Body Eternally conjoyned with it which it may always Enliven And for these Causes do they affirm the Soul always to have a Luciform Body Which Lucid and Etherial Body of the Soul is a thing often mentioned by other Writers also as Proclus in his Commentary upon the Timaeus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Humane Soul hath also saith he such an Ethereal Vehicle belonging to it as Plato himself intimâ—tâ—s when he affirmeth the Demiurgus at first to have placed it in a Chariot For of necâ—ssity every Soul before this Mortal Body must have an Eternal and easily Moveable Body it being Essential to it to move And elsewhere the same Proclus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whilst we remain above we have no need of these Divided Organs which now we have descending into Generation but the Vniform Lucid or Splendid Vehicle is sufficient this having all Senses Vnited together in it Which Doctrine of the Vnorganized Luciform and Spirituous Vehicles seems to have been derived from Plato he in his Epinomis writing thus concerning a Good and Wise man after Death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of whom whether I be in Jest or Earnest I constantly affirm that when dying he shall yield to Fate he shall no longer have this Variety of Senses which now we have but One Vniform Body and live a happy Life Moreover Hiâ—rocles much insisteth upon this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this Luciform and Ethereal Body 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which also saith he the Oracles call the Thin and Subtle Vehicle or Chariot of the Soul he meaning doubtless by these Oracles the Magical or Chaldaick Oracles before mentioned And amongst those now Extant under that Title there seems to be a clear acknowledgment of these Two Vehicula of the Soul or Interiour Induments thereof the Spirituous and the Luciform Body the latter of which is there Enigmatically called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a Plain Superficies in these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Take care not to Defile or Contaminate the Spirit nor to make the Plain Superficies Deep For thus Psellus glosseth upon that Oracle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Chaldaick Philosophers bestow upon the Soul Two Interiour Tunicles or Vestments the one of which they called Pneumatical or the Spirituous Body which is weaved out as it were to it and compounded of the Gross Sensible Body it being the more Thin and Subtle part thereof the other the Luciform Vestment of the Soul Pure and Pellucide and this is that which is here called the Plain Superficies Which saith Pletho is not so to be understood as if it had not Three Dimensions for as much as it is a Body also but only to denote the Subtlety and Tenuity thereof Wherefore when the aforesaid Hierocles also calls this Luciform and Etherial Body 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Spiritual Vehicle of the Rational Soul he takes not the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that Sense wherein it is used by Philoponus and Others as if he intended to confound this Etherial Body with that other Spirituous or Airy Body and to make but one of them but rather styles it Spiritual in a higher Sense and which cometh near to that of the Scripture as being a Body more Suitable and Cognate with that Highest and Divinest Part of the Soul Mind or Reason then the other Terrestial Body is which upon that account is called also by the same Hierocles as well as it is by St. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Animal or Natural Body So that this Spiritual Body of Hierocles is not the Airy but the Etherial Body and the same with Synesius his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His Divine Body And that this Distinction of two Interior Vehicles or Tunicles of the Soul besides that Outer Vestment of the Terrestial Body styled in Plato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Crustaceous or Ostrâ—aceous Body is not a meer Figment of the latter Platonists since Christianity but a Tradition derived down from Antiquity appeareth plainly from Virgil in his Sixth Aenead where though not commonly understood he writeth first of the Spirituous or Airy Body in which Unpurged Souls receive Punishment after Death thus Quin Supremo cum Lumine Vita reliquit Non tamen omne Malum miseris nec funditus omnes Corporeae excedunt pestes penitusque necesse est Multa diu concreta modis inolescere miris Ergo exercentur poenis veterumque malorum Supplicia expendunt aliae panduntur inanes Suspensae ad Ventos aliis sub gurgite Vasto Infectum eluitur Scelus aut exuritur Igni And then again of the other Pure Ethereal and Fiery Body in this manner Donec Longa dies perfecto temporis Orbe Concretam exemit labem Purumque reliquit Aethereum Sensum atque Aurai Simplicis Ignem Now as it was before observed that the Ancient Asserters of the Souls Immortality supposing it to have besides this Terrestial Body another Spirituous or Airy Body conceived this not only to accompany the Soul after Death but also to hang about it here in this Life as its Interiour Vest or Tunicle they probably meaning hereby the same with that which is commonly called the Animal Spirits diffused from the Brain by the Nerves throughout this whole Body in like manner is it certain that Many of them supposing the Soul besides those Two forementioned to have yet a Third Luciform or Etherial Body conceived this in like manner to adhere to it even in this Mortal Life too as its Inmost Clothing or Tunicle yet so as that they acknowledged the Force thereof to be very much weakned and abâ—ted and its Splendour altogether obscured by the Heavy Weight and Gross Steams or Vapours of the Terrestial Body Thus Suidas â—poâ— the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tells us out of Isidore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That according to some Philosophers the Soul hath a certain Luciform Vehicle called also Star or Sun-like and Eternal which Luciform Body is now shut up within this Terrestrial Body as a Light in a dark Lanthorn it being supposed by some of them to be included within the Head c. With which agreeth Hierocles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Splendid or Luciform Body lieth in this Mortal Body of ours continually Inspiring it with Life and containing the Harmony thereof The ground of which opinion was because these Philosophers generally conceived the Humane Soul to have Pre-Existed before it came into this Earthly Body and that either from Eternity or else from the First beginning of the World's Creation and being never without a Body and then in a Perfect State to have had a Lucid and Etherial Body either Co-Eternal or Co-Eve with it though in order of Nature Junior to it as its Chariot or Vehicle which being Incorruptible did always inseparably adhere to the Soul in its After Lapses and Descents into an Aerial first and then a Terrestrial Body this being as it were the Vinculum of Union betwixt the Soul
Incorruption Which Place being undoubtedly not to be Allegorized it may be from thence inferred that the Happy Resurrection-Body shall not be this Foul and Gross Body of ours only Varnished and Guilded over on the outside of it it remaining still Nasty Sluttish and Ruinous within and having all the same Seeds of Corruption and Mortality in its Nature which it had before though by perpetual Miracle kept off it being as it were by Violence defended from being Seised upon and devoured by the Jaws of Death but that it shall be so Inwardly changed in its Nature as that the Possessers thereof Cannot die any more But all this which hath been said of the Resurrection-Body is not so to be understood as if it belonged Vniversally to all that shall be Raised up at the last day or made to appear upon the Earth as in their own Persons at that Great and General Assizes That they shall have all alike wicked as well as Good such Glorious Spiritual and Celestial Bodies but it is only a Description of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Resurrection of Life which is Emphatically called also by our Saviour Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Resurrection from the dead or to a Happy Immortality as they who shall be thought worthy thereof are likewise Styled by him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Children of the Resurrection Of which Resurrection only it is that S. Paul treateth in that Fifteenth Chapter of his to the Corinthians And we say that this Christian Resurrection of Life is the Vesting and Setling of the Souls of Good men in their Glorious Spiritual Heavenly and Immortal Bodies The Complete Happiness of a man and all the Good that can be desired by him Was by the Heathen Poet thus Summed up Vt sit Mens Sana in Corpore Sano That there be a Sound Mind in a Sound Body and the Christian Happiness seems to be all comprized in these Two Things First in being Inwardly Regenerated and Renewed in the Spirit of their Mind Cleansed from all Pollution of Flesh and Spirit and made partakers of the Divine Life and Nature and then Secondly in being Outwardly Clothed with Glorious Spiritual Celestial and Incorruptible Bodies The Scripture plainly declareth that our Souls are not at Home here in this Terrestrial Body and These Earthly Mansions but that they are Strangers and Pilgrims there in it which the Patriarchs also confessing plainly declared that they Sought a Country not that which they came out from but a Heavenly one From which passages of Scripture some indeed would infer that Souls being at first Created by God Pure Pre-Existed before this their Terrene Nativity in Celestial Bodies but afterwards stragled and wandered down hither as Philo for one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Our Soul saith he having left its Heavenly Mansion came down into this Earthly Body as a strange place But thus much is certain that Our Humane Souls were at first intended and designed by God Almighty the Maker of them for other Bodies and other Regions as their proper Home and Country and their Eternal Resting Place however to us that be not First which is Spiritual but that which is Natural and afterwards that which is Spiritual Now though some from that of St. Paul where he calls this Happy Resurrection-Body 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That house of ours that is from Heaven or which cometh out of Heaven would infer that therefore it will not be taken out of Graves and Charnel Houses they conceiving also that the Individuation and Sameness of mens Persons does not necessarily depend upon the Numerical Identity of all the Parts of Matter because we never continue thus the Same our Bodies always flowing like a River and passing away by Insensible Transpiration and it is certain that we have not all the same Numerical Matter and neither more nor less both in Infancy and in Old Age though we be for all that the self Same Persons yet nevertheless according to the best Philosophy which acknowledges no Essential or Specifical Difference of Matter the Foulest and Grossest Body that is meerly by Motion may not only be Chrystallized but also brought into the Purity and Tenuity of the Finest Ether And undoubtedly that Same Numerical Body of our Saviour Christ which lay in the Sepulchre was after his Resurrection thus Transformed into a Spiritual and Heavenly Body the Subtlety and Tenuity whereof appeared from his entring in when the doors were shut and his vanishing out of sight however its Glory were for the time suspended partly for the better convincing his Disciples of the Truth of his Resurrection and partly because they were not then able to bear the Splendor of it We conclude therefore that the Christian Mystery of the Resurrection of Life consisteth not in the Souls being reunited to these Vile Rags of Mortality these Gross Bodies of ours such as now they are but in having them Changed into the Likeness of Christ's Glorious Body and in this Mortal's putting on Immortality Hitherto have we seen the Agreement that is betwixt Christianity and the Old Philosophick Cabbala concerning the Soul in these Two Things First That the highest Happiness and Perfection of the Humane Soul consisteth not in a State of Pure Separation from all Body and Secondly that it does not consist neither in an Eternal Vnion with such Gross Terrestrial Bodies as these Unchanged the Soul being not at Home but a Stranger and Pilgrim in them and Oppressed with the Load of them but that at last the Souls of Good men shall arrive at Glorious Spiritual Heavenly and Immortal Bodies But now as to that Point Whether Humane Souls be always United to some Body or other and consequently when by Death they put off this Gross Terrestrial Body they are not thereby quite Devested and Strip'd Naked of all Body but have a Certain Subtle and Spirituous Body still adhering to them and accompanying them Or else Whether all Souls that have departed out of this Life from the very beginning of the World have ever since continued in a State of Separation from all Body and shall so continue forwards till the Day of Judgment or General Resurrection We must confess that this is a thing not so explicitely Determined or expresly Decided in Christianity either way Nevertheless it is First of all certain from Scripture That Souls Departed out of these Terrestial Bodies are therefore neither Dead nor Asleep till the Last Trump and General Resurrection but still Alive and Awake our Saviour Christ affirming That they all Live unto God the meaning whereof seems to be this that they who are said to be Dead are Dead only unto Men here upon Earth but neither Dead unto themselves nor yet unto God their Life being not Extinct but only Disappearing to us and withdrawn from our sight for as much as they are gone off this Stage which we still continue to act upon And thus is it said also of our Saviour Christ himself
Act alone without Vital Union with any Body If Natural to the Soul to Enliven a Body then not probable that it should be kept so long in an Unnatural State of Separation Page 799 800 Again Probable from Scripture That wicked Souls after Death have Punishment of Sense or Pain besides Remorse of Conscience which not easily Conceivable How they should have without Bodies Thus Tertullian He adding That Men have the same Shape or Effigies after this Life which they had here Though indeed he drive the business too far so as to make the Soul it self to be a Body Figurate and Colourate Page 800 801 But Irenaeus plainly supposed the Soul after Death being Incorporeal to be Adapted to a Body such as has the same Character and Figure with its Body here in this Life Page 801 802 Origen also of this Perswasion That Souls after Death have certain Subtile Bodies retaining the same Characterizing Form which their Terrestrial Bodies had His Opinion That Apparitions of the Dead are from the Souls themselves surviving in that which is called a Luciform Body As also that Saint Thomas did not doubt but that the Body of a Soul departed might appear every way like the Former onely be disbelieved our Saviour's appearing in the Same Solid Body which he had before Death Page 802 804 Our Saviour telling his Disciples That a Spirit had no Flesh and Bones that is no Solid Body as himself then had seems to Imply them to have Thinner Bodies which they may Visibly Appear in Thus in Apollonius is Touch made the Sign to distinguish a Ghost Appearing from a Living Man Our Saviour's Body after his Resurrection according to Origen in a Middle State betwixt This Gross or Solid Body of ours and That of a Ghost Page 804 A place of Scripture which as interpreted by the Fathers would Naturally Imply the Soul of our Saviour after Death not to have been quite Naked of all Body but to have had a Corporeal Spirit Moses and Elias Visibly appearing to our Saviour had therefore True Bodies Page 804 805 That the Regenerate here in this Life have a certain Earnest of their Future Inheritance which is their Spiritual or Heavenly Body Gathered from Scripture by Irenaeus and Novatian Which Praelibations of the Spiritual Body cannot so well consist with a Perfect Separation from all Body after Death till the Day of Judgement Page 805 806 This Opinion of Irenaeus Origen and others supposed by them not at all to Clash with the Christian Article of the Resurrection Nothing in this Point determined by us Page 806 The Last thing in the Pythagorick Cabbala That Daemons or Angels and indeed all Created Understanding Beings consist as well as Men of Soul and Body Incorporeal and Corporeal Vnited together Thus Hierocles Vniversally of all the Rational Nature and that no Incorporeal Substance besides the Supreme Deity is Compleat without the Conjunction of a Body God the Onely Incorporeal in this Sense and not a Mundane but Supra-Mundane Soul Page 806 808 Origen's full Agreement with this Old Pythagorick Cabbala That Rational Creatures are neither Body nor yet without Body but Incorporeal Substances having a Corporeal Indument Page 808 809 Origen misrepresented by Huetius as asserting Angels not to Have Bodies but to Be Bodies whereas he plainly acknowledged the Humane Soul to be Incorporeal and Angels also to have Souls He proveth Incorporeal Creatures from the Scriptures which though themselves not Bodies yet always Use Bodies Whereas the Deity is neither Body nor yet clothed with a Body as the Proper Soul thereof Page 809 810 Some of the Fathers so far from supposing Angels altogether Incorporeal that they ran into the other Extream and concluded them altogether Corporeal that is to be All Body and Nothing else The Middle betwixt both these the Origenick and Phythagorick Hypothesis That they consist of Incorporeal and Corporeal Substance Soul and Body Joyned together The Generality of the Ancient Fathers for neither of those Extreams That they did not suppose Angels to be perfectly Unbodied Spirits Evident from their affirming Devils as the Greek Philosophers did Demons to be Delighted with the Nidours of Sacrifices as having their Vapourous Bodies or Airy Vehicles refreshed thereby Thus Porphyrius and before him Celsus Amongst the Christians besides Origen Justin Athenagoras Tatianus c. S. Basil concerning the Bodies of Demons or Devils being Nourished with Vapours not by Organs but throughout their whole Substance Page 810 812 Several of the Fathers plainly asserting both Devils and Angels to consist of Soul and Body Incorporeal and Corporeal Substance Joyned together Saint Austine Claudianus Mamertus Fulgentius Joannes Thessalonicensis and Psellus who Philosophizeth much concerning this Page 812 814 That some of the Ancients when they called Angels Incorporeal understood Nothing else thereby but onely that they had not Grosse but Subtile Bodies Page 814 815 The Fathers though herein Happening to Agree with the Philosophick Cabbala yet seemed to have been led thereunto by Scripture As from that of our Saviour They who shall obtain the Resurrection of the Dead shall be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Equal to the Angels that is according to Saint Austine shall have Angelical Bodies From that of Saint Jude That Angels Sinning lost their Own Proper Dwelling-House that is their Heavenly Body called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Saint Paul which made them Fit Inhabitants of the Heavenly Regions and thereupon Cast down into the Lower Tartarus interpreted by Saint Austine to be this Caliginous Air or Atmo-Sphear of the Earth Again From that Fire said to have been Prepared for the Devils which being not to be taken Metaphorically therefore as Psellus concludeth Implies them to be Bodied because an Incorporeal Substance alone and not Vitally Vnited to any Body cannot be Tormented with Fire Page 815 817 Now if all Created Incorporeals Superiour to Men be Souls vitally Vnited to Bodies and never quite Separate from all Body then Probable that Humane Souls after Death not quite Naked from all Body as if they could Live and Act compleatly without it a Priviledge Superiour to that of Angels and proper to the Deity Nor is it at all Conceivable How Imperfect Beings could have Sense and Imagination without Bodies Origen Contra Celsum Our Soul in its own Nature Incorporeal alwaies Standeth in need of a Body suitable to the place wherein it is And accordingly Sometimes Putteth Off what it had before and Sometimes again Putteth On something New Where the following words being vitiated Origen's Genuine Sense restored Evident that Origen distinguisheth the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in S. Paul Translated Tabernacle from the Earthly House he understanding by the former a Thin Spirituous Body which is a Middle betwixt the Earthly and the Heavenly and which the Soul remaineth still clothed with after Death This Opinion of Origen's That the Soul after Death not quite Separate from all Body never reckoned up in the Catalogue of his Errours Origen not Taxed
