bond of peace Peace in Hebrew is the same with Persection The word signifieth the Harmony of things mutually answering each other in fit and full proportions In Greek peace signifieth the harmonious Union of things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 peace from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to knit or joyn together Without Union without Order and Harmony in the Union Many things can never become One there can be no Beauty to the Eye no Musick to the Ear no Life no Light of Sense or Understanding no Form of things no Peace no Perfection no Power no Pleasantness no Person Without an undivided Unity where all meet in one which is One the same undivided in All there can be no Union no Order no Harmony The eternal Spirit is the first and supream Unity Intellectual Spirits next to this Spirit are Similitudes and Births of it Substantial undivided Unities the Springs the Seats of the universal the supream the incorporeal Beauties Musicks Perfection Order Harmony through the Creation the only Persons the bonds of all Union Order Harmony Peace Perfection Beauty Life Loveliness Virtue Joy Power Personality in all Bodies in all Corporeal Forms By one Spirit saith that Spirit we are all baptized into one Body In spirituality by meeting together undividedly in the Unity of the eternal Spirit which is undividedly one and the same in all by which all are one and the same in every one All the Saints become one heavenly Body This Unity of the Spirit springing up into every one as a Divine and compleat Image of it self having thus the Whole the Image the Life the Spirit of the whole in it self is the bond of their fellow-membership This is the ground and spring of their Sympathy of all their Motions by which in a Divine Love and Harmony they exactly accord with each other We have the shadowy figure of this mystery in natural things How inexplicable is motion in Bodies without the understanding of this Unity What shall excite Motion in any Corporeal Subject Accidents Virtues Qualities pass not from one Corporeal Substance to another They are essentially inseparable from their Individual Subjects Corporeal Substances are impenetrable each to other and so cannot operate immediately one upon another In what order shall Motion be advanced if it be excited Shall the part immediately touched move first How can it until that part next before it give place to it Upon what account shall this before move until that behind it on which the impression is first made thrust it forward How Beautiful how Harmonious how Easie is all If an Intellectual Spirit containing the whole Body the whole Corporeal frame in an undivided Unity being undividedly entirely one and the same through the whole Body and in each part immediately at once by it self Act all the parts in a mutual exact Correspondency to each other like persons in a figure-Dance All is now it self in so many shadowy figures of more substantial and sublimer Variety in the Unity and Harmony of its own Essence This is a clear reason for that Sympathy by which all the parts most remote of the same Body have a present sense of are acted and moved together with all the essential acts and motions of each other They are all by one Spirit baptized into one Body They all are comprehended together in the undivided Unity of the same Spirit So they mutually penetrate possess each other in One as One in the Fountain of their Being Life and Motion the same Spirit This Spirit is each Intellectual Soul to its own Body Let us sum up this whole Argument into a brief and clear conclusion The Intellectual Soul in the perfection of its natural form understands compares judges not only particular Beauties and Harmonies but the Beauty and Harmony of the whole Universe the Universal Truth and Goodness All particular Beauties and Harmonies all Agreements and Disagreements Strifes Friendships all forms and parts as they make up the Beauty of the Universe Then all forms of things in all their Similitudes and Differences Conformities and Contrarieties in all their Essences and Accidents in all their several distinct Proportions and order in their Beauties and Harmonies with all the Parts and Elements which compose these as they make up the universal Harmony and Beauty meet together clearly compleatly in the undivided Unity of the Souls Essence Thus also this Soul contains within it self its own Body its Image and Organ in all the forms parts and proportions of it Neither doth it so comprehend this alone but the universal Body as it relates to its own particular Body as it stands in the senses of this Body like Images in a Glass Here in this Unity is the Corporeal Image as in a Divine Mould formed in all its parts and proportions to answer to their Original in the Soul and to each other for here only are they seen together to be compared and judged from hence they come forth by this Unity they consist in their Union are acted every moment unto motions corresponding with each other and to a Sympathy for one Spirit springs up through the whole Body as it self descended