grave and necessary Caution of the Poet Sumite materiam vestris qui scribitis â—quam viribus versate diù quid ferre recusent quid valeant humeri Horace to wield and poise the burden as Porters use to do before I undertook it Zuinglius blamed Carolostadius as some may do me for undertaking the Controversie of that Age because saith he Non habet satis humerorum his shoulders are too weak for it And yet I know mens labours prosper not according to the art and elegancy of the composure but according to the divine blessing which pleaseth to accompany them Ruffinus tells us of a learned Philosopher at the Council of Nice who stoutly defended his Thesis against the greatest Witts and Scholars there and yet was at last fairly vanquished by a man of no extraordinary parts of which Conquest the Philosopher gave this candid and ingenuous account Against words said he I opposed words and what was spoken I overthrew by the art of speaking But when instead of words power came out of the mouth of the Speaker words could no longer withstand truth nor man oppose the power of God O that my weak endeavours might prosper under the like influence of the Spirit upon the hearts of them that shall read this inartificial but well-meant Discourse I am little concerned about the Contempts and Censures of fastidious Readers I have resolved to say nothing that exceeds Sobriety nor to provoke any man except my dissent from his unproved Dictates must be his provocation Perhaps there are some doubts and difficulties relating to this Subject which will never be fully solved till we come to Heaven For Man by the Fall being less than himself doth not understand himself nor will ever perfectly do so until he be fully restored to himself which will not be whilst he dwells in a Body of sin and death And yet it is to me past doubt that this as well as other Subjects might have been much more cleared than it is if instead of the proud Contendings of masterly Wits for Victory all had humbly and peaceably applied themselves to the impartial search of truth Truth like an Orient Pearl in the bottom of a River would have discovered it self by its native lustre and radiancy had not the feet of Heathen Philosophers cunning Atheists and daring School Divines disturbed and foul'd the stream 2. And as the difficulties of the Subject are many so many have been the interruptions and Avocations I have met with whilst it was under my hand Which I mention for no other end but to procure a more favourable Censure from you if it appear less exact than you expected to find it Such as it is I do with much respect and affection tender it to your hands humbly requesting the blessing of the Spirit may accompany it to your hearts If you will but allow your selves to think close to the matter before you I doubt not but you may find somewhat in it apt both to inform your minds and quicken your affections I know you have a multiplicity of business under your hands but yet I hope your great concern makes all others daily to give place and that how clamorous and importunate soever the Affairs of this World be you both can and do find time to sit alone and bethink your selves of a much more important business you have to do My Friends we are Borderers upon Eternity we live upon the Confines of the Spiritual and Immaterial World We must shortly be associated with bodyless Beings and shall have after a few days are past no more concerns for Meat Drink and Sleep buying and selling Habitations and Relations than the Angels of God now have Beside we live here in a State of Tryal Man as Scaliger fitly calls him is Utriusque Mundi nexus one in whom both Worlds do meet his Body participates of the lower his Soul of the upper World Hence it is he finds such tugging and pulling this way and that way upward and downward both Worlds as it were contending for this invaluable prize the precious Soul All Christs Ordinances are instituted and his Officers ordained for no other use or end but the Salvation of Souls Books are valuable according to their Conducibility to this end How rich a Reward of my Labours shall I account it if this Treatise of the Soul may but promote the Sanctification and Salvation of any Readers Soul To your hands I first tender it It becomes your Property not only as a Debt of Justice the fulfilling of a Promise made you long since upon your joynt and earnest desires for the publication of it but as an acknowledgment of the many Favours I have received from you to one of you I stand obliged in the Bond of Relation and under the sense of many Kindnesses beyond whatever such a degree of Relation can be supposed to exact You have here a succinct account of the Nature Faculties and Original of the Soul of Man as also of its infusion into the Body by God without intitling himself to the guilt and sin resulting from that their Union You will also find the breath of your Nostrils to be the Nexus Tie or Bond which holds your Souls and Bodies in a personal Union and that whilst the due Crasis and Temperament of the Body remains and Breath continues your Souls hang as by a weak and slender thread over the state of a vast Eternity in Heaven or in Hell Which will inform you both of the value of your breath and the best way of improving it whilst you enjoy it The Immortality of the Soul is here asserted proved and vindicated from the most considerable Objections so that it will evidently appear to you by this Discourse you do not cease to be when you cease to breathe And seeing they will over-live all Temporal Enjoyments they must necessarily perish as to all their Joys Comforts and Hopes which is all the Death that can be incident to an Immortal Spirit if they be not in the proper season secured and provided of that never-perishing food of Souls God in Christ their Portion for ever Here you will find the Grounds and Reasons of that strong inclination which you all feel them to have to your Bodies and the necessity notwithstanding that of their divorce and separation from their beloved Bodies and that it would manifestly be to their prejudice if it should be otherwise And to overcome the unreasonable Aversations of Believers and bring them to a more becoming chearful submission to the Laws of death whensoever the Writ of Ejection shall be served upon them You will here find a representation of that blessed life comely order and most delightful employment of the incorporeal People inhabiting the City of God wherein beside those sweet Meditations which are proper to feast your hungry affections you will meet with divers unusual though not vain or unuseful Questions stated and resolved which will be a grateful entertainment
his own feet and the Bird enjoy himself as well yea better in the open Fields and Woods than in the Cage neither depend as to Being or action on the Horse or Cage 3. Both Scripture and Philosophy consent in this that the Soul is the chief most noble and principal part of Man from which the whole Man is and ought to be denominated So Gen. 46.26 All the Souls that came with Iacob into Aegypt i. e. all the persons as the Latines say tot capita so many Heads or Persons The Apostle in 2 Cor. 5.8 seems to exclude the body from the notion of personality when he saith We are willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord that We a term of personality is there given to the Soul exclusively of the Body for the Body cannot be absent from it self but We that is the Souls of Believers may be both absent from it and present with Christ. To this we may add 2 Cor. 4.16 where the Soul is called the Man and the inner Man too the body being but the external face or shadow of the Man And to this Philosophy agrees The best Philosophers are so far from thinking that the body is the substantial part of Man and the Soul a thing dependent on it that contrarily they affirm that the body depends upon the Soul * Anima corpus animatum conservat sustentat ubâ— autem illa reliquit corpus perit animatum corpus animalis ratio Anima non est in corpore tanquam in loco cùm à loco circuâ— scâ—iâ—i nequeat tota per totum meat corpus non et pars in qua non tota adsit non enim à corpore tenetur sed ipsa tenet Corpus Neque est in corpore ut in vase vel in utre sed potius in ipsa est Corpus Nyâ—â—en de Anima lib. 2. cap. 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Anima cujusque est quisqus and that it is the Soul that conserves and sustains it And that the Body is in the Soul rather than the Soul in the Body And that which is seen is not the Man but that is the Man which is invisible That the body might be kill'd and the Man not hurt meaning the Soul which only deserves the name of Man Now if it be the chief part of Man and that which is only worthy the name of a Man and from which therefore the whole is and ought to be denominated a Man If it be so far from depending on the body or being contained within the body that the body rather depends on it and is in it then surely the Soul must be what we describe it to be a substantial Being 4. It is past all Controversie that the Soul is a Substance because it is the Subject of Properties Affections and Habits which is the very strict and formal notion of a Substance All the affections and passions of Hope Desire Love Delight Fear Sorrow and the rest are all rooted in it and spring out of it and so for Habits Arts and Sciences * A 〈◊〉 Subjectum 〈…〉 omnium viâ—â—â—tum vitiorum Sâ—â—entiâ—rum Artium Buchan loc Com. p. 86. 't is the Soul in which they are lodged and seated Having once gotten a Promptitude to act either by some strong or by some frequently repeated actings they abide in the Soul even when the Acts are intermitted as in sleep a Navigator Scribe or Musician are really Artists when they are neither Sailing Writing or Playing Because the habits still remain in their minds as is evident in this that when they awake they can perform their several works without learning the rules of their Art anew 2 A Vital Substance II. The Soul is a vital Substance i. e. A Substance which hath an essential principle of Life in it self A living active Being A living Soul saith Moses in the Text and hereby it is distinguished from and opposed to matter or body The Soul moves it self and the body too it hath a self-moving Virtue or Power in it self whereas the matter or body is wholly passive and is moved and acted not by it self but by this vital Spirit James 2.26 The body without the Spirit is dead It acts not at all but as it is acted by this invisible spirit This is so plain that it admits of sensible proof and demonstration Take meer matter and compound or divide it alter it and change it how you will you can never make it see feel hear or act vitally without a quickning and actuating Soul Yet we must still remember that this active vital principle the Soul though it hath this vital Power in it self it hath it not from it self but in a constant receptive dependance upon God the first Cause both of its Being and Power 3 A Spiritual Substance III. It is a Spiritual Substance All Substances are not gross material visible and palpable substances but there are spiritual and immaterial as well as corporeal substances discernable by Sight or Touch. To deny this were to turn a downright Sadducee and to deny the existence of Angels and Spirits Acts 23.8 The word Substance as it is applied to the Soul of Man puzzles and confounds the dark understandings of some that know not what to make of an immaterial Substance whereas in this place it is no more than * A Substance in this use of the word is that which depends not in respect of its Being upon any other fellow creature as Accidents and Qualities do whose Being is by having their in-being in another fellow creature as their subject but this Being The Soul exists in it self substare accidentibus i. e. to be a subject in which properties affections and habits are seated and subjected This is a spiritual Substance and is frequently in Scripture called a Spirit into thy hands I commit my spirit Luke 23.46 Lord Iesus receive my spirit Acts 7.59 and so frequently all over the Scriptures And the spirituality of its nature appears 1. by its Descent in a peculiar way from the Father of Spirits 2. in that it rejoyceth in the essential Properties of a Spirit 3. That at Death it returns to that great Spirit who was its Efficient and Former 1. It descends in a peculiar way from the Father of Spirits as hath been shewn in the opening of this Text God stiles himself its Father Heb. 12.9 it s Former Zech. 12.1 'T is true he giveth to all living things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 life and breath Acts 1â— 25 Other Souls are from him as well as the rational Soul but in a far different way and Manner They flow not immediately from him by Creation Gen. 1.24 27. as this doth It is said Let the Earth bring forth the living Creature after his kind but God created Man in his own Image Which seems plainly to make a specifical difference betwixt the reasonable and all other Souls 2. It
rejoyceth in the essential Properties of a Spirit for it is an incorporeal Substance as Spirits are It hath not partes extra partes extension of parts nor is it divisible as the body is It hath not Dimensions and Figures as matter hath but is a most pure invisible and as the acute and judicious Dr. More expresseth it an indiscerpible Substance It hath the Principle of Life and Motion in it self or rather it is such a Principle it self and is not moved as the dull and sluggish matter is per aliud by another It s efficacy is great though it be unseen and not liable to the Test of our touch as no spiritual substances are A Spirit saith Christ hath not Flesh and Bones Luke 24.39 We both grant and feel that the Soul hath a love and inclination to the body which indeed is no more than it is necessary it should have yet can we no more inferr its Corporeity from that love to the body than we can infer the Corporeity of Angels from their affection and benevolent love to men It is a Spirit of a nature vastly different from the body in which it is immersed Mr. How 's Funeral Serm. p. 9 10. There is saith a learned Author no greater mystery in nature than the union betwixt the Soul and Body That a Mind and Spirit should be so ty'd and linkt to a clod of Clay that while that remains in a due temper it cannot by any art or power free it self What so much a-kin are a Mind and a piece of Earth a Clod and a Thought that they should be thus affixed to one another Certainly the heavenly pure Bodies do not differ so much from a dunghil as the Soul and Body differ they differ but as more pure and less pure matter but these as material and immaterial If we consider wherein consists the Being of a Body and wherein that of a Soul and then compare them the matter will be clear We cannot come to an apprehension of their Beings but by considering their primary passions and properties whereby they make discovery of themselves The first and primary affection of a body * Philosophical Essay â— 2. §. 2. p. 39. as is rightly observed is that extension of parts whereof it is compounded and a capacity of Division upon which as upon the fundamental mode the particular Dimensions that is the figures and the local motion do depend Again for the Being of our Souls if we reflect upon our selves we shall find that all our knowledge of them resolves into this that we are Beings conscious to our selves of several kinds of cogitations that by our outward senses we apprehend bodily things present and by our imagination we apprehend things absent And that we oft recover into our apprehension things past and gone and upon our perception of things we find our selves variously affected Let these two properties of a Soul and Body be compared and upon the first view of a considering mind it will appear that Divisibility is not Apprehension or Judgment or Desire or Discourse That to cut a body into several parts or put it into several shapes or bring it to several motions or mix it after several ways will never bring it to apprehend or desire No man can think the combining of Fire and Air and Water and Earth should make the lump of it to know or comprehend what is done to it or by it We see manifestly that upon the division of the body the Soul remains entire and undivided It is not the loss of a Leg or Arm or Eye that can maim the Understanding or the Will or cut off the affections Nay it pervades the body it dwells in and is whole in the whole and whole in every * Understand iâ— negatively that the Soul is not in the parts of the body per partes part in one part and part in another seeing it is indivisible and hath no parts part which it could never do if it self were material Yea it comprehends in its understanding the body or matter in which it is lodged and more than that it can and doth form conceptions of pure spiritual and immaterial Beings which have no Dimensions or Figures all which shâ—ws it to be no corporeal but a Spiritual and immaterial Substance 3. As it derives its Being from the Father of Spirits in a peculiar way and rejoyceth in its spiritual properties so at death it returns to that great Spirit from whence it came It is not annihilated or resolved into soft Air or suckt up again by the Element of Fire or catcht back again into the soul of the World as some have dreamed but it returns to God who gave it to give an account of it self to him and receive its Judgment from him Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was and the Spirit shall return to God who gave it Eccles. 12.7 Each part of Man to its like dust to dust and spirit to spirit Not that the Soul is resolved into God as the Body is into Earth but as God created it a rational Spirit conscious to it self of moral good and evil so when it hath finisht its time in the body it must appear before the God of the Spirits of all flesh its Arbiter and final Judge By all which we see that as it is elevated too high on the one hand when it is made a particle of God himself not only the Creature but a part of God as * Anima autem mentis particeps facta non solum Dei opus est verum etiam pars neque ab â—o sed de eo ex eo facta Plut. de Qu. Platon Plutarch and †Quomoda credibile vidatur tam axiguam mentem humanam membranulâ etrebri aut corde â—aud â—mplis spaciis inâ—lusam tantam Coeli mundique magnitudinem capere nisi illius divinae fâ—licisque animae particula esset indivisibilis Philo. Philo Iudaeus and others have term'd it a Spirit it is but of another and inferiour kind So it is degraded too low when it is affirmed to be matter though the purest finest and most subtle in nature which approacheth nearest to the nature of a spirit A Spirit it is as much as an Angel is a Spirit though it be a spirit of another species This is the name it is known by throughout the Scriptures In a word it is void of mixture and composition there are no jarring qualities compounded Elements or divisible parts in the Soul as there are in bodies but it is a pure simple invisible and indivisible Substance which proves its spirituality and brings us to the fourth particular viz. IV. It is an immortal Substance 4 An immortal Substance The simplicity and spirituality of its nature of which I spake before plainly shews us that it is in its very nature designed for Immortality for such a being or Substance as this hath none of the seeds of Corruption and Death in
I find that God hath answerably endued and furnished it with an Vnderstanding Will and Affections whereby it is capable of being wrought upon by the spirit in the way of Grace and Sanctification in this world in order to the enjoyment of God its chief happiness in the world to come By this its Understanding I am distinguished from and advanced above all other creatures in this World I can apprehend distinguish and judge of all other intelligible Beings By my Understanding I discern truth from falsehood good from evil It shews me what is fit for me to chuse and what to refuse To this faculty or power of Understanding my thoughts and conscience do belong The former to my speculative the latter to my practical Understanding My thoughts are all formed in my mind or Understanding in innumerable multitudes and variety By it I can think of things present or absent visible or invisible of God or my self of this or the world to come To my Understanding also belongs my Conscience a noble Divine and awfull power By which I summon and judge my self as at a solemn Tribunal bind and loose condemn and acquit my self and actions but still with an eye and respect to the judgment of God Hence are my best comforts and worst terrors This Understanding of mine is the director and guide of my Will That is as the Counsellor This as the Prince It freely chuseth and refuseth as my Understanding directs and suggests to it The members of my Body and passions of my Soul are under its Dominion The former are under its absolute command the latter under its suasions and insinuations though not absolutely and always with effect and success And both my Understanding and Will I find to have great influence upon my Affections These Passions and Affections of my Soul are of great use and dignity I find them as manifold as there are considerations of good and evil They are the strong and sensible motions of my Soul according to my apprehensions of good and evil By them my Soul is capable of union with the highest good By love and delight I am capable of enjoying God and resting in him as the Centre of my Soul This noble Understanding Thoughts Conscience Will Passions and Affections are the principal faculties acts and powers of this my high and heaven-born Soul And being thus richly endowed and furnished I find it could never rise out of matter created and infused with an inclination to the Body or come into my Body by way of natural generation the Souls of Brutes that rise that way are destitute of Understanding Reason Conscience and such other excellent faculties and powers as I find in mine own Soul They cannot know or love or delight in God or set their affections on things spiritual invisible and eternal as my Soul is capable to do it was therefore created and infused immediately into this body of mine by the Father of Spirits and that with a strong inclination and tender affection to my flesh without which it would be remiss and careless in performing its several Duties and Offices to it during the time of its abode therein Fearfully and wonderfully therefore am I made and designed for nobler ends and uses than for a few daies to eat and drink and sleep and talk and dye My Soul is of more value than ten thousand Worlds What shall a man give in exchange for his Soul USE FRom the several parts and branches of this Description of the Soul we may gather the choice Fruits which naturally grow upon them in the following Inferences and Deductions of truth and duty For we may say of them all what the Historian doth of Palestine that there is nihil infructuosum nihil sterile No Branch or Shrub is barren or unfruitful Let us then search it Branch by Branch and Inference I. I The Soul a substantial Being Tanta praerogativa manifeâ—â—e testâ—tur ipsius animam penes quam â—atio principatus est non esse materialem caducam sed sâ—perioris cujusdam atque eminentis naturae à conditione reliquarum animarum longeÌ„ distantem Coâ—imb Disp. de Anima separ p. 584. FRom the substantial Nature of the Soul which we have proved to be a Being distinct from the Body and subsisting by it self we are informed That great is the difference betwixt the death of a Man and the death of all other creatures in the world Their souls depend on and perish with their bodies but ours neither result from them nor perish with them My Body is not a Body when my Soul hath forsaken it but my Soul will remain a Soul when this body is crumbled into dust Men may live like beasts a meer sensual life yea in some sense they may dye like beasts a stupid death but in this there will be found a vast difference Death kills both parts of the Beasts destroyes matter and form it toucheth only one part of Man it destroyeth the Body and only dislodgeth the Soul but cannot destroy it In some things Solomon shews the Agreement betwixt our death and theirs Eccles. 3.19 20 21. That which befallâ—th the Sons of Men befalleth the Beasts even one thing befalleth them As the one dyeth so dyeth the other all go to one place all are of the dust and all turn to dust again We breathe the same common air they breathe we feel the same pains of death they feel our bodies are resolved into the same earth theirs are O! but in this is the difference The spirit of Man goeth upward and the spirit of a Beast goeth downward to the Earth Their spirits go two ways at their dissolution The one to the Earth the other to God that gave it as he speaks cap. 12.7 Though our Respiration and Expiration have some Agreement yet great is the odd in the consequences of death to the one and other They have no pleasures nor pains besides those they enjoy or feel now but so have we and those eternal and unspeakable too The Soul of Man like the bird in the shell is still growing and ripening in sin or grace Conâ—â—â—tuâ— fuit discretum et reâ—â—itque unde veneraâ— terra deo sâ—m spiritus sa sâ—m Epichâ— till at last the shell breaks by death and the Soul flees away to the place it is prepared for and where it must abide for ever The body which is but it's shell perisheth but the Soul lives when it is fallen away How doth this consideration expose and aggravate the folly and madness of the sensual world who herd themselves with beasts though they have souls so near of kin to Angels The Princes and Nobles of the World abhorr to associate themselves with Mechanicks in their shops or to take a place among the sottish rabble upon an Ale-bench They know and keep their distance and Decorum as still carrying with them a sense of Honour and abhorring to act beneath it But we equalize our high and
the line of modesty in what I shall speak about them And the first is this QUERIE I. Querie 1. Whether any Notion or Conception can be formed of a separate Soul and if so how we may be assisted duely to form it and conceive of it Sol. Solution §. 1. 1. It must be acknowledged not only very difficult but an impossible task for a Soul immersed in matter and so unacquainted with its own Nature and Powers as it is in its embodied state to gain a perfect clear and adequate Conception of what it shall be in the World to come Expect not then a perfect image much less any magnificent draught of this excellent Creature This would be the same thing as to go about to depaint the Sun in its Glory Motions and Influences with a Pencil I shall think I have done enough if I can but give you any umbrage or faint representation of this sublime and Spiritual Being and the manner of its subsisting and acting out of the body For seeing it is by nature invisible and in most of its actions whilst it is in the state of composition it makes the same use of the body and natural Spirits that a Scribe doth of his Pen and Ink without which he cannot decipher the Characters which are formed in his fancy it must needs be difficult to conceive how it subsists and acts in its separate state §. 2. But though we acknowledge it to be a great difficulty to trace it beyond the Limits of this World though we perceive nothing to depart from the Body at the instant of its expiration but a puff of breath which vanishes like Smoke into the air And though Atheistical Witts daringly pronounce an immaterial substance to be a meer Iargon Hobs Leviathan cap. 34. a Contradiction in terminis which being joined together destroy one another Yet all this doth not make the Notion of a separate Soul impossible much less undermine its existence in its unbodied and lovely state the Scriptures having so abundantly obviated all these Atheistical Suggestions by so many plain Discoveries of the Happiness of some and Misery of others after this Life Yea my Text answers us That Death is so far from destroying or annihilating that it perfects the Spirits of the Just. §. 3. There can be no more difficulty in conceiving of a separate Soul than there is in conceiving of an Angel For it is certain that a separated Soul and an Angel are the liveliest and clearest representations of each other in the whole number of created Beings Dr. More 's Immortality of the Soul lib. 2. cap. 17. § 4. 8. Bell. de Ascen mentis Some make the difference betwixt them little more than of a Sword in the Scabbard from one that is naked A Soul is but a Genius in the Body and a Genius or Angel is a Soul out of a Body An Angel saith another is a compleat and perfect Soul a Soul an imperfect and incompleat Angel The separate Soul doth not become an Angel by putting off the Body they are and still will be divers Species but in this they agree that in their common nature they are both Spirits that is Immaterial Substances endued with Vnderstanding Will and active power And I know not why the one should not be as intelligible as the other or if there be any advantage the Soul certainly must have it seeing our acquaintance with Souls is much more intimate than with Angels Angels indeed have larger Capacities and have no natural inclination to be embodied as Souls have but their common Nature as they are Spirits is the same And if we can conceive of one we may also of the other §. 4. But the difficulty seems to lie in this how the Soul can subsist alone without a Body and how the habits of Grace which were infused into it in this life by Sanctification do inhere in it or can be reduced into act by it when it hath no bodily Organs to work by As to the first there is no difficulty at all if we once rightly apprehend what is meant when we call it a Spiritual Substance that is a Being by it self independent upon any other Creature as to its existence as was opened before The Soul depends not for its life upon the Body but the Body upon the Soul It is the same Sword when it is drawn as it was when sheathed in its Scabbard the Soul is as much it self when separated from the Body as it was when united with it it s Being is independent on it it can live and act in a Body and it can do so without it For it is a distinct Being from its Body a substantial Being by it self And §. 5. As for the habits of grace which accompany it to Heaven it would much facilitate our apprehension of it if we but compare acquired and infused habits with each other 'T is true they are of different Natures and Originals but the Soul is the subject of them both and their inhesion and improvement is much after the same manner Take we then an acquired habit into consideration which is nothing else but a permanent Quality rendering the subject of it prompt and ready to perform a work with ease Suppose that of Musick or Writing and we shall find these habits to be safely lodged in the Soul as well when the body is laid into the deepest sleep which is the Image of death as when it is awake and most active for they are both Artists when asleep and need learn no new Rules to play or write when you awake them which shews the habits to be permanently rooted in their minds Infused habits of grace are as deeply rooted in the Soul yea deeper than any acquired habit can be For when Knowledge and Tongues shall be done away love abideth 1 Cor. 13.8 viz. after death when the Body is asleep in the Grave §. 6. Add hereto that these habits of grace are inseparably rooted or lodged in a subject which is by nature a Spirit that is to say The Understanding and Will are the primary Faculties of the Soul and are therefore called Inorganical because not affixed to any Member of the Body as the sensitive Appetite and locomotive Powers are to their proper Organs The Soul therefore hath the free use and exercise of them in its separate state an intelligent active Being able to use its faculties of Understanding Will and Affections and consequently in their use to reduce these habits of Grace inherent in them into act without the help of the Body For to suppose otherwise were to dispirit it and destroy the very nature of it Moreover let this Spirit thus furnished with gracious habits be now considered in separation from the Body in which state it enjoyeth and rejoyceth in a double Priviledge it never had before viz. Perfection both of it self and of its Graces and the nearest access to God it is capable of 2 Cor. 5.6
