between them In the horrour of these Dreams and in this sleep they may lie till â—…hey be awakened by that joyful sound of a Trumpet from Heaven or of an Arch-angel Arise and shine for thy light is come the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee Which St. Paul expresseth thus Awake thou that sleepest and stand up from the dead for Christ shall give thee light Then shall these bridegroom-Bridegroom-Souls with their beloved Brides their Bodies appear after this dark and tempestuous night of their sleep and dreams in the fresh and pleasant morning of a new day as new Heavens and a new Earth with their Beauties all new married anew to each other Some have imagined that these Souls together with their Bodies lying yet in their bosomes above before their descent and fall had a prospect of this terrible dream in that Image of the Divine Wisdom which did then shine clearly in their Natures and Essences It seemed to them an horrible Pit without any bottom a vast and howling Wilderness full of deformed and dreadful Monsters to which their sweet Beauties and Chastities dearer than their Lives would be exposed to be deflowred and defiled by them full of Dearths and Droughts full of fiery Serpents which with stings fixed in them with their infused Poyson would fill them all over with pains and horrors would subject them to that most deformed and most dreadful Monster the King of Terrors death it self Thus were they for their own sakes most averse to this descent and exile from their native home from themselves from their own true sweetest Purities Beauties and Beings But in that Divine Glass in which they saw this Prospect they saw also that this terrible Dream had a Divine mystery of wisdome and love in it that out of it was to arise from every part and circumstance in it a far more transcendent Glory to the supream Love their Father and Bridegroom They saw that this Love it self would go along with them through all though hidden and vailed reserving his own Purities and Sweetnesses in the midst of all They saw that he in the midst of those hidden Purities and Sweetnesses would preserve that Love which he had to them in eternity when he beheld them in that first-born Image of all loves and lovelinesses and that in these loves and lovelinesses he would conduct them and direct their way through this Wilderness They understood that he would be a seed of hope to them by the virtue of which they should certainly in the set time in their proper season ascend out of this Pit return home from this Exile then should they be received with an universal shout of Joys and Glories resounding from all things without them and within them when they should see all these sufferings break up into the most heightned Glories of the supream God the supream eternal Love and themselves with Raptures of highest pleasures transcending all Humane or Angel-like thoughts taken up into the fellowship of these Glories This imagination seemeth to some to be well-grounded upon and naturally to arise from that Scripture The earnest expectation of the Creature or the Creation was made subject to vanity not willingly but by reason of him or for his sake who subjected the same in hope because the Creature or the Creation 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 till now Reader I hope it will not be unacceptable to you that I have endeavoured to divert thee and my self by these Speculations which seem to be very pleasant representing to us the Soul as a Coelestial Bridegroom with its Bride and Bridal Chariot both in one its Body descending and returning as in a Caelestial Dance measured by the Musick of the Divine Harmony Let these things have with thee that weight of probability or truth which thou thy self shalt give to them in thine own judgment However I have thought them proper to my present end the illustration of that truth the harmony of things in the whole and of the several parts as they lie in the whole which seemeth to me to be clearly character'd in all the beautiful and bright lineaments of Reason it self which its essential form is an universal Harmony and to be expressed through the whole Scriptures as their proper design which are a Divine Draught or Description of the Divine Harmony in its eternal Original and in its Figure St. Paul saith That all things work together for good for those that love God The only true love of God is the immediate and proper Birth of the Divine Love its clearest and fullest effulgency and its most perfect reflection upon it self This is the essential Character of a Saint as he is the Spiritual man To this person St. Paul saith All things are yours this world lise and death things present and things to come you are Christ's and Christ is Gods God is the Head the beginning the end the measure of Christ. Christ is the Head the beginning the end the measure of a Saint A Saint is the head the beginning the end the measure of all things All things through the whole World through the whole compass of time in both those bright and black Regions of Life and of Death are exactly tuned each to other and struck with a Divine Hand of Power and Skill with all manner of sweetness to make the most agreeable and charming Musick to God to Christ and to a Saint as they dwell together in one heavenly Image and in one eternal Spirit All things even the most distant and most contrary meet together by a most admirable and ravishing consent in one most beautiful Harmony of a perfect universal eternal good to a Saint as he is in Christ as Christ is in God as all three lie together in the pure the soft the spacious bosome of Divine and eternal Love But I shall speak more fully of this universal Harmony in the Second Part when I shall have occasion to shew what place Sin hath in this Harmony how Disorder it self is reduced into Order by its powerful Charms how the Harmony is made perfect by a full Variety The Variety cannot be full without a Contrariety how in the contrariety the Law ariseth as a ministry of wrath out of which Sin takes its birth as a Contrary which is the proper correlate or mark or object of the Divine Contrariety and Wrath how this Divine Contrariety heightning it self to the utmost upon Sin and Sinners to declare to the utmost their irresistible contrariety to the Divine Nature and prevailing over them in the Person of Christ consuming them consumes it self together with them as a flame with its fewel like a flame it vanisheth into the pure Air Light and Heaven where all things now spring again and are seen new in the beautious Glories and ever-flourishing sweetnesses of an Universal
essential Form I design and hope so to open and establish these Propositions that the true Liberty of the Soul in its Operations may all along shine clearly forth from the Divine ground and form of its proper nature 1. Proposition The Intellectual Soul in Man is an indivisible Unity comprehending Variety Diversity Contrariety of Forms This is the first Proposition There is a three-fold Unity 1. There is an Unity in the Division of Parts This is the most imperfect Unity or rather a shadow of Unity the Unity of shadows of Corporeal substances or bodies 2. There is an Unity in Diversity of Forms or Essences above all divisibility of parts This also is an imperfect Unity This is the Unity of Essences of Intellectual Substances of all created Spirits The Unities of this sort are the Essences of things in their created state which are said to be indivisible 3. Above all Divisibility or Diversity is the first the supream the perfect Unity having in it self the first the fullest Variety and distinction This is the Unity of the Divine Nature or the Divine World This for its infinite heighth above all expression or comprehension by any created Image or Understanding for the equal concurrence of the first the most entire Unity and the first the most full Variety both alike boundless and infinite is well termed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Above an Unity The Humane Soul is an Unity of the second Rank whether you ascend or descend in the number of Intellectual Substances like the Angels above all Division but subject to Diversity This is an Unity in a Diversity Diversity which is Variety contracted and obscured by a mixture of the Contrariety with the Unity overshadows the Unity of the Soul and rendreth it a shadowy Unity The