. lib. 1.331 A kind of presage of a future World Moreover these Persons who have endeavoured to run down the Notion of the Soul's Immortality have not been able to avoid the force of it in their own Breasts nor to secure themselves from the fear of what might befal them in a State of Separation from the Body finding something within themselves which bore witness to the Truth in despight of their stupid Opposition And what Seneca saith of Atheists may be applied to these Men viz. That though in the day-time and in company they may with some shew of confidence deny the Immortality of the Soul yet in the Night when they are alone sibi dubitant they are full of doubts about it The Giant Epicurus of whom Lucretius saith He was the first man who durst fight against Heaven Lib. 1. de Natura rerum was himself as fearful as any man of those things which he denied were to be feared viz. Death and the Deity As Cicero observes de Natur. Deor. Lib. 1. and so you find him arguing in Laertius That Death is not a thing to be jested with Vid. Laert. in Epicur 297. Whence the Learned Dr. Stillingfleet observes How hard it is for an Epicurean to silence his Conscience after he has prostituted it for whatever there be in the Air there is says he an Elastical power in Conscience that will bear it self up notwithstanding the weight that is laid upon it Orig. Sacr. 365. And 't is very observable that our Author himself though pag. 15. he says positively That by Death the man's Faculty of thinking is certainly destroyed yet else where he speaks more dubiously pag. 3 11 12. The Minds of such Persons says my Lord Bacon are always wavering and unsatisfied never able to smother the in-bred consciousness of their Immortality so as not to have continual suggestions of fear and scruple Have you not heard of some such Persons
can never be reconciled to or explicated by the rigid Laws of Matter and Motion but all our Actions must either arise from the fortuitous dances and friskings of Atoms up and down the Brain and Nerves or else be necessitated by the irresistible impulse of some Superior Cause and so there is a fatal determination which sits upon the Wheels of these Corporeal Motions And thus Mr. Hobs will have it That our Volitions are necessitated by Superior or Natural Causes as much as any motion in a Clock or Watch and that it is unconceivable that any Act or mode of Act can be without a necessitating Efficient Cause Thus he also affirms a certain connexion betwixt all our Thoughts and a necessary Fate in all things If this be true we must no more say that the Will cannot be compelled but rather that it is always so and by consequence the man that kills another is no more blame-worthy than the Sword wherewith he kills him both their Motions being alike necessitated and the Dog acts philosophically when he bites the Stone but considers not the Hand that threw it Neither is it to any more purpose to persuade men to Virtue than it would be to make a Learned Discourse of Harmony to a Lute instead of putting it in Tune As you like these Consequences you shall have more of them at another opportunity If you say your Opinion is not so gross as that of Mr. Hobs's I answer it had ill hap to be so like it Your words are pag. 2. We see in a Musical Organ every Pipe has its proper sound and function and the same Breath acts them all and therein appears a great effect and power of Matter and Motion rightly fabricated and acted by the hand of Artists and what then may not God do with them and by them when he pleaseth So that if our Material Spirits be inordinate in their motions you are in a ready way to make God the Author of sin by your Philosophy It were much better to say with Cicero Sentit animus se moveri quod cum sentit illud únà sentit se vi suâ non alienâ moveri nec accidere posse ut ipse unquam à se deseratur Ex quo efficitur aeternitas c. Tusc Qu. lib. 1.341 so be it we overlook not the Universal concourse of the First Cause with his Creatures but in a way suitable to their Natures 3dly If the Hypothesis which I am writing against be true no man can rationally believe a Future State of Retribution You have heard already how Individuation and Personality are overthrown by it and by consequence there can be no just room for Rewards and Punishments hereafter because the Person when he died had not the same Soul that he had a month before and why should one Soul be punished for another's Crimes and that other go free Our Author indeed owns the Articles of the Resurrection and Future Judgment 't is likely to serve a turn but what he builds up with one hand he pulls down with the other He says That Soul and Body as they fall together so shall rise again together Whereupon Judgment Rewards and Punishments shall ensue according as men have behaved themselves in this present world pag. 6. But the difficulty returns upon him Why should that Soul which according to his Hypothesis was no better than a little Wheat-flower Malt or it