thither and keeps them there The Mittimus of a Justice is but the instrument of the Law whereby they are deprived of liberty and taken into custody The Law of God which sinners have both violated and despised at death takes hold of them and arrests them 'T is the Law which claps up their Spirits in Prison and in the name and authority of the great and terrible God commits them to Hell All that are out of Christ are under the curse and damning sentence of the Law which now comes to be executed on them Gal. 3.10 Secondly Prisoners are carried or haled to prison by force and constraint Natural force backs legal authority The Law is executed by rough and resolute Bayliffs who compel them to go though never so much against their will This also is the case of the wicked at death Satan is Gods Bayliff to hurry away the Law-condemned Soul to the infernal Prison The Devil hath the power of death Heb. 2.14 as the Executioner hath of the Body of a condemned man Thirdly Prisoners are chained and bolted in Prison to prevent their escape so are damned Spirits secured by the power of God and chained by their own guilty and trembling Consciences in Hell unto the time of Judgment and the fulness of misery not that they have no torment in the mean time Alas Were there no more but that fearful expectation of wrath and fiery indignation spoken of by the Apostle Heb. 10.27 it were an inexpressible torment but there is a further degree of torment to be awarded them at the judgment of the great day to which they are therefore kept as in Chains and Prisons Fourthly Prisons are dark and noisome places not built for pleasure as other houses are but for punishment so is Hell Jud. v. 6. Reserved in everlasting chains under darkness as he there describes the place of torments yea utter darkness Matth. 8. v. 12. extream or perfect darkness Philosophers tell us of the darkness of this World non dantur purae tenebrae that there is no pure or perfect darkness here without some mixture of light but there is not a glade of light not a spark of hope or comfort shining into that Prison Fifthly Mournful sighs and groans are heard in Prisons Psal. 97.11 Let the sighing of the Prisoners come before thee saith the Psalmist But deeper sighs and emphatical groans are heard in Hell There shall be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth Matth. 8 12. Those that could not groan under the sence of sin on Earth shall howl under anguish and desperation in Hell Sixthly There is a time when Prisoners are brought out of the Prison to be judged and then return in a worse condition than before to the place from whence they came God also hath appointed a day for the solemn condemnation of those Spirits in Prison The Scriptures call it the iudgement of the great day Iude v. 6. from the great business that is to be done therein and the great and solemn assembly that shall then appear before God But I will insist no longer upon the display of the Metaphor My business is to give you a representation of the state and condition of damned Souls in Hell and to assist your conceptions of them and of their state 'T is a dreadful sight I am to give you this day but how much better is it to see than to feel that wrath the treasures thereof shall shortly be broken up and poured forth upon the Spirits of men You had in the former Discourse a faint umbrage of the Spirits of just men in glory in this you will have an imperfect representation of the Spirits of wicked men in Hell and look as the former cannot be adequate and perfect because that happiness passeth our knowledge so neither can this be so because the misery of the damned passeth our fear The case and state of a damned Spirit will be best opened in these following Propositions PROP. I. That the guilt of all sin gathers to and settles in the Conscience of every Christless sinner and makes up a vast treasure of guilt in the course of his life in this World THE high and awful power of Conscience belonging to the understanding faculty in the Soul of Man was spoken to before as to its general nature Page 21. And that conscience certainly accompanies it and is inseparable from it was there shewed I am here to consider it as the seat or centre of guilt in all unregenerate and lost Souls For look as the tides wash up and leave the slime and filth upon the shore even so all the corruption and sin that is in the other faculties of the Soul settles upon the conscience Their mind and conscience saith the Apostle is defiled Tit. 1.15 it is as it were the sink of a sinners Soul into which all filth runs and guilt settles The conscience of every Believer is purged from its filthiness by the blood of Christ Heb. 9.14 his blood and his Spirit purifie it and pacifie it whereby it becomes the region of light and peace but all the guilt which hath been long contracting through the life of an unbeliever fixes it self deep and fast in his conscience It is written upon the Tables of their hearts as with a pen of Iron Jer. 17.1 i. e. guilt is as a mark or character fashioned or ingraven in the very substance of the Soul as letters are cut into glass with a Diamond Conscience is not only the principal engagée obliged unto God as a Judge but the principal director and guide of the Soul in its courses and actions and consequently the guilt of all sin falls upon it and rests in it The Soul is both the spring and fountain of all actions that go outward from man and the term or receptacle of all actions inward but in both sorts of actions going outward and coming inward conscience is the chief Counsellor Guide and director in all and so the guilt which is contracted either way must be upon its head 'T is the bridle of the Soul to restrain it from sin the eye of the Soul to direct its course and therefore is principally chargeable with all the evils of life Bodily members are but instruments and the will it self as high and noble a faculty or power as it is moveth not until the judgment cometh to a conclusion and the debate be ended in the mind Now in the whole course and compass of a sinners life in this World what treasures of guilt must needs be lodged in his conscience What a Magazine of sin and filth must be laid up there 'T is said of a wicked man Job 20.11 His bones are full of the sins of his youth meaning his Spirit Mind or Conscience is as full of sin as bones are of Marrow yea the very sins of his Youth are enough to fill them and Rom. 2.5 they are said to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath which is only done
without Plea or Apology for your supine neglects of the seasons of Salvation Argument II. SEcondly The consideration of the uncertainty and slippery nature of these spiritual seasons must awaken in us all care and diligence to secure and improve them This nick of opportunity is tempus labile a slippery season it is but short in it self and very uncertain To day whilst it is said to day saith the Apostle if ye will hear his voice Heb. 3.15 q. d. you have now a short uncertain but most precious and valuable season for your Souls lay hold on it whilst it is called to day for if this season be let slip the time to come is called by another name that is not to day but to morrow Your time is the present time take heed of procrastinating and putting it off till that which is called to day which is your only season be past and gone This precious inch of time though it be more worth than all the other greater parts and portions of your time yet it is as much in fluxu in hasty motion and expence as other parts of time are and being once lost is never more to be recalled or recovered Few men know or understand it whilst it is current other seasons for natural or civil actions are known and stated but the time of Grace is not so easily discerned and therefore commonly mistaken and lost and this comes to pass partly through 1. Presumptuous Hopes 2. Discouraging Fears 1. Presumptuous Hopes which put it too far forth and perswade us this season is yet to come that we have before us Praesumendo sperant sperando perâ—unt and that to morrow shall be as to day Thus through presumption men hope and by their presumptuous hopes they perish this is the ruine of most Souls that perish 2. Discouraging Fears put it too far back and represent it as long since past and gone whilst it is yet in being and in our hands By such pangs of desperation Satan cuts the very nerves of industry and diligence and causes Souls to yield themselves as by consent for lost and hopeless even whilst the Gospel is opening their eyes to see their sin and misery which is a part of the work in order to their recovery Thus the eyes of thousands are dazled that they cannot discern the season of Mercy and so it slides from them as if it had never been God came near them in the means of their Conversion yea and nearer than that in the motions of his Spirit upon their Consciences and Affections but they knew not the time of their visitation and now the things of their peace are hidden from their eyes Had those Convictions been obeyed and those purposes that were begotten in their hearts been followed home by answerable executions of them happy had they been to all Eternity but their careless neglects have quenched them and the door is shut and who knows whether it may be opened any more O dally not with the Spirit of God resist not his calls his motions upon the Soul are tender things they may soon be quenched and never recovered Argument III. NEglect not the seasons of Mercy the day of Grace because opportunity facilitates the great work of your Salvation it is much easier to be done in such a season than it can be afterwards an impression is easily made upon wax when it is melted but stay a while till it be hardned and if you lay the greatest weight upon the seal it leaves not its impress upon it Much so it is with the heart there is a season when God makes it soft and yielding when the affections are thawed and melted under the Word Conscience is full of sense and activity the will pliable now is the time to set in with the motions of the Spirit there is now a gale from Heaven if you will take it and if not it tarrieth not for man nor waiteth for the sons of men Neglect of the season is the loss of the Soul The heart like melted wax will naturally harden again and then to how little purpose are your own feeble essays Heb. 3.15 't is both easie and successful striving when the Spirit of God strives in you and with you you are now workers together with God and such work goes on smoothly and sweetly that which is in motion is easily moved but if once the heart be set you may tug to little purpose Argument IV. THE infinite importance and weight of Salvation is alone instead of all motives and arguments to make men prize and improve every proper season for it It is no ordinary concern it is your life yea it is your eternal life The solemnity and awfulness of such a business as this is enough to swallow up the spirit of a man O what an awful found have such words as these Ever with the Lord Suppose you saw the Glory of Heaven the full reward of all the labours and sufferings of the Saints the blessed harvest of all their prayers tears diligence and self-denial in this world or suppose you had a true representation of the Torments of Hell and could but hear the wailings of the damned for the neglect of the season of Mercy and their passionate but vain wishes for one of those days which they have lost would you think any care any pains any self-denial too much to save and redeem one of these opportunities Surely you would have a far higher estimation of them than ever you had in your lives A Tryal for a mans whole Estate is accounted a solemn business among men the Cast of a Dye for a mans life is a weighty action and seldom done without anxiety of the mind and trembling of the hand yet both these are but Childrens Play compared with Salvation-work Three things put an unspeakable solemnity upon this matter it is the precious Soul which is above all valuation that lies at stake and is to be saved or lost The saving or losing of it is not for a time but for ever and this is the only season in which it will be eternally saved or cast away all hangs upon a little inch of time which being over-slipt and lost is never more to be recalled or recovered Lord with what serious spirits deep and weighty consideration fears and tremblings of heart should men and women attend the seasons of their Salvation Believe it Reader since thy Soul projected its first thought there never was a more weighty and concerning subject than this presented to thy thoughts O therefore let not thy thoughts trifle about it and slide from it as they use to do in other things of common concernment Argument V. IF we set any value upon the true pleasure of life or solid comforâ— of our Souls at death let us by no means neglect the special seasons and opportunities of Salvation we now enjoy These two things the pleasure of life and comfort in death should be prized by every
to your inquisitive and searching minds 'T is possible they may be censured by some as undeterminable and unprofitable Curiosities but as I hate a presumptious intrusion into unrevealed Secrets so I think it a weakness to be discouraged in the search of truth so far as it is fit to trace it by such damping and causeless Censures Nor am I sensible I have in any thing transgressed the bounds of Christian Sobriety to gratifie the Palate of a nice and delicate Reader I have also here set before the Reader an Idea or representation of the state and case of damned Souls that if it be the Will of God a seasonable discovery of Hell may be the means of some mens recovery out of the danger of it and closed up the whole with a Demonstration of the invaluable preciousness of Souls and the several dangerous snares and artifices of Satan their professed Enemy to destroy and cast them away for ever This is the design and general scope of the whole and of the principal parts of this Treatise and Oh that God would grant me my hearts desire on your behalf in the perusal of it Even that it may prove a sanctified instrument in his hand both to prepare you for and bring you in love with the unbodied life to make you look with pleasure into your Graves and die by consent of Will as well as necessity of Nature I remember Dr. Staughton in a Sermon preached before King Iames relates a strange Story of a little Child in a Shipwrack fast asleep upon its Mothers lap as she sate upon a piece of the Wrack amidst the Waves the Child being awaked with the noise asked the Mother what those things were she told it they were drowning Waves to swallow them up the Child with a pretty smiling Countenance beg'd a stroke from its Mother to beat away those naughty Waves and chid them as if they had been its Play-mates Death will shortly Shipwrack your Bodies your Souls will sit upon your lips ready to expire as they upon the Wrack ready to go down Would it not be a comfortable and most becoming frame of mind to sit there with as little dread as this little One did among the terrible Waves Surely if our Faith had but first united us with Christ and then loosed our hearts off from this inchanting and ensnaring World we might make a fair step towards this most desireable temper but unbelief and earthly mindedness make us loth to venture I blush to think what bold adventures those men made who upon the Contemplation of the Properties of a despicable stone first adventured quite out of sight of Land under its conduct and direction and securely trusted both their Lives and Estates to it when all the eyes of Heaven were vail'd from them amid'st the dark Waters and thick Clouds of the Sky when I either start or at least give an unwilling shrug when I think of adventuring out of sight of this World under the more sure and steady direction and conduct of Faith and the Promises To cure these evils in my own and the Readers heart these things are written and in much respect and love tendered to your hands as a Testimony of my Gratitude and deep sense of the many Obligations you have put me under That the Blessings of the Spirit may accompany these Discourses to your Souls afford you some assistance in your last and difficult work of putting them off at death with a becoming chearfulness saying in that hour Can I not see God till this Flesh be laid aside in the Grave Must I die before I can live like my self Then die my Body and go to thy dust that I may be with Christ. With this design and with these hearty Wishes dear and honoured Cousin and worthy Friends I put these Discourses into your hands and remain Your Most obliged Kinsman and Servant Io. Flavell THE PREFACE AMong many other Largesses and rich Endowments bestowed by the Creators bounty upon the Soul of Man the * Demonstravimus à communâ— omnium jam inde à condito orbe gentium ac populâ—rum prâ—sertim bâ—nâ—rum literatorum Consensione animam humanam incorruptibilem immortalem esse â—oque corrupto corpore ipâ—um â—anere superstitem ut in sempiternum aut pro benefactuà Deo coronetur aut pro malefactâ—â—s puniatur Zanch. de Aâ—lmarum immortalâ—tate p. 653. Sentiments and impressions of the World to come and the ability of reflection and self-intuition are peculiar invaluable and heavenly gifts By the former we have a very great Evidence of our own immortality and designation for nobler employments and enjoyments than this imbodied state admits and by the latter we may discern the agreeableness or disagreeableness of our hearts and therein the validity of our title to that expected blessedness But these heavenly gifts are neglected and abused all the World over Degenerate Souls are every where fallen into so deep an Oblivion of their excellent Original Spiritual and Immortal nature and alliance to the Father of Spirits That to use the upbraiding expression of a great 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Max. Tyr. Diss. 41. Philosopher they seem to be buried in their Bodies as so many silly Worms that lurk in their holes and are loth to peep forth and look abroad So powerfully do the Cares and Pleasures of this World charm all except a small remnant of regenerate Souls that nothing but some smart stroke of Calamity or the terrible Messengers of death can startle them and even these are not always able to do it and when they do all the effect is but a transient glance at another and an unwilling shrug to leave this World and so to sleep again And thus the Impressions and Sentiments of the World to come which are the natural growth and Off-spring of the Soul are either stifled and supprest as in Atheists or born down by impetuous masterly lusts as in Sensualists And for its self-reflecting and considering Power it seems in many to be a power received in vain It is with most Souls as it is with the Eye which sees not it self though it see all other Objects There be those that have almost finished the course of a long life wherein a great part of their time hath lain upon their hands as a cheap and useless Commodity 〈◊〉 Dei est ista vita mortalis ubi homo vanitati similis factus est dies ejus velut umbra praetereunt Aug. de Civâ—â— lib. 21. c. 24. which they knew not what to do with who yet never spent one solemn entire hour in discourse with their own Souls What serious heart doth not melt into Compassion over the deluded Multitude who are mockt with Dreams and perpetually busied about Trifles Who are after so many frustrated attempts both of their own and all past Ages eagerly pursuing the fleeing shadows who torture and rack their brains to find out the Natures and Qualities
a thing composed of Earth and Fire Galen saith it is heat Hippocrates a Spirit diffused throughout the Body Plato a Self-moving Substance Aristotle calls it Entelechia that by which the Body is moved If my Opinion should be asked which of all these Definitions I like best I should give the same Answer which Theocritus gave to an ill Poet repeating many of his Verses and asking which he liked best Those said he which you have omitted Or if they must have the Garland as the prize they have shot for let them have it upon the same reason that was once given to him that always shot wide Difficilius est toties non attingere Because it was the greatest difficulty to aim so often at the Mark and never come near it One Word of God gives me more light than a thousand such laborious trifles As Caesar was best able to write his own Commentaries so God only can give the best account of this his own Creature on which he hath impressed his own Image Modern Philosophers assisted by the Divine Oracles must needs come closer to the Mark and give us a far better account of the nature of the Soul Yet I have endeavoured not to cloud this Subject with their Controversies or abstruse Notions remembring what a smart but deserved check Tertullian gives those Qui Platonicum Aristotelicum Christianismum procudunt Christianis Words are but the Servants of Matter I value them as Merchants do their Ships not by the gilded Head and Stern the neatness of their Mould or curious Flags and Streamers but by the soundness of their Bottoms largeness of their Capacity and richness of their Cargoe and loading The quality of this Subject necessitates in many places the use of Scholastick terms which will be obscure to the Vulgar Reader but apt and proper words must not be rejected for their obscurity except plainer words could be found that fit the Subject as well and are as fully expressive of the matter The unnecessary I have avoided and the rest explained as I could The principal fruits I especially aim at both to my own and the Readers Soul are that whilst we contemplate the freedom pleasure and satisfaction of that Spiritual Incorporeal People who dwell in the Region of light and joy and are hereby forming to our selves a true Scriptural Idea of the blessed state of those disembodied Spirits with whom we are to serve and converse in the Temple-worship in Heaven and come more explicitely and distinctly to understand the Constitution Order and Delightful imployment of those our everlasting Associates We may answerably feel the fond and inordinate love of this Animal life subacted and wrought down the frightful Vizard of death drop off and a more pleasing Aspect appear that no upright Soul that shall read these Discourses may henceforth be convuls'd at the name of death but chearfully aspire and with a pleasant expectation wait for the blessed season of its transportation to that blessed Assembly 'T is certainly our ignorance of the life of Heaven that makes us dote as we do upon the present life There is a gloom a thick Mist overspreading the next life and hiding even from the eyes of Believers the glory that is there We send forth our thoughts to penetrate this Cloud but they return to us without the desired success We reinforce them with a Sally of new and more vigorous thoughts but still they come back in confusion and disappointment as to any perfect account they can bring us from thence though the oftner and closer we think the more still we grow up into acquaintance with these excellent things Another benefit I pray for and expect from these labours is that by describing the horrid state of those Souls which go the other way and shewing to the living the dismal condition of Souls departed in their unregenerate state some may be awakened to a seasonable and effectual Consideration of their wretched Condition whilst they yet continue under the means and among the Instruments of their Salvation Whatever the fruit of this Discourse shall be to â—thers I have cause to bless God for the advantages it hath already given me I begin to find more than ever I have done in the separate state of sanctified Souls all that is capable of attracting an intellectual nature and if God will but fix my mind upon this state and cause my pleased thoughts about it to settle into a frame and steddy temper I hope I shall daily more and more depreciate and despise this common way of existence in a Corporeal Prison and when the blessed season of my departure is at hand I shall take a chearful farewel of the greater and lesser Elementary World to which my Soul hath been confined and have an abundant Entrance through the broad gate of Assurance unto the blessed unbodied Inhabitants of the World to come A Synopsis or View of the Soul in the state of Composition in six Particulars in this first Table of Life viz. The Soul of Man is considered in this Treatise two ways First in the state of Composition Secondly In the state of Separation 1. In its general Nature a Substance proved to be so 1. By its Creation Page 11 2. By its single Existence p. 11 3. By its Sâ—â—tentation of the Body p. 12 4. By the subjecting of Habits and Affections in it p. 13 2. In its Essential Properties which are six 1. It is a Vital substance whose life is not from it self but 1. It receives it from God p. 13 2. Communicates it to the Body p. 13 2. An Immortal substance proved by eight Arguments 1. The simplicity of its Nature p. 96 2. The Veracity of God in his promises and threats p. 98 3. The Consent of all Nations p. 100 4. It s everlasting habits which are inseparable p. 103 5. The Peculiar dignity of Man p. 105 6. His desires of Immortality p. 107 7. Its returns after death p. 108 8. The Absurdities clogging the Negative p. 109 3. Endued with Understanding to which belong 1. Thoughts to the Speculative 2. Conscience to the Practical understanding p. 20 4. And a Will which glorieth in 1. It s Liberty p. 23 And 2. It s Dominion both 1. Despotical p. 24 2. Political p. 24 Yet both restrained in some particulars 1. As to the Body p. 25 2. As to the thoughts p. 26 3. As to the Conscience p. 27 5. Affections and Passions where is shewed 1. Their rise in the Soul p. 28 2. Their use to the Soul p. 29 6. It s inclination to the Body which differenceth it from other Spirits p. 29 3. It s Excellent Original about which we have 1. Errors refuted that it was not 1. By Seminal Traduction p. 31 2. By Angelical Procreation p. 32 3. By Coâ—taneous Creation p. 33 2. It s true Original asserted â—y immediate Creation p. 34 3. Objections against this Assertion answered p. 37 â—â— 4. It s Union with the Body
humane souls to be created together before their bodies and placed in some glorious and suitable Mansions as the Stars till at last growing weary of Heavenly and falling in love with Earthly things for a punishment of that Crime they were cast into Bodies as into so many Prisons Origen suckt in this Notion of the praeexistence of Souls And upon this supposition it was that Porphyry tells us in the life of Plotinus that he blushed as often as he thought of his being in a Body as a man that had lived in reputation and honour blushes when he is lodged in a Prison The ground on which the Stoicks bottomed their Opinion was the great dignity and excellency of the Soul which inclined them to think they had never been degraded and abased as they are by dwelling in such vile bodies but for their faults And that it was for some former sin of theirs that they slid down into gross matter and were caught into a vital union with it Whereas had they not sinned they had lived in celestial and splendid habitations more suitable to their dignity But this is a pure creature of fancy for 1. no Soul in the world is conscious to it self of such a praeexistence nor can remember when it was owner of any other habitation than that it now dwells in 2. Nor doth the Scripture give us the least hint of any such thing Some indeed would catch hold of that expression Gen. 2. 2. God rested the seventh day from all the works which he had made And it is true he did so the work of Creation was finished and sealed up as to any new species or kind of creatures to be created no other sort of souls will ever be created than that which was at first But yet God still creates individual Souls My father worketh hitherto and I work of the same kind and nature with Adams Soul And 3. for their detrusion into these bodies as a punishment of their sins in the former state if we speak of sin in Individuals or particular persons the Scripture mentions none either original or actual defiling any Soul in any other way but by its union with the body Praeexistence therefore is but a Dream But to me it 's clear that the Soul receives not its being by Traduction or Generation for that which is generable is also corruptible but the spiritual immortal Soul as it hath been proved to be is not subject to Corruption Nor is it imaginable how a Soul should be produced out of matter which is not endued with reason Or how a bodily Substance can impart that to another which it hath not in it self If it be said the Soul of the child proceeds from the Soul of the Parents that cannot be for spiritual Substances are impartible and nothing can be discinded from them Absâ—rdum est aliunde esse animam â—â—stâ—am aliunde animam Adae cum omnes sunt ejusdem speciti Zanch. And it is absurd to think the Soul of Adam should spring from one Original and the souls of all his off-spring from another whilst both his and theirs are of one and the same Nature and species To all which let me add that as this Assertion of their Creation is most reasonable so it is most scriptural It is reasonable to think and say †Nalla virtus aâ—liâ—a agit ultâ—a sâ—â—m genus sâ—d Anima â—â—tellectiva excedit totum genus corporae natarae cum sit sâ—bstantia sâ—iritualis c. Conâ—ubâ— that no active power can act beyond or above the proper Sphere of its activity and ability But if the Soul be elicited out of the power of matter here would be an effect produced abundantly more noble and excellent than his cause And as it is most reasonable so it is most Scriptural To this purpose divers Testimonies of Scripture are cited and produced by our Divines amongst which we may single out these four which are of special remark and use Heb. 12.9 Furthermore we had fathers of our flesh which corrected us and we gave them reverence shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of Spirits and live Here God is called the Father of Spirits or of Souls and that in an emphatical Antithesis or contradistinction to our natural Fathers who are called the Fathers of our Flesh or Bodies only The true scope and sense of this Text is with great judgment and clearness given us by that learned and judicious Divine Mr. * Pembâ—e de Origine Animae p. 59. Nihil apertins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ista Antithesi Carnem corpusque à pareâ—tibâ—s animas à Deo accipimus Quod si vilioris partis Authores qui minus in nos juris habent patienter caâ—ligantes fâ—â—â—imus quà m aequiore animo â—â—remus eâ—m qui sâ—premum in nos jus obtinet utpote partis quae in nobis est praestantiâ—sima unicus Datoâ— Conditorquâ— Pemble in these words Nothing is more plain and emphatical than this Antithesis We receive our flesh or body from our Parents but our souls from God if then we patiently bear the chastisements of our Parents who are Authors of the vilest part and have the least right or power over us with how much more equal a mind should we bear his chastisements who hath the supream right to us as he is the Father and only giver of that which is most excellent in us viz. our souls or spirits Here it seems evident that our souls flow not to us in the material Chanel of fleshly generation or descent as our bodies do but immediately from God their proper Father in the way of Creation Yet he begets them not out of his own Essence or Substance as Christ his natural Son is begotten but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of nothing that had been before as Theodoret well expresseth it Agreeable hereunto is that place also in †Testimonium satis clarum quo docâ—mur pari passâ— haectria ambulare expansionem câ—â—li fâ—â—dationem teâ—rae â—ormationem animae ratioâ—alis Zech. 12.1 The Lord which stretcheth forth the Heavens and layeth the foundations of the Earth and formeth the spirit of man within him Where the forming of the spirit or soul of Man is associated with those two other glorious effects of Gods creating power namely the expansion of the Heavens and laying the foundations of the Earth all three are here equally assumed by the Lord as his remarkable and glorious works of Creation He that created the one did as much create the other Now the two former we â—ind frequently instanced in Scripture as the effects of his creating Power or works implying the Almighty power of God and therefore are presented as strong props to our Faith when it is weak and staggering for want of visible matter of incouragement Isa. 40.22 and 42.5 Ierem. 10.12 Iob 9.8 Psal. 104.2 q. d. Are my people in Captivity and their Faith nonplust and at a loss