the Tradition of their Ancestors concerning the Cosmogonia But the Egyptians however they attributed more Antiquity to the World than they ought yet seem to have had a constant Perswasion of the Beginning of it and the Firmest of all other Nations they as Kircher tells us therefore picturing Horus or the World as a Young man Beardless not only to signifie its constant youthful and flourishing Vigour but also the Youngness and Newness of its Duration Neither ought it to be suspected that though the Egyptians held the World to have had a Beginning yet they conceived it to be made by Chance without a God as Anaximander Democritus and Epicurus afterwards did the contrary thereunto being so Confessed a Thing that Simplicius a zealous Contender for the Worlds Eternity affirms the Mosaick History of its Creation by God to have been nothing else but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Egyptian Fables The Place is so considerable that I shall here set it down in the Authors own Language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If Grammaticus here mean the Lawgiver of the Jews writing thus In the beginning God made Heaven and Earth and the Earth was invisible and unadorned and Darkness was upon the Deep and the Spirit of God moved upon the Water and then afterward when he had made Light and separated the Light from the Darkness adding And God called the Light Day and the Darkness Night and the Evening and the Morning were the First Day I say if Grammaticus think this to have been the First Generation and Beginning of Time I would have him to know that all this is but a Fabulous Tradition and wholly drawn from Egyptian Fables As for the Philosophy of the Egyptians That besides their Physiology and the Pure and Mix'd Mathematicks Arithmetick Geometry and Astronomy they had another higher kind of Philosophy also concerning Incorporeal Substances appears from hence because they were the first Asserters of the Immortality of Souls their Preexistence and Transmigration from whence their Incorporeity is necessarily inferred Thus Herodotus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Egyptians were the first Asserters of the Souls Immortality and of its Transmigration after the Death and Corruption of this Body into the Bodies of other Animals successively viz. until it have run round through the whole Circuit of Terrestrial Marine and Volatile Animals after which they say it is to return again into a Humane Body they supposing this Revolution or Apocatastasis of Souls to be made in no less space than that of Three Thousand years But whether Herodotus were rightly Catechized and instructed in the Egyptian Doctrine as to this particular or no may very well be questioned because the Pythagoreans whom he there tacitly reprehends for arrogating the first Invention of this to themselves when they had borrowed it from the Egyptians did represent it otherwise namely That the Descent of Humane Souls into these Earthy Bodies was first in way of Punishment and that their sinking lower afterwards into the Bodies of Brutes was only to some a further Punishment for their further Degeneracy but the Vertuous and Pious Souls should after this Life enjoy a state of Happiness in Celestial or Spiritual Bodies And the Egyptian Doctrine is represented after the same manner by Porphyrius in Stobaeus as also in the Hermetick or Tristmegistick Writings Moreover Chalcidius reports that Hermes Trismegist when he was about to die made an Oration to this purpose That he had here lived in this Earthly Body but an Exile and Stranger and was now returning home to his own Country so that his Death ought not to be lamented this Life being rather to be accompted Death Which Perswasion the Indian Brachmans also were embued withal whether they received it from the Egyptians as they did some other things or no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That this Life here is but the Life of Embryo's and that Death to good men is a Generation or Birth into true life And this may the better be believed to have been the Egyptian Doctrine because Diodorus himself hath some Passages sounding that way as that the Egyptians lamented not the Death of Good men but applauded their Happiness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as being to live ever in the other World with the pious However it being certain from this Egyptian Doctrine of Preexistence and Transmigration that the Egyptians did assert the Souls Incorporeity it cannot reasonably be doubted but that they acknowledged also an Incorporeal Deity The Objection against which from what Porphyrius writeth concerning Chaeremon will be answered afterwards We come in the last place to the Theology of the Egyptians Now it is certain that the Egyptians besides their Vulgar and Fabulous Theology which is for the most part that which Diodorus S. describes had another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arcane and Recondite Theology that was concealed from the Vulgar and communicated only to the Kings and such Priestsand others as were thought capable thereof These Two Theologies of theirs differing as Aristotle's Exotericks and Acroamaticks Thus much is plainly declared by Origen whose very name was Egyptian it being interpreted Horo-genitus which Horus was an Egyptian God upon occasion of Celsus his boasting that he thoroughly understood all that belonged to Christianity Celsus saith he seemeth here to me to do just as if a man travelling into Egypt where the Wise men of the Egyptians according to their Country-Learning Philosophize much about those things that are accounted by them Divine whilst the Idiots in the mean time hearing only certain Fables which they know not the meaning of are very much pleased therewith Celsus I say doth as if such a Sojourner in Egypt who had conversed only with those Idiots and not been at all instructed by any of the Priests in their Arcane and Recondite Mysteries should boast that he knew all that belonged to the Egyptian Theologie Where the same Origen also adds that this was not a thing proper neither to the Egyptians only to have such an Arcane and True Theology distinct from their Vulgar and Fabulous one but common with them to the Persians Syrians and other Barbarian Pagans 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. What we have now affirmed saith he concerning the difference betwixt the Wise men and the Idiots amongst the Egyptians the same may be said also of the Persians amongst whom the Religious Rites are performed Rationally by those that are ingenious whilest the superficial Vulgar look no further in the observation of them than the external Symbol or Ceremony And the same is true likewise concerning the Syrians and Indians and all those other Nations who have besides their Religious Fables a Learning and Doctrine Neither can it be dissembled that Origen in this place plainly intimates the same also concerning Christianity it self namely that besides the Outside and exteriour Cortex of it in which notwithstanding there is nothing Fabulous communicated to all there was a more Arcane and Recondite
of That the Vulgarly Received Tradition of Humane Souls after Death going into Hades might be Objected against them For the Satisfying whereof Plotinus suggesteth these Two Things First 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That if by Hades be meant nothing but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Invisible as many times it is then is there no more signified by the Souls going into Hades than it s no longer being Vitally united to this Earthy Body and but Acting apart by it self and so hath it nothing of Place necessarily included in it Secondly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if by Hades be understood a Certain Worser Place as sometimes it also is What wonder is this since now where our Body is there in the same place is our Soul said to be also But you will Reply how can this be when there is now no longer any Body left We Answer that if the Idol of the Soul be not quite Separated from it Why should not the Soul it self be said to be there also where its Idol is Where by the Idol of the Soul Plotinus seems to mean an Airy or Spirituous Body Quickned and Vitalized by the Soul adhering to it after death But when the same Philosopher supposes this very Idol of the Soul to be also Separable from it and that so as to subsist apart by it self too this going alone into Hades or the Worser Place whilst that liveth only in the Intelligible World where there is no Place nor Distance lodged in the Naked Deity having nothing at all of Body hanging about it and being now not A Part but the Whole and so Situate nether here nor there in this High Flight of his he is at once both Absurdly Paradoxical in dividing the Life of the Soul as it were into Two and forgat the Doctrine of his own School which as himself elsewhere intimateth was this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That Our Soul though it shall quit this Body yet shall it never be disunited from all Body Wherefore Porphyrius answering the same Objection though he were otherwise much addicted to Plotinus and here uses his Language too yet does he in this depart from him adhering to the ancient Pythagorick Tradition which as will appear afterwards was this That Humane Souls are always Vnited to some Body or other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As the Souls being here upon Earth saith he is not its moving up and down upon it after the manner of Bodies but it s Presiding over a Body which moveth upon the Earth so is its being in Hades nothing but its presiding over that Idol or Enlivened Vaporoâ—â— Body whose Nature it is to be in a Place and which is of a Dark Subsistence Wherefore if Hades be taken for a Subterraneous and Dark Place yet may the Soul nevertheless be said to go into Hades because when it quits this Gross Earthy Body a more Spirituous and Subtle Body collected from the Spheres or Elements doth still accompany it Which Spirit being Moist and Heavy and naturally descending to the Subterraneous places the Soul it self may be said in this sense to go Vnder the Earth also with it not as if the Substance thereof passed from One Place to Another but because of its Relation and Vital Vnion to a Body which does so Where Porphyrius addeth contrary to the Sense of Plotinus That the Soul is never quite Naked of all Body but hath alway some Body or other joyned with it suitable and agreeable to its own present Disposition either a Purer or Impurer one But that at its first Quitting this Gross Earthly Body the Spirituous Body which accompanieth iâ— as its Vehicle must needs go away Fouled and Incrassated with the gross Vapours and steams thereof till the Soul afterwards by Degrees Purging it self this becometh at length A Dry Splendour which hath no Mysty Obscurity nor casteth any Shadow But because this Doctrine of the Ancient Incorporealists concerning the Humane Souls being always after Death United to some Body or other is more fully declared by Philoponus then by any other that we have yet met withal we shall here excerp some Passages out of him about it First therefore he declareth this for his own opinion agreeable to the Sense of the best Philosophers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the Rational Soul as to its Energie is separable from all Body but the Irrational Part or Life thereof is Separable only from this Gross Body and not from all Body whatsoever but hath after Death a Spirituous or Aiery Body in which it acteth This I say is a True Opinion as shall be afterwards proved by us And again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Irrational Life of the Soul hath not all its Being in this Gross Earthy Body but remaineth after the Souls Departure out of it having for its Vehicle and Subject the Spirituous Body Which it self is also compounded out of the Four Elements but receiveth its Denomination from the Predominant Part to wit Air as this Gross Body of ours is called Earthy from what is most Predominant therein Thus do we see that according to Philoponus the Humane Soul after Death does not meerly exercise its Rational Powers and think only of Metaphysical and Mathematical Notions Abstract things which are neither in Time nor Place but exerciseth also its Lower Sensitive and Irrational Faculties which it could not possibly do were it not then Vitally United to some Body and this Body then accompanying the Soul he calls Pneumatical that is not Spiritual in the Scripture-Sense but Spirituous Vaporous or Airy Let us therefore in the next place see what Rational Account Philoponus can give of this Doctrine of the Antients and of his Own Opinion agreeably thereunto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Our Humane Soul in those who are not Purged and Cleansed in this Life after its departure out of this Body is acknowledged or rather Demonstrated to go into Hades there to receive Punishment for its evil Actions past For Providence does not only take Care of our Being but also of our Well-Being Therefore is the Soul though lapsed into a Preter-Natural State yet not neglected by Providence but hath a Convenient Care taken of it in order to its Recovery And since Sinning had its Original from the Desire of Pleasure it must of necessity be Cured by Pain For here also Contraries are the Cures of Contraries Therefore the Soul being to be Purged is Punished and Pained in those Subterraneous Judicatories and Prisons in order to its Amendment But if the Soul be Incorporeal it is Impossible for it to Suffer How then can it be Punished There must of Necessity be some Body joyned with it Which being immoderately Constringed or Agitated Concreted or Secreted and Discordantly Moved by Heat and Cold or the like may make the Soul sensible of Pain by reason of Sympathy as it is here in this Life What Body therefore is that which is then Conjoyned with the Soul after the dissolution
and no further but the Latter into Terrestial also Now Hierocles positively affirmeth this to have been the True Cabala and Genuine Doctrine of the Ancient Pythagoreans entertained afterwards by Plato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And This was the Doctrine of the Pythagoreans which Plato afterwards declared he resembling Every both Humane and Divine Soul that is in our Modern Language Every Created Rational Being to a Winged Chariot and a Driver or Charioteer both together meaning by the Chariot an Enlivened Body and by the Charioteer the Incorporeal Soul it self Acting it And now have we given a full Account in what manner the Ancient Asserters of Incorporeal Substance as Vnextended Answered that Objection against the Illocality and Immobility of Particular Finite Spirits Demons or Angels and Humane Souls that these being all Naturally Incorporate however in Themselves and Directly Immoveable yet were capable of being in some sense Moved by Accident together with those Bodies respectively which they are Vitally United to But as for that Pretence That these Finite Spirits or Substances Incorporeal being Vnextended and so having in themselves no Relation to any Place might therefore Actuate and Inform the Whole Corporeal World at once and take Cognizance of all things therein their Reply hereunto was That these being Essentially but Parts of the Vniverse and therefore not Comprehensive of the Whole Finite or Particular and not Universal Beings as the Three Hypostases of the Platonick Trinity are the Sphere of their Activity could not possibly Extend any further than to the Quickning and Enlivening of some certain Parts of Matter and the World allotted to them and thereby of becoming Particular Animals it being Peculiar to the Deity or that Incorporeal Substance which is Infinite to Quicken and Actuate All things But it would be no Impertinent Digression here as to the main Scope of our Present Vndertaking should we briefly compare the forementioned Doctrine and Cabbala of the Ancient Incorporealists the Pythagoreans and Platonists with that of Christianity and consider the Agreement or Disagreement that is betwixt them First therefore here is a plain Agreement of these Best and most Religious Philosophers with Christianity in this That the most Consummate Happiness and Highest Perfection that Humane Nature is capable of consisteth not in a Separate State of Souls strip'd Naked from all Body and having no manner of Commerce with Matter as some High-flown Persons in all Ages have been apt to Conceit For such amongst the Philosophers and Platonists too was Plotinus Vnevennes and Vnsafeness of whose Temper may sufficiently appear from hence That as he conceived Humane Souls might possibly ascend to so high a Pitch as quite to shake off Commerce with all Body so did he in the other hand again Imagine that they might also Descend and Sink down so low as to Animate not only the Bodies of Bruits but even of Trees and Plants too Two Inconsistent Paradoxes the Latter whereof is a most Prodigious Extravagancy which yet Empedocles though otherwise a Great Wit seems to have been guilty of also from those Verses of his in Athenaeus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And amongst the Jews the famous Maymonides was also of this Perswasion it being a Known Aphorism of his in his Great Work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That in the World to Come or State of Consummate Happiness there shall be nothing at all of Body but Pure Incorporeity Upon which Account being accused as a Denyer of the Resurrection an Article as well of the Jewish as of the Christian Faith he wrote that Book intituled Iggereth Teman purposely to purge himself and to reconcile those Two Assertions together which he doth after such a manner as that there should be indeed a Resurrection at the First Coming of the Jewish Messias of some certain Persons to live here a while upon the Earth Eat and Drink Marry and be given in Marriage and then dy again after which in the World to come they should for ever continue Pure Souls Ununited to any Body In which it may be well suspected that the Design Maymonides drove at was against Christianity which notwithstanding as to this Particular hath the Concurrent Suffrages of the best Philosophers That the most Genuine and Perfect state of the Humane Soul which in its own Nature is immortal is to continue for ever not without but with a Body And yet our High-flown Enthusiasts generally however calling themselves Christians are such great Spiritualists and so much for the Inward Resurrection which we deny not to be a Scripture-Notion also As in that of S. Paul If ye be Risen with Christ c. And again If by any means I might attain to the Resurrection of the Dead as that they quite Allegorize away together with other Parts of Christianity the Outward Resurrection of the Body and indeed will scarcely acknowledge any Future Immortality or Life to come after Death their Spirituality thus ending in Sadducism and Infidelity if not at length in Down-right Atheism and Sensuality But besides this there is yet a further Correspondence of Christianity with the forementioned Philosopbick Cabbala in that the Former also supposes the Highest Perfection of our Humane Souls not to consist in being Eternally Conjoyned with such Gross Bodies as these we now have Unchanged and Unaltered For as the Pythagoreans and Platonists have always Complained of these Terrestrial Bodies as Prisons or Living Sepulchres of the Soul so does Christianity seem to run much upon the same strain in these Scripture-Expressions In this We Groan Earnestly desiring to be Clothed upon with our House which is from Heaven and again We that are in this Tabernacle do Groan being burdened not for that we would be Vncloathed that is strip'd quite Naked of all Body but so cloathed upon that Mortality might be swallowed up of Life and lastly Our selves also which have the First Fruits of the Spirit Groan within our selves waiting for the Adoption Sonship or Inheritance namely the Redemption of our Bodies That is the Freedom of them from all those Evils and Maladies of theirs which we herely oppressed under Wherefore we cannot think that the same Heavy Load and Luggage which the Souls of good men being here burdened with do so much groan to be delivered from shall at the General Resurrection be laid upon them again and bound fast to them to all Eternity For of such a Resurrection as this Plotinus though perhaps mistaking it for the True Christian Resurrection might have some cause to affirm that it would be but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Resurrection to another Sleep the Soul seeming not to be Thoroughly Awake here but as it were Soporated with the Dull Steams and Opiatick Vapours of this gross Body For thus the Authour of the Book of Wisdom The Corruptible Body presseth down the Soul and the Earthly Tabernacle weigheth down the Mind that museth upon many things But the same will further appear from that