may be some Cordial Julap or other a few days before the man died be judged and punished for all the Faults which were committed long since Will you say that all the rest are past by and that he is only accountable for the Sins of the last Week or ten Days of his Life This would be to turn the Solemnity of the Resurrection and Final Judgment into a meer piece of Pageantry Moreover the Doctrine of the Resurrection cannot be known but by Supernatural Revelation and therefore 't is an Article of meer Belief There is much in it above the reach of Natural Reason and therefore I ask What must the poor Heathens do who know not that God has revealed any such thing Are they obliged to believe and prepare for a Future State or no If you say they are not they themselves will contradict you and so will the Scripture too which makes them inexcusable for their neglects Rom. 1.20 and that they could not be if there lay not upon them an obligation to the contrary Duties If you say they are so obliged you will be ill set to prove it according to your Hypothesis For if the Soul die with the Body and the Resurrection cannot be proved by Natural Reason how shall they believe without Objective Evidence 'T is true they commonly assert a Future State of Retribution and ground their belief of it upon the Immortality of the Soul which if your Opinion be admitted is an unsound Foundation Whence it appears that Natural Light taught them better things than you have learnt from Supernatural and it together And whatever uncertain hints may be found in any of their Writings as to the Resurrection derived perhaps by Tradition from the Jews or inserted afterwards by the pious Frauds as they call them of some well-meaning Christians we are sure they speak solidly and distinctly concerning the Soul's Immortality 4thly Our Author's Hypothesis makes such a sudden descent from the Angelical Spirits to meer matter and motion denying all the active Natures that are between as is absurd and not to be endured Such Jumps as these are not usual in Nature which is wont to act by due and orderly Gradations and not to take precipitous leaps from one extream to another He would not be thought to deny that there are Immaterial Intelligent Angelical Spirits pag. 6 15. And how unreasonable is it to suppose that there are no other Spirits or active Natures inferior to the Angels and differing in their several kinds and degrees of Perfection and Virtue from each other answerable to the several Operations whereunto they are designed by the Author of Nature But that all the great and wonderful Phanemena which we daily behold must be reduced to and solved by the supposed power of Matter and Motion How much doth the Wisdom of God shine forth in that admirable variety which is observable in the visible Corporeal World And are not spiritual or active Natures as noble as Bodies Why then should there not be a proportionable variety in the Spiritual Invisible World Especially when we observe such Vistigia or Images of the higher Natures in those that are lower Thus there is something in Plants like Sense and in Bruits like Reason and in Men there is somewhat which resembles the Deity Must we therefore say that God and the Creature are all one Or must we confound the inferior Orders of Creatures with those that are Superior and deny those active Natures which animate the visible World and distinguish one Species of Creatures from another While
suitably to it Ibid. Therefore that you may not destroy your own Souls and contribute so much to the ruin of others even while you profess to believe the Immortality of the Soul take these following Directions Direct 1. If you believe that the Soul is Immortal let it be your great care to secure your Eternal Interest If there was no more than a bare probability that the Souls of Men must be for ever either happy or miserable it would yet be a point of the highest Wisdom to take the safest side and to prepare for Eternity as much as possible But when there is so full evidence both Natural and Supernatural as puts the case beyond probability and makes it certain it must needs be the most stupendious folly to neglect the Interest of our Souls which are daily hasting to their Eternal State If the Soul be Immortal says Socrates we had need to take care of it and the danger is dreadful if we neglect it Phaedo 167. And here let me ask you Do you not know that the Life of Man is short and uncertain That the deceitful pleasures of the Flesh will soon be at an end and that the more delightful your accommodations are here below the more unwilling 't is likely you will be to leave them Haec sunt quae faciunt invitos mori And can you chuse but fear what will follow after Death Do you not know that the time of this present Life is given us to prepare for another And what are you in pursuit of that can justify so stupid a neglect of your greatest concerns or that will make amends for the loss of your Immortal Souls Have you not sometimes