many souls become foolish forgetful injudicious c. by their union with ill disposed Bodies Nothing is more sensibly plain and evident than that â—â—ere is a reciprocal Communication betwixt the Soul and Body The Body doth as really though we know not how affect the Soul with its dispositions as the Soul influences it with life and motion The more excellent any form is the more intimate is its union and conjunction with the matter The Soul of man hath therefore a more intimate and perfect union with the Body than light hath with the Air Which is made by some the best Emblem and Similitude to shadow forth this union But the union betwixt them is too intimate to be conceived by the help of any such Similitudes That this infection is by way of Physical agency as a rusty Scabbard infects and defiles a bright Sword when sheathed therein I will not confidently affirm as some do It may be by way of Natural Concomitancy as Estius will have it or to speak as Dr. Reynolds modestly and as becomes men that are conscious of darkness and weakness by way of ineffable resultancy and emanation 3. In summ Original Sin consists in two things viz. 1. In the privation of that original rectitude which ought to be in us 2. In that habitual Concupiscence which carrieth nature to inordinate motions This Privation and inordinate inclination make up that original corruption the rise whereof we are searching for and to bring us as near it as we can come without a daring intrusion into unrevealed Secrets our solid Divines proceed by these steps in answering this Objection 1. If it be demanded how it comes to pass that an Infant becomes guilty if Adam's sin The answer is because he is a child of Adam by natural generation 2. But why is he deprived of that Original rectitude in which Adam was created They answer because Adam lost it by his sin and therefore could not transmit what he had lost to his posterity 3. But how comes he to be inclined to that which is evil Their answer is because he wants that original rectitude For whosoever wants original rectitude naturally inclines to that which is evil And so the propension of Nature to that which is evil seems to be by way of Concomitancy with the defect or want of original righteousness And thus I have given some account of the Nature and Original of the Soul of Man though alas My dim eyes see but little of its excellency and glory Yet by what hath been said it appears the Masterpiece of all God's works of Creation in this lower World But because I suspect the Description I have given of it will be obscure and cloudy to vulgar Readers of a plain and low capacity by reason of divers Philosophical terms which I have been forced to make use of and reckoning my self a debtor to the weak and unlearned as well as others I will endeavour to strip this Description of the Soul for their sakes out of those artificial terms which darken it to them and present it once more in the most plain and intelligible Epitome I am capable to give it in that so the weaker understanding may be able to form a true notion of the Nature and Original of the Soul in this manner This Soul of mine is a true and real Being The Soul a Substance Not a fancy a conceit a very nothing It hath a proper and true Being in it self whether I conceit it or not Nor indeed can I conceive of it but by it It is not such a thing as whiteness is in Snow a meer accident which depends upon the Snow in which it is for the Being it hath and must perish as soon as the Snow is dissolved my Soul doth not so depend upon my Body or any other fellow creature for its Being but is as truly a Substance as my Body is though not of so gross and material a kind and nature My Soul can and will subsist and remain what it is when my Body is separated from it but my Body cannot subsist and remain what it now is when my Soul is separated from it So that I find my Soul to be the most substantial and noble part of me it is not my Body but my Soul which makes me a man And if this depart all the rest of me is but a dead log a lump of inanimate Clay a heap of vile dust and corruption From this independent subsistence it hath in it self and the dependence its properties and affections have upon it I truly apprehend and call it a Substance But yet when I call it a Substance but a Spiritual Substance I must not conceive of it as a gross material palpable substance such as my Body is which I can see and feel No there are spiritual substances as well as gross visible material Substances An Angel is a Spiritual Substance a real creature and yet imperceptible by my sight or touch such a substance is my Soul Spiritual substances are as real and much more excellent than bodily substances are I can neither see hear nor feel it but I both see hear and feel by it My Soul is also a vital Substance A Vitaâ— Substanâ—â— It is a principle of life to my Body It hath a life in it self and quickens my body therewith My Soul is the spring of all the actions and motions of life which I perform It hath been an errour taken in from my childhood That sense is performed in the outward Organs or members of my Body as Touching in the Hand seeing in the Eye Hearing in the Ear c. in them I say and not only by them As if nothing were required to make Sense but an Object and an Organ No no it is not my Eye that seeth nor my Ear that heareth nor my Hand that toucheth but my Soul in and by them performs all this Let but an Apoplex hinder the operations of my Soul in the Brain and of how little use are my Eyes Ears Hands or Feet to me My life is originally in my Soul and secondarily by way of Communication in my Body So that I find my Soul to be a vital as well as a spiritual Substance An Immortal Substance And Being both a vital and Spiritual Substance I must needs conclude it to be an immortal Substance For in such a pure spiritual nature as my Soul is there can be found no seeds or principles of Death Where there is no composition there will be no dissolution My Body indeed having so many jarring humours mixed elements and contrary qualities in it must needs fail and dye at last But my Soul was formed for immortality by the simplicity and spirituality of its nature No sword can pierce it from without nor opposition can destroy it from within Man cannot and God will not endued with Vnderstanding Will and Affections And being an immortal Spirit fitted and framed to live for ever
considerations wherein there are remarkable differences betwixt Soul and Soul As 1. some Souls are much better lodged and accommodated in their bodies than others are though none dwell at perfect rest and ease God hath lodged some Souls in strong vigorous comely bodies others in feeble crazy deformed and uncomfortable ones The Historian saith of Galba Anima Galbae male habitat The Soul of Galba dwelt in an ill Body And a much better man than Galba was as ill accommodated Iohn wishes in behalf of his beloved Gaius that his body might but prosper as his Soul did Epist. 3. v. 2. Timothy had his often infirmities Indeed the world is full of instances and examples of this kind * 〈◊〉 Bp. of Abâ—lâ—m had so stroâ—g and firm a conâ—titution to eâ—dure severe studies that he is said 〈◊〉 inâ—estina 〈◊〉 to have hâ—d a body of Brass If some Souls had the advantages of such bodies as others have who make little or very bad use of them O what service would they do for God! 2. There is a remarkable difference also betwixt Soul and Soul in respect of natural gifts and abilities of mind Some have great advantages above others in this respect The natural spirits and organs of the body being more brisk and apt the Soul is more vegete vigorous and able to exert it self in its sunctions and operations How clear nimble and firm are the apprehensions fancies and memories of some souls beyond others What a Prodigy of memory fancy and judgment was Father Paul the Venetian and Suarez of whom Strada saith such was the strength of his parts that he had all S. Augustine's works the most copious and various of all the Fathers as it were by heart so that I have seen him saith he †Statim 〈◊〉 loco 〈…〉 readily pointing with the finger to any place or page he disputed of Our Dr. Reynolds excell'd this way to the astonishment of all that knew him so that he was a living Library a third Vniversity But above all the character given by Vives of Budeuâ— is amazing that there was nothing written in Greek or Latin which he had not turned over and examined That both languages were alike to him speaking either with more facility than he did the French his mother tongue and all by the penetrating â—orce of his own natural parts without a Tutor so that †Qâ—o viro Gallia aâ—â—tiore ingeâ—io 〈…〉 produxit hic 〈◊〉 atate nec Itaâ—â—a quidem Lud. Viv. in 1â— cap. de civit Deâ— France never brought forth a man of sharper wit more piercing judgement exact diligence and greater learning nor in his time Italy it self Foelix foecundum ingenium quod in se uno invenit Doctorem Discipulum A happy and fruitful wit which in it self found both a Master and a Scholar And yet Pasquier relates what is much more admirable of a young man who came to Paris in the twentieth year of his age and in the year 1445 and shewed himself so excellent and exact in all the Arts Sciences and Languages that if a man of an ordinary good wit and sound constitution should live an hundred years and during that time study incessantly without eating drinking sleeping or any recreation He could hardly attain to that perfection 3. And yet a far greater difference is made betwixt one Soul and another by the sanctifying work of the Spirit of God This makes yet a greater disparity for it alters and new moulds the frame and temper of the Soul and restores the lost Image of God to it by reason whereof the righteous is truly said to be more excellent than his neighbour Prov. 12.26 This ennobles the Soul and stamps the highest dignity and glory upon it that it is capable of in this world 'T is true it hath naturally an excellency and perpetuity in it above other Beings as Cedar hath not only a beauty and fragrancy but a soundness and durability far beyond other trees of the Wood But when it comes under the sanctification of the spirit then it is as Cedar overlaid with gold 4. Lastly a wonderful difference will be made betwixt one Soul and another by the judgement of God in the great day Some will be blessed and others cursed Souls Matt. 25. ult some received into glory others shut out into everlasting misery Matth. 8.11 12. Many shall come from the East and West and shall sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Iacob in the kingdom of Heaven but the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth And that which will be the sting and aggravation of the difference which will then be made will be this Parity and Equality in the nature and capacity of every Soul by reason whereof they that perish will find they were naturally as capable of blessedness as those that enjoy it and that it was their own inexcusable negligence and obstinacy that was their ruine Inference IV. III The Soul a created Substance IF God be the immediate Creator and Former of the Soul of Man Then sin must needs involve the most unnatural evil in it as it is an horrid violation of the very law of nature No title can be so full so absolute as that which Creation gives How clear is this in the light of reason If God created my Soul then my Soul had once no Being at all That it had still remained nothing had not the pleasure of its Creator chosen and called it into the Being it hath out of the millions of meer possible Beings For as there are millions of possible Beings which yet are nothing so there are millions of possible Beings which never shall be at all So that since the pleasure and power of God was the only fountain of my Being he needs must be the rightful owner of it What can be more his own than that whose very Being flowed meerly from him and which had never been at all had he not called it out of nothing And seeing the same pleasure of God which gave it a Being gave it also a reasonable Being capable of and fitted for moral Government by laws which other inferiour natures are incapable of it must needs follow that he is the supream Governour as well as the rightful owner of this Soul Moreover it is plain that he who gave my Soul it's Being and such a Being gave it also all the good it ever had hath or shall have and that it neither is nor hath any thing but what is purely from him And therefore he 〈◊〉 needs â—e my most bountiful benefactor as well as 〈◊〉 owner and supream Governour There is not a Soul which he hath created but stands bound to him in all these ties and titles Now for such a creature to turn rebelliously upon its absolute owner whose only and wholly it is upon its supream Governour to whom it owes intire and absolute Obedience upon its
respects the excellency of the Spiritual above the Animal life not in point of Priority for that which is natural is before that which is spiritual and it must be so because the natural Soul is the recipient Subject of the spirits quickning and sanctifying operations but in point of dignity and real excellency To how little purpose or rather to what a dismal and miserable purpose are we made living souls except the Lord from Heaven by his quickning power make us spiritual and holy Souls The natural Soul rules and uses the body as * Corpus organo simile est anima Aâ—tificis ratioâ—em obtinet Irenaeus lib. 2. an Artificer doth his Tools and except the Lord renew it by grace Satan will rule that which rules thee and so all thy members will be instruments of inquity to fight against God The actions performed by our bodies are justly reputed and reckon'd by God to the Soul †Omnia quaecunque fecerit corpus sive bonum sive malum animae reputantur Origen in Job because the Soul is the spring of all its motions the fountain of its life and operations What it doth by the body its instrument is as if it were done immediately by it self for without the Soul it can do nothing Inference VII V A Spiritual Substance MOreover from the immaterial and spiritual nature of the Soul we are informed That Communion with God and the enjoyment of him are the true and proper intentions and purposes for which the Soul of Man was created Such a nature as this is not fitted to live upon gross material and perishing things as the body doth The food of every creature is agreeable to its nature one cannot subsist upon that which another doth As we see among the several sorts of Animals what is food to one is none to another In the same Plant there is found a root which is food for Swine a stalk which is food for Sheep a flower which feeds the Bee and a seed on which the Bird lives The Sheep cannot live upon the root as the Swine doth nor the Bird upon the flower as the Bee doth But every one feeds upon the different parts of the Plant which are agreeable to its Nature So it is here our bodies being of an earthly material Nature can live upon things earthly and material as most agreeable to them they can relish and suck out the sweetness of these things but the Soul can find nothing in them suitable to its nature and appetite it must have spiritual food or perish It were therefore too brutish and unworthy of a man that understood the nature of his own Soul to chear it up with the stores of earthly provisions made for it as he did Luk. 12.20 I will say to my Soul Soul thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thine ease eat drink and be merry Alas the Soul can no more eat drink and be merry with carnal things than the Body can with spiritual and immaterial things It cannot feed upon bread that perisheth it can relish no more in the best and daintiest fare of an earthly growth than in the White of an Egg But bring it to a reconciled God in Christ to the Covenant of Grace and the sweet promises of the Gospel set before it the joyes comforts and earnests of the Spirit and if it be a sanctified renewed Soul it can make a rich Feast upon these These make it a â—east of fat things full of Marrow as it is expressed Isaiah 25.6 Spiritual things are proper food for spiritual and immaterial Souls VI A Spiritual Substance Inference VIII THE spiritual nature of the Soul farther informs us That no acceptable service can be performed to God except the Soul be imployed and ingaged therein The Body hath its part and share in Gods worship as well as the Soul but its part is inconsiderable in comparison Prov. 23.26 My Son give me thy heart i. e. thy Soul thy Spirit The holy and religious acts of the Soul are suitable to the nature of the Object of worship Iohn 4.24 God is a spirit and they that worship him must worship in Spirit and in truth Spirits only can have Communion with that great Spirit They were made spirits for that very end that they might be capable of converse with the Father of Spirits They that worship him must worship in Spirit and in Truth That is with inward love fear delight and desires of Soul that is to worship him in our spirits And in Truth i. e. according to the rule of his word which prescribes our duty Spirit respects the inward power Truth the outward form The former strikes at Hypocrisie the latter at Superstition and Idolatry The one opposes the inventions of our Heads the other the loosness and formality of our Hearts No doubt but the service of the body is due to God and expected by him for both the souls and bodies of his people are bought with a price and therefore he expects we glorifie him with our souls and bodies which are his But the service of the body is not accepted of him otherwise than as it is animated and enlivened by an obedient Soul and both sprinkled with the blood of Christ. Separate from these bodily exercise profits nothing 1 Tim. 4.8 What pleasure can God take in the fruits and evidences of mens Hypocrisie Ezek. 33.31 Holy Paul appeals to God in this matter Rom. 1.9 God is my witness saith he whom I serve with my spirit q. d. I serve God in my spirit and he knows that I do so I dare appeal to him who searches my heart that it is not idle and unconcerned in his service The Lord humble us the best of us for our careless dead gadding and vain spirits even when we are engaged in his solemn services O that we were once so spiritual to follow every excursion from his service with a groan and retract every wandring thought with a deep sigh Alas a cold and wandring spirit in duty is the disease of most good men and the very temper and constitution of all unsanctified ones It is a weighty and excellent expression of the Iews in their Euchologium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 b. â— qâ—a re potius praeveniâ—m faciem 〈◊〉 nisi spiritu meo nihil enim est homini praeciosius animâ suà or Prayer-Book Wherewithall shall I come before his face unless it be with my spirit For man hath nothing more precious to present to God than his Soul Indeed it is the best man hath thy heart is thy totum posse 't is all that thou art able to present to him If thou cast thy Soul into thy duty thou dost as the poor Widow did cast in all that thou hast And in such an offering the great God takes more pleasure than in all the external costly pompous ceremonies adorned Temples aâ—â— external devotions in the World It is a remarkable anâ—â—â—tonishing expression of
his own in this case Isai. 66.1 2. Thus saith the Lord the Heaven is my Throne and the Earth is my footstool where is the house that ye build to me and where is the place of my rest For all these things have mine hands made and all these things have been saith the Lord but unto this man will I look even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit and trembleth at my word q. d. Think not to please me with magnificent Temples and adorned Altars if I had pleasure in such things Heaven is a more glorious Throne than any you can build me and yet I have more delight in a poor contrite spirit that trembles with an holy awe and reverence at my word than I have in Heaven or Earth or all the works of my hands in either O if there had been more trembling at his word there had not been such trembling as now there is under fears of the loss and removal of it Some can superstitiously reverence and kiss the sacred dust of the sanctuary as they call it and express a great deal of zeal for the externals of religion but little consider how small the interest of these things is in Religion and how little God looks at or regards them Inference IX HOw much are the spirits of men sunk by sin below the dignity and excellency of their Nature Our Souls are Spirits by nature yet have they naturally no delight in things spiritual They decline that which is homogeneal and suitable to Spirits and rellish nothing but what is carnal and unsuitable to them How are its affections inverted and misplaced by sin That noble spiritual Heaven-born creature the Soul whose Element and Centre God alone should be is now fallen into a deep Oblivion both of God and it self and wholly spends its strength in the pursuit of sensual and earthly enjoyments and becomes a meer drudge and slave to the body Carnal things now measure out and govern its delights and hopes its fears and sorrows O how unseemly is it to bâ—â—â—ld such an high-born spirit lackying up and down the Woâ—â—d in the service of the perishing flesh Their heart saith the Prophet goeth after their Covetousness Ezek. 33.31 as a Servant at the beck or nod of his Master O! how many are there to be found in every place who melt down the precious affections and strength of their Souls in sensitive brutish Pleasures and Delights Iames 5.5 Ye have lived in pleasures upon Earth as the Fish in the Water or rather as the Eel in the Mud never once lifting up a thought or desire to the spiritual and eternal pleasures that are at Gods right hand Our Creation did not set us so low we are made capable of better and higher things God did not inspire such a noble excellent spiritual Soul into us meerly to salt our bodies or carry them up and down this world for a few years to gaze at the vanities of it It was a great saying of an Heathen * Maior sum ad majora natus quam â—t carporis â—ti sim mancipium Seneca I am greater and born to greater things than that I should be a slave to my body We have a spirit about us that might better understand its Original and know it is so base a Being as its daily imployments speak it to be The Lord raise our apprehensions to a due value of the dignity of our own Souls that we may turn from these sordid imployments with a generous disdain and set our affections on what is agreeable to and worthy of an high-born spirit Inference X. VII The Soul an immortal Substance IS the Soul of Man a Vital Spiritual and immortal Substance Then it is no wonder that we find the resentments and impressions of the world to come naturally ingraven upon the Souls of men all the world over These impressions and sentiments of another life after this do as naturally and necessarily spring out of an immortal Nature as branches spring out of the body of a Tree or feathers out of the body of a Bird. So fairly and firmly are the characters and impressions of the life to come sealed upon the immortal spirits of all men that no man can offer violence to this truth but he must also do violence to his own Soul and unman himself by the denial of it Who feels not a cheariness to spring from his absolving and an horrour from his accusing Conscience Neither of which could rise from any other prinple than this We arâ— Beings conscious to our selves of a future State and that our Souls do not vanish when our breath doth That we cease not to be when we cease to breathe And this is common to the most Barbarous and Salvage Heathens They shew saith the Apostle the work of the Law written in their Hearts their Conscience also bearing them witness and their thoughts in the mean while accusing or else excusing one another By the work of the Law understand the summ and substance of the Ten Commandments comprizing the duties to be done and the sins to be avoided This work of the Law is said to be written upon the Hearts of the Gentiles who had no external written Law upon their hearts it was written though many of them gave themselves over to all uncleanness and they shewed or gave evidence and proof that there was such a Law written upon their hearts They shewed it two ways 1. Some of them shewed it in their Temperance Righteousness and moral honesty wherein they excelled many of us who have far greater Advantages and Obligations 2. In the efficacy of their Consciences which as it clear'd and comforâ—ed them for things well done so it witnessed against them yea judg'd and condemned them for things ill done And these evidences of a Law written on the heart are to be found where-ever men are to be found Their ignorance and barbarity cannot stifle these sentiments and impressions of a future State and a just Tribunal to which all must come And the universality of it plainly evinces that it springs not out of Education but the very nature of an immortal Soul Let none say that these universal impressions are but the effects of an universal Tradition which hath been time out of mind spread among the Nations of the World For as no such universal Tradition can be proved so if it could the very propension that is found in the minds of all men living to embrace and close with the proposals of a life to come will evince the agreeableness of them to the nature of an immortal Soul Yea the natural closing of the Soul with these Proposals will amount to an evidence of the reality and existence of thosâ— invisible things For as the natural senses and their Organs prove that there are colours sounds savours and juices as well as or rather because there are Eyes Ears c. naturally fitted to close with and receive them so it
is here if the Soul naturally looks beyond the line of time to things eternal and cannot bound and confine its thoughts and expectations within the too narrow limits of present things surely there is such a future state as well as Souls made apprehensive of it and propense to close with the discoveries thereof So natural are the notions of a future state to the Souls of men that those who have set themselves designedly to banish them and struggled hard to suppress them as things irksome and grievous to them giving intâ—rruption to their sensual lusts and pleasures Yet still these apprehensions have returned upon them and gotten a just victory over all their objections and prejudices They follow them wheresoever they go they can no more flee from them than from themselves whereby they evidence themselves to be natural and indelible things Inference XI VIII Endued with Vnderstanding Will and Affections HAth God endued the Soul of man with Understanding Will and Affections whereby it is made capable of knowing loving and enjoying God 'T is then no wonder to find the malice and envy of Satan engaged against man more than any other Creature and against the Soul of man rather than any thing else in man It grates that spirit of envy to see the Soul of Man adorning and preparing by sanctification to fill that place in glory from which he fell irrecoverably It cut Haman to the very heart to see the honour that was done to Mordecai much more doth it grate and gall Satan to see what Jesus Christ hath purchased and designed for the Souls of Men. Other creatures being naturally uncapable of this happiness do therefore escape his fury but men shall be sure to feel it as far as he can reach them 1 Pet. 5.8 Your Adversary the Devil goeth about like a roaring Lyon seeking whom he may devour He walks to and fro that speaks his diligence seeking whom he may devour that speaks his design his restlessness in doing mischief is all the rest and relief he hath in his own torments 'T is a mark of pure and perfect malice to endeavour to destroy though he knows he shall never be successful in his attempts We read of many bodies possessed by him but he never takes up his quarters in the body of any but with design to mischief the Soul No room but the best in the house will satisfie him no blood so sweet to him him as Soul-blood If he raise persecution against the bodies of men it is to destroy their souls holiness is that he hates and happiness is the Object of his envy The Soul being the Subject of both is therefore pursued by him as his prey Inference XII UPon the consideration both of its excellent nature and divine Original it follows That the corruption and deacing of such an excellent creature by sin deserves to be lamented and greatly bewailed and the recovery of it by sanctification to be studied and diligently prosecuted as the great concern of all men What a Beautiful and Blessed creature was the Soul of Man at first whilst it stood in its integrity His mind was bright clear and apprehensive of the Law and Will of God His Will chearfully complied therewith his sensitive appetite and inferiour powers stood in an obedient subordination God made man upright Eccles. 7.29 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 straight and equal bending to neither extream The Law of God was fairly engraven upon the table of his heart Principles of holiness and righteousness were inlayed in the very frame of his mind fitting him for an exact and punctual discharge of his duties both to God and Man This was the soundness of his constitution the healthful temper of his inner man Whereby it became the very region of light peace purity and pleasure For think how serene lightsome and placid the state of that Soul must be in which there was no obliquity not a jarr with the divine will But joy and peace continually transfused through all its faculties But sin hath defaced its Beauty raz'd out the divine Image which was its glory and stampt the very Image of Satan upon it Turn'd all its noble powers and faculties against the Author and Fountain of its Being Surely if all the posterity of Adam from the beginning to the end of the world should do nothing else but weep and sigh for the sin and misery of the fall it could not be sufficiently deplored Other sins like single bullets kill particular persons but Adams sin like a Chain-shot mowed down all mankind at once It murthered himself actually all his posterity virtually and Christ himself occasionally O! what a black train of doleful consequents attend this sin It hath darkned the bright eye of the Souls understanding 1 Cor. 2.14 made its complying and obedient will stubborn and rebellious Ioh. 5.40 rendered his tender heart obdurate and senseless Ezek. 36.26 filled its serene and peaceful Conscience with guilt and terror Tit. 1.15 The consideration of these things is very humbling and should cause those that glory in their high and illustrious Descents to wrap their silver Star in Cypress and cover all their glory with a mourning Vail But this is but one part of their duty How should this consideration provoke us to apply our selves with most serious diligence to recover our lost beauty and dignity in the way of sanctification This is the great and most proper use of the Fall as Musculus excellently speaks ut gratiam Christi eo subnixius ambiamus to inflame our desires the more vehemently after grace Sanctification restores the Beauty of the Soul which sin defaced Eph. 4.24 Col. 3.10 Yea it restores it with this advantage that it shall never be lost again holiness is the beauty of God imprest upon the Soul and the impression is everlasting Other beauty is but a fading flower time will plow up deep furrows upon the fairst faces But this will be fresh to eternity All moral vertues homilitical qualities which adorn and beautifie Nature and make it attractive and lovely in the eyes of men are but separable accidents which Death discinds and crops off like a sweet flower from the stalk Iob 4.21 Doth not their excellency that is in them go away But sanctification is inseparable and will ascend with the Soul into Heaven O! that God would set the glass of the Law before us that we may see what defiled souls we have by nature that we might come by faith to Jesus Christ who cometh to us by water and by blood 1 Ioh. 5.6 Inference XIII TO conclude Upon the consideration of the whole matter before us if this excellent creature the Soul receive both its Being and excellencies from God Then he that formed it must needs have the full and only right to possess and use it and is therefore most injuriously kept out of the possession of it by all unsanctified and disobedient persons The Soul of Man is a building of God he
Soul may be evinced from the everlasting habits which are subjected and inherent in it If these habits abide for ever certainly so must the Souls in which they are planted The Souls of good Men are the good Ground in which the Seed of Grace is sown by the Spirit Matth. 13.23 i. e the subjects in which gracious properties and affections do inhere and dwell which is the formal notion of a Substance and these implanted Graces are everlasting things So Iohn 4.14 It shall be in him a Well of Water springing up into everlasting Life i. e. the Graces of the Spirit shall be in Believers permanent habits fixed Principles which shall never decay And therefore that Seed of Grace which is cast into their Souls at their Regeneration is in 1 Pet. 1.23 called incorruptible Seed which liveth and abideth for ever and it is incorruptible not only considered abstractly in its own simple nature but concretely as it is in the sanctified Soul its Subject for it is said 1 Iohn 3.9 The Seed of God remaineth in him It abideth for ever in the Soul If then these two things be clear to us viz. 1. That the Habits of Grace be everlasting 2. That they are inseparable from sanctified Souls It must needs follow that the Soul their Subject is so too an everlasting and immortal Soul And how plainly do both these Propositions lie before us in the Scriptures As for the immortal and interminable nature of saving Grace it is plain to him that considers not only what the fore cited Scriptures speak about it calling it incorruptible Seed a Well of Water springing up into everlasting life But add to these what is said of these Divine qualities in 2 Pet. 1.4 where they are called the Divine Nature and Ephes. 4.18 The life of God noting the perpetuity of these Principles in Believers as well as their resemblance of God in Holiness who are endowed with them I know it is a great question among Divines An gratia in renatis sit naturà essentià suà interminabilis Whether these Principles of Grace in the Regenerate be everlasting and interminable in their own nature and essence For my own part I think that God only is naturally essentially and absolutely interminable and immortal But these gracious Habits planted by him in the Soul are so by vertue of Gods Appointment Promise and Covenant And sure it is that by reason hereof they are interminate which is enough for my purpose if they be not essentially interminable Though Grace be but a Creature and therefore hath a pesse mori yet it is a Creature begotten by the Word and Spirit of God which live and abide for ever and a Creature within the Promise and Covenant of God by reason whereof it can never actually dye And then as for the inseparableness of these Graces from the Souls in whom they are planted how clear is this from 1 Iohn 2.27 where sanctifying Grace is compared to an Unction and this Unction is said to abide in them And 1 Iohn 3.9 't is called the Seed of God which remaineth in the Soul All our natural and moral Excellencies and Endowments go away when we dye Iob 4.21 Doth not their Excellency that is in them go away Men may out-live their acquired Gifts but not their supernatural Graces These stick by the Soul as Ruth to Naomi and where it goes they go too so that when the Soul is dislodged by Death all its Graces ascend up with it into Glory it carries away all its Faith Love Delight in God all its comfortable experiences and fruits of Communion with God along with it to Heaven For Death is so far from divesting the Soul of its Graces that it perfects in a Moment all that was defective in them 1 Cor. 13.10 When that which is perfect shall come then that which is in part shall be done away as the Twilight is done away when the Sun is up and at its Zenith So then Grace never dyeth and this never-dying Grace is inseparable from its Subject by which it is plain to him that considers That as Graces so Souls abide for ever But this only proves the Immortality of regenerate Souls Object It doth so Sol. but then consider as there be gracious habits in the regenerate that never dye so there are vicious habits in the unregenerate that can never be separated from them in the world to come Hence Iohn 8.21 They are said to dye in their sins and Iob 20.11 Their iniquities ly down with them in the dust and Ezek. 24.13 They shall never be purged Remarkable is that place Revel 22. v. 11. Let him that is filthy be filthy still And if guilt stick so fast and sin be so deeply engraven in impenitent Souls they also must remain for ever to bear the punishment of them Argument V. THE Immortality of the Soul of Man may be evinced from the Dignity of Man above all other Creatures Angels only excepted and his Dominion over them all In this the Scriptures are clear that Man is the Master-piece of all Gods other work Psal. 8.5 6. For thou hast made him a little lower than the Angels and hast crowned him with glory and honour Thou hast made him to have Dominion over the works of thy hands thou hast put all things under his feet Other Creatures were made for his service and he is crowned King over them all One Man is of more worth than all the inferiour Creatures But wherein is his Dignity and excellency above all other Creatures if not in respect of the capacity and immortality of his Soul Sure it can be found no where else for as to the Body many of the Creatures excel man in the perfections of Sense greatness of Strength agility of Members c. Nos Aper auditu praecellit aranea tactu vultur odoratu linx visu simia gustu And for beauty Solomon in all his Glory was not arrayed like one of the Lilies of the Field The Beasts and Fowls enjoy more pleasure and live divested of those cares and cumbers which perplex and wear out the lives of men It cannot be in respect of bodily perfections or pleasures that man excels other Creatures If you say he excels them all in respect of that noble endowment of Reason which is peculiar to man and his singular excellency above them all 'T is true this is his glory but if you deprive the reasonable Soul of Immortality you despoil it of all both its glory and comfort and put the reasonable into a worse condition than the unreasonable and brutish Creatures for if the Soul may dye with the Body and man perish as the Beast happier is the life of the Beast which is perplexed with no cares nor fears about futurities our Reason serves to little other purpose but to be an engine of Torture a meer Rack to our Souls Certainly the Priviledge of Man doth not consist in that as abstracted from