and that after his Resurrection too That he Liveth unto God Romans the 6. the 10. From whence it is evident that they who are said to Live to God are not therefore supposed to be less Alive than they were when they Lived unto men Now it seemeth to be a Priviledge or Prerogative Proper to the Deity only to Live and Act alone without Vital Vnion or Conjunction with any Body Quaerendum saith Origen Si Possibile est penitus Incorporeas remanere Rationabiles Creaturas cum ad summum Sanctitatis ac Beatudinis venerint An necesse est eas semper Conjunctas esse Corporibus It is worth our Enquiry Whether it be possible for Rational Creatures to remain Perfectly Incorporeal and Separate from all Body when they are arrived to the Highest Degree of Holiness and Happiness Or Whether they be always of necessity conjoyned with some Bodies And afterwards he plainly affirmeth it to be Impossible Vivere praeter Corpus Vllam aliam Naturam praeter Patrem Filium Spiritum Sanctum For any other Nature besides the Father and the Son and Holy Ghost to live quite without a Body Indeed if this were most Natural to the Humane Soul and most Perfective of it to continue Separate from all Body then doubtless as Origen Implied should the Souls of Good men rather After the day of Judgment continue in such a State of Separation to all Eternity But on the contrary If it be Natural to Souls to Enliven and Enform some Body or other though not always a Terrestrial one as our Inward Sense inclines us to think then can it not seem so probable that they should by a kind of Violence be kept so long in an Vn-Natural or Preter-Natural State of Nakedness and Separation from all Body some of them even from Adam till the day of Judgment Again the Scripture also Intimates that Souls Departed out of this Life have a Knowledge of one another and are also capable of the Punishment of Sense or Pain Fear him saith our Saviour who After he hath killed hath Power to cast into Hell Luke the 12. And the Soul of the Rich Man is said to be immediately after Death in Torments before the Day of Judgment as likewise to have Known Abraham and Lazarus And it seems neither agreeable to our Common Notions nor yet to Piety to conclude That the Souls of wicked men departing out of this Life from the beginning of the world in their several Ages till the Day of Judgment have all of them no manner of Punishment inflicted on them save only that of Remorse of Conscience and Future Expectation Now it is not conceivable how Souls after Death should Know and be Knowable and Converse with one another and have any Punishment of Sense or Pain inflicted on them were they not Vitally Vnited to some Bodies And thus did Tertullian reason long ago Dolet apud Inferos Anima cujusdam Punitur in Flamma Cruciatur in Linguâ de digito animae foelicioris implorat Solatium Roris Imaginem existimas exitum illum Pauperis Laetantis Divitis moerentis Et quid illic Lazari nomen si non in veritate res est Sed etsi Imago credenda est testimonium erit veritatis Si enim non habet Anima Corpus non caperet Imaginem Corporis Nec mentiretur de Corporalibus Membris Scriptura si non erant Quid est autem illud quod ad Inferna transfertur post Divortium Corporis quod detinetur in Diem Judicii reservatur Ad quod Christus moriendo descendit puto ad Animas Patriarcharum Incorporalitas Animae ab omni genere Custodiae libera est immunis à Poena à Fovel◠Per quod enim Punitur aut Fovetur hoc erit Corpus Igitur siquid Tormenti sive Solatii Anima praecepit in Carcere vel Diversorio Inferûm in Igni vel in Sinu Abrahae probata erit Corporalitas Animae Incorporalitas enim nihil Patitur non habens per quod Pati possit aut si habet hoc erit Corpus In quantum enim Omne Corporale Passibile est in tantum quod Passibile est Corporale est We read in Scripture of a Soul Tormented in Hell Punished with Flames and desirous of a drop of water to cool his Tongue You will say perhaps that this is Parabolical and Fictitious What then does the name of Lazarus signifie there if it were no Real thing But if it be a Parable never so much yet must it notwithstanding as to the main speak agreeably to Truth For if the Soul after Death have no Body at all then can it not have any Corporeal Image Shape or Figure Nor can it be thought that the Scripture would Lie concerning Corporal Members if there were none But what is that which after its Separation from this Body is carried down into Hell and there detained Prisoner and reserved till the day of Judgment And what is that which Christ dying descended down unto I suppose to the Souls of the Patriarchs But Incorporality is free from all Custody or Imprisonment as also devoid of Pain and Pleasure Wherefore if Souls be sensible of Pain after Death and Tormented with Fire then must they needs have some Corporeity for Incorporality suffers Nothing And as every Corporeal thing is Passive or Patible so again whatsoever is Passive is Corporeal Tertullian would also further confirm this from a Vision or Revelation of a certain Sister-Prophet Miracles and Prophecy being said by him not to be then altogether Extinct Inter caetera ostensa est mihi Anima Corporaliter Spiritus videbatur Tenera Lucida Aerii Coloris Et Formae per omnia Humanae There was said she amongst other things a Soul Corporally Exhibited to my View and it was Tender and Lucid and of an Aereal Colour and every way of Humane Form Agreeably to which Tertullian himself addeth Effigiem non aliam Animae Humanae deputandam praeter Humanam quidem ejus Corporis quod unaquaeque circuntulit There is no other Shape to be assigned to a Humane Soul but Humane and indeed that of the Body which it before carried about It is true indeed that Tertullian here drives the business so far as to make the Soul it self to be Corporeal Figurate and Colorate and after Death to have the very same Shape which its respective Body had before in this Life he being one of those who were not able to conceive of any thing Incorporeal and therefore being a Religionist concluded God himself to be a certain Body also But the Reasons which he here insisteth on will indeed extend no further than to prove that the Soul hath after Death some Body Vitally Vnited to it by means whereof it is both capable of Converse and Sensible of Pain for as much as Body alone can have no Sense of any thing And this is that which Irenaeus from the same Scripture gathereth
sermone 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 indicatur qui Graecis vel Gentilibus auctoribus ostenditur quum de Incorporeâ Naturâ à Philosophis disputatur In hoc enim Libello Incorporeum Daemonium dixit pro eo quod ipse ille quicunque est habitus vel circumscriptio Daemonici Corporis non est similis huic nostro Crassiori vel Visibili Corpori sed secundum sensum ejus qui composuit illam Scripturam intelligendum est quod dixit non esse tale Corpus quale habent Daemones quod est naturaliter Subtile velut Aura Tenue propter hoc vel imputatur à multis vel dicitur Incorporeum sed habere se Corpus Solidum Palpabile The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Incorporeal is not to be taken here in that sense wherein it is used by the Greek and Gentile Writers when they Philosophised concerning the Incorporeal Nature But a Demon is here said to be Incorporeal because of the Disposition of the Demoniack Body not like to this Gross and Visible Body of ours So that the sense is as if Christ should have said I have not such a Body as the Demons have which is naturally Subtle Thin and Soft as the Air and therefore is either supposed to be by many or at least called Incorporeal but the Body which I now have is Solid and Palpable Where we see plainly that Angels though supposed to have Bodies may notwithstanding be called Incorporeal by reason of the Tenuity and Subtlety of those Bodies comparatively with the Grossness and Solidity of these our Terrestrial Bodies But that indeed which now most of all inclineth some to this Perswasion That Angels have nothing at all Corporeal hanging about them is a Religious regard to the Authority of the Third Lateran Council having passed its Approbation upon this Doctrine as if the Seventh Oecumenical so called or Second Nicene wherein the contrary was before owned and allowed were not of equal force at least to counterbalance the other But though this Doctrine of Angels or all Created Vnderstanding Beings Superiour to men having a Corporeal Indument or Clothing does so exactly agree with the Old Pythagorick Cabbala yet have we reason to think that it was not therefore meerly borrowed or derived from thence by the Ancient Fathers but that they were led into it by the Scripture it self For first the Historick Phaenomena of Angels in the Scripture are such as cannot well be otherwise Salved than by supposing them to have Bodies and then not to lay any stress upon those words of the Psalmist Who maketh his Angels Spirits and Ministers a flame of fire though with good reason by the Ancient Fathers interpreted to this sense because they may possibly be understood otherwise as sometime they are by Rabbinical Commentators nor to insist upon those passages of S. Paul where he speaks of the Tongues of Angels and of the Voice of an Arch-Angel and such like there are several other Places in Scripture which seem plainly to confirm this Opinion As first that of our Saviour before mentioned to this purpose Luke the 20. the 35. They who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the Resurrection from the dead neither Marry nor are given in Marriage neither can they die any more for they are Equal unto the Angels For were Angels utterly devoid of all Bodies then would the Souls of Good men in a State of Separation and without any Resurrection be rather Equal to Angels than after a Resurrection of their Bodies Wherefore the Natural meaning of these words seems to be this as St. Austin hath interpreted them that the Souls of Good men after the Resurrection shall have Corpora Angelica Angelical Bodies and Qualia sunt Angelorum Corpora such Bodies as those of Angels are Wherein it is supposed that Angels also have Bodies but of a very different kind from those of ours here Again that of St. Jude where he writeth thus of the Devils The Angels which kept not their First Estate or rather according to the Vulgar Latin Suum Principatum Their own Principality but left thei◠Proper Habitation or Dwelling House hath he reserved in everlasting Chains under darkness unto the Judgement of the Great Day In which words it is first Implied that the Devils were Created by God Pure as well as the other Angels but that they kept not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Their own Principality That is their Lordly Power and Dominion over their Worser and Inferiour part they having also a certain Duplicity in their Nature of a Better and Worser Principle of a Superiour Part which ought to Rule and Govern and of an Inferiour which out to be Governed nor is it indeed otherwise easily conceivable how they should be Capable of Sinning And this Inferiour Part in Angels seems to have a respect to something that is Corporeal or Bodily in them also as well as it hath in men But then in the next place St. Jude addeth as the Immediate Result and Natural Consequent of these Angels Sinning that they thereby Left or Lost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Suum Proprium Domicilium That is not only their Dwelling Place at Large those Etherial Countries and Heavenly Regions above but also their Proper Dwelling House or Immediate Mansion to wit their Heavenly Body For as much as that Heavenly Body which Good men expect after the Resurrection is thus called by St. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Our Habitation or Dwelling House that is from Heaven The Heavenly Body is the Proper House or Dwelling Clothing or Indument both of Angelical and Humane Souls and this is that which makes them fit Inhabitants for the Heavenly Regions This I say was the Natural effect and Consequent of these Angels Sinning their Leaving or Loosing their Pure Heavenly Body which became thereupon forthwith Obscured and Incrassated the Bodies of Spirits Incorporate always bearing a Correspondent Purity or Impurity to the different disposition of their Mind or Soul But then again in the last place that which was thus in Part the Natural Result of their Sin was also by the Just Judgment of God converted into their Punishment For their Etherial Bodies being thus changed into Gross Aerial Feculent and Vaporous ones themselves were Immediately hereupon as St. Peter in the Parallel Place expresseth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cast down into Tartarus and there Imprisoned or Reserved in Chains Under Darkness until the Judgment of the Great Day Where it is observable that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 used by St. Peter is the very same that Apollodorus and other Greek Writers frequently make use of in a like case when they speak of the Titan's being Cast down from Heaven which seems to have been Really nothing else but this Fall of Angels Poetically Mythologized And by Tartarus here in all probability is meant this Lower Caliginous Air or Atmosphere of the Earth according to that of St. Austin concerning these
Angels Post Peccatum in hanc sunt detrusi Caliginem ubi tamen Aer That after their Sin they were thrust down down into the Misty darkness of this Lower Air. And here are they as it were Chained and Fettered also by that same Weight of their Gross and heavy Bodies which first sunk them down hither this not suffering them to reascend up or return back to those Bright Etherial Regions above And being thus for the present Imprisoned in this Lower Tartarus or Caliginous Air or Atmosphere they are indeed here Kept and Reserved in Custody unto the Judgment of the Great Day and General Assizes however they may notwithstanding in the mean time seem to Domineer and Lord it for a while here And Lastly our Saviours Go ye Cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels seems to be a clear Confirmation of Devils being Bodied because First to Allegorize this Fire into nothing but Remorse of Conscience would indanger the rendering of other Points of our Religion uncertain also but to say that Incorporeal Substances Vnunited to Bodies can be tormented with Fire is as much as in us lieth to expose Christianity and the Scripture to the Scorn and Contempt of all Philosophers and Philosophick Wits Wherefore Psellus laies no small stress upon this Place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am also convinced of this That Demons have Bodies from the words of our Saviour affirming That they shall be Punished with Fire which how could it be were they altogether Incorporeal it being Impossible for that which is both it self Incorporeal and Vitally Vnunited to any Body to suffer from a Body Wherefore of necessity it must be granted by us Christians that Devils shall receive Punishment of Sense and Pain hereafter in Bodies capable of Suffering Now if Angels in general that is all Created Beings Superiour to men be Substances Incorporeal or Souls Vitally United to Bodies though not always the same but sometimes of one kind and sometimes times of another and never quite Separate from all Body it may seem probable from hence that though there be other Incorporeal Substances besides the Deity yet Vita Incorporea a Life perfectly Incorporeal in the forementioned Origenick Sense or Sine Corporeae Adjectionis Societate Vivere to Live altogether without the Society of any Corporeal Adjection is a Privilege properly belonging to the Holy Trinity only and consequently therefore that Humane Souls when by Death they are Devested of these Gross Earthly Bodies they do not then Live and Act Compleatly without the Conjunction of any Body and so continue till the Resurrection or Day of Judgment this Being a priviledge which not so much as the Angels themselves and therefore no Created Finite Being is capable of the Imperfection of whose Nature necessarily requires the Conjunction of some Body with them to make them up Complete without which it is unconceivable how they should either have Sense or Imagination And Thus doth Origen Consentaneously to his own Principles Conclude 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Our Soul which in its own Nature is Incoâ—poreal and Invisible in whatsoever Corporeal place it Existeth doth always stand in need of a Body suitable to the Nature of that place respectively Which Body it sometimes beareth having Put Off that which before was necessary but is now Superfluous for the Following State and sometimes again Putting On something to what before it had now standing in need of some better Clothing to fit it for those more Pure Etherial and Heavenly places But in what there follows we conceive that Origen's sense having not been rightly understood his words have been altered and perverted and that the whole place ought to be read thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Sense whereof iâ— this The Soul descending hither into Generation Put on first that Body which was useful for it whilst to continue in the Womb and then again afterward such a Body as was necessary for it to Live here upon the Earth in Again it having here a Two fold kind of Body the one of which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by St. Paul being a more Subtle Body which it had before the other the Superinduced Earthly House necessarily subservient to this Schenos here the Scripture Oracles affirm that the Earthly House of this Schenos shall be corrupted or dissolved but the Schenos it self Superindue or Put On a House not made with hands Eternal in the Heavens The same declaring that the Corruptible shall put on Incorruption and the Mortal Immortality Where it is plain that Origen takes that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in St. Paul 1 Cor. 5.1 for a Subtle Body which the Soul had before its Terrene Nativity and which Continues with it after death but in good men will at last Superindue or Put on without Death the Clothing of Immortality Neither can there be a better Commentary upon this place of Origen than those Excerpta out of Methodius the Martyr in Photius though seeming to be Vitiated also where as we conceive the sense of Origen and his Followers is first contained in those words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That in St. Paul the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is One thing and the Earthly House of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Another thing and We that is our Souls a Third thing distinct from both And then it is further declared in this that follows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That this short Life of our Earthly Body being destroyed our Soul shall then have before the Resurrection a dwelling from God until we shall at last receive it renewed restored and so made an Incorruptible House Wherefore in this we groan desirous not to put off all Body but to put on Life or Immortality upon the Body which we shall then have For that House which is from Heaven That we desire to put on is Immortality Moreover that the Soul is not altogether Naked after Death the same Origen endeavours to confirm further from that of our Saviour concerning the Rich Man and Lazarus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Rich man Punished and the Poor man refreshed in Abraham 's bosome before the Coming of our Saviour and before the end of the world and therefore before the Resurrection plainly teaches that even now also after Death the Soul useth a Body He thinketh the same also to be further proved from the Visible Apparition of Samuel's Ghost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Samuel also visibly appearing after Death maketh it manifest that his Soul was then clothed with a Body To which he adds in Photius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That the Exteriour Form and Figure of the Souls Body after Death doth resemble that of the Gross Terrestrial Body here in this Life All the Histories of Apparitions making Ghosts or the Souls of the Dead to appear in the same Form which their Bodies had before This therefore as was observed is that which Origen understands by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