Divine Unity and Variety lie hid and vailed beneath the Diversity in the shadowy Unity of the Souls natural Form This Diversity as it over-shadows so it also bounds the Unity and renders it finite infinitely beneath the first and supream Unity in the Divine Nature This is the Unity of the Intellectual Soul an Unity free from raised above all Division or divisibility of parts lying one without another as they appear in Bodies or Corporeal Substances The explication of this Unity in the Intellectual Operations of the Soul as I humbly conceive will be a full demonstration of it There seemeth according to common sense and language to be manifest in us a Life a Power which compareth and judgeth things which discerneth the differences of things relations proportions agreements disagreements which is delighted with Harmony Beauty Musick which taketh in entertaineth it self with the Essences of things the whole Universals as its most native and most suitable Companions which adorneth it self with Sciences The Sciences are an Angel-like building which this Life or Power hath framed by single notions or forms of things regularly composed into Propositions by Propositions in a most beautiful order laid one upon another and by fit joynts like Jewels knit together into one Body of Divine Light which setteth its Feet on the Earth and raiseth its Head into the unseen Glories of the highest Heavens This Power and Life within us which makes good all this or a similitude of this with more or less degrees of Perfection is that which we call the Intellectual Soul in Man If the Object or its Image be extended and so composed of parts which lie all one without another if the Subject which receives into it self the Object or the Image be of the same nature Now the one part of the Object is taken into and seated in one part of the Subject Another part in another Thus all lie diffused differently in different parts not only divisible but actually divided from each other Now they no where meet together in one they are no where compared and judged the Discord the Harmony the Whole is no where understood Yea These are no more in the nature of things There is no such thing as Picture Prospect or Person Life Love or Joy Death or Suffering All is an unimaginable heap of unconceivable Atomes which have no Relation to no Commerce with each other if there be no indivisible Unity in which things meet in which they are compared judged and proportioned How an Atome it self or any thing of whole or part can be without Unity which constitutes it which connects it into which it Ultimately resolves it self from which it first ariseth is of all things to me most hard to comprehend But this is a digression and more than is necessary to my present design Let us return The two essential Operations of the Intellectual Soul are to understand and to will The Objects of these are Truth and Goodness real or apparent 1. Truth is a representative conformity of the Image to its Original 2. Goodness is a mutual perfcctive Conformity or suitableness of the Original and Image or of the Object to the Faculty Power or Spirit to which it relates These two are the Divine Meat and Drink of the Soul like the Ambrosia and Nectar of the Gods or separated Spirits with the Poets But where there is any impression any sense or relish of these two Truth or Goodness in the lowest forms of things These three must meet undividedly in one The two terms or bounds of conformity or suitableness the relation between these two their suitableness and conformity to each other The Intellectual Soul riseth an higher pitch according to the Doctrine of all the Schools and its own innate testimony of it self in all its Motions in all its Virtues and Vices It is carried up upon these two soaring wings as the wings of an Angel quite out of the sight of sense above all the tumult of Individuals and particulars to the invisible Glories and Harmonies of universal Forms The universal Truth and Good are its only mark and rest where its motions terminate The heavenly Beauty of the universal Truth can be no where seen the heavenly sweetness of the universal Good can be tasted by no Spirit but that alone where all Truths all kinds and degrees of good all things in their friendships and enmities are met and concentred with a full with an exact Harmony in one indivisible Point or in a perfect Unity It is indeed a Divine Unity running like the Spirit of Musick through all these terminating them all by it self recollecting them all entirely with their several Divisions after the most undivided manner into it self which makes this Harmony the Joy the Glory the Divine Life of Angels of God and God-like men This Divine Unity can be no where received but into an Unity like it self This Unity in the Intellectual Soul makes it a Divine â—…ye Ear and Spirit capable of taking in the Beauty enjoying the Musick being entertained at the heavenly Feast of the universal Truth and Goodness in the Society of all blessed and immortal Spirits Keep the Unity of the Spirit saith St. Paul in the
externae pepulerunt singere Causae Materiae fluitantis opus verum insita summi Forma boni livore carens Tu cunct a superno Ducis ab exemplo pulchrum pulcherrimus ipse Mundum mente gerens similique in imagine formans Perfect asque jubens perfectum absolvere partes Tu numeris Elementa ligas ut frigora flammis Arida conveniant liquidis ne purior ignis Evolet aut mersas deducant pondera terras Tu triplicis mediam naturae cuncta moventem Connectens animam per Consona membra resoluis Quae cum sect a duos motum glomeravit in orbeis In semet reditura meat mentemque profundam Circuit simili convertit imagine Caelum Tu causis animas paribus vitasque minores Provehis levibus sublimeis curribus aptans In Caelum terramque seris quas lege benigna Ad te conversas reduci facis igne reverti Da pater Augustam menti conscendere sedem Da fontem lustrare boni Da luce reperta In te conspicuos animi Desigere visus Deiice terrenae nebulas pondera molis Atque tuo splendore mica tu namque serenum Tu requies tranquilla piis te cernere finis Principium Vector Dux semita terminus idem The English O thou who by the golden linked Chain Of reason's Musick with an even strain Conductest all from thy bright Throne on high Father of shady Earth and shining Skie By undiscovered Tracts Time's stream and spring Thou from Eternity's vast Sea doest bring Motion and change ever unknown to thee From thee deriv'd and by thee guided be This work of floating matter which we see By inbred form of good from envy free By sweetest force of Native Loves rich seeds Without external cause from thee proceeds In Loves eternal Garden as its flowers Flourish in their first forms and fullest powers All Beauties These are the life the living Law From which thou dost all forms of Being draw As light to dazled eyes all things below From these pure Suns in fading circles flow A World all fair from thee supreamly fair Shines in thy mind above controul or care In an harmonious Image thou the same By perfect parts dost to perfection frame By potent Charms of sacred numbers bound The waving Elements keep their set round Fire Aire Earth Water in mysterious Dances Move to thy Musick through all times and chances Mixt into various figures with sweet grace In each form undivided they embrace Earth sinks not nor doth fire to Heav'n fly Frosts Flames Droughts Floods meet in an Unity The three-fold Natures golden Knot mid-band The Soul thou tyest in one by Love's bright hand Then it by thee unloosned spread doth lie In Limbs well suited to a sympathy Of motion and distinct melody Diffus'd through things below or those on high This is the Spring and Circle ampler far And purer than the Christal Heavens are The universal Beauties charming face Where sweetly spring and dance each lovely grace Within it self divided this great Soul Into a double Globe it self doth roul One hidden from us by excess of light One with shades sweetly temper'd to our sight As thorough these it moves it still returns Into it self still with Love's fire it burns By force of this it still doth circle round Th' eternal minds great deep Heav'n thus doth found And in like figure of those unseen Lights Doth turn about these Glories in our sights Brought forth from causes like Souls and less lives Thy will aloft in airy Chariots drives And sows in Heaven in Earth