the redeemed who were to come after him to glory in their several generations Iohn 14.2.3 The Intercession of Christ in Heaven is for the security of our purchased inheritance to us and to prevent any new breaches which might be made by our Sins whereby it might be forfeited and we divested of it again 1 Iohn 2.1 2. All these joyntly make up the foundation of our faith and hope of glory But if our Souls perish or be annihilated at death our Faith Hope and Comforts are all Delusions vain Dreams which do but abuse our fond Imaginations For 1. It was not worth so great a stoop and abasement of the blessed God as he submitted to in his Incarnation wherein he appeared in flesh yea in the likeness of sinful flesh Rom. 8.3 and made himself of no reputation Philip. 2.7 An act that is and ever will be admired by men and Angels I say it was not worth so great a Miracle as this to procure for us the vanishing comfort of a few years and that short-lived comfort no other than a deluding Dream or mocking Phantasm For seeing it consists in hope and expectation from the world to come as the Scriptures every where speak 1 Thes. 5.8 and 2 Cor. 3.12 Rom. 5.3 4 5. if there be no such enjoyments for us there as most certainly there are not if our Souls perish it is but a vanity a thing of nought that was the errand upon which the Son of God came from the fathers bosome to procure for us 2 And for what think you was the blood of God upon the Cross what was so vast and inconceivable a treasure expended to purchase What! the flattering and vain hopes of a few years of which we may say as it was said of the Roman Consulship unius anni volaticum gaudium the fugitive joy of a year yea not only short-lived and vain hopes in themselves but such for the sake whereof we abridge our selves of the pleasures and desires of the flesh 1 Iohn 3.3 and submit our selves to the greatest sufferings in the world Rom. 8.18 for the Hope of Israel am I bound with this chain c. Acts 28.20 was this the Purchace of his bloud was this it for which he sweat and groaned and bled and died was that precious bloud no more worth than such a trifle as this 3 To what purpose did Christ rise again from the dead was it not to be the first-fruits of them that sleep did he not rise as the common Head of Believers to give us assurance we shall not perish and be utterly lost in the grave Col. 1.18 But if our Souls perish at Death there can be no Resurrection and if none then Christ dyed and rose in vain we are yet in our sins and all those absurdities are unavoidable with which the Apostle loads this supposition 1 Cor. 15.13 c. 4 And to as little purpose was his Triumphant Ascension into Heaven if we can have no benefit by it The professed end of his Ascension was to prepare a place for us Iohn 14.2 But to what purpose are those Mansions in the Heavens prepared if the Inhabitants for whom they are prepared be utterly lost And why is he called the forerunner if there be none to follow him as surely there are not if our Souls perish with our Bodies Those Heavenly Mansions that City prepared by God must stand void for ever if this be so 5 To conclude in vain is the Intercession of Christ in Heaven for us if this be so They that shall never come thither have no business there to be transacted by their advocate for them So that the whole Doctrine of Redemption by Christ is utterly subverted by this one supposition 4. As it subverts the Doctrine of Redemption by Christ and all the hopes and comforts we build thereon so it utterly destroys all the works of the Spirit upon the hearts of Believers and makes them vanish into nothing There are divers Acts and Offices of the Spirit of God about and upon our Souls I will only single out three viz. his sanctifying sealing and Comforting work all things of great weight with believers 1. His sanctifying work whereby he alters the frames and tempers of our Souls 2 Cor. 5.17 old things are past away behold all things are become new The declared and direct end of this work of the Spirit upon our Souls is to attemper and dispose them for Heaven Col. 1.12 For seeing nothing that is unclean can enter into the holy place Revel 21.27 And without holiness no man shall see the Lord Heb. 12.14 It is necessary that all those that have this hope in them should expect to be partakers of their hopes in the way of purification 1 Iohn 3.3 And this is the ground upon which the people of God do mortifie their lusts and take so much pain with their own hearts Matt. 18.8 counting it better as their Lord tells them to enter into life halt or maimed than having two eyes or hands to be cast into Hell But to what purpose is all this self-denyal all these heart-searchings heart-humblings cryes and tears upon the account of Sin and for an heart suited to the will of God if there be no such life to be enjoyed with God after this animal life is finished If you say there is a present advantage resulting to us in this world Object from our abstinence and self-denial we have the truer and longer enjoyment of our comforts on earth by it Debauchery and licentiousness do not only flat the appetite and debase and alloy the comforts of this World but cut short our lives by the exorbitances and abuses of them Though there be a truth in this worth our noting Sol. yet 1 Morality could have done all this without sanctification there was no need for the pouring out of the Spirit for so low a use and purpose as this 2 And therefore as the wisdom of God would be censured and impeached in sending his spirit for an end which could as well be attained without it so the Veracity of God must needs be affronted by it who as you heard before hath declared our Salvation to be the end of our sanctification 2. His Sealing Witnessing and Assuring work we have a full account in the Scriptures of these Offices and works of the Spirit and some spiritual sense and feeling of them upon our own hearts which are two good assurances that there are such things as his bearing witness with our Spirits Rom. 8.16 his Sealing us to the day of Redemption Eph. 4.30 his earnests given into our hearts 2 Cor. 1.22 All which acts and works of the Spirit have a direct and clear aspect upon the life to come and the happiness of our Souls in the full enjoyment of God to eternity For it is to that life we are now sealed And of the full sum of that glory that these are the pledges and earnests But if our Souls perish by
And both these viz The divine Appointment and Providence are in pursuance of a double design or for the payment of a twofold debt which God owes to the first and to the second Adam 1. By cutting off the life or dissolving the Tabernacles of wicked men God pays that debt of Justice owing to the first Adam's sinful Posterity whose sins cry daily to his Justice to cut them off â—om 6 23. The wages of sin is death and indeed it is admirable that his patience suffers ungodly men to live so long as they do for he endures with much long-suffering â—om 9.22 He sees all their sins he is grieved at the heart with them His forbearance doth but encourage them the more to sin against him Eccles. 8.11 Because Sentence c. yet forbears Forty years long was I grieved with this generation Psal. 95.10 And it 's wonderful that patience doth not crack under such a load Habakkuk admired it Habak 1.13 Thou art of purer eyes c. Yet he suffers them to spend lavishly upon his patience from year to year but Justice must do its office at last 2. By cutting off the lives of good men God pays to Christ the reward of his Sufferings the end of his death which was to bring many Sons to glory Hebr. 2.10 Alas it answers not Christs end and intention in dying to have his people so remote from him Iohn 17.24 He would have them where he is that they might behold his glory Two vehement desires are satisfied by this Appointment of God and its Execution viz. 1. Christs viz. 2. The Saints 1. Christs desires are satisfied for this is the thing he all along kept his eye upon in the whole work of his Mediation it was to bring us to God 1 Pet. 3.18 Though he be in glory yet his Mystical Body is not full till all the elect be gathered in by Conversion and gathered home by glorification Eph. 1.23 The Church is his fulness He is not fully satisfied till he see his seed the Souls he died for safe in Heaven and then the debt due to him for all his Sufferings is fully paid him Isai. 53.11 He sees the travel of his Soul As it is the greatest satisfaction and pleasure a man is capable of in this World to see a great design which hath been long projecting and mannaging at last by an orderly conduct brought to its perfection 2. The desires of the Saints are hereby satisfied and their weary Souls brought to rest O what do gracious Souls more pant after than the full Enjoyment of God and the Visions of his face The state of freedom from sin and compleat Conformity to Jesus Christ From the day of their Espousals to Christ these desires have been working in their Souls Love and Patience have each acted its part in them 2 Thess. 3.5 Love hath put them into an holy ardor and longing to be with Christ Patience hath qualified and allayed those desires and supported the Soul under the delay Love cries Come Lord come Patience commands us to wait the appointed time This appointed time on which so great hopes and expectations depend is the time of dissolving these Tabernacles for till then the Souls Rest is suspended And if it were perfectly freed from all other Loads and Burdens both of sin and affliction yet its very absence from Christ would alone make it restless For it is with the Soul in the Body as it is with any other Creature that is off its Centre it doth and must gravitate and propend it is still moving and inclining further and feels not it self easie and at rest where it is be its Condition in other respects never so easie 2 Cor. 5.6 Whilst we are at home in the Body we are absent from the Lord You have a little shadow or Emblem of this in other Creatures You see the Rivers though they glide never so sweetly betwixt the fragrant banks of the most pleasant Meadows in their Course and Passage yet on they go towards the Sea and if they meet with never so many Rocks or Hills to resist their course they will either strive to get a Passage through them or if that may not be they will fetch a compass and creep about them and nothing can stop them till by a central force they have finished their weary Course and poured themselves into the Bosome of the Ocean Or as it is with your selves when abroad from your Habitations and Relations this may be pleasing a little while but if every day might be a Festival it would not long please you because you are not at home The main Motives that perswade a gracious Soul to abâ—de here are to finish the work of their own Salvation and further other mens but as their Evidences for Heaven grow clearer to themselves and their capacity of Service less to others so must their desires to be with Christ be more and more inflamed Now the case so standing that Christs condition in Heaven being a condition of desire and longing for the enjoyment of his people there and all the Glory of Heaven would not content him without that and the condition of his people on earth being also a state of longing groaning and panting to be with him and all the Pleasures and Delights and Comforts they have on earth will not content them without it How wise and gracious an Appointment of Heaven is it that these our Tabernacles shall and must be put off and that shortly For hereby a full and mutual satisfaction is given to the restless desires both of Christs heart and of theirs See the reflected flames of love betwixt them in Revel 22. The Spirit and the Bride say Come and let him that is a thirst come Behold I come quickly even so Lord Iesus come quickly Delays make the heart sad Prov. 13.12 Should our Commoration on earth be long our Patience had need be much greater than it is but under all our burdens here this is our relief it is but a little while and all will be well as well as our Souls can desire to have it Inference I. MUst we put off these Tabernacles Is death necessary and inevitable Then 't is our wisdom to sweeten to our selves that Cup which we must drink and make that as pleasant to us as we can which we know cannot be avoided Die we must whether we be fit or unfit willing or unwilling 't is to no purpose to shrug at the name or shrink back from the thing In all Ages of the World death hath swept the Stage clean of one Generation to make room for another and so it will from Age to Age till the Stage be taken down in the general dissolution But though death be inevitable by all it is not alike evil bitter and dreadful to all Some tremble others triumph at the appearance of it Some meet it half way receive it as a friend and can bid it welcome and die by consent making that
perfect in the Kingdom of God THAT the Spirits of just Men at the time of their separation from their Bodies do not utterly fall in their beings nor that they are so prejudiced and wounded by death that they cannot exert their own proper Acts in the absence of the Body hath been already cleared in the foregoing parts of this Treatise and will be more fully cleared from this Text. But the true level and aim of this discourse is at an higher mark viz the far more excellent free and noble life the Souls of the just begin to live immediately after their Bodies are dropt off from them by death at which time they begin to live like themselves a pleasant free and divine life So much at least is included in the Apostle Epithete in my Text Spirits of the just made perfect and suitable thereto are his words in 1 Cor. 13.10.12 When that which is pâ—rfect is come then that which is in part shall be done away For now we see through a glass darkly but then face to face now I know in part but then shall I know even as I am known These two Adverbs Now and Then distinguish the twofold state of gracious Souls and shew what it is whilst they are confined in the Body and what it shall be from the time of their emancipation and freedom from that clogg of mortality Now we are imperfect but then that which is perfect takes place and that which is imperfect is done away as the imperfect twilight is done away by the opening of the perfect day And it deserves a serious animadversion that this perfect State doth not succeed the imperfect one after a long interval as long as betwixt the dissolution and Resurrection of the Body but the imperfect state of the Soul is immediately done away by the coming of the perfect one The glass is laid by as useless when we come to see face to face and eye to eye The Waters will prove very deep here too deep for any line of mine to fathom there is a cloud always overshadowing the world to come a gloom and haziness upon that state fain we would with our weak and feeble beam of imperfect knowledge penetrate this cloud and dispel this gloom and haziness but cannot we think seriously and close to this great and awful subject but our thoughts cannot pierce through it we re-inforce those thoughts by a salley or thick succession of fresh thoughts and yet all will not do our thoughts return to us either in confusion or without the expected success For alas how little is it that we know or can know of our own Souls now whilst they are embodied much less of their unbodied state The Apostle tells us 1 Cor 2.9 That eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither have entred into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him And another Apostle adds it doth not yet appear what we shall be 1 John 3.1 Yet all this is no discouragement to the search and regular enquiry into the future state for though reason cannot penetrate these mysteries yet God hath revealed them to us though not perfectly by his Spirit And though we know not particularly and circumstantially what we shall be yet this we know that we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is And it is our priviledge and happiness that we are come to the Spirits of just men made perfect i.e. to a clearer knowledge of that state than was ordinarily attainable by Believers under former dispensations These things premised I will proceed to open my apprehensions of the separate state of the Spirits of just men made perfect in twelve Propositions whereby as by so many steps we may orderly advance as far as safely and warrantably we may into the knowledge of this great Mystery clearing what afterwards shall remain obscure in the solution of several Questions relating to this Subject and then apply the whole in several Uses of this great point and the first Proposition is this PROP. I. THere is a'twofold Separation of the Soul from the Body viz one Mental the other Real Or 1. Intellectual by the mind only 2. Physical by the stroke of death Separatio per intellectum fit cum duo revera conjuncta separatim contipimus Conimbr de Anima p. 595. 1. Of Intellectual or mental Separation I am first to speak in this Proposition and it is nothing else but an act of the understanding or mind conceiving or considering the Soul and Body as separated and parted each from other whilst yet they are united in a personal oneness by the breath of life This mental Separation may and ought to be frequently and seriously made before death make the real and actual Separation and the more frequently and seriously we do it the less of horror and distraction will attend that real and fatal stroke when ever it shall be given For hereby we learn to bear it gradually and by gentle essays to acquaint our shoulders with the burden of it Separation is a word that hath much of horror in the very sound and useth to have much more in the sense and feeling of it else it would not deserve that title Iob 8.14 The King of Terrors or the most terrible of all terribles but acquaintance and familiarity abates that horror and that two ways especially 1. As it is preventive of much guilt 2. As it gains a more inward knowledge of its Nature 1. The serious and fixed thoughts of the parting hour is preventive of much guilt and the greatest part of the horrour of death rises out of the guilt of sin The sting of death is sin 1 Cor. 15.56 Augustine saith Nothing more recals a man from sin Nihil sie revocat à pâ—ccato quam frequens mortis meditatio August than the frequent meditation of death I dare not say it is the strongest of all curbs to keep us back from sin but I am sure it is a very strong one Let a Soul but seriously meditate what a change death will make shortly upon his person and condition and the natural effects of such a meditation Qui considerat qâ—alis eâ—it in morte semper pavidus erit in operatione atque inde in oculis sui Condiâ—oris vivet Nihil quod transit appetit pene mortuum se considerat quia se moriturum non ignorat Greg. Mor. 12. through the blessing of God upon it will be a flatting and quenching of its keen and raging appetite after the ensnaring vanities of this World which draw men into so much guilt a conscientious fear of sin and an awakened care of duty It was once demanded of a very holy man who spent much more than the ordinary allowance of time in Prayer and searching his own heart why he so macerated his own Body by such frequent and long continued Duties His answer was O I must dye I must dye Nothing could separate
passions and burdens with it never spends one thought more about Food and Raiment Health and Sickness Wives and Children Riches or Poverty but lives henceforth after the manner of Angels Matth. 22.30 It is now unrelated to and therefore unconcerned about all these things 3. In the unbodied state it is perfectly freed from sin both in the Acts and Habits a mercy it never enjoyed since the first moment it dwelt in the Body The cure of this disease was indeed begun in the Work of Sanctification but is not perfected till the day of the Souls glorification 'T is now and not till now a Spirit made perfect that is a Soul enjoying its perfect health and rectitude No more groans tears or lamentations upon the account of in-dwelling sin 4. The way and manner of its converse with and enjoyment of God is changed There are two mediums by which Souls converse with God in the Body viz 1 One internal sc Faith 2 The other external sc. Ordinances 1 If a man walk with God on earth it must be in the use and exercise of Faith 2 Cor. 5.7 nor can there be any communion carried on betwixt God and the Soul without it Heb. 11.6 2 The external mediums are the ordinances of God or duties of Religion both publick and private Psal. 63.2 Betwixt these two mediums of Communion with God this remarkable difference is sound the Soul may see and enjoy God by Faith in the want or absence of Ordinances but there is no seeing or conversing with God in the greatest plenty and purity of Ordinances without Faith Heb. 4.2 But in the same moment the Soul is cut off from union with the Body it is also cut off from both these ways of enjoying God 1 Cor. 13.12 Isai. 38.11 But yet the Soul is no loser nay it is the greatest Gainer by this change The Child is no loser by ceasing to derive its nourishment by the Navel when it comes to receive it by the mouth a more noble way whereby it gets a new pleasure in tasting the variety of all delectable Food Hezekiah bemoaned the loss of Ordinances upon his supposed death-bed saying I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the Land of the living q. d. Now farewel Temple and Ordinances I shall never go any more into his Temple where my Soul hath been so often cheared and refresht with the displays of his grace and goodness I shall never more join with the Assembly of his people on earth And suppose he had not sure he would have lost nothing had he then exchanged the Temple at Ierusalem for the Temple in Heaven and Communion with sinful imperfect Saints on earth for fellowship with Angels and the Spirits of just men made perfect By this change we lose no more than he loseth who whilst he stands delightfully contemplating the image of his dearest friend in a glass hath the glass snatcht away by his friend whom he now seeth face to face Upon this change of the mediums of Communion it will follow that the Communion betwixt God and the separate Soul excells all the Communion it ever had with him on Earth in 1 The Clearness in 2 The Sweetness of it in 3 The Constancy 1 Its Visions of God in the state of Separation are more clear distinct and direct than they were on earth Clouds and Shadows are now fled away The Soul now seeth as it is seen and knoweth as it is known its apprehensions of God there differ from those it had here as the crade and confused apprehensions of a Child do from those we have in the manly state 2 They are also more sweet and ravishing As our Visions are so are our Pleasures Perfect Visions produce perfect Pleasures The faculties of the Soul now and never till now lie level to that rule Matth. 22.37 The Visions of God command and call forth all the heart and soul mind and strength into acts of love and delight It was not so here if the Spirit were willing the Flesh was weak but there the clog is off from the foot of the Will 3 More constant fixed and steddy 'T is one of the greatest difficulties in Religion to fix the thoughts and cure the wildness and roveings of the fancy The heart is not steddy with God and hence are its ups and downs heatings and coolings which are things unknown in the perfect state By all which it appears the change by Dissolution is great and marvelous both upon Body and Soul but upon the Soul more especially PROP. IV. The Souls of the Righteous at the instant of their Separation are received by the blessed Angels and by them transferred unto the place of Blessedness THough Angels are by nature a superiour order of Spirits differing from men in Dignity as the Nobles and Barons in the Kingdoms of this World differ from inferiour Subjects yet are they made ministring Spirits i.e. serviceable Creatures in the Kingdom of Providence to the meanest of the Saints Heb. 1.14 and herein the Lord puts a singular honour upon his people in making such excellent Creatures as Angels serviceable to them Luther assigns to them a double office sc. to sing the praises of God on high and to watch over his Saints here below Their Ministry is distinguished into three Branches 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for Admonition or warning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for Protection and defence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for succour help and comfort This last office they perform more especially at the Souls departure Like tender Nurses they keep us whilst we live and bring us home in their arms to our Fathers house when we die They are about our death-beds waiting to receive their precious charge into their arms and bosomes When Lazarus breathed out his Soul the Text saith it was carried by Angels into Abraham's bosome Luke 10.22 And upon this account Tertullian calls them Evocatores animarum the Callers forth of Souls At the Translation of Elijah they appeared in the form of Horses and Chariots of fire 2 Kings 2. 11. Horses and Chariots are not only design'd for conveyance but for conveyance in State and truly it is no small honour to have such a noble Convoy and Guard to attend our Souls to Heaven If it be demanded Object What need is there of their help or company Cannot God by his immediate hand and power gather home the Souls of his people to himself at death He inspired them into our Bodies without their help and can receive them again when we expire them without their aid True Sâ—lâ—t he can do so but it hath pleased him to appoint this method of our Translation not out of meer necessity but bounty Souls ascend not to God in the vertue of the Angels wings or arms but of Christ's Ascension Had not he ascended as our head and representative all the Angels in Heaven could not have brought our Souls thither He ascended by his own power and we
ascend by the virtue of his Ascension 'T is therefore rather for the State and Decorum than any absolute necessity that they attend us in our Ascension God will not only have his people brought home to him safely but honourably They shall come to their Fathers house in a becoming Equipage as the Children of a King This puts honour upon our Ascension day that day is adorned by the attendance of such illustrious Creatures upon us 'T is no small honour which God herein designes for us that Creatures of greater dignity than our selves shall be sent from Heaven to attend and wait upon us thither Yea That our Ascension day should in this resemble Christ's Ascension is an honour indeed When he ascended there were multitudes of these heavenly Creatures to wait upon him Psal. 68.17 18. The Chariots of God are twenty thousand even thousands of Angels the Lord is among them as in Sinai in the holy place Thou hast ascended on high c. A Cloud was prepared as a Royal Chariot to carry up the King of Glory to his Princely Pavillion and then a Royal Guard of mighty Angels to wait upon his Chariot if not for support yet for the greater State and Solemnity of their Lords Ascension And Oh what Jubilations of blessed Angels were heard that day in Heaven How was the whole City of God moved at his coming the Triumph is not ended to this day no nor ever shall Now herein God greatly honours his people that there shall be some resemblance and conformity betwixt their Ascension and Christs * Quomodo inservierunt capiti eo modo inserviunt etiam membris Gaudent inserviâ—â— iâ—lis in terris quosaliquando socios habebunt in coelis Gerhard they rejoice to attend those to Heaven who must be their fellow Citizens for ever in Heaven It is convenient also that those who had the charge of us all our life should attend us to our Fathers house at our death In the one they finish their ministry in the other they begin their more intimate Society Moreover the Angels are they whom God will imploy to gather together his Elect from the four winds of Heaven at the great day Matth. 24.31 and who more fit to attend their Spirits to Heaven singly than those who must collect them into one Body at last and wait upon that collective Body when they shall be brought to Christ Psal. 45.14 Object But the sight and presence of Angels is exceeding awful and overwhelming to humane nature it will rather astonish and terrifie than refresh and chear us to find our selves all on a suddain surrounded and beset with such Majestick Creatures We see what effects the appearance of an Angel hath had upon good men in this World We shall die said Manoah for we have seen God Judg. 13.22 So Eliphaz a Spirit passed before my face the hair of my flesh stood up Iob 4.15 Sol. True whilst our Souls inhabit these mortal and sinful Bodies the appearance of Angels is terrible to them and cannot be otherwise partly upon a natural and partly upon a moral account The dread of Angels naturally falls upon our Animal Spirits They shrink and tremble at the approach of Spirits not only the Spirits of Men but of Beasts quail at it A Dog or an Horse is terrified at it as well as a Man Numb 22.25 The dread of Spirits strikes the Animal or natural Spirits primarily and the mind or rational Soul by consent There is also another cause of fear in man upon the sight or presence of Angels viz. A Consciousness of guilt Whereever there is guilt there will be fear especially upon any extraordinary appearance of God to us though it be but imediately by an Angel But when the Soul is freed both from flesh and sin and shall enjoy it self in a nature like to these pure and holy Spirits the dread of Angels is then vanished and the Soul will take great content and satisfaction in their Company and Communion The Soul then finds it self a fit Companion for them looks upon them as its fellow Servants for so they are Revel 19.10 and the Angels look upon the Spirits of just men not as Inferiours and Underlings but with great respect as Spirits in some sense nearer to Christ than themselves So that henceforth no dread falls upon us from the presence of these excellent Creatures but each enjoyeth singular delight in each others Society And thus we see in what honourable and pleasing Company the souls of the just go hence to their Father's house and bosome PROP. V. The Soul is not so maimed and prejudiced by its separation from the Body but that it both can and doth live and act without it and performs the acts of Cogitation and Volition without the aid and ministry of the Body I Know it is objected by them that assert the Souls sleeping till the Resurrection that though its essence be not destroy'd by death yet its Operations are obstructed by the want and absence of the Body its Tool and Instrument and thus they form their Objection All that the Soul understands Object it understands by Species that is the Images of things which are first formed in the Phantasie Conditiones Intellectus sunt tres 1 Objectum ens verum intelligibile 2 Phantasma vel species sensilâ— in Phâ—ntasia latens 3 Species intelligibilis quae est accidens spirituale repraesentaâ—s idealiter intellectui rem materialem existentem extra intellectum As when we would conceive the nature of an House a Ship a Man or a Beast we first form the Image or Species thereof in our fancy and then exercise our thoughts about it But this depending upon bodily Organs and Instruments the separated Soul can form no such Images It hath no such innate Species of its own but comes into the World an abrasa tabula white paper and being deprived by separation of the help of Senses and Phantasms it consequently understands nothing Thus the Soul in its state of Separation is represented to us as wounded in its Powers and Operations to that degree which seems to extinguish the very nature of it But Sol. 1. We deny that the Soul knows nothing now but by Phantasms and Images Intellectus incorporea immaterialia contemplatur ut Deum intelligentias sed haec nullo modo in phantasiam cadunt cum sunt extra limites corporeatum viriam Conimb de Anima lib. 3. cap. 8. Q. 8. For it knows it self it s own nature and powers of which it cannot possibly feign or form any image or representation What form shape or figure can the fancy of a man cast his own Soul into to help him to understand its nature And what shall we say of its understanding during an ecstasie or Rapture Doth the Soul know nothing at such a time Doth a dull Torpor seize and benumb its intellectual powers No no the Understanding is never more bright clear apprehensive