It is true indeed that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Thing Vnderstood is in order of Nature before the Intellection and Conception of it and from hence was it that the Pythagoreans and Platonists concluded that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mind or Intellect was not the very First and Highest Thing in the Scale of the Vniverse but that there was another Divine Hypostasis in order of Nature before it called by them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One and The Good as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Intelligible thereof But as those Three Archical Hypostases of the Platonists and Pythagoreans are all of them Really but One 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Divinity And the First of those Three Superiour to that which is properly called by them Mind or Intellect is not supposed therefore to be Ignorant of it self So is the First Mind or Vnderstanding no other than that of a Perfect Being Infinitely Good Fecund and Powerful and vertually Containing all things comprehending it self and the Extent of its own Goodness Fecundity Vertue and Power that is all Possibilities of things their Relations to one another and Verities a Mind before Sense and Sensible Things An Omnipotent Vnderstanding Being which is it self its own Intelligible is the First Original of all things Again that there must of necessity be some other Substance besides Body or Matter and which in the Scale of Nature is Superiour to it is evident from hence because otherwise there could be no Motion at all therein no Body being ever able to move it self There must be something Self-Active and Hylarchical something that can Act both from it self and upon Matter as having a Natural Imperium or Command over it Cogitation is in order of Nature before Local Motion Life and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind are no Syllables or Complexions of things Secundary and Derivative which might therefore be made out of things devoid of Life and Vnderstanding but Simple Primitive and Vncompounded Natures they are no Qualities or Accidental Modifications of Matter but Substantial Things For which Cause Souls or Minds can no more be Generated out of Matter than Matter it Self can be Generated out of Something else and therefore are they both alike in some sense Principles Naturally Ingenerable and Incorruptible though both Matter and all Imperfect Souls and Minds were at first Created by one Perfect Omnipotent Vnderstanding Being Moreover Nothing can be more Evident than this that Mind and Vnderstanding hath a Higher Degree of Entity or Perfection in it and is a Greater Reality in Nature than meer Sensless Matter or Bulkie Extension And Consequently the things which belong to Souls and Minds to Rational and Intellectual Beings as such must not have Less but More Reality in them than the things which belong to Inanimate Bodies Wherefore the Differences of Just and Vnjust Honest and Dishonest are greater Realities in Nature than the Differences of Hard and Soft Hot and Cold Moist and Dry. He that does not perceive any Higher Degree of Perfection in a Man than in an Oyster nay than in a Clod of Earth or Lump of Ice in a Piece of Past or Pye-Crust hath not the Reason or Understanding of a Man in him There is unquestionably a Scale or Ladder of Nature and Degrees of Perfection and Entity one above another as of Life Sense and Cogitation above Dead Sensless and Vnthinking Matter of Reason and Vnderstanding above Sense c. And if the Sun be Nothing but a Mass of Fire or Inanimate Subtle Matter Agitated then hath the most Contemptible Animal that can see the Sun and hath Consciousness and Self enjoyment a Higher Degree of Entity and Perfection in it than that whole Fiery Globe as also than the Materials Stone Timber Brick and Morter of the most Stately Structure or City Notwithstanding which the Sun in other regards and as it s vastly Extended Light and Heat hath so great an Influence upon the Good of the whole World Plants and Animals may be said to be a far more Noble and Vseful thing in the Universe than any one Particular Animal whatsoever Wherefore there being plainly a Scale or Ladder of Entity the Order of Things was unquestionably in way of Descent from Higher Perfection Downward to Lower it being as Impossible for a Greater Perfection to be produced from a Lesser as for Something to be Caused by Nothing Neither are the Steps or Degrees of this Ladder either upward or downward Infinite but as the Foot Bottom or Lowest Round thereof is Stupid and Sensless Matter devoid of all Life and Vnderstanding so is the Head Top and Summity of it a Perfect Omnipotent Being Comprehending it self and all Possibilities of things A Perfect Understanding Being is the Beginning and Head of the Scale of Entity from whence things Gradually Descend downward lower and lower till they end in Sensless Matter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mind is the Oldest of all things Senior to the Elements and the whole Corporeal World and likewise according to the same Ancient Theists it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Nature Lord over all or hath a Natural Imperium and Dominion over all it being the most Hegemonical thing And thus was it also affirmed by Anaxagoras 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Mind is the Soveraign King of Heaven and Earth We have now made it evident that the Epicurean and Anaximandrian Atheists who derive the Original of all things from Sensless Matter devoid of all Manner of Life can no way Salve the Phaenomenon of Cogitation Life and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind no more than they can that of Local Motion And the Reason why we have insisted so much upon this Point is because these Atheists do not only pretend to Salve this Phaenomenon of Cogitation without a God and so to take away the Argument for a Deity from thence but also to Demonstrate the Impossibility of its Existence from the very Nature of Knowledge Mind and Vnderstanding For if Knowledge be in its own Nature Nothing but a Passion from Singular Bodies Existing without the Knower and if Life and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind be Junior to Body and Generated out of Sensless Matter then could no Mind or Vnderstanding Being Possibly be a God that is a First Principle and the Maker of all things And though Modern Writers take little or no Notice of this yet did Plato anciently make the very State of the Controversie betwixt Theists and Atheists principally to consist in this very thing viz. Whether Life and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind were Juniors to Body and Sprung out of Sensless Matter as Accidental Modifications thereof or else were Substantial things and in order of Nature Before it For after the Passages before Cited he thus concludeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 These men seem to suppose Fire Water Air and Earth to be the very First things in the Vniverse and the Principles of all calling them only Nature but
were Clothed therewith these as soon as Created were immediatly Invested with certain Thin and Subtle Bodies or put into Light Ethereal or Aereal Chariots and Vehicles wherein they subsist both before their Entrance into other Gross Terrestrial Bodies and after their Egress out of them So that the Souls not only of men but also of other Animals have sometimes a Thicker and sometimes a Thinner Indument or Clothing And thus do we understand Boetius not only of the Rational but also of the other Inferior Sensitive Souls in these Verses of his Tu Causis Animas paribus Vitasque Minores Provehis Levibus sublimes Curribus aptans In Coelum Terramque seris Where his Light Chariots which all Lives or Souls at their very First Creation by God are placed in and in which being wasted they are both together as as it were Sowed into the Gross Terrestrial Matter are Thin Aereal and Ethereal Bodies But this is plainly declared by Proclus upon the Timaeus after he had spoken of the Souls of Demons and Men in this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And every Soul must of necessity have before these Mortal Bodies certain Eternal and easily moveable Bodies it being Essential to them to move There is indeed mention made by the same Proclus and others of an Opinion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Irrational or Brutish Demons or Demoniack Aereal Brutes of which he sometime speaks doubtfully as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If there be any Irrational Demons as the Theurgists affirm But the Dispute Doubt or Controversie here only was Whether there were any such Irrational Demons Immortal or no. For thus we learn from these Words of Ammonius upon the Porphyrian Isagoge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Some affirm that there is a certain kind of Irrational Demons Immortal but others that all these Irrational or Brutish Demons are Mortal Where by Irrational Demons Immortal seem to be understood such as never Descend into Terrestrial Bodies and these are there disclaimed by Ammonius but the Mortal Ones such as act also upon Gross Terrestrial Bodies obnoxious to Death and Corruption As if Ammonius should have said There are no other Brutish or Irrational Demons than only the Souls of such Brute Animals as are here amongst us sometimes acting only Aereal Bodies Thus according to the ancient Pythagorick Hypothesis There is neither any New Substantial thing now Made which was not before nor yet any Real Entity Destroyed into Nothing not only no Matter but also no Soul nor Life God after the First Creation neither making any New Substance nor yet Annihilating any thing made He then Creating nothing that was not fit to be Conserved in Being and which could not be well Used and Placed in the Universe and afterward never Repenting him of what he had before done And Natural Generations and Corruptions being nothing but Accidental Mutations Concretions and Secretions or Anagrammatical Transpositions of Prae and Post-Existing things the same Souls and Lives being sometimes United to one Body and sometimes to another Sometimes in Thicker and sometimes in Thinner Clothing and sometimes in the Visible sometimes in the Invisible they having Aereal as well as Terrestrial Vehicles and never any Soul quite naked of all Body And thus does Proclus complain of some as Spurious Platonists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who Destroying the Thinner Vehicles of Souls were therefore necessitated sometimes to leave them in a State of Separation from all Body or without any Corporeal Indument Which Cabbala probably derived from the Egyptians by Pythagoras was before fully represented by us out of Ovid though that Transmigration of Humane Souls there into Ferine Bodies hath not been by all acknowledged as a Genuine Part thereof And the same was likewise insisted upon by Virgil. Georg. L. 4. as also owned and confirmed by Macrobius for a Great Truth Constat secundum verae rationis Assertionem quam nec Cicero nescit nec Virgilius ignorat dicendo Nec Morti esse Locum Constat inquam Nihil intra Vivum Mundum perire sed eorum quae interire videntur solam mutari Speciem It is manifest according to Reason and True Philosophy which neither Cicero nor Virgil were unacquainted with the Latter of these affirming That there is no place at all left for Death I say it is manifest that none of those things that to us seem to die do absolutely perish within the Living World but only their Forms changed Now how extravagant soever this Hypothesis seem to be yet is there no Question but that a Pythagorean would endeavour to find some Countenance and Shelter for it in the Scripture especially that place which hath so puzled and non-plus'd Interpreters Rom. 8.19 For the Earnest expectation of the Creature waiteth for the Manifestation of the Sons of God For the Creature was made subject unto Vanity not willingly but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope Because the Creature it self also shall be delivered from the Bondage of Corruption into the glorious Liberty of the Children of God For we know that the whole Creation Groaneth and Travelleth in pain together until now And not only they but our selves also which have the First Fruits of the Spirit Groan within Our selves Waiting for the Adoption even the Redemption of our Bodies Where it is first of all evident 〈◊〉 that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Creature or Creation Spoken of is not the very same the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Children or Sons of God but something distinct from them Wherefore in the next place the Pythagorean will add that it must of necessity be understood either of the Inanimate Creature only or of the Lower Animal Creation or else of both these together Now though it be readily acknowledged that there is a Prosopopoeia here yet cannot all those Expressions for all that without difficulty and violence be understood of the Inanimate Creation only or Sensless Matter Viz. That this hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Earnest Expectation of some future Good to it self That it is now made Subject 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Vanity Frustration and Disappointment of Desire and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Corruption and Death And that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not Willingly but Reluctantly And yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too In Hope notwithstanding of some further Good to follow afterward and that it doth in the mean time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Groan and Travel in Pain together till it be at length delivered from the Bondage of Corruption into the glorious Liberty of the Children of God Moreover in the Generations and Corruptions of Senseless Bodies as of Minerals and Vegetables or when for example Oyl is turned into Flame Flame into Smoke Water into Vapour Vapour into Snow or Hail Grass into Milk Milk into Blood and Bones and the like there is I say in all this no Hurt done to
any thing nor any Real Entity destroyed all the Substance of Matter still remaining intirely the same without the least diminution and only Accidental Transformations thereof made All this is Really Nothing but Local Motion and there is no more Toyl nor Labour to an Inanimate Body in Motion than in Rest it being altogether as Natural for a Body to be Moved by something else as of it self to Rest. It is all nothing but Change of Figure Distance Site and Magnitude of Parts causing several Sensations Phancies and Apparitions in us And they who would have the meaning of this place to be That all such like Mutations and Alternate Vicissitudes in Inanimate Bodies shall at Length quite cease these Groaning in the mean time and travelling in Pain to be delivered from the Toylsome Labour of such Restless Motion and to be at Ease and Quiet by taking away all Motion thus out of a fond regard to the Ease and Quiet of Senseless Matter they would thereby ipso facto Petrifie the whole Corporeal Universe and Consequently the Bodies of Good Men also after the Resurrection and Congeal all into Rockie Marble or Adamant And as vain is that other Conceit of some that the whole Terrestrial Globe shall at last be Vitrified or turned into Transparent Crystal as if it also Groaned in the mean time for this For whatsoever Change shall be made of the World In the New Heaven and the New Earth to come it is Reasonable to think that it will not be made for the sake of the Sensless Matter or the Inanimate Bodies themselves to which all is alike but only for the Sake of Men and Animals the Living Spectators and Inhabitants thereof that it may be fitter both for their Vse and Delight Neither indeed can those words For the Creature it self shall be delivered from the Bondage of Corruption into the Glorious Liberty of the Children of God be understood of any other than Animals for as much as this Liberty of the Children of God here meant is their being Cloathed instead of Mortal with Immortal Bodies of which no other Creatures are Capable but only such as consist of Soul and Body And that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Whole Creation which is said afterwards to Groan and Travel in Pain together may be well understood of all That of the Creation which Can Groan or be Sensible of Evil or Misery Wherefore the Pythagorean would interpret this place of the Lower Animal Creation only which is Sensible of Good and Evil That as this was Unwillingly or against its own Inclination after the Fall of man or Lapse of Souls made subject to Vanity and the Bondage of Corruption Pain Misery and Death in those Gross Terrestrial Bodies In the manifestation of the Sons of God when they in stead of these Mortal Bodies shall be clothed with Celestial and Immortal ones then shall this Creature also have its certain share in the Felicity of that Glorious Time and partake in some Measure of such a Liberty by being Freed in like manner from these their Gross Terrestrial Bodies and now living only in Thin Aerial and Immortal ones and so a Period put to all their Miseries and Calamities by him who made not Death neither hath pleasure in the Destruction of the Living but Created whatsoever liveth to this end that it might have its Being and enjoy it self But however thus much is certain that Brute Animals in this place cannot be quite excluded because the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Whole Creation will not Suffer that and therefore a Pythagorist would conclude it a warrantable Inference from this Text of Scripture That that whole Rank in the Creation of Irrational Brutish Animals below Men shall not be utterly Annihilated in the Consummation of things or Future Renovation of the World quite strip'd of all this Furniture Men being then left alone in it but that there shall be a Continuation of this Species or Rank of Being And not only so neither as if there should still be a constant Succession of such Alternate Generations and Corruptions Productions or Births and Deaths of Brute Animals to all Eternity but also that the Individuals themselves shall continue the same for as much as otherwise there would be none at all delivered from the Bondage of Corruption And Lastly that these very Souls of Brutes which at this time Groan and Travel in Pain shall themselves be made partakers of that Liberty of the Children of God since otherwise they should be With Child or Parturient of Nothing Groaning not for themselves but others But enough of this Pythagorick Hypothesis which supposing all manner of Souls Sensitive as well as Rational to be Substantial things and therefore to have a Permanency after Death in their distinct Natures allows them certain Thin Aerial Ochemata or Vehicles to Subsist in when these Gross Terrestrial ones shall fail them But let these Aerial Vehicles of the Souls of Brutes go for a Whimsey or meer Figment nor let them be allowed to Act or Enliven any other than Terrestrial Bodies only by means whereof they must needs be immediately after Death quite Destitute of all Body they Subsisting nevertheless and not vanishing into Nothing because they are not meer Accidents but Substantial things We say that in this case though the Substances of them remain yet must they needs continue in a State of Insensibility and Inactivity unless perhaps they be again afterwards united to some other Terrestrial Bodies Because though Intellection be the Energie of the Rational Soul alone without the Concurrence of Body yet is the Energie of the Sensitive always Conjoyned with it Sense being as Aristotle hath rightly determined a Complication of Soul and Body together as Weaving is of the Weaver and Weaving Instruments Wherefore we say that if the Irrational and Sensitive Souls in Brutes being Substantial things also be after Death quite destitute of all Body then can they neither have Sense of any thing nor Act upon any thing but must continue for so long a time in a State of Insensibility and Inactivity Which is a thing therefore to be thought the less Impossible because no man can be certain that his own Soul in Sleep Lethargies and Apoplexies c. hath always an uninterrupted Consciousness of it self and that it was never without Thoughts even in the Mother 's Womb. However there is little Reason to doubt but that the Sensitive Souls of such Animals as Lie Dead or Asleep all the Winter and Revive or Awake again at the Approaching warmth of Summer do for that time continue in a State of Inactivity and Insensibility Upon which account though these Souls of Brutes may be said in one Sense to be Immortal because the Substance of them and the Root of life in them still remains yet may they in another Sense be said also to be Mortal as having the Exercise of that Life for a time at least quite suspended From whence it