which by Love's Law Turn'd back to thee thou to thy self dost draw By the innate returning flame Grant Father to our minds thy glorious Mount To climb to view of good the sacred Fount In thine own Light which doth within us shine To fix the clear eyes of our Souls on thine Cast down the mists and weight of earthly mold The joyous splendors of thy face unfold Thou art to holy minds the golden Calm The sweet repose the grief appeasing Balm To see Thee our Beginning is our End Guide Chariot Way our Home to which we tend I mean to take no notice of any thing in this Poem besides that alone which immediately concerns the Soul In that part I shall after the manner of a brief Commentary present the Reader with some few Notes upon the several Passages for the illustration and confirmation of my fore-going Discourse upon the Nature of the Humane or Intellectual Soul 1. Passage The three-fold Natures golden knot Mid-band The Soul Thou tiest in one Triplicis Naturae mediam Connectens Animam  1. Note The three Natures here are manifestly The Invisible Incorporeal Nature Immortal Spirits The Visible Corporeal Nature Bodies Mortal or Immortal The Soul the middle between both these 2. Note The Soul is a middle-nature between both these not by Abnegation or Separation but by Participation and Connection So that word imports Connectens the Golden Knot lying all in one The Soul is a middle-nature three wayes 1. The Soul extendeth her self through both Natures to their utmost Heighths above and Depths beneath by her Idea which is her Golden Head by her Angel which is her Arms and Breast of her Silver her immediate Image and Birth as she springs forth from her Idea her incorruptible Essence above all motion the first seat of her Life Understanding Virtue Power as they flow from her Ideal Spring Thus Plotinus believed the Soul her self in her Essence in her Intellectual Form at its first abstracted heighth and purity to be her own good Angel But the Soul dissuseth her self also by her Coelestial Garment or Body through the wide-spread Heavens These are her Belly and Thighs of Brass the Springs of Generation the first seat of Motion Division and successive Forms By her Elemental Body she swims in this uncertain Sea of Generation and Corruption The Elements in their Orbs compose her Legs and Feet of Iron Here is the lowest Region of Division Motion and Change Here is the scene of Corruption here is the Soul most obscured In the lowest parts of this Earth is she resolved into a shade 2. The Soul is a Nature distinct from the other two Angelical Spirits are Omniforme or Universal Bodies are extended into divisible parts The Intellectual is composed of both universal and particular Forms all which it contains in an indivisible Unity The Soul circles through all forms of things universal and particular as they subsist apart or united appearing mutually infolding each other within the undivided Unity of its own Essence whilst in the Unity and Majesty of its undivided Essence it rouls through all forms and parts of it self as the Sun through the whole compass of the Heavens In this is a more glorious Sun and Heaven that it is in each point of it self at once as a distinct Sun in its full glory and every Sun a spacious transparent Glass in which the whole Heaven of its Essence with all its
one breath one beam one stream from the eternal Spirit succeeds new in the place of the other sprung forth from it in the point of time immediately preceding The whole Creation each particular Creature is no more the same hath no continuance hath no Unity with it self save only as it is in Jesus Christ in its first and eternal Form its truest Form its truest Self in Him who alone is the true the substantial the universal Image of God the express Image of his Substance Unity and Eternity All created forms are so far only the same and one in a figure or similitude as they are sealed with the impression of their Ideal and Original form in Christ as they subsist in this Root as they are Garments with which this their eternal Truth and Substance cloathes it self In the my stical Fables of the Heathens the Goddess of Wisdome contending with the God of the Seas for the tutelage of Athens made suddainly at once to spring up out of the Earth an Olive-tree in its perfection with its branches and leaves all green laden with ripe Olives When an Olive-tree or an Apple-tree riseth up by degrees from its Kernel to a perfect Plant when it successively putteth forth it self thorow the Spring and Summer in buds in leaves in blosomes in fruit unto a fulness in Autumn then in that state of maturity with its leaves and fruit in full growth and beauty upon it it standeth up immediately and entirely out of its Ideal or first Cause out of the Divine Omnipotency or Almightiness as if it had never before existed as if no Summer no Spring had ever gone before Yea the whole Creation round about that Olive-tree in its present posture with all Plants on Earth with the present face of Heaven with the present configuration of all Bodies of all Humane or Angelical Spirits comes forth from God as immediately entirely absolutely as when on the third day all Herbs Flowers and Trees first appeared and rose up in a moment at once perfect out of the Earth or as if this present Autumn had been the first and the beginning of the World as some suppose that season to have been All things in the Creature upon this ground have their order and connexion not by virtue of any dependance upon each other but by the force of the eternal Order the inviolable Harmony in the first Cause the Ideal or exemplary World in the Divine Mind If the Being of the Creature be an emanation or beaming forth from the first Being then as the emanation or flowing forth is distinct new and fresh every moment so is there every moment a new fresh distinct World or Creation If man thus with his Soul his Powers his Operations with all the modifications of his whole Person Body and Spirit in each moment spring forth fresh and full that moment from his first and universal Cause as Philosophers say the Sun and his beams were concreated at the beginning of the World What then is the liberty of the Will in determining it self Is it any other than this the truest the happiest the only desirable freedome of coming forth as it is sent forth from God the first and the best of all things in a conformity to its eternal Truth its Original Form in the highest Beauty the highest Bliss the Divine Wisdome and Will Reader if any difficulties arise in thy mind about the reconciling of the appearances of things in the World so mixt with Good and Evil the evil of Deformity the evil of Sin the deformity of Intellectual Spirits the most hateful Fountain of all Deformity the evil of Sufferings consequent to this Deformity with this proceding of the Creature distinct and new every moment from God the pure Fountain of Good I entreat thee to carry this along in thy thoughts that the second part of this Discourse is designed for a clear stating and full examination of all Objections I am unwilling therefore to disturb my method to prevent my self or make Repetitions by bringing in these things here which are there to be treated of I entreat thee here only to mark with a skilful and curious eye whether the foundation of Truth be firmly laid and whether the building arise regularly out of it In the second Book it will be thy part to see whether this building stand fast against the assaults of all contrary appearances which like the Rivers the Wind the Rain from above from below on every side beat upon it This is enough upon this Head the universal Nature of the Creature 4. My fourth Head from which I draw my Reasonings upon this Subject of Free-will is The Nature of the Soul From the Nature of the Soul we thus reason the Essence of the Soul and its Faculties the Understanding and the Will differ not really but formally alone All three are one and the same Every one is all three in one They are distinguished according to the distinct forms in which they appear ever appearing with all their forms in each form 1. The Essence of the Soul is immaterial a substantial Act an undivided Unity and essential Form which comprehends the forms of all Essences essentially in it self We speak all this while of the Intellectual Soul This Soul then essentially comprehends it self reflects upon