done to it in order to its preparation for our Souls So that no delay can be upon that account 2 The departed Souls of Believers are as ready for Heaven as ever they shall be For there is no preparation-work to be done by them or upon them after death Ioh. 9.3 Eccles. 9.10 Their justification was compleat before death and now their sanctification is so too Sin which came in by the Union going out at the separation of their Souls and Bodies They are Spirits made perfect 3 The Scripture is plain and full for their immediate glorification Luke 23.43 To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Luke 16.22 The Beggar dyed and was carried by the Angels into Abraham's bosome Philip. 1.21 I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ which is far better The Scripture speaks but of two ways by which Souls see and enjoy God viz. Faith and Sight the one imperfect suited to this life the other perfect fitted for the life to come and this immediately succeeding that for the imperfect is done away by the coming of that which is perfect as the Twilight is done away by the advancing of the perfect day 4 To conclude There is nothing in reason lying in bar to it It hath been proved before the Soul in its unbodied State is capable to enjoy blessedness and can perform its acts of Intellection Volition c. not only as well but much better than it did when embodied I conclude therefore That seeing Heaven is already as much prepar'd for Believers as it need be or can be and they as much prepar'd from the time of their Dissolution as ever they shall be The Scriptures also being so plain for it and no bar in reason against it All the forementioned Opinions are but the Dreams and Fancies of men who have forsaken their Scripture-guide and this remains an unshaken truth That the Spirits of the just go immediately to glory from the time of their Separation PROP. VIII At the time a gracious Souls separation from the Body it is instantly and perfectly freed from sin which till that time dwelt in it from its beginning But thenceforth shall do so no more IMmediately upon their separation from the Body Ideoque vocat conseâ—ratos vel perfectos quia carnis infirmitatibus non amplius sint obnoxii depositâ ipsâ carne Marl. in loc they are Spirits made perfect as my Text stiles them and that Epithet perfect could never suit them if there were any remaining root or habit of corruption in them The time yea the set time is now come to put an end to all the dolorous groans of gracious Souls upon the account of indwelling sin What the Angel said to Ioshua Zech. 3.3 4. The same doth God say of every upright Soul at the time of its separation Take away the filthy Garments from him and cloath him with change of rayments and set a fair Miter upon his head Thus the Garments spotted with the flesh are taken away with the Body of flesh and the pure unchangeable Robes of perfect holiness cloathed upon the Soul in which it appears without fault before the Throne of God Rev. 14.5 There is a threefold burdensom evil in sin under which all regenerated souls groan in this life viz. 1 The Guilt 2 The Filth 3 The Inherence of it in their nature And there is a threefold Remedy or cure of these evils The guilt of sin is remedied by justification The filth of sin is inchoatively healed by sanctification The inherence of sin is totally eradicated by glorification For as it entred into our persons by the union of our Souls and Bodies so it is perfectly cast out by their disunion or separation at death The last stroak is then given to the work of sanctification and the last is evermore the perfecting stroak Sin languished under imperfect sanctification in the time of life but it gives up the Ghost under perfected sanctification from 〈◊〉 after death Sanctification gave it its deadly wound but glorification its final Abolition For it is with our sins after Regeneration as it was with that Beast mentioned Dan. 7.12 which though it was wounded with a deadly wound yet its life was prolonged for a season And this is the appointed season for its expiration For if at their dissolution they are immediately received into glory as it hath been proved they are in our seventh Proposition they must necessarily be freed perfectly from sin immediately upon their dissolution because nothing that is unclean can enter into that pure and holy place They must be as the Text truly represents them The Spirits of just men made perfect For if so great holiness and purity be required in all that draw nigh to God upon earth as you read Psal. 93.5 certainly those who are admitted immediately to his Throne must be without fault according to Rev. 7.14 15 16 17. When a compounded being comes to be dissolved each part returns to its own principle so it is here The Spirit of man and all the grace that is in it came from God and to him they return at death and are perfected in him and by him The flesh returns to the earth whence it came and all that body of sin is destroyed with it neither the one or other shall be a snare or clog to the soul any more A Christian in this World is but Gold in the Ore at death the pure Gold is melted out and separated and the dross cast away and consumed Hence three Consectaries offer themselves to us Consectary I. That a Believers life and warfare end together We lay not down our weapons of war till we lie down in the dust 2 Timothy 4.7 I have fought a good fight I have finished my course The course and conflict you see are finished together Though they commence from different terms yet they always terminate together Grace and sin have each acted its part upon the Stage of time and the victory hovered doubtfully sâ—â—â—times over Sin and sometimes over Grace but now the â—â—r is ended and the quarrel decided Grace keeps its ground and sin is finally vanquished Now and never before the gracious Soul stands triumphing like that noble Argive In vacuo solus Sessor Plausorque Theatro not an Enemy left to renew the Combat the war is ended and with it all the fears and sorrows of the Saints Consectary II. Separated Souls become impeccable or free from all the hazard of sin from the time of their separation For there being no root of sin now inherent in them consequently no temptation to sin can fasten upon them all temptations have their handles in the Corruptions of our natures Did not Satan find matter prepar'd within us dry tinder fitted to his hand he might strike in temptations long enough before one of his hellish sparks could catch or fasten upon us Temptations are grievous exercises to Believers they are darts Eph. 6.16 they are thorns 2 Cor. 12.7 but
the separate Soul is out of Gun-shot 'T were as good discharge an Arrow at the body of the Sun as a temptation at a translated Soul Consectary III. Separated Souls are more lovely Companions and their Converses more sweet and delightful than ever they were in this World It was their corruption which spoil'd their Communion on earth and it is their spotless holiness which makes it incomparably pleasant in Heaven The best and loveliest Saints have something in them which is distastful even sweet Bryars and holy Thistles have their offensive Prickles but when that which was so lovely on earth is made perfect in Heaven and nothing of that remains in Heaven which was so offensive in them on earth O what delightful Companions will they be O blessed Society O most desirable Companions let my Soul for ever be united to their assembly I love them under their Corruptions but how shall my Soul be knit to them when it seeth them shining in their Perfections PROP. IX The Pleasures and Delights of the separate Spirits of the just are incomparably greater and sweeter than those they did or at any time could experience in their bodily state WIth what a pleasant face would death smile upon Believers what Roses would it raise in its pale cheeks if this Proposition were but well setled in our hearts by faith And if we will not be wanting to our selves it may be firmly settled there by these four Considerations which demonstrate it Consideration I. Whatsoever Pleasure any man receives in this World he receives it by means of his Soul Even all corporeal and sensitive delights have no other relish and sweetness but what the Soul gives them which is demonstrable by this that if a man be placed amidst all the pleasing Objects and Circumstances in the World if he were in that Centre where he might have the confluence of all the delights of this World yet if the Spirit be wounded there is no more relish or savour in them than in the White of an Egg. What pleasure had Spira in his Liberty Estate Wife and Children These things were indeed proposed and urged again and again to relieve him but instead of pleasure they became his horrour let but the mind be wounded and all the mirth is marr'd one touch from God upon the Spirit destroys all the joy of this World Nay Let but the intention of the mind be strongly carried another way and for that time though there be no guilt or wound upon the Soul the most pleasant enjoyments lose their pleasure What Delight think you would bags of Gold sumptuous Feasts or exquisite melody have afforded to Archimedes when he was wholly intent upon his Mathematical lines By this then it is evident that the rise of all pleasure is in the mind and the most agreeable and pleasing Objects and Enjoyments signifie nothing without it The mind must be found in it self and at leisure to attend them or we can have no pleasure from them Consideration II. Of all Natural Pleasures in the World Intellectual Pleasures are found to be most agreeable and connatural to the Soul of man The more refined and remote from sense any pleasure is the more grateful it is to the Soul those are certainly the sweetest Delights that spring out of the mind A drop of intellectual pleasure is valued by a generous and well tempered soul above the whole Ocean of impure Joys which come to it sophisticated and tang'd through the muddy Channels of sense No sensualists in the World can extract such pleasure out of Gold Silver Meat and Drink as a searching and contemplating mind finds in the discovery of truth * In qua simulac pedem posui foribus pessulum obdo in ipso aeternitatis gremio inter tot illustres animas sedem mihi sumo cum ingenti quidem animo ut sâ—bindè magnaetum misereat qui hanc faelicitatem ignorant Epist. Prin. Heynsius that learned Library-keeper of Leyden professed that when he had shut up himself among so many illustrious Souls he seemed to sit down there as in the very lap of Eternity and heartily pitied the Rich and Covetous Worldlings that were strangers to his Delights †Arcana coeli naturae secreta ordinem universi scire majoris foelicitatis dulcedinis est quam câ—gitatione quis assequi potest aut mortalis sperare And Cardan tells us that to know the secrets of Nature and the order of the Universe hath greater pleasure and sweetness in it than the thoughts of Man can fathom or any Mortal hope for Yea such beauty saith * Talis est Mathematum pulchritudo ut his indignum sit divitiarum phalâ—ras istas bullas puerilia spectacula comparari Plutarch there is in the Study of the Mathematicks that it were unworthy to compare such Baubles and Bubbles as Riches with it Yea saith another †Dulce est extingui Mathematicarum artium studio Leon. Diggs it were a sweet thing to be extingnished in those Studies Iulius Scaliger was so delighted with Poetry that he protested he had rather be the Author of twelve Verses in Lucan than Emperour of Germany And to say truth there is a kind of * Talis suavitas ut cum quis ea degustaverit quasi circeis poculis captus non potest â—nquam ab illis divelli Cardan enchanting sweetness in those intellectual Pleasures and Feasts of the mind such a delight as hardly suffers the mind to be pull'd away from it These Pleasures have a finer edge an higher gust a more agreeable savour to the mind than sensitive ones as approaching much nearer to the nature of the Soul which is spiritual Consideration III. And as Intellectual pleasures do as far exceed all sensitive pleasures as those which are proper to a man do those which we have in common with Beasts So Divine pleasures do again much more surmount Intellectual ones For what compare is there betwixt those joys which surprize a Scholar in the discovery of the Secrets of Nature and those that overwhelm and swallow up the Christian in the discovery of the glorious Mysteries of Redemption by Christ and his own personal interest therein To solve the Phaenomena of Nature is pleasant but to solve all the difficulties about our Title to Christ and his Covenant that is ravishing Archimedes his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have found it was but the frisk or skip of a Boy that rapturous voice of the Spouse My Beloved is mine and I am his These are Entertainments for Angels 1 Pet. 1.12 a short Salvation for the season it is felt and tasted 1 Pet. 1.8 after these delights all others are insipid and dry And yet one step higher Consideration IV. All that divine pleasure which ever the holiest and devoutest Soul enjoyed in the Body is but a Sip or Praelibation â—ompared with those full draughts it hath in the unbodied State Whilst it is embodied it rejoyceth in the
Mic. 5.7 2. No grace is or can be acted here without the clog of a contrary corruption upon its heel Rom. 7.21 When I would do good evil is present with me Every beam of faith is presently darkned by a cloud of unbelief Mark 9.24 Lord I believe help thou my unbelief Saepè in libro experientiae legimus quomodo à corde nostro relinquimar nunc est nobisâ—um nunc alibi nunc avoâ—at nunc recurrit in sola lubricitate manens Bern. We often read in the Book of experience saith one what an inconstant fickle thing the heart is in duties Now it is with us by and by it 's fled away and gone we know not where to find it It is constant only in its inconstancy and lubricity There is iniquity in our most holy things which needs pardon Exod. 28.38 Our best duties have enough in them to damn us as well as our worst sins but in that perfect state above grace flows purely out of the Soul as beams do from the Sun or crystal streams from the purest Fountain No impure or imperfect acts proceed from Spirits made perfect 3. Here the graces of the Saints are never or very rarely acted in their highest and most intense degree When they love God most fervently there is some coldness in their love Who comes up to the height of that rule Matt. 22.37 Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy mind and all thy strength When we meditate on God it is not in the depth of our thoughts without some wanderings and extravagancies 't is very hard if not impossible for the Soul to stand long in its full bent to God But in Heaven it doth so and will do so for ever without any relaxation or remission of its fervour Christ among the Saints and Angels in Heaven is as a mighty Load-stone cast in amongst many Needles which leap to him and fix themselves inseparably upon him They all act in glory as the fire doth here to the utmost of their power and ability There is no note lower than Glory to God in the highest 4 The most spiritual Souls on earth who live most with God have and must have their dayly and frequent intermissions The necessities of the Body as well as the defectiveness of their graces require and necessitate it to be so Our hands with Moses will hang down and grow weary Our affections will cool and fall do what we can But as the Spirits of just men made perfect know no remissions in the degree so neither any intermissions in the actings of their grace They shall serve him day and night in his Temple Rev. 7.15 You that would purchase the continuance of your spiritual comforts but for a day with all that you have in this World will there enjoy them at full without any intermitting throughout eternity 5. If the best hearts on earth be at any time more than ordinarily enlarged in spiritual comforts they need presently some humbling providence to hide pride from their eyes Even Paul himself must have a thorn in the flesh a messenger of Satan to buffet him Bernard could never perform any duty with comfortable enlargement but he seemed to hear his own heart whisper thus benè fecisti Bernarde O well done Bernard But in Heaven the highest comforts are injoyed in the deepest humility and the intire glory is ascribed to God without any unworthy defalcations Rev. 4.10 They put not the Crown upon their own heads but Christs they cast down their Crowns and fall down at the feet of him that sitteth upon the Throne 6. All Assemblies for worship in this World are mixed They consist of Regenerate and Unregenerate living and dead Souls this spoils the harmony and allays the comfort of mutual Communion In a Congregation consisting of a 1000 persons Ah! How few comparatively are there that are heartily concerned in the Duty But it is not so above There are ten thousand times ten thousand even thousands of thousands before the Throne loving adoring praising and triumphing together and not a jaring string in all their Harps 7. Here the worship of God is impured mixed and adulterated by the sinful additions and inventions of men This gracious Souls groan under as an heavy burden sighing and praying for Reformation as knowing they can expect no more of Gods presence than there is of his Order and Institution in Worship But above all the Worship is pure the least pin in the heavenly Tabernacle is according to the perfect pattern of the divine Will 8. We have here Duties of divers kinds and natures to perform All our time is not to be spent in loving praising and delighting in God but we must turn our selves also to searching watching and Soul-humbling work Sometimes we are called to get up our hearts to the highest praise and then to humble them to the dust for sin and judgments One while to sing his praises and another while to sigh even to the breaking of our loins but the Spirits of just men made perfect have but one kind of imployment viz praising loving and delighting in God There is no groaning sighing searching or watching-work in that state 9. The most illuminated Believers on Earth have but dark and crude apprehensions of Christs intercession work in Heaven or of the way and manner in which it is there performed by him We know indeed that our High-Priest is for us entred within the vail Heb. 6.20 That he appears in that most holy place for us Heb. 9.24 That he there represents his sufferings for us to God standing before him as a Lamb that had been slain Rev. 5.6 That he offers up our prayers with his incense to God Rev. 8.3 But the immediate intuition of the whole performance by the person of Christ in Heaven the beholding of him in his work there with the smiles and honours the delight and satisfaction of the Father in his Person and Work certainly this must be a far different thing and what must make more deep and suitable impressions upon our hearts than ever the most affecting view of them by Faith at this distance could do 10. In such ravishing sights and joyful ascriptions of glory to him that sâ—tteth upon the Throne and to the Lamb for evermore all the separated Spirits of the just are imployed and wholly taken up in Heaven as they come in their several times thither and will be so imploy'd in that Temple-service unto the end of the World when Christ shall deliver up the Kingdom to his Father and thenceforth God shall be all in all The illustration and confirmation of this assertion we have in these two or three particulars 1 That all the Spirits of just men from the beginning of the World until Christs ascension into Heaven did enter into Heaven as a place of rest as a City prepared for them of God Heb. 11.16 and did enjoy blessedness and Glory there but yet there seems to
against the persecutors thereof Rev. 6. 10. Nor do I think those words Isai. 63.16 repugnant hereunto Abraham is ignorant of us and Israel acknowledgeth us not For I look upon the import of those words only as an humble acknowledgment of their defection which rendered them unworthy that their Forefathers should own or acknowledg them any more for their children Iob. 14. 21. Eccles. 9. 5,6 John 19.25 and not as implying their utter ignorance or total oblivion of the Churches state on earth But I here understand such a particular knowledg of our personal states and conditions as they once had when they dwelt amongst us in the Body and this seems to be denied them by those Scriptures alledged against it in the margent 3. By commerce and intercourse understand not their intercession with God for us which the Papists affirm but their concernments about our natural or civil interest in this World so as to be useful to our persons by warning us of death or dangers or to our Estates by disquieting such as wrong us in not fulfilling the Wills and Testaments they once made or by giving us notice by words or signs of the death of our friends who died at a distance from us or come to some violent and untimely end The sense of the Words being thus determined and the Question so stated I will for the resolution of it give you 1. The strength of what I find offered for the Affirmative 2. The general Concessions or what may be granted 3. My own judgement about it with the grounds thereof 1 Some there are even among the learned and judicious who are for the Affirmative part of the Question and do with much confidence assert that departed Souls both know our particular concerns in this world and intermeddle with them confirming their assertion both by reasons to convince us that it may be so and variety of instances that it is so I will produce both the one and the other and give them a due consideration and censure The substance of what is pleaded for the affirmative I find thus collected and improved by Dr. Sterne a learned Physician in Ireland Dissentatio de morte à p. 208. ad p. 214. in his Book entituled a Dissertation concerning Death where he offers us these four Arguments to convince that is possible for departed Souls thus to appear and perform such offices for their Friends on Earth Argument I. ANgels by command from God are useful and helpful to men (1) Angeli jussu Dei hominibus opitulantur haâ—d quaquam ambigitur unde animas à corpore solutas sese reb s humanis miscere comprobari videtur Sequtlae sundamentum duplex est prius quod animae separatae Angeli sunt saltem Angelis aequales posterius quod magis idonti sunt quibus officium generi humano succurrendi demandetur quà m Spiâ—itus inter quos corpus nullus unquam intercessit nexus c. they are the Saints Guardians and it is probable that each Christian hath his peculiar Angel whence it will follow that separated Souls do mingle themselves with humane affairs and that because they are Angels at least equal unto Angels Luke 20.36 Besides they being Spirits that were once embodied must needs be more fit for this imployment than those who never had any tie at all to a Body unless we can imagine them to have lost the remembraâ—â—â— of all that ever they did and suffered in the Body as also that they put off and buried all their affections to us with their Bodies which is hard to think Even as Christ our High-Priest is qualified for that office above all others in Heaven because he once dwelt and suffered in a Body like ours here upon Earth so separated Souls are qualified above all other Spirits who are unrelated to Bodies of flesh Argument II. THE Church triumphant and militant are but one Body (2) Ecclesia est corpus unum cujus membra quo meliora to magis ad aliis ejusdem corporis membris oâ—itâ—landum sunt propensa hujus autem corporis pars altera est triumphans in coelis altera militans in terris illa melior hec opis magis indiga c. and by how much better the triumphant are than the militant by so much the more propense they are to succour and help the other that stand in need of it This being the case we cannot imagine but they are inclined to perform all good Offices for us for else they should do less for us now they are in a state of highest perfection in Heaven than they did or were willing to do in their imperfect state on Earth Argument III. A Will or Testament as Vlpian defines it is the just sentence or declaration of our minds concerning that which we would have done after our decease (3) Testamentum Ulpiano definiente est voluntatis nostra justa sententia de co quod post mortem nostram fieri volumus Testamentum autem tanquam res sacra ab omnibus gentibus religiosâ— observatur Gal. 3.15 Ratio autem tam religiosa taniq universalis observantia est quoniam animas corum qui Testamenta condiderant etiam suam post mortem in tadem voluntate perseverare ejus complementa curare ac deinque ejus vel executrices vel non praestila vindices esse praesumitur These Testaments have always and among all Nations been religiously observed as the Apostle witnesseth Gal. 3.15 The reasons of this so religious observance are a presumption that those who made them when a live continue in the same mind and will after death that they take care for the fulfilling of them and revenge the non-performance upon the unjust Executors For otherwise there can be no reason why so great a stress should be laid upon the Will of the Dead if they care not whether their Wills be performed or no. Why should we be so solicitous and studious about it and pay so great reverence to it but on this account Argument IV. (4) In sacris Scripturis consulere mortuos paâ—sâ—m prohibetur ut Deut. 18.10 11. Sed si homines à mortuis non suscitentur legibus haâ—d opus est si mortuirogati non aliquando responderent ab hominibus haudquaquam coâ—â—â—â—erentur Sterne de Morte ubi sup THe Scriptures forbid consultations with the Dead Deut. 18.10 11. This prohibition supposeth some did consult them and received answers from them which must needs imply some commerce betwixt the Living and the Souls that are departed And considering he had before forbidden their consultation with the Devil it appears that here we must needs understand the very Souls of the Dead and not the Devil personating them only These are the Arguments of this learned Author for the Affirmative which he closes with two necessary Cautions First That this layes no foundation for religious Worship or Invocation of departed Souls Those that are helpful to us are not therefore
signifying a Messenger or one sent And for the mischief done by Spirits in this World the Scriptures ascribe that to the Devils those unquiet Spirits have their Walks in this World they compass the whole earth and walk up and down in it Iob 1.7 and 1 Pet. 5.8 they can assume any shape yea I doubt not but he can act their Bodies when dead as well as he did their Souls and Bodies when alive how great his power is this way appears in what is so often done by him in the Bodies of Witches They are not ordinarily therefore the Spirits of men but other Spirits that appear to us 2 If God should ordinarily permit the Spirits of men inhabiting the other World a liberty so frequently to visit this what a gap would it open for Satan to beguile and deceive the living Quid enim idololatriam inter Ethnicos Christianos magis propagavit Hinc fluxâ—runt multae perigrinationes monasteria delubra dits festi alia Lav. In Job 33. What might he not by this means impose upon weak and credulous Mortals There hath been a great deal of Superstition and Idolatry already introduced under this pretence he hath often personated Saints departed and pretended himself to be the Ghost of some venerable person whose love to the Souls of the people and care for their Salvation drew him from Heaven to reveal some special Secret to them Swarms of Errors and superstitious and idolatrous Opinions and Practices are this way conveyed by the tricks and artifices of Satan among the Papists which I will not blot my Paper withal only I desire it may be considered that if this were a thing so frequently permitted by God as is pretended upon what dangerous terms had he left his Church in this World seeing he hath left no certain marks by which we may distinguish one Spirit from another or a true Messenger from Heaven from a counterfeit and pretended one But God hath tied us to the sure and standing rule of his Word forbidding us to give heed to any other voice or spirit leading us another way Isa. 8.19 2 Thes. 2.1 2. Gall. 1.8 It was therefore a discreet reply which one of the Ancients made when in Prayer a Vision of Christ appeared to him and told him Thy Prayers are heard for thou art worthy The good man immediately clapt his hands upon his eyes and said Nolo hic videre Christum c. I will not see Christ here it is enough for me that I shall behold him in Heaven To conclude My Opinion upon the whole matter is this that although it cannot be denied but in some grand and extraordinary cases as at the transfiguration and Resurrection of Christ. God did and perhaps sometimes though rarely may order or permit departed Souls to return into this World yet for the most part I judge those Apparitions are not the Souls of the Dead but other Spirits and for the most part evil ones Lib. de cura pro mortuis Of this Judgment was St. Augustine who when he had at full related the Story above of the Fathers Ghost directing his Son to the Acquittance yet will not allow it to be the very soul of his Father but an Angel where he farther adds If saith he the souls of the dead might be present in our affairs they would not forsake us in this sort especially my Mother Monica who in her life could never be without me surely she would not thus leave me being dead Object 1. Objection 1. But it was pleaded before that we allow the Apparitions of Angels and departed Souls if they be not Angels at least are equal unto Angels and in respect of their late relation to us are more propense to help us than Spirits of another sort can be supposed to be Sol. Solution It seems too bold an imposing upon Soveraign Wisdom to tell him what Messengers are fittest for him to send and imploy in his service who hath taught him or been his Counsellor Object 2. Object 2. But these offices seem to pertain properly to them as they are not only fellow-members but the most excellent members of the mystical Body to whom it belongs to assist the meaner and weaker Sol. Sol. If there be any force of reason in this Plea it carries it rather for the Angels than for departed Souls for Angels are gather'd under the same common head with the Saints the Text tells us we are come to an innumerable company of Angels they and the Saints are fellow Citizens and we know they are a more noble order of Spirits and as for their love to the Elect it is exceeding great as great to be sure as the departed Souls of our dearest Relatives can be For after death they sustain no more civil Relations to us all that they do sustain is as fellow members of the same body or fellow Citizens which Angels also are as well as they Object 3. Object But saith the Doctor the reason why all Nations pay so great honour and religious care to the Wills of the Dead is a supposition that they still continue in the same mind after death and will avenge the Falsifications of Trusts upon injurious Executors else no reason can be given why so great a stress should be laid upon the Will of the Dead Sol. Sol. This is gratis dictum to say no worse a cheap and unwary expression can no reason be given for the religious observance of the Testaments of the dead but this Supposition I deny it for though they that made them be dead yet God who is witness to all such acts and trusts liveth and though they cannot avenge the frauds and injustice of men he both can and will do it 1 Thes. 4.6 which I think is a weightier ground and reason to inforce duty upon men than the fear of Ghosts Besides This is a case wherein all the living are concerned all that die must commit a trust to them that survive and if frauds should be committed with impunity who could safely repose confidence in another Quod tangit omnes tangi debet ab omnibus that which is of general concernment and becomes every mans interest infers a general Obligation upon all As for the Letters of Elijah 't is a Vanity to think they came Post from Heaven no no they were doubtless left behind him out of due care to the Government and produced in that fit occasion Object 4. Object 4. But what need of a Law to prohibit Necromancy or consultation with the Dead if it were not practicable Sol. Sol. I do not think the wicked art there prohibited enabled them to recal departed Souls but it was a conversing with the Devil who personated the dead and therein a kind of homage was paid him to the dishonour of God or he might possibly raise the Bodies of wicked men and appear in them but I think the Spirits of the dead return not