but also from thence to Demonstrate the Impossibility of his Existence Though Modern Writers not so much aware hereof yet is the Controversy betwixt Theists and Atheists thus Stated by Plato Whether Soul and Mind Juniors to Sensless Matter and the Offspring thereof or else Substantiall Things and in Order of Nature Before it Accordingly Plato confuteth Atheism no otherwise then by proving Soul not to be Junior to Inanimate Matter and Generated out of the same Evident That Plato by Soul here understood not onely the Mundane Soul but also that Whole Rank of Beings called Soul and That no Life was Generated out of Matter Page 859 860 Those professed Christians who Generate Rationall Souls out of Sensless Matter plain Betrayers of the Cause of Theism Page 860 861 Nor is the Case much different as to others who though they professedly Generate onely Sensitive Souls yet making the Rationall but meer Blanks which have Nothing in them but what was Scribbled upon them by Sense and so Knowledge in its own Nature Junior to Sense and Sensibles Highly Gratify the Atheists hereby Page 861 If any Life and Cogitation may be Generated out of Dead and Sensless Matter then can no good Reason be given why All should not be Life not partly Accidental partly Substantiall but either All Conscious Life Accidental Generable and Corruptible or else None at all ibid. The Doctrine of Reall Qualities Generable and Corruptible favourable to Atheism also And though the Atheistick Atomists Explode all the other Qualities Because Nothing can come from Nothing yet contradicting themselves again do they make Life and Understanding Reall Qualities Generated out of Matter or Caused by Nothing Page 861 862 There being a Seale or Ladder of Entities in Nature to Produce a Higher Rank of Beings out of a Lower as Life and Cogitation out of Matter and Magnitude is to Invert the Order of this Scale from Downwards to Upwards and so to lay a Foundation for Atheism Wherefore great Reason to maintain this Post against the Atheists That no Souls can be Generated out of Matter Page 862 863 The Grand Objection against the Substantiality of Sensitive Souls from that Consequence of their Permanent Subsistence after Death Cartesius so Sensible thereof that he would rather make Brutes to be Sensless Machines then allow them Substantiall Souls which he granted they must have if Thinking Beings What clearly Demonstrable by Reason not to be abandoned because attended with some Difficulties or seemingly Offensive Consequences Page 863 The Pythagorick Hypothesis That Souls all Created by God not in the Generation of Animals but in the Cosmogonia These therefore first Clothed with Thin and Subtile Bodies Aeriall or Aetheriall Ochemata wherein they Subsist both before their Ingress into Terrestriall Bodies and after their Egress out of them Thus Boëtius and Proclus Ammonius his Irrationall Demons Mortall Brutish Souls in Aeriall Bodies Since the First Creation no New Substantiall thing Made or Destroyed and therefore no Life This looked upon by Macrobius as a Great Truth Page 863 865 That the Pythagoreans would Endeavour to gain some Countenance for this Hypothesis from the Scripture Page 865 867 But if these Aeriall Vehicles of Brutish Souls be exploded for a Whimsey and none but Terrestriall Bodies allowed to them though after Death they will not Vanish into Nothing yet must they needs remain in a State of Insensibility and Inactivity till re-united to other Terrestriall Bodies Wherefore these in one Sense Mortall though in another Immortall Silk-worms dying and reviving in the Form of Butterflies made an Emblem of the Resurrection by Christian Theologers Page 867 868 But no Absolute Necessity That the Souls of Brutes though Substantiall should have a Permanent Subsistence after Death either in a State of Activity or Inactivity Because whatsoever Created by God may Possibly by him be Annihilated The Substantiality onely of the Rationall Soul Demonstrable by Reason or that it will not of it Self vanish into Nothing but not that it is Absolutely Impossible for it to be Annihilated The assurance of this Depending upon a Faith in the Divine Goodness Porphyrius his Assertion That Brutish Souls are Resolved into the Life of the Universe The whole Answer to this Objection against the Substantiality of Brutish Souls That they may notwithstanding Possibly be Annihilated in the Deaths of Animals as well as they were Created in their Generations but if they do Subsist without Aeriall Vehicles they must remain in a State of Inactivity and Insensibility Page 868 869 That this the Doctrine of the Ancient Pagan Theologers That no Life or Soul Generated out of Dead and Sensless Matter but all Produced by the Deity as well as Matter Proved out of Virgil though sundry other Testimonies also might be added thereunto Page 869 870 The Hylozoick Atheists themselves so Sensible hereof That there must be some Substantiall and Unmade Life from whence the Lives and Minds of all Animals are Derived That they attribute the same to Matter and conclude That though the Modificated Lives of Animals and Men be Accidentall Generated and Corrupted yet the Fundamental Life of them is Substantiall and Incorruptible These also asserted a Knowledge before Sense and Vnderived from Sensibles Page 870 871 This Hylozoick Atheism again Confuted Absurd to suppose Knowledge and Understanding without Consciousness as also That the Substantiall and Fundamentall Life of Men and other Animals should never Perish and yet their Souls and Personalities Vanish into Nothing That no Organization can produce Consciousness These Atheists not able possibly to give an Account whence the Intelligible Objects and Idea's of this their Knowledge of Matter should spring This Hylozoick Atheism Nothing but the Crumbling of the Deity into Matter Page 871 Concluded That the Phaenomenon of Mind and Understanding can no way possibly be Salved by Atheists without a God but affordeth a Solid Demonstration of his Existence Page 871 872 SECT V. THERE now Remaining onely the Atheistick Objections against Providence their Queries and Arguments from Interests Their First Objection From the Frame of the World as Faulty Or Because Things are Ill Made that therefore not made by a God This directed against the Sense of the Ancient Theologers That God being a Perfect Mind therefore made the World after the Best manner Some Modern Theologers Deviating from this as if the Perfection of the Deity consisted not at all in Goodness but in Power and Arbitrary Will onely The Controversy betwixt these and Atheists but Whether Matter Fortuitously Moved or a Fortuitous Will Omnipotent be the Originall of all things No Ground of Faith in a meer Arbitrarious Deity To have a Will Vndetermined to Good no Liberty nor Soveraignty but Impotency God to Celsus the Head or President of the Righteous Nature This not onely the Sense of Origen but of the Ancient Christians in Generall Plotinus The Will of God Essentially That which Ought to be God an Impartiall Balance Weighing out Heaven and Earth The
and since too have done We see here that Plato expresly asserts a Substance distinct from Body which sometimes he calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Incorporeal Substance and sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Intelligible Substance in opposition to the other which he calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sensible And it is plain to any one that hath had the least acquaintance with Plato's Philosophy that the whole Scope and Drift of it is to raise up mens Minds from Sense to a belief of Incorporeal Things as the most Excellent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he writes in another place For Incorporeal Things which are the greatest and most excellent things of all are saith he discoverable by Reason only and nothing else And his Subterraneous Cave so famously known and so elegantly described by him where he supposes men tied with their backs towards the Light placed at a great distance from them so that they could not turn about their Heads to it neither and therefore could see nothing but the shadows of certain Substances behind them projected from it which Shadows they concluded to be the only Substances and Realities and when they heard the Sounds made by those Bodies that were betwixt the Light and them or their reverberated Eccho's they imputed them to those shadows which they saw I say all this is a Description of the State of those Men who tak◠Body to be the only Real and Substantial thing in the World and to do all that is done in it and therefore often impute Sense Reason and Understanding to nothing but Blood and Brains in us XX. I might also shew in the next place how Aristotle did not at all dissent from Plato herein he plainly asserting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 another Substance beside Sensibles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Substance separable and also actually separated from Sensibles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Immoveable Nature or Essence subject to no Generation or Corruption adding that the Deity was to be sought for here Nay such a Substance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as hath no Magnitude at all but is Impartible and Indivisible He also blaming Zeno not the Stoick who was Junior to Aristotle but an ancienter Philosopher of that Name for making God to be a Body in these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Zeno implicitly affirms God to be a Body whether he mean him to be the whole Corporeal Vniverse or some particular Body for if God were Incorporeal how could he be Spherical nor could he then either Move or Rest being not properly in any Place but if God be a Body then nothing hinders but that he may be moved From which and other Places of Aristotle it is plain enough also that he did suppose Incorporeal Substance to be Unextended and as such not to have Relation to any Place But this is a thing to be disputed afterwards Indeed some learned men conceive Aristotle to have reprehended Zeno without Cause and that Zeno made God to be a Sphear or Spherical in no other sence than Parmenides did in that known Verse of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Wherein he is understood to describe the Divine Eternity However it plainly appears from hence that according to Aristotle's sence God was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Incorporeal Substance distinct from the World XXI Now this Doctrine which Plato especially was famous for asserting that there was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Incorporeal Substance and that the Souls of Men were such but principally the Deity Epicurus taking notice of it endeavoured with all his might to confute it arguing sometimes after this manner There can be no Incorporeal God as Plato maintained not only because no man can frame a Conception of an Incorporeal Substance but also because whatsoever is Incorporeal must needs want Sense and Prudence and Pleasure all which things are included in the Notion of God and therefore an Incorporeal Deity is a Contradiction And concerning the Soul of Man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. They who say that the Soul is Incorporeal in any other sence than as that word may be used to signifie a Subtil Body talk Vainly and Foolishly for then it could neither be able to Do nor Suffer any thing It could not Act upon any other thing because it could Touch nothing neither could it Suffer from any thing because it could not be Touch'd by any thing but it would be just like to Vacuum or Empty Space which can neither Do nor Suffer any thing but only yield Bodies a Passage through it From whence it is further evident that this Opinion was professedly maintained by some Philosophers before Epicurus his time XXII But Plato and Aristotle were not the first Inventors of it For it is certain that all those Philosophers who held the Immortality of the Humane Soul and a God distinct from this visible World and so properly the Creator of it and all its parts did really assert Incorporeal Substance For that a Corporeal Soul cannot be in its own Nature Immortal and Incorruptible is plain to every one's Understanding because of its parts being separable from one another and whosoever denies God to be Incorporeal if he make him any thing at all he must needs make him to be either the whole Corporeal World or else a part of it Wherefore if God be neither of these he must then be an Incorporeal Substance Now Plato was not the first who asserted these two things but they were both maintained by many Philosophers before him Pherecydes Syrus and Thales were two of the most ancient Philosophers among the Greeks and it is said of the former of them that by his Lectures and Disputes concerning the Immortality of the Soul he first drew off Pythagoras from another Course of life to the study of Philosophy Pherecydes Syrus saith Cicero Primus dixit animos hominum esse sempiternos And Thales in an Epistle directed to him congratulates his being the First that had designed to write to the Greeks concerning Divine Things which Thales also who was the Head of the Ionick Succession of Philosophers as Pythagoras of the Italick is joyned with Pythagoras and Plato by the Writer De Placitis Philosophorum after this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All these determined the Soul to be Incorporeal making it to be Naturally Self-moving or Self-active and an Intelligible Substance that is not Sensible Now he that determines the Soul to be Incorporeal must needs hold the Deity to be Incorporeal much more Aquam dixit Thales esse initium rerum saith Cicero Deum autem eam Mentem quae ex aqua cuncta fingeret Thales said that Water was the first Principle of all Corporeal things but that God was that Mind which formed all things out of Water For Thales was a Phoenician by Extraction and accordingly seemed to have received his two Principles from thence Water and the Divine Spirit moving upon the Waters The First whereof is thus
theirs That Theism is inconsistent with Civil Soveraignty it introducing a Fear greater than the Fear of the Leviathan And that any other Conscience allowed of besides the Civil Law being Private Judgment is ipso facto a Dissolution of the Body Politick and a Return to the State of Nature 22. The Atheists Conclusion from the former Premisses as set down in Plato and Lucretius That all things sprung Originally from Nature and Chance without any Mind or God that is proceeded from the Necessity of Material Motions undirected for Ends That Infinite Atoms devoid of Life and Sense moving in Infinite Space from Eternity by their fortuitous Rencounters and Intanglements produced the System of the whole Vniverse and as well Animate as Inanimate things I. HAving in the Former Chapter given an Account of the Genuine and Primitive Atomical Philosophy which may be called the Moschical we are in the next place to consider the Democritical that is the Atheized and Adulterated Atomology Which had its Origin from nothing else but the joyning of this Heterogeneous and Contradictious Principle to the Atomical Physiology That there is no other Substance in the World besides Body Now we say That that Philosophy which is thus compounded and made up of these Two things Atomicism and Corporealism complicated together is essentially Atheistical though neither of them alone be such For the Atomical Physiology as we have declared already is in its own Nature sufficiently repugnant to Atheism And it is possible for one who holds That there is Nothing in the world besides Body to be perswaded notwithstanding of a Corporeal Deity and that the world was at first framed and is still governed by an Vnderstanding Nature lodged in the Matter For thus some of these Corporealists have phancied The whole Universe it self to be a God that is an Vnderstanding and Wise Animal that ordered all things within it self after the Best manner possible and providently governed the same Indeed it cannot be denied but that this is a very great Infirmity of mind that such Persons lie under who are not able to conceive any other Substance besides Body by which is understood that which is Impenetrably Extended or else in Plato's Language which hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that thrusts against other Bodies and resist◠their impulse or as others express it which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that so fills up place as to exclude any other Body or Substance from Coexisting with it therein and such must needs have not only very imperfect but also Spurious and false Conceptions of the Deity so long as they apprehend it to be thus Corporeal but yet it does not therefore follow that they must needs be accounted Atheists But whosoever holds these two Principles before mentioned together That there is no other Substance besides Body and That Body hath nothing else belonging to it but Magnitude Figure Site and Motion without Qualities I say whosoever is That confounded Thing of an Atomist and Corporealist jumbled together he is Essentially and Unavoidably that which is meant by an Atheist though he should in words never so much disclaim it because he must needs fetch the Original of all things from Sensless Matter whereas to assert a God is to maintain that all things sprung Originally from a Knowing and Vnderstanding Nature II. Epicurus who was one of those Mongrel Things before mentioned an Atomical-Corporealist or Corporeal-Atomist did notwithstanding profess to hold a Multifarious Rabble and Democracy of Gods such as though they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Humane Form yet were so Thin and Subtle as that Comparatively with our Terrestrial Bodies they might be called Incorporeal they having not so much Carnem as Quasi-carnem nor Sanguinem as Quasi-sanguinem a certain kind of Aereal or Ethereal Flesh and Blood which Gods of his were not to be supposed to exist any where within the World upon this pretence that there was no place in it fit to receive them Illud item non est ut possis credere Sedes Esse Deûm Sanctas in Mundi partibus ullis And therefore they must be imagined to Subsist in certain Intermundane Spaces and Vtopian Regions without the World the Deliciousness whereof is thus Elegantly described by the Poet Quas neque concutiunt Venti neque Nubila nimbis Adspergunt neque nix acri concreta pruinâ Cana cadens violat sempérque innubilus Aether Integit largè diffuso lumine ridet Whereunto was added that the chief Happiness of these Gods consisted in Omnium Vacatioue Munerum in freedom from all Business and Employment and doing nothing at all that so they might live a Soft and Delicate life And lastly it was pretended that though they had neither any thing to do with us nor we with them yet they ought to be worshipped by us for their own Excellent Natures sake and Happy State But whosoever had the least Sagacity in him could not but perceive that this Theology of Epicurus was but Romantical it being directly Contrary to his avowed and professed Principles to admitt of any other Being then what was Concreted of Atoms and consequently Corruptible and that he did this upon a Politick Account thereby to decline the Common Odium and those Dangers and Inconveniences which otherwise he might have incurred by a downright denial of a God to which purpose it accordingly served his turn Thus Posidonius rightly pronounced Nullos esse Deos Epicuro videri quaeque is de Diis immortalibus dixerit Invidiae detestandae gratiâ dixisse Though he was partly Jocular in it also it making no small Sport to him in this manner to delude and mock the credulous Vulgar Deos Jocandi causâ induxit Epicurus perlucidos perflabiles habitantes tanquam inter duos Lucos sic inter duos Mundos propter metum ruinarum However if Epicurus had been never so much in Earnest in all this yet by Gassendus his leave we should pronounce him to have been not a jot the less an Atheist so long as he maintained that the whole World was made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without the ordering and direction of any Vnderstanding Being that was perfectly happy and immortal and fetcht the original of all things in the Universe even of Soul and Mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from Sensless Atoms fortuitously moved He together with Democritus hereby making the World to be in the worst Sence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Egge of the Night that is not the off-spring of Mind and Understanding but of dark Sensless Matter of Tohu and Bohu or Confused Chaos and deriving the Original of all the Perfections in the Universe from the most Imperfect Being and the lowest of all Entities than which nothing can be more Atheistical And as for those Romantick Monogrammous Gods of Epicurus had they been Seriously believed by him they could have been nothing else but a certain kind of Aerial and Spectrous Men living by themselves no Body knows where without the