it self and all forms of things in it self Thus it springs up into an essential Image of it self and of all Essences to it self within it self Thus is the Essence of the Soul it s own Understanding by virtue of its immaterial Substance and its substantial Unity 2. The Understanding of the Soul differs from the senses in two things 1. The Senses touch and take in their Objects only by material accidents as shadowy figures The Understanding toucheth taketh hold of and embraceth the Substances themselves incorruptible immutable in their eternal Truths 2. The senses take in the Images of their Objects from without but the Understanding brings forth its Object in an essential Image from within which is therefore called Verbum mentis The Senses being material are thus passive but the Understanding as an immaterial power altogether active If the Understanding bring forth from it self and comprehend within it self the essential and substantial forms of things it can be no less than a substance it self and one substance with the Soul in the essence of it For nothing unsubstantial can receive into it self that which is substantial We have also said before that the Soul in its essence or substance essentially comprehends all things in their essential and substantial forms Let me add this upon the same ground that if the Soul understand it self the understanding is every way adequate and equal to the Soul in as much as it adequately comprehends it The Will is described by Thomas Aquinas to be the Inclination of the Soul It is also a Rule That every Power or Faculty is distinguished and defined by its Object The Object of the Will is Good Good is
the Soul The Mind they call the Son the World of God the first seat of all Ideas But with us Christians this Mind is the Angelical Nature the chief of those ministring Spirits to which we in the Language of the Scripture give the Name of Angels The Son of God the World of God in the first and most proper sense is the Uncreated Mind and Wisdome the Lord Jesus who as he is the second person in the Trinity is the supream Unity the one only true God The Godhead in its essential Image where first are seated and shine all forms of things in their Original Glories in their eternal Patterns as they are the Variety in the Divine Unity every one God entirely in it self in all the full Glories of the Godhead and all one God ever undivided indivisible Plutarch calleth Life a Depth This Mind is exprest by a Deep inasmuch as it is Life it self the first unbounded Life which hath no ground no limit the fountain of Life where endlesly spring up in an unconfined Circle in a bottomless Depth forms of Glory innumerable one within another Thus St. Paul speaketh That the Spirit of God in the Spirit of a Saint is a Spirit of Revelation which takes the covering off from this Deep of Light and Glories in the Soul searching out the Depth of God The Soul circleth round this Deep of the Divine Mind not after a Corporeal or Local manner but as one Spirit encompasseth another without Circumscription extension or distance 1. The Soul without consinement or adaequation contains in its Unity and Center this glorious Deep of the Divine Mind through the Angelical Mind as the Unity of its Unity the Center in its Center 2. The Soul springs forth by a continual emanation a continual irradiation or process from this Divine Mind into an entire Image of it As it â—…ees the various Glories in the circle of this Deep So doth it spring up within it self into the similitude and forms of the same Glories in the same Order and Harmony to the filling up and compleating of the same circle within it self The Lord Jesus in the Gospel at his Transfiguration appeared as the Sun in its strength and his Garments as the Light Thus the same Jesus the Divine Mind is here a Circle a Depth of substantial Light and Glories filling the Light with all Variety of forms The Soul springs forth from him all round about him as a Garment of Light a Circle of Beams all wrought with the beautiful Figures of those Glories Plato saith That there are three Kings round whose Thrones all things dance God the Mind the Soul this continual procession of the Soul from the Divine Mind through the Angelical Mind in the entire Image of it with all its Divine Forms and their Order their Harmony their Unity in the whole compass of their Variety is the mystical Dance of the Soul round the Throne of her King her Bridegroom by which at once she contemplates enjoys springs up into his Divine Form in all its Beauties and is filled with him He in like manner hath her ever before him as the Looking-Glass of his own Beauty lying and playing in himself as the Image of a Flower or Tree in the water every way circled in by him as she is centered in him As the Divine Mind through the Angelical is in the Soul so are the Divine the Angelical Mind through the Soul in this visible World centring it in themselves riding forth upon the Circuit of the Heaven and the Earth as the lowest figure of themselves at once standing up out of them and standing in them The Soul as the Exemplar Form as the Unity the inmost center the outmost Circle sendeth forth this Corporeal Image as a figure of it self formeth moveth acteth it throughout sustaineth it in it self filleth it with it self every way boundeth and containeth it within it self The vast all-containing Unity of the Soul figureth it self the circular globous round form of the Heavens and the Earth in the Union and Harmony of all the parts suffering no where any discontinuity or vacuity nor any deformity or discord in the whole From the variety of invisible Forms within it self the Soul springeth up into all the innumerable Army of heavenly Bodies in the Coelestial Orbs into all the diversity of Elementary shapes and figures in the Regions below The Harmony and Order of the Soul in all its forms and motions through them floweth forth figureth it self as a Light of Beauty shineth as a Divine Musick soundeth through all the parts and changes of the Coelestial the Elementary Sphears charming those Souls that have awakened and purified senses to take them in As the Soul within it self springeth up into each form in its proper Order bringing forth it self at once with the entire Unity of its whole undivided Essence anew in that distinct form so doth the Soul from that Original in the likeness of the same Image each new moment spring forth anew according to the innate Law of the universal Order and Harmony into the whole Heavens and Earth in a new posture and figure Thus after the similitude of its own circlings through all forms within it self the Soul incessantly turneth round the Heavens and the Elementary Orbs which by their perpetual circling through each other turn about by day and by night the restless wheel of Generation and Corruption as of all change Thus as the Soul danceth round the Throne of the Divine and the Angelick King these Heavens and the Elements dance round the Throne of their King the Soul Before I pass from the Authority and Testimony of this great Philosopher concerning the nature of the Soul give me leave to direct this Arrow to the white and mark which I aim at through this whole Discourse According to this Doctrine the Divine the Angelick Mind the Soul the Coelestial and Elementary Orbs through all their powers parts forms and motions meet in make up one Universal and Divine Harmony one Beauty one Musick All exactly in the lowest the least the weakest stroak touch or shade in most exact measure and proportion answer one another As the Face in the water answers the living Face So doth every lower Orb or Circle of things answer the superior As the reflection of it self in its own water or lustre shining forth from it and abiding in it like the water of a precious stone Each Orb or Circle of things is filled with knit together by bounded in its own Unity which floweth through all as the Spirit the Life of Order and Harmony disposing all the parts and motions in a most just measure to preserve it self and its figure entire in the whole The supream the Divine Unity sits upon every one of these subordinate Unities rideth forth in them uniteth filleth bindeth up boundeth in it self all the Orbs and Circles all in them all This shines through them runs with its beams playing over every form as one