into a shadowy figure of it self and abiding ever with it self within the Unity of its own Essence The most eminent Character of the eternal Spirit is its Unity Hear O Israel the Lord thy God is one God How glorious an Image of God in this Character of the Divine Glory is man in the perfection of his natural form What is the amplitude the majesty of this Divine Unity in which the whole Creation with all its beauties and fulness appear together at once in One as upon its Throne Thus I hope I have from common sense and principles universally received made plain in some imperfect degree this indivisible Unity of the Intellectual Soul in man 2. Propos. The Humane Soul is an indivisible Unity containing in it self all Variety of forms The Argument before taken from the Operations of the Soul in knowing and judging things to explain its Unity declares also this Variety in its Unity The Soul hath naturally a desire and power or potentiality of knowing all things especially the Harmony of things which is the Intellectual Beauty The Harmony in no part can be understood without the knowledge of the whole If the Soul then in the primitive and pure state of the Creation did actually enjoy it self in the perfection of its natural form and faculties it contained within it self in the Unity of its Essence all Variety of things in all their Distinctions Differences and Divisions Originals and Copies Causes and Effects Substances and Circumstances or Accidents Essenceâ—… and Operations The power or potentiality in the Soul of Man is not Passive but Active It is a pure Act free from the passiveness which is the consequent of corporeal or bodily matter The Intellectual Spirit having alwayes in it self the judgment of all things in the potentiality or power of it which either is its
principal parts of the Divine Work to which all the other parts serve The great and Ultimate ends of these intellectual Spirits unexpressible eternal joys or miseries hang all upon a meer contingency upon the motion of the Will which hath no place no part in the Divine Design which receives no form no measure from any model in the Workman or any part of the work Thus are the great consequences the great ends of the work in the great the principal parts and passages of it altogether undetermined and uncertain in the nature of the work and in the continuance of the Worker 2. Answ. Doth not this seem much rather a reflection upon than an exaltation of the Divine Goodness Justice and Wisdom that the righteousness and wickedness of intellâ—…ctual Creatures the highest good and evil in the whole work the eternal blessedness and misery of its own so great so glorious Births and Images should be of so little moment to the Divine Nature to the Divine Goodness Justice and Wisdom that they should be left entirely out of the Divine contrivance and conduct without the compass of all reason and proportion to an uncertainty an indeterminateness of which no account can be given as effects of the blindest chance which was ever entertained into the most blind and confused imagination of the most vulgar Spirits But this subject of the Divine Goodness and Justice and the Argument taken from them to justifie this freedom of the Will belongs properly to the second Book where the Reader may meet with a large discourse upon it I shall therefore thus lightly pass over it here 3. Answ. The inconsistency of the setting up intellectual Spirits in this freedome by the Divine Power and Wisdom with the very essences of all Power and wisdom with the whole nature of things created or uncreated will also find its proper place in other following Arguments which is therefore only toucht here 4. Argument Next to the Wisdom of God the Power of God seemeth to furnish a fourth Argument against this Liberty of the Will We have it proclaim'd from Heaven by the mouth of God Himself That Power belongeth to God God hath spoken once twice have I heard this That Power belongeth unto God Psal. 62. 11. Joseph saith to Pharaoh That his dream was repeated to declare the certainty of it A Repetition also is design'd to express the weight and consequence of that Truth which is twice over affirmed No Truth hath a clearer certainty or beareth a greater weight upon it in the whole nature of things than this That Power belongeth to God Jesus Christ who is the only true God is said by the word of his Power to uphold all things to bring forth and to bear up all things as the Greek word manifestly and commonly signifies This alone bringeth forth all things all spirits This alone beareth upon its bosome all its own Births as a root the plant with all its fruit Here only in the sense of this truth with an immediate repose upon it do all things all hearts find rest Power is here by the Psalmist expressed absolutely unlimited in the abstract all Power is Gods and of Him So the Hebrew phrase imports God is the first Seat and Spring of all Power in every kind All Power supernatural natural civil moral All Power in every State undetermined determined All Power in every degree the Power of acting the Power