thoughts of repenting hereafter Why in so thinking you implicitly own the Necessity of Repentance and is it not the height of madness to delay the doing of that which must be done or you are undone and lost for ever In a word Are you not doing violence to your own Consciences all this while and putting away far from you that which most nearly concerns you Be persuaded therefore at length with a manly Resolution to lay aside every weight and the Sins that do so easily beset you and run with Patience the Race that is set before you And if you be so resolved you may proceed as follows 1st Labour to understand what it is that must make your Souls happy if ever they be so You may know by the acts of your Understandings and Wills as before described what Felicity and Perfection your Souls are fundamentally capacitated for Nothing but the highest Truth and the chiefest Good can satisfy them You may divert them for a while with variety of lower Objects but they quickly grow weary and run from one thing to another which may shew you that they are not yet got to their Centre You may charm them with the Delights of Sense and Appetite and some more refined Speculations too and yet you do but degrade them all the while and so they will tell you if you take them apart and freely converse with them Suffer them to act according to their nobler Tendencies and you will soon find them conversing with the World of Spirits to which they are so nearly allyed and reaching forth towards Immortality as a thing suitable to their Nature and design'd for them by its Author They will be looking to their great Original and he will meet them with the Attractive Influences of his Grace This is the way to ennoble them indeed This is something worthy the Nature of a Man These are delights which you may justify while the sordid pleasures of the Flesh leave a sting behind ' em The Life which I am exhorting you to hath something in it not only manly and rational but also Divine viz. To exercise your selves in contemplating and admiring the Perfections of the Deity till correspondent impressions be wrought upon your own Spirits transforming them into the same image from glory to glory 2 Cor. 3.18 And when once you have learnt to relish these spiritual intellectual Pleasures you will look down with a generous disdain upon those Husks which you were once fond of You will scorn those empty Notions which before you were in love with and have a clear testimony of your Immortality within your selves You will detest being so prophane as to sell your Birth-right for a morsel of unsatisfying transitory Pleasures You will then be fully convinced that true Holiness which consists in separating our selves from that which is common and unclean that we may be devoted to the Love and Service of God is perfective of Humane Nature and essentially necessary to its Happiness and that it is a perfect contradiction for an unholy Soul to be truly blessed because nothing but knowing and delighting in God can make us so and in these consists our Holiness And what is there that can justly offend you in such a Life as this Can you be better or more honourably employed Do not even the worst of men when they come to die wish they had thus lived and the best bewail that they have fallen so much short Lord pardon mine Omissions said Bishop Usher Can you be too diligent and serious in the Service of him who hath done all the good that ever was done for you and must do all that ever shall be done to make you happy He needs not you The loss is your own if you turn your backs upon him Consider how much patience he hath already exercised towards you O do not slight the offers of his Mercy and Grace and then think to complain of him as unmerciful in destroying you Thus did that wicked and slothful servant Matth. 25.24 I know indeed that the carnal mind is enmity against God and prejudiced against these things which lead towards him but I know also that this is the disease of Corrupt Nature which where-ever it is must be cur'd or the Party is ruin'd for ever Neither is it sitting still and complaining that will cure it much less pleading it as an excuse against our Duty A willingness to be healed is in this Case a great step towards it But I proceed 2dly Humble your selves for the gross neglects you have hitherto been guilty of What have you done since you came into the World that 's worthy the Nature and Capacities of a man Have you not been making provision for the flesh to fulfil the Lusts thereof while the Immortal Spirit has been almost starved for want of its proper Food viz. Knowledge and Vertue Nascitur enim ex prudentiâ sapere ex temperantiâ sobrium esse pietate Deum colere Hae sunt cibi animae propiè quae idonea est ad sugendum c. Philo Judaeus 127. Is it a light matter that you have debased so noble a Nature all this while and at once sacrilegiously robbed God of that Honour which was due to him from the Rational Creature and unnaturally set your Souls to