and Hell But this Heathenism and Manicheism are exploded as by the universal consent of all sober Christians so by the voice of reason it self For if there be two first Beings these agree in Being they differ in being two Being it self as it is One making both these one in its self as it is pure is before and above that state in which it is allayed and abased by being mixt and compounded with those differences which make it two This then alone is the first and supream Being the eternal One the only true God 2. If God then be not properly and directly the Author of Sin Sin is no positive Being but a privation only So the Scriptures express it which call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an irregularity a falling short of the Glory of God a missing of the mark 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Divines generally teach us That the Sin consisteth not in any Act but in the Deordination in the privation a want of the due order appertaining to the Act. Sin then being nothing positive but a meer privation can have no efficient but a deficient Cause only This deficient Cause is that defectibility which is inseparable from every created Nature Darkness is the privation or absence of Light which naturally and necessarily accompanieth obscure and opact Bodies as the Air the Water and the Earth While the Sun shines upon them this deficiency or want of Light discovereth not it self All things are illuminated and the natural obscurity of these Bodies illustrated by the Sun-beams when these beams are withdrawn or intercepted then the defect of Light natural to these substances appeareth and so the darkness is predominant Thus every Creature hath in it self a tendency to annihilation being of it self like the Earth before the beautiful work of the first day which was light void and without form Thus the Soul of Man in its Understanding and in its Will hath naturally of it self a tendency to unreasonableness which is a degree of Annihilation the privation of that two-sold Beauty Truth in the Understanding and goodness in the Will While the Face of God shines upon the face of the Soul by a continued irradiation as in the first moment of the Creation these Intellectual Forms of Divine Beauty Truth and Goodness flourish in the Soul binding up the natural defectibility both of the Understanding and the Will in the golden Chains of an heavenly Light and heavenly Love but in that moment in which God turns away his Face with-draws his beams in the same moment the Soul of Man is left naked its natural defectibility prevails the privation or absence of Truth is now the darkness the deformity of folly and falshood The privation or absence of Goodness is now the evil and the disorder into which as a bottomless pit the Understanding and the Will and the whole Soul with these miserably endlesly sinks This is that horrible pit out of which sin ariseth the defectibility or nothingness of the Creature in it self This is the way by which it ariseth upon the Soul over-spreading it and carrying it back into that pit of horrour the deflectibility or nothingness of the Creature prevailing in the absence of the Divine beams The Royal Prophet divinely sings the penury of the Creature and the Praises of the great Creator in this Mystery Psal. 104. 29. Thou hidest thy Face they are troubled thou takest away their Breath or Spirit they die and return to their dust Thou sendest forth thy spirit they are created and thou renewest the face of the Earth It is a truth asserted by all Philosophers and Divines That the Understanding acteth necessarily being infallibly and irresistably reduced into act by its Object duly presented The Scripture manifestly teacheth us that sin entreth into the Soul by the Understanding Those two places which I have cited above are clear The woman being deceived was first in the Transgression Sin deceived me and so slew me St. Paul speaketh in both these places of the first entrance of sin into the World in the person of the first Woman and in his own person set as a figure of all Mankind as it was collectively and representatively in the first Adam Musaeus joyns these together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Light going out and Leander perishing Man is deceived and so slain by sin As the Light of Truth goes out in the Understanding the Life of Goodness dies in the Will As the sight and light of the eye from the natural composition of the eye faileth as the irradiations from the Sun which it enjoyeth either mediately or immediately from the body of the Sun it self or from other luminous bodies depending upon the Sun are obscured So is the Souls eye the Understanding obscured according to the proportion in which the Divine illuminations in the way of Grace or Nature cease In these two first steps I have endeavoured to make clear the nature of Sin and the way of its entrance into the World in which we see a most genuine conformity to the dependance of the Will and of the whole Soul in all its changes and motions upon the first Cause as a link in the mystical Chain of the order of Causes The beauty and goodness of the Soul in its Understanding and its Will flow in the golden Pipe of the order of Causes as golden Oyl from the first cause as the Olive-Tree flourishing upon the Mount of Eternity As this golden stream from its Well-head fails beauty and goodness are no more in the Soul The deficiency or privation of these is the evil of Darkness Deformity Sin and Death to this intellectual and immortal Spirit But the knot seems to be tyed stronger by this discourse man sins inevitably by the necessity of his nature The first and free withdrawings of the Divine influence give way for the deflectibility of the Creature to spring up into those defects which are properly and formally the evils of Sin the first and greatest evils the fountains of all evils How then doth shame or guilt lie upon the Creature Why is God yet angry How is he just in punishing Is not the evil of sin from these grounds clearly cast upon God as the Author of it I shall endeavour to answer these Objections and to remove these Difficulties in the three following steps 3. I shall endeavour here to bring in some clear light into the obscure shades of this doubt how shame and guilt lie upon the Soul when it falls inevitably from the necessity of its nature Shame is a fear of Infamy from a sense of Deformity Deformity is the absence of the Divine Form originally present and so proper to the subject The subject of the form or beauty while it is present is also in its absence the subject of the privation and deformity To the deformity is annexed the reproach or disesteem Esteem or disesteem is a right judgment and so a value of each thing according to its proper state
heart 2. The measure which thou measurest to others shall be measured to thee again If you do well who will harm you St. Paul distinguisheth between a righteous man and a good man This doing well is that goodness of Divine Love pouring forth round about it heavenly beams upon all things which maketh men to be so far from any inclination to harm the person in whom this goodness discovereth it self that they are willing to die for him St. John giveth us a lively figure of the Divine Love in a light of Glory by these words He that loveth his Brother walketh in the light and there is none offence in him The last words are capable of two senses which very agreeably meet here 1. There is nothing in this person at which any man taketh any offence 2. There is nothing of which this person receiveth any Image into his Spirit which offends him He who is this Divine Lover walketh always in those blessed Regions of Divine Light where every thing presenteth it self in his heart as it lieth in the heart of God springing forth from the womb of an eternal Love acted by that eternal Spirit which is Love it self cloathed with an ever-flourishing loveliness lying in the universal Harmony of the Divine Wisdom being one piece with it having the Glory of God resulting from it and resting upon it He that is this Divine Lover shines forth in all his Discourses Conversation and Actions upon all eyes and hearts with such a sweet light and heavenly lustre of the Divine Nature of the supream Love it self the Unity the Mother the Sister the Desire of all things the Joy of the whole Earth that nothing takes offence at this Person nothing can harm him O