in act hath its first seat in God and cometh down from Him There is a three-fold Power 1. An Active Power 2. A Passive Power 3. A Power in Act. 1. The Power of Acting which as it belongeth to the forms of things which are either Spirits or spiritual so it self is a Spirit or a spiritual form This is defin'd to be a principle of Acting This is it self an eminent and universal Act or active form like a Spring containing and sending forth from it self variety of Acts or forms as a Spring doth streams This Power is more excellent than the Act which is produced by it 2. The Passive Power is that of matter which as an obscute shade comprehending or hiding variety of Acts or forms in it like Plants obscured and contracted there like Plants in their seeds in the Earth or the Intellectual and sensitive Soul with all its treasure of Intellectual of sensitive forms in a sleeping Body This Power is inferior to the Act which when it is brought forth is the exaltation of this Passive Power to an higher degree of Being it is indeed as a spiritual Act or form encompast with obscured within its own shade As the Sun calleth up the Plants out of their seeds and beds in the dust so the Spirit it self the Spiritual Act or form shining forth from the Active Power upon this shade of matter and of the Passive Power awakeneth it into a beautiful form 3. Power in Act. All Power purely Active is ever in Act. Such Power is alwayes abstracted from matter and a spiritual essence or form eminent above all things in matter an universal comprehending variety of Acts or spiritual forms in it self Every Active Power in matter is compounded being partly Active and partly Passive This Power is never brought into Act but as it is excited and awakened from without by its Object from above by power abstractive and purely active shedding its beams upon it Thus in the Schools they distinguish between the Active Understanding in man separated from matter in its operations and the Passive which ever worketh in Conjunction with the material and imaginative faculty like the Moon having some obscure light in it self but depending upon the illuminations of the Active Understanding as its Sun Power and Act are distinguished not as two several Beings but as the same Being in several states modifications or degrees of Being When Power as it is a spiritual and universal Act comprehending all its own Acts formally and eminently in it self being all at once in Act within it self brings forth it self into any particular or single Act in matter This is the same Power contracted and so in a less degree of perfection When a Passive Power in matter springs up into Act This Act is the perfection of the Power The Power and the Act here are the same form sleeping and awakened in the seed and in the flower All Power is Gods As he is the most pure perfect and universal Spirit so is Power in Him the most pure perfect and most universal Act. God gives this Testimony of Himself I am Alpha and Omega The beginning and the ending saith the Lord Which is and which was and which is to come The Almighty Rev. 1. 8. As the Power of God comprehendeth all Powers most eminently and most actually in â—…imself so all Powers in Him are ever most perfectly in Act being themselves pure Acts God is said to work all things after the counsel of his own will Eph. 1. 11. Power is the principle of Activity The Will is
Contexture of Beams living in and springing immediately freshly every moment from this entire Person which is all one most clear and lively Face of the most compleat and Original Beauty The Divine Person is not hid but shown by this Garment Mi Jesu pelluces Our Jesus shines all clearly thorow it far more clearly than a beautiful Person swimming all naked in a clear stream or the richest Diamond in a Case of purest Christal The Person here the Divine Sun is at once the eminent Head of all the Beams shining above them the vigorous Root of all the Beams springing up in them the pleasant and glorious flower flourishing forth from the end of every Beam the full Glory filling with it self each part of the Beam and every where in every Beam presenting it self entirely to every eye All the Beams in One are one entire Image of this Sun Every distinct Beam a distinct Birth and Figure of a distinct Ideal Light and Glory in this Sun Yet is the Sun in that full compass of all its Glories seen by every eye in every Beam For so is this Divine Sun the essential Idea of the Godhead the same one undivided entire full in all the Ideas in all the Original Forms and Patterns of each Creature The Beams here are Daughters Sisters and Brides to the Sun They flow forth immediately from it They stand upon the same root of the Divine Nature and Personality God is the only Person in this Jesus Both are cloathed with the same Image Both by mutual embraces lie in the bosoms of each other wrapt up together in the same Joys and Glories Yet are the Beams and created Beauties in this Mediatory Image not only distinct as the Ideas in the Godhead where the most perfect Distinction is married to the most