except as was before limited Object 5. Object 5. But the matters they discover are found to be true and the causes in which they concern themselves are just real Murthers are detected by them and real frauds and injuries corrected and rectified but the Devil being himself a lyar and Deceiver would never do it 't is not his interest to discover or discourage such things Sol. Sol. Though it be not his interest meerly to discover it yet it is certainly his interest to precipitate wicked men and hasten their ruine by the hand of Justice and he will speak the truth and seem to own a righteous cause to bring about his great design of ruining the Souls and Bodies of men I will shut up with three Cautions Caution I. Strain not Conscience to enrich Posterity be true to the trusts committed to you by the Dead or by the Living remembring that though they be dead and cannot avenge the wrong yet the Lord lives and will surely do it in a severer manner than they could should they appear in the most terrible and frightful forms to you Beside your own Consciences will haunt you worse than a Ghost Be just and true therefore in all your Promises and trusts for God is the Avenger Caution II. Finish your work for eternity before you die for as the Cloud is consumed and vanisheth away so he that goeth down to the Grave shall come up no more he shall return no more to his house neither shall his place know him any more Job 7.9 10. Your Souls will be fixed in eternity soon after they are loosed from your Bodies when death comes away you must go willing or unwilling ready or unready but no returning hither how willing soever Caution III. Keep your selves from that heathenish and accursed practice of consulting the Devil about your absent or dead Relations a practice too common in Sea-port Towns and of deep and heinous guilt before God Isa. 8.19 And when they shall say unto you seek unto them that have familiar Spirits and unto Wizards that peep and muter should not a people seek unto their God for the living to the dead You need not call the Devil twice that subtil and officious Spirit draws the living into his Net by such a bait as this You meet your Mortal enemy under the disguise of your dead friend QUERIE V. Whether the separated Souls of the just in Heaven have any converse or communication with each other and how that can be seeing all the Organs and Instruments of speech and hearing are laid aside with their Bodies It seems impossible that separated or unbodied Spirits should converse together seeing the instruments by which the thoughts are communicated from one to another are perished in the Grave Suppose the Tongue of a man to be cut out his eyes and hands perished or made useless whilst the Soul remains in the Body it may enjoy its own thoughts within it self but it is impossible to signifie them to another by words or signs Or suppose a man in a deep sleep wherein the Senses are only bound for a little time he may indeed exercise his own fancy in a pleasant Dream but another cannot understand how it is entertained but in death the Senses are not bound but extinguished Beside we must not think the felicity of the departed holy Souls to consist in mutual Converses one with another but in their ineffable Visions of God and Communion with him To him who is Omniscient and understands their most inward thoughts they can freely communicate them and receive his as well as pour forth their own love but to do it to their fellow Creatures who see not as God doth seems impossible Indeed it was never doubted but after the Resurrection they shall both know and talk with one another in a more excellent and perfect manner than now they do but till that time the Reasons above seem to perswade us that all the Converses above are only betwixt God and them which indeed is enough to make them happy and indeed if this ability be allowed to separated Souls it seems to render the Resurrection of their Bodies needless for they are well enough without them But certainly the Spirits of just men are not Mutes such an August Assembly of holy and excellent Spirits do not live together in their Fathers House without mutual Converse and fellowship with each other as well as with God That acute and judicious Divine Mr. Ioseph Symonds in the Epistle to his Book entitled Sight and Faith expresseth himself about this matter thus I often think saith he of the Communion of the Spirits of men which certainly is more than many are acquainted with though we act one upon another in our present state by the help of sense yet we are wrought and designed to a more excellent way Angels and the Spirits of men made perfect converse and trade in a mutual Communication not without sense but without such sense as ours This as eternal life begins here and is found in some degrees in this Mortal State though not in so visible appearances as to lie open to much observation Angels good and bad do act upon our Spirits and our Spirits hold converse with them and with the Father of Spirits which may be discerned in secret Parlies and Discourses betwixt them and us much of this appears in David's Psalms and there passeth not only an inward speech but there are invisible approaches entertainments and touches which Paul found when bound in the Spirit and under the working of God which wrought in him mightily Col. 1.29 it is also most certain that our Souls are not mute and shut out from all mutual Traffick with each other except what they have by the mediation of Senses Instances are found that as they say of two Needles toucht with the Loadstone the Spirit of one at a distance hath found it self affected with the motion and state of another And this we are all sensible of that there is a strong desire in us to Communion of Spirits and that because the way most ready and convenient to our bodily state is by sense we are carried with much inclination to maintain intercourse of our minds and Spirits by sense but as being made to a better way our Souls are not satisfied with this present way as being both painful and short we cannot give an exact Copy of our Apprehensions Desires Designs Delights and other affections by these two great Mediators of Communion the Eye and the Ear but because we are in so great a measure confin'd to this course our Souls as it were stand in these two gates to send and receive mutual Embassies each from other Which way as it is short in it self so it is much shortned by distances disaffections impotencies and disparities I cannot imagine that men in the state of imperfection should have so many ways to communicate their minds as by speaking writing c. Yea that the
very Birds and Beasts are by nature enabled to signifie to each other their Inclinations and that the Spirits of just men which are the best of all humane Spirits and that when made perfect too which is the best and highest state attainable by them should have none but live at a greater disadvantage in this respect than they did or the very Birds and Beasts in this World do The summ of my thoughts about this matter I will lay down in the following Sections §. 1. The state of Heaven as was at large open'd in our eleventh Proposition being an Association of Angels and blessed Souls for the glorifying and praising of God in his Temple there and this Worship being carried on by joint consent as appears by their joint ascriptions of Glory to God Rev. 7.9 10 11 12 they must of necessity for the orderly carrying on of this heavenly Worship understand each others mind and communicate their thoughts for without this 't is not imaginable how a joint or common service in which thousands of thousands are imployed can be decorously and orderly managed except we conceive of them as so many Machines or wind-instruments that are managed by an intelligent Agent though themselves be senseless and meerly passive certainly their consent is a different thing from that of the Keys of an Harpsicord or strings of a Lute they are Intelligent Beings who understand their own and each others mind and beside without this ability that Society in Heaven would be less comfortable as to mutual refreshing fellowship than the Society of the Saints is here So that it is not to be doubted but these Noble and Excellent Spirits can and do Communicate their thoughts to each other and that in a most excellent way §. 2. But yet we cannot imagine these Communications betwixt them to be by words formed by such instruments and Organs of Speech as we now use for they are bodiless Beings words and articulate sounds are fitted to the use and service of embodied Spirits It is therefore probable that they conveigh and communicate their minds to one another as the blessed Angels do Ceâ—â—tat Angelos linguas non habâ—â—e est autem in 〈◊〉 aliqâ—â—d 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 linguis per quod conceâ—tas sibi muâ—â— tradunt Lights not with Tongues of flesh though we read of the Tongues of Angels 1 Cor. 13.1 but in a way somewhat analogous to this though much more noble and excellent For look as the Scripture stiles the most excellent food Angels food so the most excellent Speech or most eloquent Tongues Angels Tongues The purest Rhetorick that ever flowed from the lips of the most charming Orator is but babling to the Language of Angels or of Spirits made perfect When Paul was rapt into the third Heaven where he was admitted to the sight and hearing of this blessed Assembly it 's said he heard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 words unspeakable Spiritual Language such as his Tongue neither could or ought to utter such as none but heavenly Inhabitants can speak and Dan. 8.13 I heard saith Daniel one Saint speaking and another Saint said unto that certain Saint that spake c. He heard the enquiries of the Angels desiring to know the Mystery from the Mouth of Christ. A Language they have but not like ours §. 3. The Communications of Angels and Souls in Heaven is therefore conceived to be an ability in those blessed Spirits silently and without sound to instil and insinuate their minds and thoughts to each other by a meer act of their Wills just as we now speak to God or our selves in our hearts Dicimur nobis ipsis in animo loqui cum aliquid actu cogitamus animo volvimus cogitamus autem actu ex voluntatis imperio hoc est cum volumus Zanch. when our lips do not move or the least outward sign appears There are two ways by which the Souls of men speak one outwardly by the Instruments of Speech or sensible signs the other inwardly without sound or sign This inward silent Speech is nothing else but an act of the Will calling forth such things into our actual Thoughts and Meditations which before lay hid and quiet in the Memory or habit of knowledge These thoughts or actual revolvings of things in the mind is in Scripture called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Word or Speech in the heart Deut. 15.9 Take heed to thy self that there be not a wicked word in thy heart we translate a wicked thought thoughts are the words and voice of the Soul and so Matth. 9.3 they spake within themselves i.e. their Souls spake though their lips moved not all Meditation is an inward Speech in the Soul and therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 indifferently signifies both to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cum puncto sinistro locutus est oâ—e aut corde cogitavit meditatus est and to meditate The Objects which we revolve in our thoughts are so many Companions with whom we converse and thus a man like Heinsius may be in the midst of abundance of excellent Company when he is all alone And this is silent talk to our selves without any sound or noise Object But you will say though the Spirit of a man can thus talk to or with it self Duo sunt oâ—lia aliorum respectu quorum nisi utrumque à te referetur fieri non potest ut que tu habes in intellecta corde tuo oâ—culta â—a alius habere cognosâ—ere queat urum ex parte animi est voluntas nisi enim quae occulâ—a latent in corde tuo ea vilis aliis patefieri quis ea percipiatâ— alterum est ipsum corpus carniâ—m ac proindè licèt quasi aperto priori interiorique ostio velis que in animo volvis alicui patefacere nisi tamen hoc etiam alterum externum reâ—eres nullo modo ab aliis hominibus cognosci poterunt Zâ—nch de operibus Dei lib. 3. cap. 19. yet this can signifie nothing to others For what man knoweth the things of a man save the Spirit of man that is in him 1 Cor. 2.11 It is not therefore enough to open this internal door of the Will for except we open also the external door of the lips no man can know our minds or be admitted into the secrets of our Souls should we never so earnestly desire that another should know our mind except we please also to discover it by word or sign he cannot know it and therefore an act of the Will is not sufficient without some external signification superadded And these Souls being bodiless can give no such outward signification There is indeed a necessity among men in this World to unlock another door beside that of their Will Sol. to communicate the Secrets of their hearts to others Quoniam igitur Angeli iis carent crassis corporibus idcirco nihil impedit quo minus qâ—â— unus Angelus in sua versat mente
these fears accompany many of Gods People from their Regeneration to their Dissolution O what would they not give what would they not do yea what would they not endure to get full satisfaction in those things Every working of Corruption every discovery made by Temptation puts them into a fright and makes them question all that ever was wrought in them And as their fears are great about the inward man so also about the outward man especially when such bloody preparations seem to be making by the same Enemies that have acted such and so many bloody Tragedies already in the World But at death they enter into perfect peace and security Isai 57.2 No wind of fear shall ever ruffle and disturb their Souls and put them into a storm any more 7. From deluding shadows into substantial good This World is the World of Shadows and delusive appearances Here we are imposed upon and baffled by empty and deceitful Vanities All we have here is little else but a Dream at death the Soul awakes out of its Dream and finds it self in the World of Realities where it feeds upon substantial good to satisfaction Psal. 17.15 Now the advantages accrewing to the Soul by death being so great and many though the Medium be harsh and ungrateful in it self yet there is all the reason in the World we should covet it for the benefits that come by it Argument V. THe foretasts we have had of Heaven already in the Body should make all the Saints long to be unbodied for the full and perfect fruition of that Joy seeing it cannot be fully and perfectly enjoyed by the Soul till it hath put off the Body by death That there are Praelibations First-fruits and Earnests of future glory given at certain seasons to Believers in this life is put beyond all doubting not only by Scripture-Testimonies but frequent experiences of God's People I speak not only with the Scriptures but with the clear experience of many Saints when I say there are to be felt and tasted even here in the Body the Earnests of our Inheritance Eph. 1.14 The first-fruits of the Spirit Rom. 8.23 The sealing of the Spirit Eph. 1.13 The very Ioy of the Lord 1 Pet. 1.8 of the same kind though in a remisser degree with that of the glorified That the fulness of this joy cannot be in us whilst we tabernacle in Bodies of flesh is as plain When Moses desired a sight of that face which the spirits of just men made perfect do continually behold and adore the Answer was No Man can see my face and live Exod. 33.18 19 20. q. d. Moses Thou askest a great thing and understandest not how unable thou art to support that which thou desirest should I shew thee my Glory in this compounded state thou now art it would confound thee and swallow thee up Nature as now constituted cannot support such a weight of Glory a Ray a glimpse of this light overpowers Man and breaks such a clay Vessel to pieces which is the reason why the Resurrection must intervene betwixt this state and that of the Bodies glorification And it is not to be doubted but one main end and reason why these foretasts of Heaven are given us in the Body is to embolden the Soul to venture through death it self for the full enjoyment of those Delights and Pleasures They are like the Grapes of Eshcol to the faint-hearted Israelites or the sweet Wines of Italy to the Gauls which once tasted made them restless till they had conquered that good Countrey where they grew Rom. 8.23 We which have the first-fruits of the Spirit even we our selves do groan within our selves waiting for the Adoption viz. The Redemption of our Bodies Well then reflect seriously upon those sweet tastes that you have had of God and his love in your sincere and secret addresses to him and converses with him What an holy forgetfulness of all things in this World hath it wrought How insipid and tastless hath it rendered the sweetest Creature-enjoyments What willingness to be dissolved for a more full fruition of it God this way brings Heaven nigh to your Souls out of design to overcome your Reluctancies at death through which you must pass to the enjoyment of it And after all those sights and tastes both of the truth and goodness of that state shall we still reluctate and hang back as if we had never tasted how good the Lord is O you may justly question whether you ever had a real taste of Jesus Christ if that taste do not kindle Coals of fire in your Bosomes I mean ardent longings to be with him and to be satiated with his love If you have been priviledged with a taste of thaâ— hidden Manna with the sight of things invisible with Joys unspeakable and full of glory and yet are loth to be gone to the fountain whence all this flows certainly you herein both cross the design of the spirit in giving them and cast a vile disgrace and reproach upon the blessed God as thinking there is more bitterness in death than there is sweetness in his presence Yea it argues the strength of that unbelief which still remains in your hearts that after so many tastes and tryals as you have had you still remain doubtful and hesitating about the certainty and reality of things invisible O what adoe hath God with his froward and peevish Children If he had only revealed the future state to us in his Word as the pure Object of Faith and required â—s to die upon the meer credit of his promise without such Pawns Pledges and Earnests as these are were there not reason enough for it But after such and so many wonderful and amazing Condescentions wherein he doth as it were say Soul if yet thou doubtest I will bring Heaven to thee thou shalt have it in thy own hand thy eyes shall see it thy hands shall handle it thy Mouth shall taste it how inexcusable is our Reluctancy Argument VI. IT should greatly fortifie the People of God against the fears of Dissolution to consider that death can neither destroy the being of their Souls by Annihilation nor the hopes and expectations they have of blessedness by disappointment and frustration Prov. 14.32 The Righteous hath hope in his death Though all earthly things fail at death upon which account dying is expressed by failing Luke 16.19 Yet neither the Soul nor the well grounded hopes can fail The Anchor of a Believers hope is firm and sure Hebr. 6.18 It will not come home in the greatest Storm that can beat upon the Soul For 1 God hath foreknown and chosen them to Salvation before the World was 1 Pet. 1.2 And this Foundation of God standeth sure having this Seal the Lord knoweth who are his 2 Tim. 2.19 His Decrees are as firm as Mountains of Brass Zâ—ch 6.1 2 God hath justified their persons and therein destroyed the power of death over them 1 Cor. 15.55 56 57. O death
In this Scripture we have the contrary glass representing the unspeakable misery of those Souls or Spirits which are separated by death from their Bodies for a time and by sin from God for ever Arrested by the Law and secured in the prison of Hell unto the judgment of the great day A Sermon of Hell may keep some Souls out of Hell and a Sermon of Heaven be the means to help others to Heaven The desire of my heart is that the conversations of all those who shall read these discourses of Heaven and Hell might look more like a diligent flight from the one and pursuit of the other The scope of the context is a perswasive to patience upon a prospect of manifold tribulations coming upon the Christian Churches strongly enforced by Christs example who both in his own person ver 18. and by his spirit in his Servants ver 19. exercised wonderful patience and long suffering as a pattern to his people This 19. ver gives us an account of his long-suffering towards that disobedient and immorigerous generation of sinners on whom he waited 120 years in the Ministry of Noah There are difficulties in the Text. Estius reckons no less than ten expositions of it Locus â—iâ—c omnium penè interpretum judicio difficillimus Estius and saith it is a very difficult Scripture in the judgment of almost all Interpreters But yet I must say those difficulties are rather brought to it than found in it It is a Text which hath been rackt and tortured by Popish Expositors to make it speak Christs local descent into Hell and to confess their Doctrine of Purgatory things which it knew not But if we will take its genuine sense it only relates the sin and misery of those contumacious persons on whom the spirit of God waited so long in the Ministry of Noah giving an account Of 1. Their sin on Earth Of 2. Their punishment in Hell 1. Their sin on Earth which is both specified and aggravated 1 Specified Namely their disobedience They were sometimes disobedient or unperswadeable neither precepts nor examples could bring them to repentance 2 This their disobedience is aggravated by the expence of God's patience upon them for the space of an hundred and twenty years not only forbearing them so long but striving with them as Moses expresseth it or waiting on them as the Apostle here but all to no purpose they were obstinate stubborn and unperswadeable to the very last 2. Behold therefore in the next place the dreadful but most just and equal punishment of these sinners in Hell they are called Spirits in prison i e. Souls now in Hell At that time when Peter wrote of them they were not intire men Psal. 31.6 Eccles. 12.7 Acts. 7.50 but Spirits in the proper sense i.e. separated Souls bodiless and lonely Souls whilst in the Body it is properly a Soul but when separated a Spirit according to Scripture-language and the strict notion of such a Being These Spirits or Souls in the state of separation are said to be in a Prison that is in Hell as the word elsewhere notes Rev. 20.7 and Iude v. 6. comp Heaven and Hell are the only receptacles of departed or separated Souls Thus you have in a few words the natural and genuine sense of the place and it is but a wast of time to repeat and refel the many false and forced interpretations of this Text which corrupt minds and mercenary Pens have perplext and darkned it withal That which I level at is comprized in this plain Proposition DOCT. That the Souls or Spirits of all men who dye in a state of unbelief and disobedience are immediately committed to the Prison of Hell there to sufferr the wrath of God due to their sins Hell is shadowed forth to us in Scripture by diverse Metaphors for we cannot conceive spiritual things unless they be so cloathed and shadowed out unto us Spiritualia capere non possumus nisi adumbrata Augustine gives this reason for the frequent use of Metaphors and Allegories in Scripture because they are so much proportioned to our senses with which our senses have contracted an intimacy and familiarity and therefore God to accommodate his truth to our capacity doth as it were this way embody it in earthly expressions according to that celebrated observation of the Cabalists lumen supremum nunquam descendit sine indumento The pure and supream light never descends to us without a garment or covering In the old Testament the place and state of damned Souls is set forth by Metaphors taken from the most remarkable places and exemplary acts of vengeance upon sinners in this World as the overthrow of the Giants by the flood those prodigious sinners that fought against Heaven and were swept by the flood into the place of Torments Hell called the place of Giants and why to this Solomon is conceived to allude in Prov. 21.16 The man that wanders out of the way of understanding shall remain in the congregation of the dead in the Heb. it is they shall remain with the Rephaims or Giants These Giants were the men that more especially provoked God to bring the flood upon the World they are also noted as the first inhabitants of Hell therefore from them the place of Torments takes its name and the damned are said to remain in the place of Giants Hell called Tophet and why Sometimes Hell is called Trophet Isa. 30.33 This Tophet was in the valley of Hinnom and was famous for divers things There the children of Israel caused their children to pass through the fire to Moloch or sacrificed them to the Devil drowning their horrible shrieks and ejulations with the noise of Drums In this valley also was the memorable slaughter of eighteen hundred thousand of the Assyrian Camp by an Angel in one night There also the Babylonians murthered the people of Ierusalem at the taking of the City Ier. 7.31 32. So that Tophet was a meer Shambles the publick chopping block on which the limbs both of young and old were quartered out by thousands it was filled with dead Bodies till there was no place for burial By all which it appears that no spot of ground in the World was so famous for the fires kindled in it to destroy men for the doleful cries that echo'd from it or the innumerable multitudes that perished in it for which reasons it is made the embleme of Hell Sometimes it is called a lake of fire burning with brimstone Hell a lake of fire Rev. 19.20 denoting the most exquisite torment by an intense and durable flame And in the Text it 's called a prison A prison where the Spirits of ungodly men are both detained and punished This notion of a Prison gives us a lively representation of the miserable state of damned Souls and that especially in the following particulars First Prisoners are arrested and seized by authority of Law 't is the Law which sends them
by treasuring up guilt for wrath and guilt are treasured up together in proportion to each other Every day of his life vast summs have been cast into this treasury and the patience of God waiteth till it be full before he call the sinner to an account and reckoning Gen. 15.16 PROP. II. All the sin and guilt contracted upon the Souls and consciences of impenitent men in this World accompanies and follows their departed Souls to judgment and there brings them under the dreadful condemnation of the great and terrible God which cuts off all their hopes and comforts for ever IF you believe not that I am he you shall die in your sins Joh. 8.24 and Job 20.11 His bones are full of the sins of his youth which shall lye down with him in the dust No Proposition lies clearer in Scripture or should lie with greater weight upon the hearts of sinners nothing but pardon can remove guilt but without faith and repentance there never was nor shall be a pardon Acts 10.43 Rom. 3 24 25. Luk. 24.46 47. Look as the graces of Believers so the sins of Unbelievers follow the Soul whithersover it goes All their sins who dye out of Christ cry to them when they go hence We are thy works and we will follow thee The acts of sin are transient but the guilt and effects of it are permanent and it is evident by this that in the great day their consciences which are the Books of record wherein all their sins are registred will be opened and they shall be judged by them and out of them Rev. 20.12 Now before that general judgment every Soul comes to its particular judgment and that immediately after death of this I apprehend the Apostle to speak in Heb. 9.27 It is appointed for all men once to dye but after that the judgment The Soul is presently stated by this judgment in its everlasting and fixed condition The Soul of a wicked man appearing before God in all its sin and guilt and by him sentenced immediately it gives up all its hope Prov. 11.7 When a wicked man dyeth his expectation shall perish Etiam spes valentissima and the hope of unjust men perisheth His strong hope perisheth as some read it i.e. his strong delusion for alas He took his own shadow for a bridge over the great waters and is unexpectedly plunged into the gulph of eternal misery as Matth. 7.22 This perishing or cutting off of hope is that which is called in Scripture the death of the Soul for so long the Soul will live as it hath any hope The deferring of hope makes it sick but the final cutting off of hope strikes it quite dead i.e. dead as to all joy comfort or expectation of any for ever which is that death which an immortal Soul is capable to suffer the righteous hath hope in his death but every unregenerate man in the world breaths out his last hope in a few moments after his last breath which strikes terror into the very centre of the Soul and is a death-wound to it PROP. III. The Souls of the damned are exceeding large and capacious subjects of wrath and torment and in their separate state their capacity is greatly enlarged both by laying asleep all those affections whose exercise is relieving and throughly awakning all those passions which are tormenting THE Soul of man being by nature a Spirit an intelligent Spirit and in its substantial faculties assimilated to God whose image it bears it must for that reason be exquisitely sensible of all the impressions and touches of the wrath of God upon it The Spirit of man is a most tender sensible and apprehensive Creature The eye of the Body is not so sensible of a touch a nerve of the Body is not so sensible when pricked as the Spirit of man is of the least touch of Gods indignation upon it A wounded spirit who can bear Prov. 18.14 Other external wounds upon the Body inflicted either by man or God are tolerable but that which immediately toucheth the Spirit of man is insufferable Who can bear or endure it And as the Spirit of man hath the most delicate and exquisite sense of misery so it hath a vast capacity to receive and let in the fulness of anguish and misery into it it is a large vessel called Rom. 9.22 a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction The large capacity of the Soul is seen in this that it is not in the power of all the creatures in the World to satisfie and fill it It can drink up as one speaks all the rivers of created good and its thirst not quenched by such a draught but after all it crys Give give Nothing but an infinite God can quiet and satisfie its appetite and raging thirst And as it is capable and receptive of more good than is found in all the Creatures So it is capable of more misery and anguish than all the Creatures can inflict upon it Let all the elements or men on Earth yea all the Devils and damned in Hell conspire and unite in a design to torment man yet when they have done all his Spirit is capable of a farther degree of torment a torment as much beyond it as a rack is beyond an hard bed or the Sword in his bowels is beyond the scratch of a pin The Devils indeed are the executioners and tormentors of the damned but if that were all they were capable to suffer the torments of the damned would be comparatively mild and gentle to what they are O the largeness of the understanding of man What will it not take into its vast capacity But add to this That damned Souls have all those affections laid in a deep and everlasting sleep the exercises whereof would be relieving by emptying their Souls of any part of their misery and all those passions throughly and everlastingly awakened which increase their torments The affections of joy delight and hope are all benummed in them and laid fast asleep never to be awakened into act any more Their hope in Scripture is said to perish i. e. it so perisheth that after death it shall never exert another act to all eternity The activity of any of these affections would be like a cooling gale or refreshing Spring amidst their torments but as Adrian lamented himself nunquam jocos dabis thou shalt never be merry more And as these affections are laid asleep so their passions are rouzed and throughly awakened to torment them So awakened as never to sleep any more The Souls of men are sometimes jog'd and startled in this World by the words or rods of God but presently they sleep again and forget all but hereafter the eyes of their Souls will be continually held waking to behold and consider their misery their understandings will be clear and most apprehensive their thoughts fixed and determined their consciences active and efficacious and by all this their capacity to take in the fulness of their misery
