Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	body_n	motion_n	soul_n	7,616	5	5.6016	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66426	The several ways of revelation a sermon preached at St. Martins in the Fields, Octob. 7, 1695 : being the seventh of the lecture for the said year, founded by the Honourable Robert Boyle, Esquire / by John Williams ...	Williams, John, 1636?-1709.	1696 (1696)	Wing W2733; ESTC R7609	14,474	36

2.22 revealeth the deep and secret things and doth communicate his Will so that the Person conceives and thinks and acts as the Divine Power would have him conceive think and act It being here as with the Soul in the Body which is the Principle of all Vital Motion for though the Body be in its contrivance admirably adapted for all Offices to which the Organs of it are to serve if there were a Soul in it yet it is the Soul that must make the Eye to see and the Foot to move and the Tongue to speak or else there will be no Sight Motion nor Speech So it is here in Divine Inspiration of this sort where the Spirit of God is to the Soul what the Soul is to the Body and must make all those Impressions upon it must infuse the Power of conceiving and thinking or rather those Conceptions and Thoughts those Notions and Ideas of Things nay that Matter So that the Person Inspired doth not think his own Thoughts nor order his own Conceptions nor form his own Notions nor use his own Words where these are Inspired as far as he is Inspired Not that his Reason is not in operation as it is in Raptures Visions and Dreams where the Rational Powers are bound up as it were by Sleep for the present but that these Infusions proceeding not from any Reasoning in themselves but from an External and Supernatural Cause it is by that Cause determined to the Matter that is Inspired As a Prompter doth suggest the Matter or dictate the Words to the Interpreter he makes use of which are not to be esteemed the Words or Thoughts of the Interpreter but of the Suggester As our Saviour saith to his Disciples When they deliver you up take no thought how or what ye shall speak for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak For it is not ye that speak but the Spirit of the Father which speaketh in you Matth. 10.19 10. Now as it was the Spirit of God speaking in them that did in that case dictate and guide them in all they said so that they spake with such Authority and Ability such Wisdom and Elocution without any Premeditation as all their Adversaries were not able to gainsay or resist Luke 21.15 as we find in the Instance of St. Stephen Acts 6.10 So it was after the same manner that the Divine Spirit did breathe upon the mind as our Saviour on the Apostles in an external way the signification of the internal John 20.22 in a way imperceptible and did so insinuate it self that it became as it were one Spirit with theirs and they thought as the Spirit dispos'd them to think as well as spake as the Spirit gave them utterance Acts 2.4 This was thinking and speaking by Inspiration And this being the most eminent way of God's communicating his Will to Mankind is call'd Revelation in the New Testament especially it being immediate without the intervention of Visions or Extasies or Voices or any other means than it self and this was the way by which the Apostles received their Revelation called a Revealing by the Spirit 2. Another way by which God revealed himself was Vision or Sight This was so common that all the ways of Revelation are sometimes set forth by this term A Vision is the Representation of an Object as in a Glass which places the Visage before us and by which we have as clear a view of the things thus represented as if they were the things themselves and not the Images or appearances of them And therefore though the external senses are herein bound up and as it were laid asleep in a Trance yet the things presented at that time to the imagination and intended as a Revelation of something to happen or to be done are as plain and evident as sensible Objects that lie open to the sense Thus Balaam describes it as to himself who saw the vision of the Almighty falling into a trance but having his eyes open Numb 24.16 that is though he had not the exercise of his outward senses and so his eyes were of no more use to him when open than if they were shut yet he evidently saw whatever was presented to his mind Thus St. Paul as clearly saw our Saviour by a Representation or Vision when he was in a Trance in the Temple as he did when he actually and visibly appear'd to him at Mid-day on the way to Damascus In this case things imaginary are as if they were real remote as if they were near future as if present and secret as if open that is what sight presence and knowledge is to us in things sensible when we are awake and have the full exercise of our outward senses that is Vision to the Visionaries to such as are in an Extasy This will be farther illustrated by a reflection upon these several particulars to which if I mistake not all the instances of this kind may be reduced As 1. In Vision things imaginary and internal are represented as evidently as if they were real and external Thus much is intimated in the case of St. Peter of whom 't is said when the Angel smote him and the chains fell off from his hands he wist not that it was true which was done by the angel but thought be saw a vision From whence it follows that all this which he found to be real when he came to himself might have been represented by way of Vision and things thereby represented are as evidently proposed to the Mind as outward Objects can be to the Eye Thus it was with the same Apostle when he fell into a Trance and saw heaven opened and a certain vessel descending unto him as it had been a great sheet knit at the four corners and let down to the earth wherein were all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth c. Acts 10.10 c. Of this kind of Vision were Jeremiah's wearing a linnen Girdle and his hiding it afterwards in a hole by Euphrates and his taking a cup of fury at the Lord's hand and causing all Nations to drink of it Of the same kind were Ezekiel's eating of the Roll his typical laying Siege to Jerusalem and an hundred things more in that and other Prophetical Books In which cases when the things represented are wholly imaginary and never existent what is in Phrase positively said of them is to be supplied with as it were as in the aforesaid Vision of St. Peter when it is said Peter saw heaven opened and a sheet descending c. it being not a thing really done but only by Representation it is to be understood That he as it were saw Heaven opened 2. In Vision things remote are represented as present and the Visionary has all the advantage of sight in things presented to the Eye without the use of sight or change of place So Ezekiel when a Captive in