what a Conquest had we attained if we once did so live that we convinced all persons that we loved them in truth and in deed that we had a Divine Love for them that we esteemed all things in our selves of no value of no effect to our present Beauty and Peace to our eternal Life and Glory to be altogether nothing except this Divine Love alone How would this demonstration of an heavenly Wisdom in an heavenly meekness of Divine Love disarm all hands of the weapons lifted up against us and all hearts of their wrath conceived against us like the Musick of David's Harp the sweet force of this Love would chase away every evil Spirit from every Breast There is no power in Nature like to that of Similitude Every thing draws and attracts its like to it Where this Divine Love flourisheth in any person all the blessed immortal Spirits of heavenly Love above in eternity with all the joys and glories of Love resort to this Person to this Heart planting themselves round about as heavenly Guards and heavenly Ministers to it inhabiting in it as their proper Paradise and Heaven here below In all things below through all their differences distances and divisions the Spirit of Love which bath in it the Root and Idea of each Creature which is in each Creature as the proper Root of that Creature as it s Ideal and primitive Form discloseth it self to shineth forth upon and in all forms of things circleth in this person this heart being attracted by it drawn to it as its proper Centre Some Divine Philosophers teach us That according to the property or power which predominateth in us here such will that Divine Idea be which shall be our eternal Habitation and Palace above in which we shall enjoy all things being sealed to us by this Idea If the Divine universal Love reign in thee here Love which seems to be the highest and sweetest of all Ideas in the Divine Nature the Divine Nature it self in its most proper and perfect Idea uniting the Ideas of all Perfections of all Beauties of all Sweetnesses of all Lives Loves Joys and Glories in it self at their greatest heighth with the most ravishing agreeableness and harmony this shall be thy proper Habitation and Palace set up for thee in thine own person in every Creature in every Created or uncreated form of things to dwell unchangeably in both here and above Here shall all things present themselves to thee cloathed and sealed with this Idea with this pure and perfect Love With the measure with which thou hast measured unto others shall it be measured unto thee Thou hast loved all things with a Divine Love looking upon them stedfastly through all seasons and changes in a Divine Light in the incorruptible form of a Divine loveliness As thou hast looked upon them so shall they all in all seasons and states appear to thee in a Divine Light full and over-flowing with a Divine Love cloathed all over with a Divine loveliness Love all things O Reader after a divine manner that thou mayest be the beloved Object of all divine things and divinely beloved by all things that thou mayest shine with a divine loveliness in all eyes and be received with a divine loveliness into all hearts These are the Requests which I make to thee for thine own sake I have one Request only to present to thee for my self which is That thou wouldst come with this Divine Love to the reading of this Discourse Câ—…me with that love which thinketh no evil We read in the Revelations of an Angel descending from Heaven who enlightned the whole Earth While thou readest let this heavenly love be as a Seraphim flying down upon its flaming wings from the Throne of Love into thy Bosom to enlighten thy whole Soul with its beams unto a Divine Candour that there may be no dark corner left for any suspitious Jealousies Prejudices Animosities or ill will like poysonous Toads in the hollows of some old wall Come with this love which believeth all things all the good that every subject either person or thing is capable of As Bees extract the virtue out of the commonest Herbs and convert it to Honey in themselves So do thou believe every thing here to be intended in the best sense of which it is capable Draw forth this sense from it and improve it in thy self with the utmost advantage to the sweetest satisfaction and the richest treasure in thy own mind Believe this Piece to be the fruit of Love springing from a Root of Divine Love We read in the Revelations of an Angel standing in the Sun Plato somewhere saith something like this that if we stood in the Sun all things even this dark mass of Elements and elementary composition to us beholding them from that center of Light would appear in a Sun-like Glory Be thou this Angel or in this an Angel-like Spirit stand in this Sun the glorious circle of divine Love From thence see the Fountain of Love opening it self to thee in this Discourse all the parts all the lines as so many streams flowing forth from it to water thy Spirit and make it a Garden of Divine Sweetnesses and Beauties If the rich man in Hell
principal parts of the Divine Work to which all the other parts serve The great and Ultimate ends of these intellectual Spirits unexpressible eternal joys or miseries hang all upon a meer contingency upon the motion of the Will which hath no place no part in the Divine Design which receives no form no measure from any model in the Workman or any part of the work Thus are the great consequences the great ends of the work in the great the principal parts and passages of it altogether undetermined and uncertain in the nature of the work and in the continuance of the Worker 2. Answ. Doth not this seem much rather a reflection upon than an exaltation of the Divine Goodness Justice and Wisdom that the righteousness and wickedness of intellâ—…ctual Creatures the highest good and evil in the whole work the eternal blessedness and misery of its own so great so glorious Births and Images should be of so little moment to the Divine Nature to the Divine Goodness Justice and Wisdom that they should be left entirely out of the Divine contrivance and conduct without the compass of all reason and proportion to an uncertainty an indeterminateness of which no account can be given as effects of the blindest chance which was ever entertained into the most blind and confused imagination of the most vulgar Spirits But this subject of the Divine Goodness and Justice and the Argument taken from them to justifie this freedom of the Will belongs properly to the second Book where the Reader may meet with a large discourse upon it I shall therefore thus lightly pass over it here 3. Answ. The inconsistency of the setting up intellectual Spirits in this freedome by the Divine Power and Wisdom with the very essences of all Power and wisdom with the whole nature of things created or uncreated will also find its proper place in other following Arguments which is therefore only toucht here 4. Argument Next to the Wisdom of God the Power of God seemeth to furnish a fourth Argument against this Liberty of the Will We have it proclaim'd from Heaven by the mouth of God Himself That Power belongeth to God God hath spoken once twice have I heard this That Power belongeth unto God Psal. 62. 