and Evil and therefore the Allowance of it is contradictious to Civil Sovereignty and a Commonwealth There ought to be no other Conscience in a Kingdom or Commonwealth besides the Law of the Countrey the allowance of Private Conscience being ipso facto a Dissolution of the Body Politick and a Return to the State of Nature Upon all these accounts it must needs be acknowledged that those Philosophers who undermine and weaken Theism and Religion do highly deserve of all Civil Sovereigns and Common-wealths XXII Now from all the premised Considerations the Democriticks confidently conclude against a Deity That the System and Compages of the Universe had not its Original from any Vnderstanding Nature but that Mind and Vnderstanding it self as well as all things else in the World sprung up from Sensless Nature and Chance or from the unguided and undirected Motion of Matter Which is therefore called by the Name of Nature because whatsoever moves is moved by Nature and Necessity and the mutual Occursions and Rencounters of Atoms their Plagae their Stroaks and Dashings against one another their Reflexions and Repercussions their Cohesions Implexions and Entanglements as also their Scattered Dispersions and Divulsions are all Natural and Necessary but it is called also by the name of Chance and Fortune because it is all unguided by any Mind Counsel or Design Wherefore Infinite Atoms of different sizes and figures devoid of all Life and Sense moving Fortuitously from Eternity in infinite Space and making successively several Encounters and consequently various Implexions and Entanglements with one another produced first a confused Chaos of these Omnifarious Particles jumbling together with infinite variety of Motions which afterward by the tugging of their different and contrary forces whereby they all hindred and abated each other came as it were by joint Conspiracy to be Conglomerated into a Vortex or Vortices where after many Convolutions and Evolutions Molitions and Essays in which all manner of Tricks were tried and all Forms imaginable experimented they chanced in length of time here to settle into this Form and System of things which now is of Earth Water Air and Fire Sun Moon and Stars Plants Animals and Men So that Sensless Atoms fortuitously moved and Material Chaos were the first Original of all things This Account of the Cosmopoeia and first Original of the Mundane System is represented by Lucretius according to the mind of Epicurus though without any mention of those Vortices which yet were an essential part of the old Democritick Hypothesis Sed quibus ille modis conjectus material Fundarit coelum ac terram pontÃque profunda Solis lunaï cursus ex ordine ponam Nam certè neque consilio primordia rerum Ordine se quaeque atque sagaci mente locarunt Nec quos quaeque dárent motus pepigere profectò Sed quia multa modis multis primordia rerum Ex infinito jam tempore percita plagis Ponderibúsque suis consuerunt concita ferri Omni'modisque coire atque omnia pertentare Quaecunque inter se possent congressa creare Proptereà fit utì magnum volgata per aevum Omnigenos coetus motus experiundo Tandem ea conveniant quae ut convenere repentè Magnarum rerum fiant exordia saepe Terraï Maris Coeli generÃsque Animantum But because some seem to think that Epicurus was the first Founder and Inventor of this Doctrine we shall here observe that this same Atheistick Hypothesis was long before described by Plato when Epicurus was as yet unborn and therefore doubtless according to the Doctrine of Leucippus Democritus and Protagoras though that Philosopher in a kind of disdain as it seems refused to mention either of their Names 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Atheists say that Fire Water Air and Earth i. e. the four Elements were all made by Nature and Chance and none of them by Art or Mind that is they were made by the fortuitous Motion of Atoms and not by any Deity And that those other Bodies of the Terrestrial Globe of the Sun the Moon and the Stars which by all except these Atheists were in those times generally supposed to be Animated and a kind of Inferiour Deities were afterwards made out of the foresaid Elements being altogether Inanimate For they being moved fortuitously or as it happened and so making various commixtures together did by that means at length produce the whole Heavens and all things in them as likewise Plants and Animals here upon earth all which were not made by Mind nor by Art nor by any God but as we said before by Nature and Chance Art and Mind it self rising up afterwards from the same Sensless Principles in Animals CHAP. III. An Introduction to the Confutation of the Atheistick Grounds in which is contained a particular Accompt of all the several Forms of Atheism 1. That the Grounds of the Hylozoick Atheism could not be insisted on in the former Chapter together with those of the Atomick they being directly contrary each to other with a further Accompt of this Hylozoick Atheism 2. A Suggestion by way of Caution for the preventing of all mistakes That every Hylozoist must not therefore be condemned for an Atheist or a mere Counterfeit Histrionical Theist 3. That nevertheless such Hylozoists as are also Corporealists can by no means be excused from the Imputation of Atheism for Two Reasons 4. That Strato Lampsacenus commonly called Physicus seems to have been the first Asserter of the Hylozoick Atheism he holding no other God but the Life of Nature in Matter 5. Further proved that Strato was an Atheist and that of a different Form from Democritus he attributing an Energetick Nature but without Sense and Animality to all Matter 6. That Strato not deriving all things from a mere Fortuitous Principle as the Democritick Atheists did nor yet acknowledging any one Plastick Nature to preside over the Whole but deducing the Original of things from a Mixture of Chance and Plastick Nature both together in the several parts of Matter must therefore needs be an Hylozoick Atheist 7. That the famous Hippocrates was neither an Hylozoick nor Democritick Atheist but rather an Heraclitick Corporeal Theist 8. That Plato took no Notice of the Hylozoick Atheism nor of any other then what derives the Original of all things from a mere Fortuitous Nature and therefore either the Democritical or the Anaximandrian Atheism which latter will be next declared 9. That it is hardly imaginable there should have been no Philosophick Atheists in the World before Democritus and Leucippus there being in all Ages as Plato observes some or other sick of the Atheistick Disease That Aristotle affirms many of the first Philosophers to have assigned only a Material Cause of the Mundane System without either Efficient or Intending Cause They supposing Matter to be the only Substance and all things else nothing but the Passions and Accidents of it
is also the Light it self and it is certain that Darkness cannot comprehend this Light nor insinuate it self with it In like manner the Nature of the Holy Ghost is such as can never receive Pollution it being Substantially and Essentially Holy But whatsoever other Nature is Holy it is only such in way of Participation and by the Inspiration of this Holy Spirit so that Holiness is not its very Nature and Essence but only an Accident to it and whatsoever is but Accidental may fail All Created Beings therefore having but Accidental Goodness and Wisdom may Degenerate and fall into Evil and Folly Which of Origen's is all one as if he should have said there is no such Rank of Beings as Autogaathotetes Essential Goodnesses there being only one Being Essentially Good or Goodness it self Nor no such Particular Created Beings existing in Nature as the Platonists call Noes neither that is Minds or Intellects Immovable Perfectly and Essentially Wise or Wisdom it self whose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whose Essence is their Operation and who consequently have no Flux at all in them nor Successive Action only the Eternal Word and Wisdom of God being such who also are absolutely Ununitable to any Bodies It is true that Origen did sometimes make mention of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Minds or Intellects but it was in another sence he calling all Souls as first Created by God and before their Lapse by that name which was as much as if he should have said though some of the Platonists talk much of their Noes yet is there nothing answerable to that name according to their Notion of them but the only Noes really existing in Nature are Vnfallen but Peccable Souls he often concluding that the Highest Rank of Created Beings are indeed no better than those which the Platonists commonly call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Souls By which Souls he understood first of all Beings in their own nature Selfmoveable and Active whereas the Noes of the Platonists are altogether Immoveable and above Action And then again such Beings or Spirits Incorporeal as exist not Abstractly and Separately from all Matter as the Noes of the Platonists were supposed to do but are Vitally Vnitable to Bodies so as together with those Bodies to compound and make up One Animal Thus I say Origen conceived even of the Highest Angelical and Arch-Angelica Orders that they were eall of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Souls United to Bodies but such as were Pure Subtil and Ethereal however he supposed it not Impossible for them to sink down into Bodies more Gross and Feculent And it is certain that many of the Ancient Christian Writers concurred with Origen herein that the Highest Created Spirits were no Naked and Abstract Minds but Souls cloathed with some Corporeal Indument Lastly Origen's Souls were also supposed to be all of them endowed with Liberum Arbitrium or Free-Will and consequently to be Self-improvable and Self-impairable and no Particular Created Spirits to be absolutely in their own Nature Impeccable but Lapsible into Vitious Habits Whereas as the Platonick Noes are supposed to be such Beings as could never Fall nor Degenerate And the Generality of the Christian Writers seem'd to have consented or conspir'd with Origen in this also they supposing him who is now the Prince of Devils to have been once an Angel of the Highest Order Thus does St. Jerome determine Solus Deus est in quem Peccatum non cadit caetera cùm sint Liberi Arbitrii possunt in utramque partem suam flectere voluntatem God is the only Being that is absolutely uncapable of sin but all other Beings having Free Will in them may possibly turn their Will to either way that is to Evil as well as to Good It is certain that God in a sence of Perfection is the most Free Agent of all neither is Contingent Liberty Universally denied to him but here it is made the only Privilege of God that is of the Holy Trinity to be devoid of Liberum Arbitrium namely as it implieth Imperfection that is Peccability and Lapsibility in it It is true that some of the Platonick Philosophers suppose that even in that Rank of Beings called by them Souls though they be not Essentially Immutable but all Self-moveable and Active yet there are some of them of so high a Pitch and Elevation as that they can never Degenerate nor sink down into Vitious Habits Thus Simplicius for one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the First and Highest of Souls which were Immediately produced from what are Essentially Good although they have some abatement in them they being not Goodnesses Essentially but desirous of Good nevertheless are they so near a kin to that Highest Good of all as that they do Naturally and Indivulsively cleave to the same and have their Volitions always uniformly directed towards it they never declining to the worser Insomuch that if Proaeresis be taken for the Choosing of one thing before another perhaps there is no such thing as Proaeresis to be imputed to them unless one should call the choosing of the First Goods Proaeresis By these higher Souls Simplicius must needs understand either the Souls of the Sun Moon and Stars or else those of the Superiour Orders of Demoniack or Angelick Beings Where though he make a Question Whether Proaeresis or Deliberation belong to them yet does he plainly imply that they have none at all of that Lubricous Liberum Arbitrium or Free-will belonging to them which would make them capable of Vice and Immorality as well as Vertue But whatever is to be said of this there seems to be no necessity at all for admitting that Assertion of Origen's that all Rational Souls whatsoever even those of Men and those of the highest Angelical Orders are Universally of one and the same Nature and have no Fundamental or Essential Difference in their Constitution and consequently that all the difference that is now betwixt them did arise only from the Difference of their Demeanour or Use of that Power and Liberty which they all alike once had So that Thrones and Dominions and Principalities and Powers were all made such by their Merits and Humane Souls though now sunk so low yet are not absolutely Uncapable of Commencing Angels or ascending to those highest Altitudes as it is not impossible according to him neither but that the Highest Angels also the Seraphim and Cherubim might in length of time not only Degenerate into Devils but also sink down into Humane Bodies His reason for which Monstrous Paradox is only this that the Divine Justice cannot otherwise well be salved but God must needs be a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Acepter of Persons should he have Arbitrarily made such vast Differences amongst Intellectual Beings Which Ground he also extendeth so far as to the Humane Soul of our Saviour Christ himself as being not Partially appointed to that transcendent
Dignity of its Hypostatick Vnion but by reason of its most faithful adherence to the Divine Word and Wisdom in a Pre-existent State beyond all others Souls which he endeavours thus to prove from the Scripture Quòd dilectionis Perfectio affectus sinceritas ei inseparabilem cum Deo fecerit Vnitatem ità ut non fortuita fuerit aut cum Personae acceptione Animae ejus assumptio sed Virtutum suarum sibi merito delata audi ad eum Prophetam dicentem Dilexisti Justitiam odisti iniquitatem proptereà unxit te Deus Deus tuus oleo laetitiae prae participibus tuis Dilectionis ergo merito ungitur Oleo laetitiae Anima Christi id est cum Verbo Dei Vnum efficitur Vngè namque oleo laetitiae non aliud intelligitur quam Spiritu Sancto repleri Prae Participibus autem dixit quia nâ—n Gratia Spiritus sicut Prophetis ei data est sed ipsius Verbi Dei in ea Substantialis inerat Plenitudo That the Perfection of Love and Sincerity of Divine Affection procured to this Soul its Inseparable Vnion with the Godhead so that the Assumption of it was neither Fortuitous nor Partial or with Prosopolepsie the Acception of Persons but bestowed upon it justly for the Merit of its Vertues hear saith he the Prophet thus declaring to him Thou hast loved Righteousness and hated Iniquity therefore hath God even thy God anointed thee with the oil of Gladness above thy Fellows The Soul of Christ therefore was anointed with the oil of Gladness or made one with the Word of God for the Merits of Love and faithful adherence to God and no otherwise For to be anointed with the oil of Gladness here properly signifies nothing else but to be replenish'd with the Holy Ghost But when it is said that he was thus anointed above his Fellows this intimateth that he had not the Holy Ghost bestowed upon him only as the Prophets and other Holy men had but that the Substantial Fulness of the Word of God dwelt in him But this Reason of Origen's seems to be very weak because if there be a Rank of Souls below Humane specifically differing from the same as Origen himself must needs confess he not allowing the Souls of Brutes to have been Humane Souls Lapsed as some Pythagoreans and Platonists conceited but renouncing and disclaiming that Opinion as monstrously Absurd and Irrational there can be no reason given why there might not be as well other Ranks and Orders of Souls Superiour to those of Men without the Injustice of Prosopolepsie as besides Simplicius Plotinus and the Generality of other Platonists conceived But least of all can we assent to Origen when from this Principle that Souls as such are Essentially endowed with Liberum Arbitrium or Free Will and therefore never in their own Nature Impeccable he infers those Endless Circuits of Souls Vpwards and Downwards and so makes them to be never at rest denying them any Fixed State of Holiness and Happiness by Divine Grace such as wherein they might be free from the Fear and Danger of ever losing the same Of whom St. Austin therefore thus Illum propter alia nonnulla maximè propter alternantes sine cessatione beatitudines miserias statutis seculorum intervallis ab istis ad illas atque ab illis ad istas Itus ac Reditus Interminabiles non immeritò reprobavit Ecclesia quia hoc quod Misericors videbatur amisit faciendo sanctis Veras Miserias quibus poenas luerent Falsas Beatitudines in quibus verum ac securum hoc est sine Timore certum sempiterni boni gaudium non haberent The Church hath deservedly rejected Origen both for certain other opinions of his and especially for those his Alternate Beatitudes and Miseries without end and for his infinite Circuits Ascents and Descents of Souls from one to the other in restless Vicissitudes and after Periods of Time Forasmuch as hereby he hath quite lost that very Title of Pitiful or Merciful which otherwise he seemed to have deserved by making so many True Miseries for the best of Saints in which they should successively undergo Punishment and Smart and none but False Happinesses for them such as wherein they could never have any True or Secure joy free from the Fear of losing that Good which they possess For this Origenical Hypothesis seems directly contrary to the whole Tenour of the Gospel promising Eternal and Everlasting Life to those who believe in Christ and Perseveringly obey him 1 Joh. 2. This is the Promise that he hath Promised us even Eternal Life and Titus 1.2 In hope of Eternal Life which God that cannot Lye hath promised And God so loved the World that he gave his only Begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have Everlasting Life and lest all this should be taken for a Periodical Eternity only John 3.26 He that believeth in me shall never die And possibly this might be the Meaning of St. Paul 2 Tim. 1.10 when he affirmeth of our Saviour Christ That he hath abolished Death and brought Life and Immortality to Light thorough the Gospel not because he was the First who had discovered and published to the World the Souls Immortality which was believed before not only by all the Pharisaick Jews but also by the Generality of Pagans too but because these for the most part held their Endless Circuits and Transmigrations of Souls therefore was he the First who brought Everlasting Life to Light and gave the World assurance in the Faith of the Gospel of a Fixed and Permanent State of Happiness and a never fading Crown of Glory to be obteined Him that overcometh will I make a Pillar in the Temple of my God and he shall go no more out Apoc. 3.12 Now the Reason why we mention'd Origen here was because he was a Person not only thoroughly skilled in all the Platonick Learning but also one who was sufficiently addicted to those Dogmata he being commonly conceived to have had too great a kindness for them and therefore had there been any Solidity of Reason for either those Particular Henades or Noes of theirs Created Beings above the Rank of Souls and consequently according to the Platonick Hypothesis Superiour to the Vniversal Psyche also which was the Third Hypostasis in their Trinity and seems to answer to the Holy Ghost in the Christian Origen was as likely to have been favourable thereunto as any other But it is indeed manifestly repugnant to Reason that there should be any such Particular that is Created Henades and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Essential Goodnesses Superiour to the Platonick First Mind or any such Noes and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Essential Wisdoms Superiour to their Vniversal Psyche it being all one as if in the Christian Trinity besides the First Person or the Father one should suppose a Multitude of Particular Paternities Superiour to the Second and also besides that Second