of their torment in Hell Rev. 18.7 so much torment and sorrow as there was delight and pleasure in sin 4. To conclude the pleasures of sin are but for a season as you read Heb. 11.25 but the wrath of God in Hell is for ever and ever There is a time when the pleasures of sin cannot be called pleasure to come but the Wrath of God that will still be wrath to come O consider for what a trifle you sell your Souls When Lysimachus parted with his Kingdom for a draught of water he said when he had drank it For how short a pleasure have I sold a Kingdom And Ionathan lamented 1 Sam. 14.43 I tasted but a little Honey and I must die Satan would not charm so powerfully as he doth with the pleasures of sin if this point were well believed and heartily applied Inference III. WHat a matchless madness is it to cast the Soul into Gods Prison to save the Body out of Mans Prison Men have their Prisons and God hath his but because the one is an Object of Sense and the other an Object of Faith that only is feared and this slighted all over this unbelieving World except by a very small number of men who tremble at the Word of God Now this I say is the height of madness and will appear to be so in a just Collation of both in a few Particulars 1 Mans Prison restrains the Body only Gods Prison Soul and Body Matt. 10.28 The Spirits of Men as my Text speaks are the Prisoners there O what a vast odds doth this single difference make A thousand times more than the captivating and binding of the greatest King or Emperour differs from the imprisonment of a poor Mechanick or Vagrant Beggar 2 In Mans Prison there are many comforts and unspeakable refreshments from Heaven but in Gods Prison none but the direct contrary You read of the Apostles Acts 16.25 how they sang in the Prison the Spirit of God made them a Banquet of heavenly Ioys and they could not but sing at it though their feet were in the stocks their Spirits were never more at liberty Algerius dated his Letters from the delectable Orchard of the Leonine Prison where saith he flows the sweetest Nectar Another tells us Christ was always kind to him but since he became a Prisoner for him he even overcame himself in kindness I verily think saith he the Chains of my Lord are all overlaid with pure Gold and his Cross perfumed but the worst terrours of the Prisoners in Hell come from the presence of the Lord 2 Thes. 1.9 God is a terrour to them 3 The cause for which a man is cast into Prison by men may be his Dâ—ty and so his Conscience must be at least quiet if not joyful in such Sufferings So it was with Paul Acts 28.20 For the hope of Israel am I bound with this Chain This diffuses Joy and Peace through the Conscience into the whole man but the cause for which men are cast into Gods Prison is their sin and guilt which armes their own Consciences against them and makes them as you heard before Self-tormentors terrours to themselves What odds is here 4 In Mans Prison the most excellent Company and sweet Society may be found Paul and Silas were fellow Prisoners In Queen Maries days the most excellent Company to be found in England was in the Prisons Prisons were turned into Churches But in Gods Prison no better Society is to be found than that of Devils and damned Reprobates Matth. 25.41 5 In Mans Prison there is hope of a comfortable deliverance but in Gods Prison none Matt. 5.26 Thou shalt not come out thence till thou hast paid the last Mite 'T is an everlasting Prison Compare these few obvious Particulars and judge then what is to be thought of that man who stands readier to cast himself into any guilt than into the least Suffering What is it but as if a man should offer his Neck to the Sword to save his hand The Lord convince us what trifles our Estates Liberties and Lives are to our Souls or to the peace and purity of our Consciences Inference IV. WHat an invaluable mercy is the pardon of sin which sets the Soul out of all danger of going to this prison When the debt is satisfied a man may walk as boldly before the prison door as he doth before his own they that owe nothing fear no Bayliffs 'T is the Law as I said before that commits men to Prison a Mittimus is but an instrument of Law but the righteousness of the Law is fulfilled in them that believe Rom. 8.4 Yea they are made the righteousness of God in him 2 Cor. 5.21 There can be no process of Law against them For who shall condemn when it is God that justifieth Rom. 8.33 34. And that divine justice might be no bar to our faith or comfort he adds It is Christ that died and yet farther to assure us that his death hath made plenary satisfaction to God for all our sins and debts it added Yea rather that is risen again q. d. If the debts of believers to God were not fully paid and satisfied for by the blood of Christ how comes it to pass that our Surety is discharged as by his Resurrection he appears to be O Believer thy Bonds are Cancelled the hand-writing that was against thee is nailed to the Cross the blood of Christ hath done that for thee that all the Gold and Silver in the World could not do 1 Pet. 1.18 19. It is a counter price 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eâ—t pretium ex adverso respondent fully answering to thy debts Matth. 20.28 And hence to the Eternal joy of thy heart result three properties of thy pardon which are able to make thine eyes gush out with tears of joy whilst thou art reading of it 1. It is a free pardon to thy Soul though it cost Christ dear it costs thee nothing We have redemption even the remission of sins according to the riches of his grace Eph. 1.7 The project of it was Gods not thine the price for it was Christs blood not thine the glory and riches of free grace are illustriously displayed in thy forgiveness 2. It is as full as it is free a compleat and perfect cause produceth a compleat and perfect effect Acts 13.39 Iustified from all things what ever thy sins be for nature number or circumstances of aggravation they cannot exceed the value of the meritorious cause of Remission The blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sin 3. It must be as firm as it is free and full even an irrevocable pardon for ever more Christ did not shed his blood at an hazzard the way of justification by faith makes the promise sure Rom. 4 16. The justified shall never come again under condemnation O the unspeakable joy that flows from this Spring O the triumphs of faith upon this foundation It is not ravishing melting overwhelming and amazing
to think thus with thy self Here sit I with a joyful plenary free pardon of sin in my hand whilst many who never sinned to that height and degree I have lye groaning howling sweating and trembling under the indignation of God poured out like fire upon their Souls in Hell A greater sinner saved and lesser damned O how unspeakably sweet is that rest into which my terrified and diquieted Soul is come by faith Rom. 5.1 Heb. 4.3 We which have believed do enter into rest O blessed calm after a dreadful Tempest This poor breast of mine was lately panting sweating trembling under the horrors of wrath to come terrified with the visions of Hell No other sound was in mine ears but that of fiery indignation to devour the adversaries O what price can be put upon my quietus est What value upon a pardon delivered as it were at the ladders foot O precious hand of faith that receives it but oh the most precious blood of Christ which purchased it If Satan now come with his accusations the law with its comminations death with its dreadful summons I have in a readiness to answer them all Here is the law the wrath of God and everlasting burnings the just demerit of sin upon one side and a poor sinful creature on the other side but the Covenant of grace hath solv'd all An Act of oblivion is past in Heaven I will forgive their iniquities and their sins and transgressions will I remember no more In this Act of Grace my Soul is included I am in Christ and there is no condemnation Dye I must but damned I shall not be My debts are paid my bonds are cancelled my Conscience is quieted let death do its worst it shall do me no harm that blood which satisfies God may well satisfie me Inference V. HOw amazingly sad and deplorable is the security and stilness of the Consciences of sinners under all their own guilts and the immediate danger of Gods everlasting wrath Philosophers observe that before an Earthquake the Wind lies and the weather is exceeding calm and still not a breath of wind going So it is in the Consciences of many just before the tempest and storm of Gods wrath pours down upon them What a golden morning open'd upon Sodom and began that fatal day Little did they imagine showres of fire had been ready to fall from so pleasant and serene a skie as they saw over their heads How secure still and unconcerned are those to day who it may be shall rage roar and tremble in Hell to morrow Caesar hearing of a Citizen of Rome who was deep in debt and yet slept soundly would needs have his Pillow as supposing there was some strange charming virtue in it It is wonderful to consider what shift men make to keep their consciences in that stilness and quiet they do under such loads of guilt and threatnings of wrath ready to be executed upon them It must be some strong Opium that so stupefies and benums their Consciences and upon enquiry into the matter we shall find it to be the effect of 1. A strong delusion of Satan 2. A Spiritual judicial stroke of God 1. This stilness of Conscience upon the brink of damnation proceeds from the strong delusions of Satan blinding their eyes and feeding their false hopes he removes the evil day at many years imaginary distance from them and interposeth many a fair day betwixt them and it and in that interposed season time enough to prepare for it without such an artifice as this his house would be in an uproar but this keeps all in peace Luke 11.21 Praesumendo â—â—erâ—nt perando pereâ—nt By presuming he feeds their hopes and by their hopes destroys their Souls Some he diverts from all serious thoughts of this day by the pleasures and others by the cares of this life and so that day cometh upon them unawares Luke 21.34 2. This stilness of Conscience in so miserable and dangerous a state is the effect of a spiritual judicial stroke of God upon the children of wrath That 's a dreadful word Isaiah 6.10 Make the heart of this people fat and make their ears heavy and shut their eyes Pinguedo non refractaria solum facit animalia sed omnis expers sensus est consetientibus Physicis Glass the Eye and Ear are the two principal doors or inlets to the heart when these are shut the heart must needs be insensible as the fat of the Body is There is a Spirit of a deep sleep poured out judicially upon some men Isa. 29.10 Such as that upon Adam when God took a Rib from his side and he felt it not but this is upon the Soul and is the same as to give up a man to a reprobate sense Inference VI. THe case of distressed Consciences upon earth is exceeding sad and calls upon all for the tenderest pity and utermost help from men You see the labourings of Conscience under the sense of guilt and wrath is a special part of the Torments of Hell of which there is not a livelier Emblem or Picture than the distresses of Conscience in this World It must be thankfully confessed there are two great differences betwixt the terrours of Conscience here and there One in the degrees of anguish the other in the reliefs of that anguish The ordinary distresses of Conscience here compared with those of the damned are as the flame of a Candle to a fiery Oven a mild and gentle fire Or as the Sparks that fly out of the top of a Chimney to the dreadful eruptions of Vesuvius or Mount Aetna Beside these are capable of relief but those are unrelievable their hearts die because their hope is perished from the Lord. But yet of all the miseries and distresses incident to men in this World none like those of distressed Consciences the terrours of God set themselves in array or are drawn up in Batalia against the Soul Iob 6.4 Whilst I suffer thy terrors saith Heman I am distracted Psal. 88.15 Yea they not only distract but cut off the Spirit as he adds v. 16. They lick up the very Spirit of a man and none can bear them Prov. 18.14 for now a man hath to do immediately with God yea with the Wrath of the great and dreadful God and this wrath which is the most acute and sharp of all torments falls upon the most tender and sensible part the Spirit and Mind which now lies open and naked before him to be wounded by it No Creature can administer the least relief by the application of any temporal comfort or refreshment to it Gold and Silver Wife and Children Meat and Melody signifie no more than the drawing off a silk stockin to cure the Paroxysms of the Gout All that can be done for their relief is by seasonable judicious and tender Applications of Spiritual Remedies and what can be done ought to be done for them What heart can hear a voice like that of Iob
could have been made upon their state by death Little do their surviving Friends think what they feel or what is their estate in the other World whilst they are honouring their Bodies with splendid and pompous Funerals None on earth have so much reason to fear death to make much of life and use all means to continue it as those who will and must be so great losers by the exchange Inference XIII SEe here the certainty and inevitableness of the judgment of the great day This Prison which is continually filling with the Spirits of wicked men is an undeniable evidence of it for why is Hell called a Prison and why are the Spirits of men confined and chained there but with respect to the judgment of the great day As there is a necessary connection betwixt sin and punishment so betwixt punishing and trying the Offender there are millions of Souls in custody a world of Spirits in Prison these must be brought forth to their Tryal for God will lay upon no man more than is right the legality of their Mittimus to Hell will be evidenced in their solemn day of Tryal God hath therefore appointed a day in which he will judge the World in righteousness by that Man whom he hath ordained Acts 17.31 Here sinners run in Arrears and contract vast debts in Hell they are seiz'd and committed at Judgment tryed and cast for the same This will be a dreadful day those that have spent so prodigally upon the patience of God must now come to a severe account for all they have past their particular judgment immediately after death Eccles. 12.7 Hebr. 9.27 by this they know how they shall speed in the general judgment and how it shall be with them for ever but though this private Judgment secures their Damnation sufficiently yet it clears not the Justice of God before Angels and Men sufficiently and therefore they must appear once more before his Bar 2 Cor. 5.10 In the fearful expectation of this day those trembling Spirits now lie in Prison and that fearful expectation is a principal part of their present misery and torment You that refuse to come to the Throne of Grace see if you can refuse to make your appearance at the Bar of Justice You that brav'd and brow-beat your Ministers that warn'd you of it see if you can out-brave your Judge too as you did them Nothing more sure or awful than such a day as this Inference XIV HOw much are Ministers Parents and all to whom the charge of Souls is committed bound to do all that in them lies to prevent their everlasting misery in the World to come The great Apostle of the Gentiles found the consideration of the terror of the Lord as a spur urging and enforcing him to ministerial faithfulness and diligence 2 Cor. 5.11 Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we perswade men and the same he presseth upon Timothy 2 Tim. 4.1 2. I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Iesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his Kingdom Preach the Word be instant in season and out of season reprove rebuke exhort with all long-suffering and Doctrine O that those to whom so great a trust as the Souls of men is committed would labour to acquit themselves with all faithfulness therein as Paul did warning every one night and day with tears that if we cannot prevent their ruine which is most desireable yet at least we may be able to take God to Witness as he did that we are pure from the blood of all men O consider my Brethren if your faithful plainness and unwearied diligence to save mens Souls produce no other fruit but their hatred of you now yet it is much easier for you to bear that than that they and you too should bear the Wrath of God for ever We have all of us personal guilt enough upon us let us not add other mens guilt to our account to be guilty of the blood of the meanest man upon the earth is a sin which will cry in your Consciences but to be guilty of the blood of Souls Lord who can bear it Christ thought them worth his heart blood and are they not worth the expence of our breath Did he sweat blood to save them and will not we move our lips to save them 'T is certainly a sore Judgment to the Souls of men when such Ministers are set over them as never understood the value of their peoples Souls or were never heartily concerned about the Salvation of their own Souls MATTH 16.26 For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul DIfficult Duties need to be enforced with powerful Arguments in the 24th verse of this Chapter our Lord presseth upon his Disciples the deepest and hardest duties of self-denial acquaints them upon what terms they must be admitted into his service If any man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me This hard and difficult Duty he enforceth upon them by a double Argument viz. from 1. The vanity of all sinful shifts from it v. 25. 2. The value of their Souls which is imported in it v. 26. They may shift off their Duty to the loss of their Souls or save their Souls by the loss of such trifles If they esteem their Souls above the World and can be content to put all other things to the hazard for their Salvation making account to save nothing but them by Christianity then they come up to Christs terms and may warrantably and boldly call him their Lord and Master and to sweeten this choice to them he doth in my Text balance the Soul and all the World weighing them one against the other and shews them the infinite odds and disproportion betwixt them What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul What is a man profited There is a plain Meiosis in the Phrase and the meaning is how inestimably and irreparably is a man damnified what a Soul-ruining bargain would a man make If he should gain the whole world There is a plain Hyperbole in this Phrase for it never was nor will be the lot of any man to be the sole Owner and Possessor of the whole world * Hypotheticâ â—âc hyperbole amissionis salutis aeternae atrocitas summa notatur S. Glassius Non magis juvabitur qâ—à m qui acquirit Venetias ipse verò suspâ—ndatur ad portam Pareus in loc But suppose all the power pleasure wealth and honour of the whole World were bid and offer'd in exchange for a mans Soul what a dear purchace would it be at such a rate What were this saith one but to win Venice and then be hang'd at the gate of it As that man acts like a
and the body too in the chase and prosecution of Truth Veritas in putâ—â— when it lyes deep as a subterranean treasure the mind sends out innumerable thoughts re-inforcing each other in thick successions to dig for and compass that invaluable treasure if it be disguised by misrepresentations and vulgar prejudice and trampled in the dirt under that disguise there is an ability in the mind to discern it by some lines and features which are well known to it and both owne honour and vindicate it under all that dirt and obloquy with more respect than a man will take up a pâ—ece of Gold or a sparkling Dâ—amond out of the gutter it searches after it by many painful deductions of reason 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Archim and triumphs more in the discovery of it than in all earthly treasures no gratification of sense like that of the mind when it grasps its prey for which it hunted The mind passes through all the works of Creation it views the several creatures on earth considers the fabrick use and beauty of Animals the signatures of Plants penetrating thereby into their Nature and Virtues it views the vast Ocean and the large train of Causes laid together in all these things for the good of man by God whose Name it reads in the most diminutive creature it beholds on earth It can in a moment mount it self from Earth to Heaven view the face thereof describe the motions of the Sun in the Ecliptick calculate Tables for the motions of the Planets and fixed Stars invent convenient Cycles for the computations of Time foretel at a great distance the dismal Eclipses of the Sun and Moon to the very Digâ—â— and the â—ortentous Conjunctions of the Planets to the very minute of their Ingress these are the pleasant imployments of the Understanding But there is an higher game at which this Eagle plays it reckons it self all thiâ—â—â—â—â—ile imploy'd as much beneath its capacity as Domitian in catching flies though these be lawful and pleasant exercises when it hath leisure for them yet it is fitted for a much nobler exercise even to penetrate the glorious Mysteries of Redemption to trace redeeming love through all the astonishing methods and manifold discoveries of it and yet higher than all this it is capable of an immediate sight or facial vision of the blessed God short of which it receives no pleasure that is fully agreeable to its noble powers and infinite appetite View its Will and you shall find it like a Queen upon the Throne of the Soul swaying the Scepter of Liberty in her hand Culverwell as one expresseth it with all the affections waiting and attending upon her No Tyrant can force it no torment can wrest the golden Scepter of Liberty out of its hand the keys of all the Chambers of the Soul hang at its girdle these it delivers to Christ in the day of his power victorious Grace sweetly determines it by gaining its consent but commits no rape upon it by unnatural coaction God accepts its offering though full of imperfections but no service is accepted without it how excellent soever the matter of it View the Conscience and Thoughts with their self-reflexive abilities wherein the Soul retires into it self and sits concealed from all eyes but his that made it judging its own actions and censuring its estate viewing its face in its own glass and correcting the indecencies it discovers there Things of greatest moment and importance are silently transacted in this Council-chamber betwixt the Soul and God so remote from the knowledge of all Creatures that neither Angels 1 Cor. 2.11 Devils or men can know what it is doing there but by uncertain guess or revelation from God here it impleads Rom. 2.15 condemns and acquits it self as at a privy Session with respect to the Judgment of the great Day here it meets with the best of comforts 2 Cor. 1.12 and with the worst of terrors Take a survey of its Passions and Affections and you will find them admirable see how they are placed by Divine Wisdom in the Soul some for defence and safety others for delight and pleasure Anger actuates the Spirits and rouzeth its courage enabling it to break through difficulties Fear keeps Sentinel watching upon all dangers that approach us Hope forestals the good and anticipates the joys of the next Life and thereby supports and strengthens the Soul under all the discouragements and pressures of the present life Love unites it to the chiefest Good he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him Zeal is the Dagger which love draws in Gods cause and quarrel to secure it self from sin and testifie its resentments of Gods dishonour O what a Divine spark is the Soul of man well might Christ prefer it in dignity to the whole World 3. Thirdly The worth of a Soul may be gathered and discerned from its subjective capacity and hability both of Grace and Glory It is capable of all the graces of the Spirit of being silled with the fulness of God Eph. 3.19 to live to God here and with God for ever What excellent Graces do adorn some Souls How are all the rooms richly hanged with Divine and costly Hangings that God may dwell in them This makes it like the carved works of the Temple overlaid with pure Gold here is Glory upon Glory a new Creation upon the old in the inmost parts of some Souls is a spiritual Altar erected with this Inscription Holiness to the Lord Here the Soul offers up it self to God in the sacred flames of Love and here they sacrifice their vile affections devoting them to destruction to the glory of their God here God walks with delight even a delight beyond what he takes in all the stately Structures and magnificent adorned Temples in the whole World Isa. 66.1 2. No other Soul besides mans is marriageable to Christ or capable of Espousals to the King of Glory they were not designed and therefore not endued with a capacity for such an honour as this but such a capacity hath every Soul even the meanest on Earth and such honour have all his Saints others may 2 Cor. 11.2 Eph. 5.27 but they are betrothed to Christ in this World and shall be presented without spot before him in the World to come It is now a lovely and excellent Creature in its naked natural state much more beautiful and excellent in its sanctified and gracious state but what shall we say or how shall we conceive of it when all spots of sin are perfectly washed off its beautiful face in Heaven and the glory of the Lord is risen upon it When its filthy garments are taken away and the pure robes of perfect Holiness as well as Righteousness superinduced upon this excellent Creature If the imperfect beauty of it begun in Sanctification enamouâ—ed its Saviour and made him say Thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes with one of the
and design for its Salvation by Christ in so great depth of counsel that the Angels of Heaven are astonished at it and desire to pry into it Christ in pursuance of this eternal project came from Heaven professedly to seek and to save lost Souls Luke 19.10 He compares himself to a good Shepherd who leaveth the ninety nine to seek one lost sheep and having â—ound it brings it home upon his shoulders rejoycing that he hath found it Luke 15.5 Hell imploys all its skill and policy sets a-work all wiles and stratagems to destroy and ruine it 1 Pet. 5.8 Your adversary the Devil goeth about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour The strong man armed gets the first possession of the Soul and with all his forces and policies labours to secure it as his property Luke 11.21 Christ raises all the spiritual Militia the very posse Coeli the Powers of Heaven to rescue it 2 Cor. 10.4 5. And do Heaven and Earth thus contend think you de lana caprina for a thing of nought No no if there were not some singular and peculiar excellency and worth in mans Soul both worlds would never tug and pull at this rate which should win that Prize It was a great Argument of the worth and excellency of Homer that incomparable Poet that seven Cities contended for the honour of his Nativity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Smyrna Rhodes Coâ—ophon Salamis Chins Argos and Athens were all at strife about one poor man who should crown themselves with the honour of his birth but when Heaven and Hell shall contend about a Soul certainly it much more speaks the dignity of it than the contention of seven Cities for one Homer What are all the wooings expostulations and passionate beseechings of Christs Ministers what are all the convictions of Conscience and strong impressions made upon the affections what are all strokes from Heaven upon men in the way of sin I say what are all these but the tuggings of Heaven to draw Souls out of the snares of Hell And what are the hellish temptations that men feel in their hearts the alluring objects presented to their eyes the ensnaring examples that are set round about them but the tuggings of Satan if possible to draw the Souls of men into the same condemnation and misery with himself Would Heaven and Hell be up in Arms as it were and strive at this rate for nothing Thy Soul O man how vilely soever thou depreciatest and slightest it is of high esteem a rich purchace a Creature of nobler rank than thou art aware of The wise Merchant knows the value of Gold and Diamonds though ignorant Indians would part with them for Glass-beads and Tinsel toyes And this leads us to 8. The eighth Evidence of the invaluable worth of Souls which is the joy in Heaven and the rage in Hell for the gain and loss of the Soul of man Christ who came from Heaven and well knew the frame and disposition of the Inhabitants of that City Quoties bene agimus gaudent Angeli tristantur Daemones quoties à bono deviamus Diabolum laetificamus Angelos suo gaudio defraudamus August tells us That there is joy in the presence of the Angels of God over one sinner that repenteth Luke 15.7 10. No sooner is the heart of a sinner darted with conviction broken with sorrow for sin and begins to cry Men and brethren what shall I do but the news is quickly in Heaven and sets all the City of God a rejoycing at it as is in the chief City of a Kingdom when a young Prince is born We never read that Christ laughed in all his time on Earth but we read that he once rejoyced in Spirit Luke 10.21 And what was the occasion of that his joy but the success of the Gospel in the Salvation of the Souls of men Now certainly it must be some great good that so affects Christ and all his Angels in Heaven at the sight of it the degree of a wise mans joy is according to the value of the object thereof no man that is wise will rejoyce feel his heart leap within him for gladness at a small or common thing And as there is joy in Heaven for the saving so certainly there is grief and rage in Hell for the loss of a Soul No sooner had God by Pauls Ministry converted one poor Lydia at Philippi whither he was called by an immediate Express from Heaven for that service but the Devil put all the City into an uproar as if an Enemy had landed on their Coast and raised a violent Persecution which quickly drave him thence Acts 16.9 14 22. And indeed what are all the fierce and cruel persecutions of Gods faithful Ministers but so many efforts of the rage and malice of Hell against them for plucking Souls as so many captives and preys out of his paws For this he owes them a spight and will be sure to pay them if ever he get them at an advantage But all this joy and grief demonstrates the high and great value of the Prize which is won by Heaven and lost by Hell 9. Ninthly The institution of Gospel-Ordinances and the appointment of so many Gospel-Officers purposely for the saving of Souls is no small evidence of what value and esteem they are No man would light and maintain a Lamp fed with golden Oyl and keep it burning from Age to Age if the work to be done by the light of it were not of a very precious and important nature what else are the Dispensations of the Gospel but Lamps burning with golden Oyl to light Souls to Heaven Zech. 4.2 3 4 12. compared a magnificent Vision is there presented to the Prophet viz. a Candlestick of Gold with a Bowl or Cistern upon the top of it and seven Shafts with seven Lamps at the ends thereof all lighted and that these Lamps might have a constant supply of oyl without any accessary humane help there are presented as growing by the Candlestick two fresh and green Olive-trees on each side thereof ver 3. which do empty out of themselves golden Oyl ver 12. naturally dropping and distilling it into that Bowl and the two Pipes thereof to feed the Lamps continually Under this stately Emblem you have a lively representation of the spiritual Gifts and Graces distilled by the Spirit into the Ministers of the Gospel for the use and benefit of the Church as you find not only by the Angels Exposition of it here but by the Spirits allusion to it and accommodation of it in Rev. 11.3 4. See herein what price God puts upon the salvation of Souls Gospel Lamps are maintain'd for their sakes not with the sweat of Ministers brows or the expence and waste of their Spirits but by the precious Gifts and Graces of Gods Spirit continually dropping into them for the use and service of Souls These ministerial Gifts and Graces are Christs
Ascension-gifts Eph. 4.8 When he ascended up on high he gave gifts unto men and what were the Royal gifts of that triumphant day why he gave some Apostles and some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ. It is an allusion to the Roman Triumphs wherein the Conqueror did spargere missilia scatter abroad his treasures among the people It is reported of the Palm-tree saith one that when it was first planted in Italy they water'd its roots with Wine to make it take the better with the Soil but God waters our Souls with what is infinitely more costly than Wine he waters them with the Heart-blood of Christ and the precious Gifts and Graces of the Spirit which certainly he would never do if they were not of great worth in his eyes O how many excellent Ministers who were as is said of Iohn burning and shining Lights in their places and generations have spent themselves and how many are there who are willing to spend and be spent as Paul was for the salvation of Souls God is at great expences for them and therefore puts a very high value upon them Now all this respects the Soul of man that is the object of all ministerial labours The Soul is the terminus actionum ad intra the subject on which God works and upon which he spends all those invaluable treasures 'T is the Soul which he aims at and principally designs and levels all to and reckons it not too dear a rate to save them at No man will dig for common stones with golden Mattocks the instruments that would be worn out being of far greater value than the thing This may convince us of what worth our Souls are and at what rates they are set in Gods Book that such instruments are sent abroad into the World and such precious Gifts and Graces like golden Oyl spent continually for their Salvation whether Paul or Apollo or Cephas all are yours 1 Cor. 3.22 i. e. all set apart for the service and salvation of your Souls 10. Tenthly The great encouragements and rewards God propounds and promiseth to them that win Souls speaks their worth and Gods great esteem of them There cannot be a more acceptable service done to God than for a man to set himself heartily and diligently to the Conversion of Souls so many Souls as a man instrumentally saves so many Diadems will God crown him withal in the great Day S. Paul calls his converted Philippians his joy and his crown Phil. 4.1 and tells the converted Thessalonians they were his Crown of rejoycing in the presence of Iesus Christ at his coming 1 Thess. 2.19 There is a full reward assured by promise to those that labour in this great service Dan. 12.3 And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever The wisdom here spoken of I conceive not to be only that whereby a man is made wise to the salvation of his own Soul but whereby he is also furnished with skill for the saving of other mens Souls according to that Prov. 11.30 He that winneth souls is wise and so the latter Phrase is exegetical of it meaning one and the same thing by being wise and turning many unto righteousness and to put men upon the study of this wisdom he puts a very honourable title upon them calling them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the justifiers of many as in 1 Tim. 4.16 they are said to save others Here is singular honour put upon the very instruments imploy'd in this honourable service and that is not all but their reward is great hereafter as well as their honour great at present they shall shine as the brightness of the firmament and the stars for ever and ever The Firmament shines like a Saphir in it self the Stars and Planets more gloriously again but those that faithfully labour in this work of saving Souls shall shine in Glory for ever and ever when the Firmament shall be parched up as a scrowl O what rewards and honours are here to provoke men to the study of saving Souls God will richly recompense all our pains in this work if we did but only sow the seed in our days and another enters into our labours and waters what we sowed so that neither the first hath the comfort of finishing the work nor the last the honour of beginning it but one did somewhat towards it in the work of Conviction and the other carried it on to greater maturity and perfection and so neither the one or other began and finished the work singly yet both shall rejoyce in Heaven together Ioh. 4.36 You see what honours God puts upon the very instruments imploy'd in this work even the honour to be Saviours under God of mens Souls Iam. 5.20 and what a full reward of glory joy and comfort they shall have in Heaven all which speaks the great value of the Soul with God Such encouragements and such rewards would never have been propounded and promised if God had not a singular estimation of them And the more to quicken his instruments to all diligence in this great work he works upon their fears as well as hopes threatens them with Hell as well as incourages them with the hopes of Heaven tells them he will require the blood of all those Souls that perish by their negligence Their blood saith he will I require at that watch-mans hands Ezek. 33.6 which are rather Thunderbolts than words saith Chrysostom By all which you see what weight God lays upon the saving or losing of Souls such severe charges great encouragements and terrible threats had never been propounded in Scripture if the Souls of men had not been invaluably precious 11. Eleventhly It is no small evidence of the preciousness and invaluable worth of Souls that God manifests so great and tender Care over them and is so much concern'd about the evil that befals them Among many others there are two things in which the tender care of God for the good of Souls is manifested 1. In his tenderness over them in times of distress and danger as a tender father will not leave his sick child in other hands but sits up and watches by him himself and administers the Cordials with his own hands even so the great God expresseth his care and tenderness Isa. 57.15 I dwell in the high and holy place with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the contrite ones Behold the condescending tenderness of the highest Majesty Is a Soul ready to faint and fail O how soon is God with it with a reviving Cordial in his hand lest the spirit should fail before him and the Soul which he hath made as it is vers 16. yea he put it into