11. Joseph saith to Pharaoh That his dream was repeated to declare the certainty of it A Repetition also is design'd to express the weight and consequence of that Truth which is twice over affirmed No Truth hath a clearer certainty or beareth a greater weight upon it in the whole nature of things than this That Power belongeth to God Jesus Christ who is the only true God is said by the word of his Power to uphold all things to bring forth and to bear up all things as the Greek word manifestly and commonly signifies This alone bringeth forth all things all spirits This alone beareth upon its bosome all its own Births as a root the plant with all its fruit Here only in the sense of this truth with an immediate repose upon it do all things all hearts find rest Power is here by the Psalmist expressed absolutely unlimited in the abstract all Power is Gods and of Him So the Hebrew phrase imports God is the first Seat and Spring of all Power in every kind All Power supernatural natural civil moral All Power in every State undetermined determined All Power in every degree the Power of acting the Power in act hath its first seat in God and cometh down from Him There is a three-fold Power 1. An Active Power 2. A Passive Power 3. A Power in Act. 1. The Power of Acting which as it belongeth to the forms of things which are either Spirits or spiritual so it self is a Spirit or a spiritual form This is defin'd to be a principle of Acting This is it self an eminent and universal Act or active form like a Spring containing and sending forth from it self variety of Acts or forms as a Spring doth streams This Power is more excellent than the Act which is produced by it 2. The Passive Power is that of matter which as an obscute shade comprehending or hiding variety of Acts or forms in it like Plants obscured and contracted there like Plants in their seeds in the Earth or the Intellectual and sensitive Soul with all its treasure of Intellectual of sensitive forms in a sleeping Body This Power is inferior to the Act which when it is brought forth is the exaltation of this Passive Power to an higher degree of Being it is indeed as a spiritual Act or form encompast with obscured within its own shade As the Sun calleth up the Plants out of their seeds and beds in the dust so the Spirit it self the Spiritual Act or form shining forth from the Active Power upon this shade of matter and of the Passive Power awakeneth it into a beautiful form 3. Power in Act. All Power purely Active is ever in Act. Such Power is alwayes abstracted from matter and a spiritual essence or form eminent above all things in matter an universal comprehending variety of Acts or spiritual forms in it self Every Active Power in matter is compounded being partly Active and partly Passive This Power is never brought into Act but as it is excited and awakened from without by its Object from above by power abstractive and purely active shedding its beams upon it Thus in the Schools they distinguish between the Active Understanding in man separated from matter in its operations and the Passive which ever worketh in Conjunction with the material and imaginative faculty like the Moon having some obscure light in it self but depending upon the illuminations of the Active Understanding as its Sun Power and Act are distinguished not as two several Beings but as the same Being in several states modifications or degrees of Being When Power as it is a spiritual and universal Act comprehending all its own Acts formally and eminently in it self being all at once in Act within it self brings forth it self into any particular or single Act in matter This is the same Power contracted and so in a less degree of perfection When a Passive Power in matter springs up into Act This Act is the perfection of the Power The Power and the Act here are the same form sleeping and awakened in the seed and in the flower All Power is Gods As he is the most pure perfect and universal Spirit so is Power in Him the most pure perfect and most universal Act. God gives this Testimony of Himself I am Alpha and Omega The beginning and the ending saith the Lord Which is and which was and which is to come The Almighty Rev. 1. 8. As the Power of God comprehendeth all Powers most eminently and most actually in â—…imself so all Powers in Him are ever most perfectly in Act being themselves pure Acts God is said to work all things after the counsel of his own will Eph. 1. 11. Power is the principle of Activity The Will is
the perfection of every thing The suitableness and convenience makes the Goodness Every thing hath essentially in its nature an inclination to its Good to its Perfection to every thing suitable and agreeable to it Suitableness is from Similitude Similitude is from Unity For it is an agreement in the same form Every thing then hath in its essence an inclination to a suitable Object to its Perfection to its Good as to it self presented distinctly to it self and to the compleating of it self in the embraces of it self Thus it appears that the Soul essentially is its own Will in as much as its essence taken most abstractedly being a substantial Act is in that Act an essential inclination to its own Good and Perfection Thus also it appears that the Understanding of the Soul is the Will of the Soul in as much as in its distinct formality it is an inclination to Truth as to its proper Perfection and Good Again the most proper and most perfective Act of the Will in its most perfect state is Love Love is an Union The Object of the Will is Good in its full Latitude the essential substantial universal Good The Act of the Will in Love is then a mutual intimate Union with the Object by which it adequately comprehends it and is adequately comprehended by it The Will then which is necessarily equal to that which it comprehends can be no other than the essence or substance of the Soul it self of which we have before said that it hath all Essences of things essentially within it self and so the whole compass of Being compleat within it self As it represents it self in this whole compass of Being to it self in a distinct Image and so reflects upon it self it is its own Understanding As it doth by this distinct Image with mutual embraces mutually comprehend and enjoy it self in Love and Joy it is its own Will it s own Love and Joy So we seem to have proved that the Will as it is a distinct faculty is really and formally the same with the essence and substance of the Soul We will endeavour also to prove that the Will comprehends the Understanding in its own proper and distinct formality 1. When the Soul Loves it self and understands it self both these Acts fall under the same definition of comprehending it self in a distinct and compleat Image of it self This Act cannot but be mutual if the Image of the Soul be adequate to the Soul and so are Love and Understanding both in one 2. The Acts and Motions of the Will do imply sense in their essential Formalities Sense in the Intellectual Soul is Understanding 3. The Object attracts and acts the Faculty by impressions of it self The impression of Good upon an Intellectual Subject is an Intellectual tast or relish of the Good The impression of an Intellectual Good which is the proper Object of the VVill is an Intellectual impression 4. The VVill as it is essentially distinguished from the natural Appetite which inanimate things are naturally moved by and from the sensitive Appetite proper to bruit Creatures is defined to be a rational Appetite Thus it comprehends Reason or Understanding in its essential Form So we have attempted to make it plain that Those three the Essence the Understanding the VVill of the Intellectual Soul mutually comprehend one another in their essential Formality and are perfectly adequate one to another so far as the Soul is in a state of Perfection perfectly understanding and loving it self By the way In this Glass you may have a pleasant glimps of the Trinity 1. The Soul in its essence is an Unity comprehending it self and all created forms of things intirely in one substantial and indivisible Act as the Fountain of all This is a shadow of the Father in the Trinity 2. The Understanding of the Soul is the essential and adequate Image of this Unity in which it bringeth forth and contemplates it self within it self This is the Son the Word 3. The VVill is the essential the intellectual and adequate Union of these two with the most full communion and highest complacency by which they propagate and multiply themselves within themselves into an endless Race of innumerable Forms in each of which they are still themselves intire and compleat This is the figure of the Holy Spirit Thus he that knows God knows the Soul as the Picture by the Life and he that knows the Soul knows God as the Life by the Picture Each of these is all to it self within it self God as the Original Life-World the Soul as the shadowy VVorld the World of shadows But to conclude this Argument If the Essence of the Soul the Understanding and the VVill be really one and formally distinct so that every one comprehends all Three in its proper Formality where is that freedome of the VVill by which it may act independent on the Understanding VVe will seal up this Argument with that confirmation of it which seems to have great strength and clearness Powers and faculties are distinguished according to their Objects The Essence of the Soul the Understanding and the VVill differ as Being Truth and Goodness not really but formally only formally comprehending the formality of each other