have heen Formed in certain Wombs or Bags growing out of the Earth Crescebant Vteri terrae radicibus apti And this no otherwise than by the Fortuitous Motion of Atoms also But if Men had been at First Formed after this manner either in Wombs or Eggs growing out of the Earth or Generated out of Putrefaction by Chance then could there be no reason imaginable why it should not sometimes so Happen now the Motions of Atoms being as Brisk and Vigorous as ever they were and so to continue to all Eternity so that there is not the least Ground at all for that Precarious Phancy and Pretence of Epicurus that the Earth as a Child-bearing Woman growing old became at length Effete and Barren Moreover the Men thus at first excluded out of Bags Wombs or Egg-shells or Generated out of Putrefaction were supposed by these Atheists themselves to have been produced not in a Mature and Adult but an Infant-like Weak and Tender State just such as they are now born into the World by means whereof they could neither be able to Feed and Nourish themselves nor defend themselves from harms and Injuries But when the same Epicurus would here pretend also that the Earth which had been so Fruitful a Mother became afterward by Chance too as tender and indulgent a Nurse of this her own Progeny and sent forth Streams or Rivers of Milk after them out of those Gaps of her Wounded Surface which they had before burst out of as Critolaus long since observed he might as well have feigned the Earth to have had Breasts and Nipples too as Wombs and Milk and then what should hinder but that she might have Arms and Hands also and Swaddling-bands to boot Neither is that less Precarious when the same Atheistick Philosopher adds that in this Imaginary State of the New-born world there was for a long time neither any Immoderate Heat nor Cold nor any Rude and Churlish Blasts of Wind the least to annoy or injure those tender Earth-born Infants and Nurslings All which things being considered Anaximander seems of the Two to have concluded more wisely that Men because they require a longer time than other Animals to be hatched up in were at first Generated in the Bellies of Fishes and there nourished up for a good while till they were at length able to defend and shift for themselves and then were Disgorged and cast up upon dry land Thus do we see that there is nothing in the World so Monstrous nor Prodigiously Absurd which men Atheistically inclined will not rather Imagine and Swallow down than entertain the Notion of a God Wherefore here is Dignus Vindice Nodus and this Phaenomenon of the First Beginning of Mankind and other Greater Animals cannot be Salved otherwise than according to the Mosaick History by admitting of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a God out of a Machin that is an Extraordinary Manifestation of the Deity in forming Man and othâ—r Animals Male and Female once out of the Earth and that not in a Rude Tender and Infant-like State but Mature and Adult â—hâ—t so they might be able immediately to shift for themselves Mulâ—iply and Propagate their kind by Generation and this being once done and now no longer any necessity of such an extraordinary way of proceeding then putting a stop immediately thereunto that so no more Terriginae nor Autochthones Earth-born Mâ—n should be any longer pâ—oduced For all these circumstances being put together it plainly appears that this whole Phaenomenon surpasses not only the Mechanical but also the Plastick Powers thâ—ir being much of Discretion in it which the latter of these cannot arrive to neither they always acting Fatally and Necessarily Nevertheless we shall not here determine Whether God Almighty might not make use of the Subservient Ministry of Angels or Superiour Spirits Created before Man in this first extraordinary Efformation of the Bodies of Animals out of the Earth in a Mature and Adult State as Plato in his Timaeus introduceth the Supreme God whom he supposeth to be the immediate Creator of all Immortal Souls thus bespeaking the Junior Gods and setting them a work in the Fabrifaction of Mortal Bodies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is your work now to Adaptate the Mortal to the Immortal and to Generate or make Terrestrial Animals He afterwards adding 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That after the sowing of Immortal Souls the Supreme God committed to these Junior Gods the task of forming Mortal Bodies Which of Plato's some conceive to have been derived from that of Moses Let us make Man after our own Image Moreover these Atheists are no more able to Salve that other Common and Ordinary Phaenomenon neither of the Conservation of the Species of all Animals by keeping up constantly in the world a due Numerical Proportion between the Sexes of Male and Female For did this depend only upon Fortuitous Mechanism it cannot well be conceived but that in some ages or other there should happen to be either all Males or all Females and so the Species fail Nay it cannot well be thought otherwise but that there is in this a Providence also Superiour to that of the Plastick or Spermatick Nature which hath not so much of Knowledge and Discretion allowed to it as whereby to be able alone to govern this Affair Lastly there are yet other Phaenomena no less Real though not Physiological which Atheists can no way Salve as that of Natural Justice and Honâ—sty Duty and Obligation the true Foundation both of Ethicks and Politicks and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Liberty of Will properly so called not that of Fortuitous Determination when there is a Perfect Equality or Indifferency of Eligibility in Objects but that whereby men deseâ—ve Commendation and Blame Rewards and Punishments and so become fit Objects for Remunerative Justice to display it self upon a Main Hinge upon which Religion Turneth though those Two be not commonly so well distinguish'd as they ought For when Epicurus an Absolute Atheist departing here from Democritus pretended to Salve this by his Exiguum Clinamen Principiorum this attempt of his was no other than a plain Delirancy or Atheistick Phrenzy in him And now have we already Preventively Confuted the Third Atheistick Pretence also to Salve the Phaenomenon of Religion and the Belief of a God so generally entertained namely from the Fiction and Imposture of Politicians we having not only manifested that there is a Natural Prolepsis and Anticipation of a God in the Minds of men as the Object of their Fear Preventing Reason but also that the Belief thereof is sustained and upheld by the strongest Reason the Phaenomena of Nature being no way Salvable nor the Causes of things Assigneable without a Deity so that Religion being Founded both upon the Instincts of Nature and upon Solid Reason cannot possibly be any Fiction or Imposture of Politicians Nevertheless we shall speak something particularly to this also The Atheists therefore conceive that though those Infirmities
Account which the Scripture it self giveth us of the Resurrection and First in General when S. Paul Answering that Querie of the Philosophick Infidel How are the dead raised or with what Body do they come Replieth in this manner Thou Fool that is thou who thinkest to puzzle or baffle the Christian Article of the Resurrection which thou understandest not That which thou sowest is not Quickened to the Production of any thing except it first die to what it was And thou sowest not that Body that shall be but bare Grain as of Wheat or of Barley or the like but God in the ordinary course of Nature giveth it a Body as it hath pleased him that is a Stalk and an Eare having many Grains with Husks in it and therefore neither in Quantity nor Quality the same with that which was Sowed under Ground Nor does he give to all Seeds one and the same kind of Body neither but to every seed it s own correspondent Body as to Wheat one kind of Eare and to Barley another As if he should have said Know that this Present Body of ours is to be look'd upon but as a kind of Seed of the Resurrection-Body which therefore is accordingly in some sense the Same and in some sense not the Same with it Besides which General Account the Particular Oppositions which the Scripture makes betwixt the Present and Future Body seem very agreeable to those of the Philosophick Cabala For First the Present Body is said to be Sowed in Corruption but the Future Raised in Incorruption For the Children of the Resurrection cannot die any more And then Mortality shall be swallowed up of Life Wherefore the Christian Resurrection-Body as well as that of the Philosophick Cabala is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too 2 Cor. 5.1 an Immortal and Eternal Body Again the Body Sowed is said to be a Dishonourable Ignominious and Inglorious Body and therefore called also by S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Body of our Humility or Humiliation A Body agreeable to this Lapsed State of the Soul But the Body which shall be Raised shall be a Glorious Body and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Conformable to that Glorious Body of Christ. Who when he was but Externally Transfigured his Face did shine as the Sun and his Raiment was white as the Light The Glory of a Body consisteth only in the Comliness of its Proportion and the Spendor thereof Thus is there one Glory of the Sun and another Glory of the Moon and another Glory of the Stars that is a different Splendor of them Wherefore the Future Body of the Righteous according to the Scripture also as well as the Philosophick Cabala will be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Glorious Splendid Luciform and Star-like Body Wisd. 3.7 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Righteous in the time of their Visitation shall shine forth Daniel 12. the 2. and 3. 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 And Matthew the 13.43 Then shall the Righteous shine forth as the Sun in the Kingdom of their Father And therefore probably this Future Glorious Resurrection Body is that Inheritance of the Saints in Light which the Scripture speaks of Col. 1. the 12. Moreover there is another difference betwixt this Present and that Future Body of the Righteous wherein S. Paul and Hierocles do well agree the First being called by both of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An Animal Body The Second 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Spiritual Body Which latter expression in Scripture does not only denote the Subtlety and Tenuity thereof but also as this Present Body is called an Animal Body because it is suitable and agreeable to that Animal Life which men have Common with Brutes so is that Future called Spiritual as bearing a fit proportion and correspondency to Souls renewed in the Spirit of their Mind or in whom the Divine Spirit Dwelleth and Acteth exercising its Dominion There is an Animal Body and there is a Spiritual Body And the First Adam was made a Living Soul the Last Adam a Quickning Spirit And thus are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Scripture taken for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They who have not the Spirit And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Animal Man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God Which Spirit is also said in Scripture to be the Earnest of that our Future Inheritance Ephesians the 1. the 14. and the Earnest of this Spiritual and Heavenly Body 2 Corinth the 5. the 5. It is also said to be that by which Efficiently these Mortal Bodies shall be Quickened Romans the 8. the 11. If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also Quicken your Mortal Bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you Neither doth Hierocles fall much short of this Scripture Notion of a Spiritual Body when he describes it to be that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which is Agreeable to the Intellectual Perfection of the Soul This Spiritual Body is that which the Ancient Hebrews called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eagles Wings We reading thus in the Gemara of the Sanhedrin c. 11. fol. 92. col 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If you Ask what shall become of the Righteous when God shall renew the world the Answer is God shall make them wings like Eagles whereby they shall fly upon the Face of the Waters Again as this Present Body is called in Scripture an Earthly Body so is the Future Body of the Righteous styled by S. Paul as well as the Pythagoreans a Heavenly Body and they who shall then be possessors thereof 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heavenly men 1 Cor. 15. As is the Heavenly such are they that are Heavenly Besides which as Philosophers supposed both Demons or Angels and Men to have one and the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a like Lucid Heavenly and Etherial Body so from that of our Saviour when he affirmeth that they who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the Resurrection from the dead will neither Marry nor be given in Marriage nor can die any more for they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equal to the Angels from hence I say we may venture to call this Resurrection-Body of the Just also an Angelical or Isangelical Body and the rather because the Ancient Hebrews as we learn from Nachmonides in Shaar Haggemul styled it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Angelical Clothing of the Soul and Tertullian himself Angelificatam Carnem Angelified Flesh. But Lastly S. Paul is not only Positive in his Doctrine here but also Negative Now this I say brethren that Flesh and Blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God neither doth Corruption inherit
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no such Solid Body as they might find him to have bidding them therefore handle him to remove that Scruple of theirs As if he should have said Though Spirits or Ghosts and Souls Departed have Bodies or Vehicles which may by them be so far Condensed as sometimes to make a Visible appearance to the Eyes of men yet have they not any such Solid Bodies as those of Flesh and Bone and therefore by Feeling and Handling may you satisfie your selves that I am not a meer Spirit Ghost or Soul Appearing as others have frequently done without a Miracle but that I appear in that very same Solid Body wherein I was Crucified by the Jews by miraculous Divine Power raised out of the Sepulchre and now to be found no more there Agreeable to which of our Saviour Christ is that of Apollonius in Philostratus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Touch me and Handle me and if you find me to avoid the Touch then may you conclude me to be a Spirit or Ghost that is a Soul departed but if I firmly resist the same then believe me Really to live and not yet to have cast off the Body And indeed though Spirits or Ghosts had certain Subtle Bodies which they could so far Condense as to make them sometimes Visible to men yet is it reasonable enough to think that they could not Constipate or Fix them into such a Firmness Grossness and Solidity as that of Flesh and Bone is to continue therein or at least not without such Difficulty and Pain as would hinder them from attempting the same Notwithstanding which it is not denied but that they may possibly sometimes make use of other Solid Bodies Moving and Acting them as in that famous Story of Phlegons where the Body Vanished not as other Ghosts use to do but was left a Dead Carcase behind Now as for our Saviour Christ's Body after his Resurrection and before his Ascension which notwithstanding its Solidity in Handling yet sometimes Vanished also out of his Disciples sight this probably as Origen conceived was purposely conserved for a time in a certain Middle State betwixt the Craâ—sities of a Mortal Body and the Spirituality of a Perfectly Glorified Heavenly Etherial Body But there is a place of Scripture which as it hath been interpreted by the Generality of the Ancient Fathers would Naturally Imply even the Soul of our Saviour Christ himself after his Death and before his Resurrection not to have been quite Naked from all Body but to have had a certain Subtle or Spirituous Clothing and it is this of St. Peter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which being understood by those Ancients of our Saviour Christ's descending into Hades or Hell is accordingly thus rendered in the Vulgar Latin Put to Death In the Flesh bút Quickned in the Spirit In which Spirit also he went and preached to those Spirits that were in Prison c. So that the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Spirit here according to this interpretation is to be taken for a Spirituous Body the Sense being this That when our Saviour Christ was put to death in the Flesh or the Fleshly Body he was Quickned in the Spirit or a Spirituous Body In which Spirituous Body also he went and preached to those Spirits that were in Prison c. And doubtless it would be said by the Asserters of this Interpretation that the word Spirit could not here be taken for the Soul of our Saviour Christ because this being Naturally Immortal could not properly be said to be Quickned and Made Alive Nor could He that is our Saviour Christ's Soul be so well said to go In this Spirit neither that is In it self the Soul in the Soul to preach to the Spirits in Prison They would add also that Spirit here could not be taken for the Divine Spirit neither which was the Efficient Cause of the Vivification of our Saviour's Body at his Resurrection because then there would be no direct Opposition betwixt Being put to Death in the Flesh and Quickned in the Spirit unless they be taken both alike Materially As also the following Verse is thus to be understood That our Saviour Christ went in that Spirit wherein he was Quickned when he was Put to Death In the Flesh and therein preached to the Spirits in Prison By which Spirits in Prison also would be meant not Pure Incorporeal Substances or Naked Souls but Souls Clothed with Subtle Spirituous Bodies as that word may be often understood elsewhere in Scripture But thus much we are unquestionably certain of from the Scripture That not only Elias whose Terrestrial Body seems to have been in part at least Spiritualized in his Ascent in that Fiery Chariot but also Moses appeared Visibly to our Saviour Christ and his Disciples upon the Mount and therefore since Piety will not permit us to think this a meer Prestigious thing in Real Bodies which Bodies also seem to have been 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luciform or Lucid like to our Saviour's then Transfigured Body Again there are sundry places of Scripture which affirm that the Regenerate and Renewed have here in this Life a certain Earnest of their Future Inheritance which is their Spiritual or Heavenly Body as also the Quickning of their Mortal Bodies is therein attributed to the Efficiency of the Spirit Dwelling in them Which is a Thing that hath been taken notice of by Some of the Ancients as Irenaeus Nunc autem Partem aliquam Spiritus ejus sumimus ad Perfectionem Praeparationem Incorruptelae paulatim assuescentes Capere Portare Deum Quod Pignus dixit Apostolus hoc est Partem ejus Honoris qui à Deo nobis promissus est Si ergo Pignus hoc habitans in nobis jam Spirituales effecit absorbetur Mortale ab Immortalitate Now have we a Part of that Spirit for the Preparation and Perfection of Incorruption we being accustomed by little and little to Receive and Bear God Which also the Apostle hath called an Earnest that is a Part of that Honour which is promised to us from God If therefore this Earnest or Pledge dwelling in us hath made us already Spiritual the Mortal is also swallowed up by Immortality And Novatian Spiritus Sanctus id agit in nobis ut ad Aeternitatem ad Resurrectionem Immortalitatis corpora nostra perducat dum illa in se assuefacit cum Caelesti Virtute misceri This is that which the Holy Spirit doth in us namely to bring and lead on our Bodies to Eternity and the Resurrection of Immortality whilst in it self it accustometh us to be mingled with the Heavenly Vertue Moreover there are some places also which seem to imply that Good Men shall after Death have a Further Inchoation of their Heavenly Body the full Completion whereof is not to be expected before the Resurrection or Day of Judgment We know that If our Earthly House of this Tabernacle were dissolved we