Chald●ea had the state of Jerusalem as it was then in fact set before him whither he was brought in the visions of God and as evidently saw all things that were at that time transacted in the Temple as if he had been actually there And even the secret practices of the Elders and Priests in the most retired corners were at that distance exactly represented to him so that if he had been personally with them they had not been more visible to him There he beheld the Idols pourtrayed on the wall and the Seventy Men or Sanhedrim and Jaazaniah their Head in the midst of them with every Man his Censer in his hand and all the particulars as there described 3. In Vision things future are as evidently represented as if they were present Thus Saul when deprived of his Sight saw in a Vision Ananias coming in and by Imposition of hands restoring him to it and by which means as described to him before-hand he as perfectly knew Ananias when he came to see as if he had afore time been conversant with him From whence we may observe 1. That Vision is Supernatural so in the Old Testament Ezekiel saith The hand of the Lord was upon me And in the New St. John saith He was in the Spirit 2. That it is Internal when the Soul tho' in the Body yet for the present is as out of it as to corporeal Sensations and sees perceives and understands nothing by the external organs Thus it was with St. Paul in his wonderful Rapture when his Soul was in such an abstracted and elevated state that he himself could not tell whether he was in the body or out of the body So that when the Name of Vision is given in Scripture to this way of Divine Communication it is not from any use made of corporeal sight or that it is entertain'd with any external objects but because of the clearness and evidence of it and a conformity it therein bears to outward and corporeal Sense By which it is distinguished from external Representations which were also very frequent in those times of Revelation of which there were two sorts more especially viz. 1. That which the Jews call the Shechinah which was God's manifestation of himself in a visible Glory and Majesty without any form as he did to the Patriarchs and afterwards it was the token of his special residence among his people the Jews called therefore his dwelling between the cherubins 2. Another way of appearance was by Angels when they took upon them a humane form by way of condescension to mankind and for a freer conversation with them and from which form and umbrage the Scripture terms them Men but besides what the Sequel of Scripture and common Sense shews the Apostle hath taught us that they were Divine Messengers sent immediately from God upon especial occasions and emergencies But the Schechinah called The Glory of the Lord was a Manifestation of the Divine Presence and not a Revelation and the Angels were only Messengers of a Revelation And so neither of them belong properly to this place 3. Another way of Revelation was by Dreams There is so far an agreement between Vision and Dreams that in both the external Senses were bound up so that a Vision may be called a supernatural Dream and a Dream may be said to be a natural Vision and so in Job they seem to be taken for one and the same God speaketh in a dream in a vision of the night when deep sleep falleth upon men in slumbrings upon the bed But the Scripture otherwise usually speaks of them as two distinct ways of Revelation So Num. 12.6 If there be a prophet among you I the Lord will make my self known to him in a vision and will speak unto him in a dream So Joel 2.28 And the difference between them seems to be 1. That Vision properly speaking was generally if not always when the Visionary was awake whether by night or day but Dreams as the nature of the thing shews were when the external Senses were asleep and Reason as to its present operation was bound up with them 2. In a Vision the whole was supernatural without any humane predisposition or concurrence as the Scripture-phrase doth shew as St. John was said to be carried in the spirit into the wilderness and a Trance is said to fall upon St. Peter But to dream is a natural Motion of the Spirits and Disposition of Body which the Spirit of God or an Angel the usual Minister employ'd in such conveyances made use of both as the Mind was then in a state of repose and by the rest of the Body relaxed from the business of the day and also as what was suggested in that way made a stronger impression upon the Mind when not diverted by outward objects and occasions and that there was a cessation from all external and sensible operations For it seemed necessary naturally speaking that in all Revelations there should be a sedate disposition of Mind and an abstraction from all other Conceptions and therefore it was either sound so as in Dreams or made so by some Angelical and Divine Operation as in a Vision or Trance In both the Senses were therefore bound up but in a Vision by a supernatural Agency in Sleep or Dreams by the meer effect of Nature And if it be asked How then is there a Revelation by Dream when Revelation is supernatural and a Dream natural I answer Though it be as natural to dream as to sleep and a Dream is a Consequent if not a constant Concomitant of Sleep yet in this case which we are speaking of the Revelation or Dream was supernatural As to think or speak is natural to man but so to think or speak as is above the capacity of the Agent and what he of himself could never have thought or spoken shews that he is not so much an Agent as a Recipient and the Instrument made use of in the conveyance Thus it was no more natural for Balaam several Ages before to foretel what the children of Israel should do to the Moabites in the latter days than it was for his Ass to speak So to dream is natural but to dream of such things then in doing or of such things to come as are altogether independent on the Body nor by any methods of Nature or presumptive Art to be known or foreseen is supernatural Thus to dream was natural to Pharaoh as to others and his Dream of the Seven fat and lean Kine might have pass'd for the fruit of a nocturnal Imagination but by a Dream to be made understand that there should be successively Seven years of great Plenty and then Seven years of Famine could proceed only from a Divine Revelation And this will further appear in the process of this Discourse when I am to consider the difference between what is Natural and what is Divine c. 4. Another