Christs Commission to preach good tidings to the meek and to bind up the broken-hearted Isa. 61.1 and not only inserts it in Christs Commission but gives the same in solemn charge to all his inferior Messengers whom he imploys about them Isa. 35.3 Strengthen ye the weak hands and confirm the feeble knees say to them that are of a fearful heart Be strong fear not 2. His special regard to Souls is evidenced in his severe prohibitions to all others to do nothing that may be an occasion of ruine to them He charges it upon all That no man put a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in his brothers way Rom. 14.13 that by the abuse of our own liberty we destroy not him for whom Christ died Rom. 14.15 And what doth all this signifie but the precious and invaluable worth of Souls 12. Lastly It is not the least evidence of the dignity of mans Soul that God hath appointed the whole Host of Angels to be their Guardians and Attendants Are they not all ministring Spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation Heb. 1.14 Are they not It is no doubtful question but the strongest way of affirmation nothing is surer than that they are All Not one of that heavenly Company excepted The highest Angel thinks it no disparagement to serve a Soul for whom Christ die Well may they all stoop to serve them wâ—en they see Christ their Lord hath stooped even to death to save them They are all of them Ministring Spirits 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 publick Officers to whom their Tutelage is committed to them it belongs to attend serve protect and relieve them The greatest Peers and Barons in the Kingdom think it not below them to wait upon the Heir apparent to the Crown in his Minority and no less dignity is here stampt by God upon the Souls of men whom he calls Heirs of Salvation And in some respect nearer to Christ than themselves are on this account it is that the Angels delight to serve them Christs little ones upon earth have their Angels which always behold the face of God in Heaven Mat. 18.10 and therefore saith our Lord there Take heed you despise not one of these little ones they are greater persons than you are aware of Nor is it enough that one Angel is appointed to wait upon all or many of them but many Angels even a whole Host of them are sometimes sent to attend upon one of them As Iacob was going on his way the Angels of God met him and when he saw them he said This is Gods host Gen. 32.1 2. The same two offices which belong to a Nurse to whom the Father commits his Child belong also to the Angels of Heaven with respect to the Children of God viz. to keep them tenderly whilst they are abroad and bring them home to their Fathers house at last And how clearly doth all this evince and demonstrate the great dignity and value of Souls Was it an Argument of the Grandeur and Magnificence of King Solomon that he had two hundred men with Targets and three hundred men with Shields of beaten Gold for his ordinary Guard every day And is it not a mark of far greater dignity than ever Solomon had in all his glory to have Hosts of Angels attending us In comparison with one of this Guard Solomon himself was but a Worm in all his Magnificence And now lay all these Arguments together and see what they will amount to You have before you no ordinary Creature for 1. it was not produced as other Creatures were by a meer word of command but by the deliberation of the great Council of Heaven and 2. such are the high and noble faculties and powers found in it as render it agreeable to and becoming such a Divine Original Yeâ— 3. by reason of these its admirable powers it becomes a capable subject both of Grace here and Glory hereafter 4. Nor is this its capacity in vain for God hath made glorious preparations for some of them in Heaven 5. And purchased them for Heaven and Heaven for them at an invaluable price even the precious Blood of Christ. 6. And stampt immortality upon their actions as well as natures 7 Both Worlds contend and strive for the Soul as a prize of greatest value 8 Their Conversion to Christ is the Triumph of Heaven and Rage of Hell 9. The Lamps of Gospel-Ordinances are maintained over all the reformed Christian World to light them in their passage to Heaven 10. Great rewards are propounded to all that shall heartily endeavour the salvation of them 11. The care of Heaven is exceeding great and tender over them And 12. the heavenly Host of Angels have the charge of them and reckon it their honour to serve them These things duly weighed bring home the conclusion with demonstrative clearness to every mans understanding That one Soul is of more value than the whole World which was the thing to be proved What remains is the improvement of this excellent subject in these following Inferences Inference I. THE Soul of man appearing to be a Creature of such transcendent dignity and excellency this truth appears of equal clearness with it That it was not made for the body but the body for it and therefore it is a vile abuse of the noble and high-born Soul to subject it to the lusts and enslave it to the drudgery of the inferior and more ignoble part The very Law of Nature assigns the most honourable places and imployments to the most noble and excellent Creatures and the baser and inferior to things of the lowest rank and quality The Sun Moon and Stars are placed by this Law in the Heavens but the Ignis fatuus and the Glow-worm in the Fens and Ditches Princes are set upon Thrones of Glory the Beggers lodg'd in Barns and Stables and if at any time this order of Nature be inverted and the baser suppress and perk over the more noble and honourable Beings it is looked upon as a kind of Prodigy in the Civil World and so Solomon represents it Eccles. 10.7 I have seen servants upon horses and Princes walking as servants upon the earth i. e. I have seen men that are worthy of no better imployments than to rub Horses heels in the Saddle with their Trappings and men who deserve to bear rule and to govern Kingdoms men who for their great ability and integrity deserved to sit at Helm and moderate the Affairs of Kingdoms these have I seen walking as servants upon the earth and this he calls an evil under the Sun that is an Ataxie confusion or disorder in the course of Nature Now there can never be that difference and vast odds betwixt one man and another as there is betwixt the Soul and the body of every man A King upon the Throne is not so much above a Begger that cryes at our doors for a crust as the Soul is above a body for the
revolutions thereof 2. By the Redemption of Time we must understand the study 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 care and diligence of Christians at the rate of all possible pains at the expence of all earthly pleasures ease and gratifications of the flesh to rescue their precious seasons both of Salvation and service out of the hands of temptations which so commonly rob unwary Souls of them Satan trucks with us for our time as we did at first with the silly Indians for their Gold and Diamonds who were content to exchange them for Glass-Beads and Tinsil Toyes Many fair seasons are forced or cheated out of our hands by the importunity of earthly cares or deceitfulness of sensual pleasures at the expence and loss of these we must redeem and rescue our time for higher and better uses and purposes We must spend those hours in prayer meditation searching our hearts mortifying our lusts which others do and our flesh fain would spend in sensual pleasures and gratifications of the fleshly appetite If ever we expect to win the Port of Glory we must be as diligent and careful as Sea-men are to take every gale that blows directly or obliquely to set them forward in their Voyage The note from hence is this DOCTRINE That the wisdom of a Christian is eminently discovered in saving and improving all opportunities in this World for that World which is to come God hangs the great things of Eternity upon the small wyers of times and seasons in this world that may be done or neglected in a day which may be the ground-work of joy or sorrow to all Eternity There is a nick of opportunity which gives both success and facility to the great and weighty affairs of the Soul as well as body to come before it is to seek the bird before it be hatcht and to come after it is to seek it when it is fled There is a twofold season or opportunity of Salvation 1. One was Christs season for the Purchace of it 2. The other is ours for the Application of it 1. Christ had a season assigned him for the impetration and purchace of our Salvation so you hear his Father bespeaking him Isa. 49.8 Thus saith the Lord In an acceptable time have I heard thee and in a day of salvation have I helped thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in tempore opportuno voluntatis vel placito It was the wisdom of the Lord Jesus Christ to set in with the Fathers time to comply with his season and it became a day of Salvation because it was the acceptable time which Christ took for it 2. Men have their seasons and opportunities for the application of Christ and his benefits to their own Souls 2 Cor. 6.1 2. We then as workers together with God beseech you also that you receive not the grace of God in vain for he saith I have heard thee in a time accepted and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee Behold now is the accepted time now is the day of salvation He exhorts the Corinthians not to dally or trifle any longer in the great concerns of their Salvation for now saith he is your day Christ had his day to purchase it and he procured a day also for you to apply it and this is that day you enjoy it you live under it that golden day is now running O see that you frustrate not the design thereof by receiving the Gospel-grace in vain Now two things concur to make a fit season of Salvation to the Souls of men 1. The external Means and Instruments 2. The Agency of the Spirit internally by or with those external Means 1. Men have then an opportunity for Salvation when God sends the means and instruments of Salvation among them When the Gospel is powerfully preached among a people then there is a door opened to them 2 Cor. 2.12 When I came to Troas to preach the Gospel a door was opened to me of the Lord. God doth as it were unlock the door of Heaven by the preaching of the Gospel Souls have then an opportunity to step in and be saved 2. But yet this is not a wide and effectual door â—s the Apostle phraseth it 1 Cor. 16.9 till the Spirit of God joyns with and works upon the heart by those external means and instruments As the waters of the Pool of Bethesda had no inherent fanative virtue in themselves untiâ— the Angel of the Lord descended and troubled them but both together make a blessed season for the Souls of men then he stands at the door and knocks by convictions and perswasions Rev. 3.20 strives with men as he did with the old world by the Ministry of Noah Gen. 6.3 Now the door of opportunity is indeed opened but this will not always last there is a time when the Spirit ceaseth to strive and when the door is shut Luke 13.25 There is a season when by the fresh impression of some Ordinance or Providence of God mens hearts are awakened and their affections stirred It is now with the Souls of men as it is with Fruit-trees in the Spring when they put forth blossoms if they knit and set fâ—uit follows if they be nipt and blasted no fruit can be expected For all convictions and motions of the affections are to Grace much the same thing as blossoms are to Fruit which are but the rudiment thereof fructus imperfectus ordinabilis somewhat in order to it and look as that is a critical and hazardous season to Trees so is this to Souls I do not say it is in the power of any Soul to make the work of the Spirit effectual and abiding by adding his endeavours to the Spirits motions for then conversion would not be the free and arbitrary act of the Spirit as it is Ioh. 3.8 neither would Souls be born of God but of the will of man contrary to Ioh. 1.13 And yet it is not to be thought or said that mens endeavours and strivings are altogether vain needless and insignificant because though they cannot make the grace of God effectual his Grace can make them effectual they are our duty and God can bless them to our great advantage Now there are among others five remarkable essays efforts or strivings of a Soul under the impression and hand of the Spirit which greatly tend to the fixing settling and securing of that great work upon the Soul and it is seldom known that any Soul miscarries in whom these things are found 1. Deep serious and fixed consideration which lets conviction deep into the Soul and settles it and roots it fast in the heart Psal. 119.59 I thought upon my ways and turned my feet unto thy testimonies There are close and anxious debates in those Souls in whom convictions prosper to full conversion they sit alone and think close to their great and eternal concerns they carry their thoughts back to the evils of their life past then smite on the thigh and cry What have I done
the Lord prosper it by the Blessing of his Spirit on the hearts of them that read it Amen FINIS A Catalogue of Books Printed for and Sold by Francis Tyton Bookseller at the Three Daggers in Fleetstreet near the Temple-Gate Books in Folio SPeed's Maps and Geography of Great Britain and Ireland and of Foreign Parts Gâ—illim's Display of Heraldry with large Additions Roll's Abridgment French His Reports in 2 Vol. French Cook 's Reports in 3 Vol. English Dalton's Office of Sheriffs with many Additions Country Justice The Tryal and Condemnation of Edward Fitzharris Esq for High Treason at the Bar of the Court of Kings Bench at Westminster on Thursday Iune 9. 1681. As also the Tryal and Condemnation of Dr. Oliver Plunket Titular Primate of Ireland for High Treason The Arraignment and Plea of Edward Fitzharris Esq with all the Arguments in Law and Proceedings of the Kings Bench thereupon in Easter Term 1681. Lawson's Theopolitica or a Body of Divinity containing the Rules of the special Government of God according to which he orders the immortal and intellectual Creatures Angels and Men to their final and eternal Estate c. Cradock's Harmony of the Four Evangelists Strong 's Discourse of the two Covenants wherein the nature differences and effects of the Covenant of Works and of Grace are distinctly and practically discussed c. Bishop Gauden's Tears Sighs Complaints and Prayers of the Church of England Morrice on the Sacrament Lord Bacon's Advancement of Learning Petavius's History of the World The History of the valorous and witty Knight Errant Don Quixote Habington's History of Edward IV. King of England The History of the Wars of Italy rendred into English by Henry Earl of Monmouth Books in Quarto Mr. Flavel's Fountain of Life opened or a Display of Christ in his Essential and Mediatorial Glory c. The Method of Grace in bringing home the Eternal Redemption continued by the Father and carried on by the Son through the effectual Application of the Spirit unto Gods Elect being the second part of Gospel-Redemption Discourse of the Immortality of the Soul Dr. Patrick's Parable of the Pilgrim Two Sermons preached at the Funeral of Mr. Samuel Iacomb and Mr. Greg. Dr. Tenison of Idolatry A Sermon concerning the discretion of giving of Alms preached at St. Sepulchres Church London instead of the Spittle upon Wednesday in Easter-week 1681. Mr. Baxter's Saints Everlasting Rest. Reasons of the Christian Religion Sermon of Repentance Murcot's Works Strong 's God 's Shepherd or the Man God's Fellow Vengeance of the Temple Voice from Heaven Blackwood on Matthew Alleyn's Scripture-Chronology Burroughs on Gospel-Reconciliation Sympson of Unbelief Gregory's Moot-Book Englished by Hughs Crompton's Jurisdiction of Courts Swinburn of Wills Spelman de Sepultura Buck on the Beatitudes Special Law-Cases Books in Octavo Flavel's Divine Conduct or the Mystery of Providence Dr. Patrick's Jewish Hypocrisie Mensa Mystica or a Discourse concerning the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper In which the Ends of its Institution are so manifested our Addresses to it so directed our Behaviour there and afterwards so composed that we may not lose the benefits which are to be received by it In which several Prayers and Thanksgivings are now inserted to make it of more general use Divine Arithmetick or the Art of Numbring our days being a Sermon preached Iune 17. 1659. at the Funeral of Mr. Samuel Iacomb B. D. at St. Mary Woolnoth Lombardstreet A brief Exposition of the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer Iacomb's Catechism with a brief Exposition of the Creed and Ten Commandments Baxter's right Method for a setled Peace of Conscience and spiritual Comfort in 32 Directions Lawson against Hobbs Dr. Fowler 's Design of Christianity Maynard's Law of God ratified Row's Emmanuel Saints Temptations Strong 's Will of Man subjected to God's Will Gale's Theophile a Treatise of Christ's Love Gearing of Pride Wotton's Remains Alleyn's King Henry VII a Poem Ianna Linguarum Speed's Travellers Companion Chamberlain's Compleat Justice Zouch of the Jurisdiction of the Admiralty Fitzherbert's Natura Brevium Books in small 8â— 12 0 and 24 0 Dr. Patrick's Hearts Ease or a Remedy against all Troubles with a consolatory Discourse particularly directed to those who are their Friends and dear Relations Flavel's Touchstone of Sincerity or the signs of Grace and Symptoms of Hypocrisie opened in a practical Treatise upon Rev. 3.17 18. being the second Part of the Saint indeed Baxter's Universal Concord Catholick Unity The true Catholick Mischief of self-Ignorance Strong 's Worm that dieth not or the certainty of Hell-Torments Heavenly Creature Lawrence of Christ's Power over bodily Diseases Whateley's Redemption of Time Vines on the Saints nearness to God Row's Heavenly and Earthly Mindedness Sydenham on Infant-Baptism and singing of Psalms Swafield of the Saints Failings The Life of Mr. Iohn Row of Crediton in Devon Gearing of Prayer Of Providence Perkin's Catechism The Calvinists Cabinet unlockt The Spanish Inquisition The Schism of the Mass. Wotton's Letters Chaucer's Ghost The Office of the Houswife Loves Journal Finche's Law in 4 Books Eng. Meriton's Guide to Constables A new Book of Instruments Clayton's Reports Fleetwood's Justice Sheppard's Office of a Justice Britton The History of Eurialus and Lucretia Horace with Minelius his Notes Grotius de Veritate Christianae Religionis c. Valerius Maximus Quintus Curtius The Christian Pattern by Thomas à Kempis The Wisdom of the Just.
thus lamented it self Wo is me that I dwell in Mesheck It inclosed their Souls within it's mud walls which intercepted the light and joy of God's face Death therefore did a most friendly office when it set it at liberty and brought it forth into its own pure and pleasant light and liberty These blessed Spirits now rejoyce as Prisoners do in their recovered liberty and can it be supposed after all these sufferings groans and sighs to be dissolved they can be willing to be embodied again Surely there is as little reason for Souls at liberty to desire to be again embodied as there is for a Bird got out of the Snare or Cage to flie back again to its place of confinement and restraint Yea when we consider how loth some holy Souls when under the excruciating pains of sickness and as yet in the sight of this alluring World have been to â—ear of a return to it by the recovery of their health we cannot think but being quite out of the sight of this and in the fruitions of the other World the thoughts of the Body must needs be more loathsome to them than ever We read that when a good man in time of his sickness was told by his friends that some hopeful signs of his recovery began now to appear he answered And must I then return to this Body I was as a sheep driven out of the Storm almost to the Fold and then driven back into the storm again Or as a weary Traveller near his home who must go back again to fetch something he had neglected or as an Apprentice whose time was almost out and then must begin a new Term. Of some others it hath been also noted that the greatest infirmities they discovered upon their death-bed have been their too passionate desires to be dissolved and their unsubmissiveness to Gods will in their longer stay in the Body Now the Bodies of the Saints being so cheerfully forsaken and that only upon a foretaste of Heaven by Faith how can it be thought they should find any inclination to a re-union when they are so abundantly satisfied with the joys of his face in Heaven Certainly the Body hath been no such pleasant habitation to the Soul that it should cast an eye or thought that way when it is once delivered out of it If it were burdensome here a thought of it would be loathsome there 2. We have shew'd before that the separate Soul wants not the help of the Body but lives and acts at a more free and comfortable rate than ever before 'T is true it is not now delighted with meat and drink with smells and sounds as it was wont to be but then it must be considered that it is happiness and perfection not to need them It is now become equal to the Angels in the way and manner of its living and what it enjoyed by the ministry of the Body it eminently and more perfectly injoys without it What perfections can the Soul receive from matter Anima rationalis nihil perfectionis recipit à materia quod extra ilâ—am non posset recipeâ—â— ergo cum sepâ—rata fuerit in ilâ—am propensa non dicetur Conimbr What can a lump of flesh add to a Spirit And if it can add nothing to it there is no reason why it should hanker after it and incline to a re-union with it It added nothing of happiness to it but much of trouble and therefore becomes justly undesireable to it 3. The supposition of such a propension and inclination seems no way to suit with that state of perfect rest which the Souls of the just enjoy in Heaven The Scriptures tell us that at death they enter into rest Isa. 57.2 Heb. 4.9 That they rest from their labours Rev. 14.13 But that which inclines and desires especially when the desired enjoyment as in this case is suspended so long must be as far from Rest as it is from satisfaction in the enjoyment of the thing desired We know what Solomon hath observed of such a life and his observation is experimentally true that hope defer'd makes the heart sick Prov. 13.12 Who finds not his own desires a very rack to him in such cases If we be kept but a few days in earnest expectation and desire of an absent Friend and he comes not what an uneasie life do we live But here we must suppose some have such an unsatisfied life for hundreds and others for thousands of years already and how much longer they may remain so who can tell We use to say lovers hours are full of Eternity These reasons seem to carry it for the Negative But if the matter be weighed once more with the following reasons in the counter scale and prejudice do not pull down the balance we shall find the contrary conclusion much more strong and rational For Argument I. THE Soul and Body are the two essential constitutive parts of Man either of these being wanting the Man is not compleat and perfect The good of the whole is the good of the parts themselves and every thing hath a natural desire and appetite to its own good and perfection Anima separata ad unionem corporis propeâ—sa est nam illa vult totius compositi actualem constitutionem cum propter hanc tanquam finem illa sit in entium latitudine inveniatur Atque haec est illa perfectio quam anima obtinet ex illo appetitu nam bonum totius compositi est bonum ipsarum partium Affirmandum itaque est animan separatam naturaliter desiderare resurrectionem Alstedii Nat Theol. pars prima p. 214 215. 'T is confessed the Soul for as much as concerns it self singly is made perfect and enjoys blessedness in the absence of the Body but this is only the perfection and blessedness of one part of man the other part viz the Body lies in obscurity and corruption and till both be blessed and blessed together in a state of composition and re-union the whole man is not made perfect For this therefore the Soul must wait Argument II. THough death hath dissolv'd the Union yet it hath not destroyed the relation betwixt the Soul and Body that dust is more to it than all the dust of the whole earth Hence it is that the whole person of a Believer is sometimes denominated from that part of him namely his Body which remains captivated by death in the grave Hence 2 Thes. 4.15 dead believers are called those that sleep which must needs properly respect the Body for the Soul sleeps not and shews what a firm and dear relation still remains betwixt these absent Friends Now we all know the mighty power of relation if it be least among entities yet surely it is one of the greatest things in the World in efficacy It is difficult to bear the absence of our dear Relatives especially if we be in prosperity and they in adversity As the case here is betwixt the Spirit in Heaven
and it's Body in the Grave This associated with Angels that prey'd upon by Worms Ioseph's case is the liveliest Embleme that occurs to my present thoughts to illustrate the point in hand He was advanced to be Lord over all Aegypt living in the greatest pomp and splendor there Gen. 43.29 30 31. but his Father and Brethren were at the same time ready to perish in the land of Canaan He had been many years separated from them but neither the length of time nor honours of the Court could alienate his affections from them O see the mighty power of Relation No sooner doth he see his Brethren and understand their case and the pining condition of Iacob his Father but his bowels yearned and his compassions rolled together for them Yea he could not forbear nor stifle his own affections though he knew how injurious his Brethren had been to him and betrayed him as the Body hath the Soul Yet all this notwithstanding he breaks forth into tears and outcries over them which made the house ring again with the news that Ioseph's brethren were come Nor could he be at rest in the lap of honour and plenty until he had gotten home his dear and ancient Relations to him Thus stands the case betwixt Soul and Body Argument III. THE regret reluctancy and sorrows expressed by the Soul at parting do strongly argue its inclination to a re-union with it when it is actually separated from it For why should we surmise that the Soul which mourn'd and groan'd so deeply at parting which clasp'd and embraced it so dearly and affectionately which fought strugled and disputed the passage with death every foot and inch of ground it got and would not part with the Body till by plain force it was rent out of its arms should not when absent desire to see and enjoy its old and endeared friend again Hath it lost its affection though it continue its relation that 's very improbable Or doth its advancement in Heaven make it regardless of its Body which lies in contempt and misery that 's an effect which Christs personal glory never produced in him towards us nor a good mans perferment would produce in him to his poor and miserable friends in this World as we see in the case of Ioseph but now instanced in It is therefore harsh and incongruous to suppose the Souls love to the Body was extinguished in the parting hour and that now out of sight out of mind Object But was it not urged before in opposition to this assertion that the Souls of the righteous looked upon their Bodies as their Prisons and sighed for deliverance by death and greatly rejoiced in the hope and foresight of that liberty death would restore them to How doth this consist with such reluctancies at parting and inclinations to re-union Sol. The objection doth not suppose any man to be totally free from all reluctancies and unwillingness to die The holiest Souls that ever lived in Bodies of flesh will give an unwilling shrug when it comes to the parting point 2 Cor. 5.2 But this their willingness to be gone arises from two other grounds which make iâ— consistent enough with its reluctancies at parting and inclination to a second meeting 1 This willingness to die doth not suppose the Souls love to the Body to be utterly extinguished but mastered and overpowered by another and stronger love There is in every Christian a double love one natural to the Body and the things below the other supernatural to Christ and the things above the latter doth not extinguish though it conquer and subdue the other Love to the Body pulls backward love to Christ pulls forward and finally prevails This is so consistent with it that it supposes natural reluctation and unwillingness to part 2 The willingness of Gods people to be dissolved must not be understood absolutely but comparatively In that sense the Apostle will be understood 2 Cor. 5.8 We are confident I say and willing rather to be absent from the Body and present with the Lord. i. e. Rather than to live always a life of sin sorrow and absence from God Death is not desireable in and for it self but only as it is the Souls outlet from sin and its inlet to God So that the very best desire it but comparatively and it is but few who find the love of this animal life subacted and overpowered by high raised acts of faith and love The generality even of good Souls feel strong renitencies and suffer sharp conflicts at their dissolution All which discovers with what lothness and unwillingness the Soul unclasps its arms to let go its Body Now as Divines argue the frame of Christs heart in Heaven toward his people on earth from all those endearing passages and demonstrations of love he gave them at parting so we here argue the continued love and inclination of the Soul to its Body after it is in Heaven from the manifold demonstrations it gave of its affection to it in this World especially in the parting hour No considerations in all the World less than the more full fruition of God and freedom from sin could possibly have prevailed with it to quit the Body though but for a time and leave it in the dust Which is our third Argument Argument IV. AND as the dolorous parting hour evidenceth it so doth the joy with which it receives it again at the Resurrection If it part from it so heavily and meet it again with joy unspeakable sure then it still retained much love for it and desires to be re-espoused to it in the interval Now that its meeting in the Resurrection is a day of joy to the Soul is evident because it is called the time of refreshment Acts 3.19 And they awake with singing out of the dust Isai. 26.19 If the direct and immediate scope of the Prophet point not as some think it doth at the Resurrection yet it is allowed by all to be a very lively allusion to it which is sufficient for my purpose And indeed none that understands and believes the design and business of that day can possibly doubt but there was reason enough to call it a time of refreshment a singing morning for the Souls of the righteous come from Heaven with Christ and the whole host of shouting Angels not to be speclators only but the subjects of that days triumph They come to re-assume and be re-espoused to their own Bodies this being the appointed time for God to vindicate and rescue them from the tyrannical power of the Grave to endow them with spiritual qualities at their second marriage to their Souls that in both parts they may be compleatly happy O the joyful claspings and dear embraces betwixt them who but themselves can understand And by the way this removes the objection forementioned of the miseries and prejudices the Soul suffered in this world in and from the Body For now it receives it a spiritual Body i.e. so