appears that there is no Reason at all for that Fear and Suspition of some That if the Souls of Brutes be Substantial and continue in Being after Death they must therefore needs go either to Heaven or Hell But as for that Supposed Possibility of their awakening again afterwards in some other Terrestial Bodies this seemeth to be no more than what is found by dayly Experience in the Course of Nature when the Silk-worm and other Worms dying are transformed into Butterflies For there is little Reason to doubt but that the same Soul which before Acted the Body of the Silk-worm doth afterward Act that of the Butterfly upon which account it is that this hath been made by Christian Theologers an Emblem of the Resurrection Hitherto have we declared Two several Opinions concerning the Substantial Souls of Brutes supposed therefore to have a Permanent Subsistence after Death one of Plato's and the Pythagorean's that when they are devested of these Gross Terrestrial Bodies they Live and have a Sense of themselves in Thin Aerial ones The other of such as Exploding these Aerial Vehicles of Brutes and allowing them none but Terrestrial Bodies affirm the Substances of them Surviving Death to continue in a State of Inactivity and Insensibility Sleep Silence or Stupor But now to say the Truth there is no Absolute Necessity that these Souls of Brutes because Substantial should therefore have a Permanent Subsistence after Death to all Eternity Because though it be True that no Substance once Created by God will of it self ever vanish into nothing yet is it true also that whatsoever was Created by God out of Nothing may possibly by him be Annihilated and Reduced to nothing again Wherefore when it is said that the Immortality of the Humane Soul is Demonstrable by Natural Reason the meaning hereof is no more than this that its Substantiality is so Demonstrable from whence it follows that it will Naturally no more perish or vanish into Nothing than the Substance of Matter it self and not that it is Impossible either for it or Matter by Divine Power to be Annihilated Wherefore the assurance that we have of our own Souls Immortality must depend upon something else besides their Substantiality namely a Faith also in the Divine Goodness that he will conserve in Being or not Annihilate all such Substances Created by him whose Permanent Subsistence is neither Inconsistent with his own Attributes nor the Good of the Vniverse as this of Rational Souls unquestionably is not they having both Morality and Liberty of Will and thereby being capable of Rewards and Punishments and Consequently Fit Objects for the Divine Justice to display it self upon But for ought we can be certain the case may be otherwise as to the Souls of Brute Animals devoid both of Morality and Liberty of Will and therefore Uncapable of Reward and Punishment That though they will not Naturally of themselves vanish into Nothing yet having been Created by God in the Generations of the Respective Animals and had some enjoyment of themselves for a time they may by him again be as well Annihilated in their Deaths and Corruptions and if this be Absolutely the Best then doubtless is it so And to this seemeth agreeable the Opinion of Porphyrius amongst the Philosophers when he affirmed every Irrational Power or Soul to be resolved into the Life of the Whole that is Retracted and Resumed into the Deity and so Annihilated as to its Creaturely Nature Though possibly there may be another Interpretation of that Philosophers meaning here Viz. That all the Sensitive Souls of Brutes are Really but one and the same Mundane Soul as it were Out-flowing and variously Displaying it self and Acting upon all the several parts of Matter that are capable to receive it but at their Deaths retiring again back into it self But we have Sufficiently retunded the Force of that Objection against the Ingenerability of all Souls and the Substantiality of those of Brutes also from their consequent Permanence after Death we having shewed That notwithstanding this their Substantiality there is no Absolute Necessity of their Perpetuity after Death and Permanency to all Eternity or else that if they do continue to Subsist God Annihilating no Substance unless they have Aerial Vehicles to Act they must remain in a State of Inactivity and Insensibility Silence or Sleep Now therefore if no Souls no Life nor Cogitation could possibly be ever Generated out of Dead and Sensless Matter they being not meer Accidents but Substantial things which must in this case have come from Nothing then either all Souls Existed of themselves from Eternity or else there must of Necessity be some Eternal Vnmade Life and Mind from whence all the other Lives and Minds were derived And that this was the Doctrine of the Ancient Theists That no Soul or Mind no Life or Vnderstanding was ever Generated out of Matter but all Produced by the Deity the Sole Fountain of Life and Understanding might be here proved were it needful at large by sundry Testimonies but it may sufficiently appear from those Verses of Virgil First in his Sixth Aenead where after he had spoken of God as a Spirit and Mind diffused thorough out the whole world he addeth Inde hominum pecudumque genus Vitaeque Volantum Et quae marmoreo fert monstra sub aequore Pontus That from thence are the Lives of all Men and Beasts Birds flying in the Air and Monsters swimming in the Sea And again in his Georgicks where after these words Deum namque ire per omnes Terrasque Tractusque Maris Coelumque profundum That God passeth through all Tracts of Earths Seas and Heavens He subjoyneth Hinc Pecudes Armenta Viros genus omne Ferarum Quemque sibi tenues nascentem arcessere Vitas Scilicet huc Reddi deinde Resoluta Referri Omnia nec Morti esse locum And from Hence not only Men but also all manner of Brute Animals and Beasts when produced into this world do every one derive their Lives or Souls as also at their Deaths they render the same back again to him in whose hand or custody they remain undestroyed so that there is no place any where in the world left for Death This was therefore undoubtedly the Genuine Doctrine of the Ancient Theists however some of late have Deviated and Swerved from it That no Life was Generated out of Matter but all Created by the Deity or Derived from it the Sole Fountain of Lives and Souls And it is a Truth so evident That Life being Substantial and not a meer Accidental thing Generated and Corrupted there must therefore of Necessity be Some Eternal Vnmade Life and Mind from whence all other Lives and Minds are derived That the Hylozoick Atheists themselves in this far wiser than the Atomicks were fully convinced thereof Nevertheless being strongly possessed with that Atheistick Prejudice that there is no other Substance besides Body they Attribute this first Original Vnmade Life and Understanding to
and Phancies This the Fourth Atheistick Argument That to suppose an Incorporeal Mind to be the Original of all things is nothing else but to make the Abstract Notion of a meer Accident to be the First Cause Page 67 IX A Fifth Pretended Ground of Atheism That an Incorporeal Deity being already confuted a Corporeal one may be disproved also from the Principles of Corporealism in General Because Matter being the onely Substance and all other Differences of things nothing but the Accidents thereof Generable and Corruâ—tible no Living Vnderstanding Being can be Essentially Incorruptible The Stoical God Incorruptible onely by Accident Page 69 X. Their further Attempt to doe the same Atomically That the First Principle of all things whatsoever in the Vniverse being Atoms or Corpuscula devoid of all manner of Qualities and consequently of Sense and Understanding which sprung up afterwards from a certain Composition or Contexture of them Mind or Deity could not therefore be the First Original of all Page 70 XI A farther Atheistick Attempt to impugn a Deity by disproving the World's Animation or its being governed by a Living Vnderstanding Animalish Nature presiding over the whole Because forsooth Sense and Understanding are peculiar Appendices to Flesh Bloud and Braines and Reason is no where to be found but in Human Form Page 73 XII An Eighth Atheistick Instance That God being taken by all for a Most Happy Eternal and Immortal Animal or Living Being there can be no such thing because all living Beings are Concretions of Atoms that were at first generated and are liable to Death and Corruption by the Dissolution of their Compages Life being no Simple Primitive Nature but an Accidental Modification of compounded Bodies onely which upon the Disunion of their Parts or Disturbance of their Contexture vanisheth into Nothing Page 75 XIII A Ninth Pretended Atheistick Demonstration That by God is meant a First Cause or Mover and such as was not before moved by any thing else without it but Nothing can move it self and therefore there can be no unmoved Mover nor any First in the Order of Causes that is a God Page 76 XIV Their farther Improvement of the same Principle That there can be no Action whatsoever without some external Cause or that Nothing taketh Beginning from it self but from the Action of some other Agent without it so that no Cogitation can arise of it self without a Cause all Action and Cogitation being really nothing but Local Motion from whence it follows that no Thinking Being could be a First Cause any more than a Machin or Automaton Page 76. XV. Another Grand Mystery of Atheism That all Knowledge and Mental Conception is the Information of the things themselves known existing without the Knower and a meer Passion from them and therefore the world must needs have been before any Knowledge or Conception of it but no Knowledge or Conception before the world as its Cause Page 77 XVI A Twelfth Atheistick Argumentation That things could not be made by a God because they are so Faulty and Ill made That they were not contrived for the Good of Man and that the Deluge of Evils which overflows all shows them not to have proceeded from any Deity ibid. XVII A Thirteenth Instance of Atheists from the Defect of Providence That in Human Affairs all is Tohu and Bohu Chaos and Confusion Page 79 XVIII A Fourteenth Atheistick Objection That it is impossible for any one Being to Animadvert and Order all things in the distant places of the whole world at once But if it were possible That such Infinite Negotiosity would be absolutely inconsistent with Happiness Page 80 XIX Quaeries of Atheists Why the world was not made sooner and What God did before Why it was made at all since it was so long unmade and How the Architect of the world could rear up so huge a Fabrick Page 81 XX. The Atheists Pretence That it is the great Interesse of Mankind There should be no God And that it was a Noble and Heroical Exploit of the Democriticks to Chase away that Affrightfull Spectre out of the world and to free men from the Continual Fear of a Deity and Punishment after Death Embittering all the Pleasures of Life Page 83 XXI The Last Atheistick Pretence That Theism is also inconsistent with Civil Sovereignty it introducing a Fear greater than the Fear of the Leviathan and that any other Conscience besides the Civil Law being Private Judgment is Ipso Facto a Dissolution of the Body Politick and a Revolt to the State of Nature Page 84 XXII The Atheists Conclusion from all the former Premisses as it is set down in Plato and Lucretius That all things sprung Originally from Nature and Chance without any Mind or God or proceeded from the Necessity of Material Motions Vndirected for Ends. And that Infinite Atoms Devoid of all Life and Sense Moving in Infinite Space from Eternity did by their Fortuitous Rencounters and Entanglements produce the System of this whole Vniverse and as well all Animate as Inanimate things Page 97 CHAP. III. An Introduction to the Confutation of the Atheistick Grounds wherein is contained a particular Account of all the Severall Forms of Atheism together with a necessary Digression concerning a Plastick or Artificial Nature I. THat the Grounds of the Hylozoïck Atheism could not be insisted on by us in the former Chapter together with those of the Atomick they being directly opposite each to other with a farther Account of this Hylozoïck Atheism P. 104. II. A Suggestion in way of Caution for the Preventing of all mistakes That every Hylozoïst must not therefore be presently condemned as an Atheist or but a meer Counterfeit Histrionical Theist Page 105 III. That nevertheless such Hylozoïsts as are also Corporealists or acknowledge no other Substance besides Body can by no means be excused from the Imputation of Atheism for Two Reasons Page 106 IV. That Strato Lampsacenus commonly called Physicus was probably the First Asserter of the Hylozoïck Atheism he acknowledging no other God but the Life of Nature in Matter Page 107 V. Further Proved that this Strato was an Atheist and of a different Form from Democritus he attributing an Energetick Nature but without Sense and Animality to all Matter Page 108 VI. That Strato not deriving all things from a meer Fortuitous Principle as the Democritick Atheists did nor yet acknowledging any one Plastick Nature to preside over the whole but deducing the Original of things from a Mixture of Chance and Plastick Nature both together in the several parts of Matter must therefore needs be an Hylozoïck Atheist ibid. VII That the Famous Hippocrates was neither an Hylozoïck nor Democritick Atheist but rather an Heraclitick Corporeal Theist Page 109 VIII That Plato took no notice of the Hylozoïck Atheism nor of any other save what derives the Original of all things from a meer Fortuitous Nature and therefore either the Democritical or the Anaximandrian Atheism which Latter will be next
Difference of Matter Page 781 The Third Argument against Un-Extended Substance That to be All in the Whole and All in every Part a Contradiction and Impossibility This Granted by Plotinus to be True of Bodies or that which is Extended That it cannot be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but Impossible that what hath no Parts should be a Part here and a Part there Wherefore the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that Whole in the Whole and Whole in every Part to be taken onely in a Negative Sense for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Undivided The Whole Undivided Deity Every-where and not a Part of it Here onely and a Part There Page 782 783 The Last Objection is against the Illocality and Immobility of Finite Created Spirits and Humane Souls onely That this not onely Absurd but also Contrary to that Generally Received Tradition amongst Theists of Souls Moving Locally after Death into another Place called Hades Two Answers of Plotinus to this First That by Hades may be meant onely the Invisible or the Soul 's Acting without the Body Secondly That if by Hades be Meant a Worser place the Soul may be said to be there where its Idol is But when this same Philosopher supposeth the Soul in Good men to be separable also from this Idol he departeth from the Genuine Cabbala of his own School That Souls alwaies united to some Body or other This asserted here by Porphyrius That the Soul is never quite naked of all Body and therefore may be said to be there wheresoever its Body is Page 784 785 Some Excerptions out of Philoponus wherein the Doctrine of the Ancients concerning the Soul's Spirituous or Airy Body after Death is Largely declared Page 785 787 Intimated here by Philoponus That according to some of these Ancients the Soul hath such a Spirituous Body here in this Life as its Interiour Indument which then adheres to it when its Outer Garment is stript off by Death An Opinion of some That the Soul may in this Spirituous Body leave its Grosser Body for some time without Death True That our Soul doth not immediately Act upon Bones and Flesh but certain Thin and Subtile Spirits the Instruments of Sense and Motion Of which Porphyrius thus The Bloud is the Food of the Spirit and the Spirit the Vehicle of the Soul Page 787 788 The same Philoponus further Addeth That according to the Ancients besides both the Terrestrial and this Spirituous or Airy Body there is yet a Third kind of Body peculiar to such as are Souls as are more thoroughly purged after Death called by them a Luciform and Heavenly and Aetherial and Starre-like Body Of this Proclus also upon the Timaeus who affirmeth it to be Un-organized as likewise Hierocles This called the Thin Vehicle of the Soul in the Chaldee Oracles according to Psellus and Pletho By Hierocles a Spiritual Body in a Sense agreeable to that of the Scripture by Synesius the Divine Body This Distinction of Two Interiour Vehicles or Tunicles of the Soul besides the Terrestrial Body called by Plato the Ostreaceous no Invention of Latter Platonists since Christianity it being plainly insisted upon by Virgil though commonly not Vnderstood Page 788 790 That many of these Platonists and Pythagoreans supposed the Soul in its First Creation when Made pure by God to be Clothed with this Luciform and Heavenly Body which also did alwaies Inseparably adhere to it in its After-Descents into the Aërial and Terrestrial though Fouled and Obscured Thus Pletho And the same Intimated by Galen when he calls this the First Vehicle of the Soul Hence was it that besides the Moral and Intellectual Purgation of the Soul they recommended also a Mystical or Telestick way of Purifying the Aetherial Vehicle by Diet and Catharms This much Insisted on by Hierocles What Pliny's Dying By Wisedom or the Philosophick Death Page 790 792 But this not the Opinion of all That the Same Numerical Aetherial Body always adhereth to the Soul but onely that it every where either Finds or Makes a Body suitable to it self Thus Porphyrius Plato also seems to have been of that Perswasion Page 792 793 This Affirmed by Hierocles to have been the Genuine Cabbala of the Ancient Pythagoreans which Plato afterwards followed Hierocles his Definition of a Man A Rational Soul together with a Cognate Immortal Body he declaring This enlivened Terrestrial Body to be but the Idol or Image of the True man or an Accession to him This therefore the Answer of the Ancient Incorporealists to that Objection against the Illocality and Immobility of Created Incorporeals That these being all Naturally Vnited to Some Body or other may be thus said to be in a Place and Locally Moved And That it does not follow that because Created Incorporeals are Un-extended they might therefore inform the whole Corporeal Universe Page 793 794 That it would be no Impertinent Digression here To Compare the forementioned Pythagorick Cabbala with the Doctrine of Christianity and to consider their Agreement or Disagreement First therefore A Clear Agreement of these most Religious Philosophers with Christianity in this That the Highest Happiness and Perfection of Humane Nature consisteth not in a Separate State of Souls Un-united to any Body as some High-flown Persons have Conceited Thus Plotinus who sometimes runs as much into the other Extream in supposing Humane Souls to Animate not onely the Bodies of Brutes but also of Plants Thus also Maimonides amongst the Jews and therefore suspected for denying the Resurrection His Iggereth Teman written purposely to purge himself of this Suspicion The Allegorizers of the Resurrection and of the Life to come Page 794 795 Again Christianity Correspondeth with the Philosophick Cabbala concerning Humane Souls in this That their Happiness consisteth not in Conjunction with such Gross Terrestrial Bodies as these we now have Scripture as well as Philosophy complaining of them as a Heavy Load and Burthen to the Soul which therefore not to be taken up again at the Resurrection Such a Resurrection as this called by Plotinus a Resurrection to Another Sleep The Difference betwixt the Resurrection-Body and this Present Body in Scripture The Resurrection-Body of the Just as that of the Philosophick Cabbala Immortal and Eternal Glorious and Lucid Star-like and Spiritual Heavenly and Angelical Not this Gross Fleshly Body Guilded and Varnished over in the outside onely but Changed throughout This the Resurrection of Life in Scripture Emphatically called The Resurrection Our Souls Strangers and Pilgrims in these Terrestrial Bodies Their proper Home and Country the Heavenly Body That the Grossest Body that is according to Philosophy may meerly by Motion be brought into the Purity and Tenuity of the Finest Aether Page 795 799 But whether Humane Souls after Death alwaies Vnited to some Body or else quite Naked from all Body till the Resurrection not so Explicitly determined in Christianity Souls after Death Live unto God According to Origen This a Priviledge Proper to the Deity to Live and