absolute Unity with a most exact equality But all the Forms of created Glory here have besides a distinction from their Sun the Divine Glory and from each other a diversity also an inequality a subordination in an hypostatical or personal Unity But I now anticipate my self This will have a more proper place in the following Character of our Jesus in his Mediatory Kingdom 4. Christ here in his created Nature is a Spirit a great and universal Spirit comprehending the whole Creation eminently in himself before it have a subsistence in it self The whole Creation is here in greater majesty in greater clearness and glory than in it self when it is freshest and fairest It is the very Iustre and effulgency of the Godhead it self all transparent the Divine Essence at once shining thorow it filling it cloathing and comprehending it as a Temple founded upon it self framed by it self of its own most immediate Light and clearest brightness The King's Daughter is said to be all glorious within and her Garments of wrought Gold Psal. 45. The first Marriage is that of the most High and holy Trinity to which eternity it self is the Marriage-day celebrated with Joys and Glories transcending all measures or bounds The Father and the Son are here mutually the Bridegroom and the Bride while both are in both the Father in the Son the Son in the Father the Love-Spring in its lovely and beautiful Image the Lovely-Image the first and highest Beauty in its Love-spring the first the sweetest the fruitfullest Love and Fountain of Loves The Holy Spirit the conspiration of both these in One is their Marriage-band and Marriage-bed where they preserve entire their Unity and their Distinction in a most blissful Union to make their Loves and Joys more full From this Marriage-bed doth flow the God-like Race of Divine Ideas surmounting all numbers and natures of things The second Marriage is in this Middle-Glory between the Uncreated and created Beauty joyned together in one Divine eternal Person and Spirit The Divine Nature is here the King and the Bridegroom this created Spirit is the Kings Daughter his Queen and his Bride This Queen is described to be all glorious within and to have her Garment of wrought Gold The Hebrew word within signifieth properly in her Person in her naked Face which are within all her Garments and Vails Her God her Bridegroom Jesus in his essential Image her eternal Idea is her Person her Face her internal Form Thus is she all glorious within For the Lamb himself her Bridegroom is her Glory The Glory of the Lord himself in his eternal Splendors enlightneth all within This Queens Garment is all of wrought Gold The word Wrought signifieth properly a work of Eyes set all over the Garment So Dr. Hammond expoundeth it Her Garment was all over set with round Oes like so many Eyes or Suns wrought in Gold The created form of this Spirit being the pure lustre of the eternal Sun the Divine Essence is the Queen's Garment The numberless Ideas of the Divine Nature in each of which the Godhead it self is entire in its Sacred Unity comprehending all its Ideas or Variety in a Variety entirely thorowout infinitely fresh and new form in this Garment secondary Ideas their own most immediate fairest and fullest Effulgencies or Life-Pictures In every one of these is this Queen also according to the Original Patterns in her Father King and Bridegroom compleat with all the full Glories of her Person and equally distinct in a new Variety of all her Glories as a new Queen a new Person a distinct Spirit These are the Divine Suns and Eyes in the Garment of this Queen in which the eternal Eyes and Suns shining in the Divine Essence look forth as thorow Casements of pure living and immortal Christal Each Form each distinction of every kind in the Creation here below is such an eye such a Sun wrought in Gold such a Spirit of incorruptible Glory such a Bride and Queen to the eternal King Every one in particular is a spiritual and heavenly Member all together make up the spiritual and heavenly Body of our Jesus in this Personal Kingdom of his where he in his own Person is a Kingdom to himself containing the Creator with the Creation in all their Amplitudes and Varieties married together into one Person Spirit and Glory which is to it self Bride-groom Bride Ofspring and All. See if this be not that heavenly Hierusalem the Hierusalem above which is indeed free in the spacious embraces and unlimited Amplitudes of the Godhead which at the same time is by the inviolable sweetness of a sweetly-invincible necessity the eternal Law of supream Love confined to these embraces in which she becometh the glorious Virgin-Mother of us all Is not this the Hierusalem whose heavenly transparencies whose Divine lustre whose unstain'd incorruptible Beauties and Virtues are figured by Gold Pearls precious Stones and Glass Glass of Christal Is not this that Bride of the Lamb which cometh down from God out of the Heaven of the essential Image of the Godhead as out of the Bosom of her Father and Bridegroom with this Character in which the perfection of Beauty and