The Reader is desired to take notice That how ever the Author in one of his Copies intended only this short accompt of this Argument taken from the Nature of the Soul yet a larger Discourse upon this Head being found amongst his Papers it is judg'd most fitting in this place to publish it The chief Praise of this Age is that it runs along in a stream directly contrary to the Romish Church having little veneration for an implicite Faith Tradition Antiquity Universality in the persuit of Truth It s labour and glory is with its hands eyes and spirit to penetrate and view the first grounds of Truth I desire it may be as happy in distinguishing between the upper part of the beam of Light where it unites it self to its Sun and Fountain where it is firmest fullest brightest warming enlivening as well as shining and the lower part of the beam which touches the Earth and the Senses where it is weak wavering obscure mixt with and vanishing into the darkest shade I shall therefore endeavour taking my rise somewhat high from the Fountain of things to open the Nature of the Soul with as much clearness and plainness as I am able and the nature of the Subject will bear in these three Propositions 1. Prop. The Intellectual Soul in Man is an Unity altogether indivisible comprehending Variety Diversity Contrariety of Forms Powers and Parts without and above all Division 2. Prop. This indivisible Unity containeth in it self the full Variety of all forms created uncreated after its own manner according to its own proper Character 3. Prop. The most perfect and full Image of God in the midst of the Creation resulting from the Harmonious Union of the Unity and Variety is the Soul's Essence and
Seraphim and Cherubim In its sensitive powers and parts it stretcheth forth it self through those lower Worlds the Coelestial and Elementary In its rational and discoursive faculty it makes a distinct World of its own at once dividing and uniting the invisible and visible Worlds filling up the internal or middle space between them The Soul from its Divine Unity in its most immediate Union with its eternal Idea where all Unities of things in their God-like forms do meet together in one descendeth into its Angelick Image or Intellectual Form Here all things in Angels shapes dwell together as in a Palace of Angels Here the Soul in her own face as in a Glass beholdeth all things in their universal Forms rouling through them all so that in each form she is Omniform comprehending in open view all things in their universal Forms under the Property or Character of that universal Form in which she at present appears From thence she passeth into her rational Form in which she is a contexture of universal and particular Images mutually infolding each other mutually springing up and shining forth in a beautiful Harmony from the Christalline Bosomes of each other So this Spirit slides by degrees into the most divided shapes in sense and on Earth through these into the lowest and obscurest shades beneath the Earth Again by answerable Revolutions and in the same proportions she gathereth her self up again into her first and supream Unity Three things make the Soul in these Circlings a most beautiful and delightful Prospect which three Beauties and Pleasures all flow by á sweetly-natural necessity from her Divine Unity 1. The Changes of the Soul through all these Diversities of forms are all most orderly and harmonious all together make up one most ravishing Harmony of Divine Beauty and Musick For the Unity spreadeth it self through all this diversity of Forms and Changes The Unity preserveth it self entire in the whole composure of these Changes and in each part in each turn of the whole Upon this account hath the Soul been defined to be Harmony and a self-moving Number or a numerous Motion a numerous spring of Motion Harmony consisteth in is measured and expressed by Numbers Inasmuch as Number is Unity diffusing it self Unity going forth from it self in a just order by Multiplication or Division of it self returning again into it self and all this within it self 2. The Soul through the whole Circle of its Descent and Return carrieth along with it all diversity of Forms into every Change For the Unity of the Soul is her self every where inseparable from the Soul and indivisible in it self This is clearly signified in that Maxim concerning the Soul universally taught in the Schools That the Soul is divisible and mutable in her Operation that is in respect to her Change into diversity of forms but through all this mutability of Operations and Changes indivisible and immutable in her Essence Thus is the Essence of the Soul as a Christalline Heaven or as a Palace composed all of purest and firmest Looking-Glass after such a manner that all the parts of the wonderful structure all the persons in all the Apartments all the Changes and Motions are seen at once in every point of the Divine Building All the Glories all the Inhabitants of this Heaven in all shapes in all postures of Light and Life meet the Eye every where not only by a most clear transparency but by the Spring or Fountain of Light and Life which in winding streams floweth through the whole openeth it self with all its various streams and all their curious windings in its Bosome every where 3. The Soul rouleth through all these Changes circling from the highest Lights above to the most shady depths below and through those shades into the brightnesses above within her self Her own Essence is within it self the Spring the Center the Seat the Circle of all those mysterious and harmonious Revolutions For this is the Essence of the Soul An Unity containing in it self all diversity of Forms This is the Soul in its Essence in the perfection of its natural form the Universe within it self like God comprehending conversing with all things within its self alone All this indeed was in a shadowy figure yet such as the Life it self brought forth supported filled illustrated and acted But alas now by the Fall this great and glorious Spirit contracted obscured in death wandreth within it self as a Ghost or shade of it self among the Dead It looketh up it beholdeth it self all things round about it and wondreth at their strange shapes as the shades of the Dead It understandeth knoweth nothing of it self or them not so much as that it is dead It calleth this state of Death Life This the World which is it self become its own Tomb. Perhaps this Picture which I have drawn of the Soul in her proper Essence or Nature in her true and essential form may seem rather a fancy than any thing taken from the Life I shall therefore attempt to touch it over again that I may give more lustre and life to it that I may at once make it more clear and confirm it I shall to this end make use of two Authorities The one Humane the other Divine I shall begin with Humane Authority that I may prepare the way to and close all with the Divine Authority as the seal of Truth The Humane Authority is taken from a Person eminent as a Philosopher and Divine for a profound Knowledge in all manner of Learning for a heighth of Beauty in his Life the suitable Birth and Image of that Divine Light in his Mind for a Death which was an ascent to the eternal Mansions in a flame of Martyrdome and Divine Love agreeable to both the Light of his Knowledge and the Beauty of his Life His Writings are universally esteemed His Testimony universally received and often cited as Authentick by the greatest Persons through many Ages He hath the stamp of Antiquity upon him Boetius that great Roman is the Person of whom I speak The Authority I cite from him is the Meeter in the Book of the Consolation of Philosophy It is a part of this Meeter which describes the nature of the Soul But the whole seems to me so pertinent to the general Subject of my Discourse so excellent in it self drawn forth from the inmost Treasuries of the Platonical Pythagorean Mosaical Christian Philosophy and Divinity that I thought I should oblige the Reader to set it down entire I have therefore first transcribed it in Latin for the sake of the learned Reader and then rendred it into English for the benefit of all that shall take any pleasure in those sacred Mysteries of Truth presented in her richest Robes at the whitest heighth of her never fading Beauty and Majesty The Latin O qui perpetua mundum ratione gubernas Terrarum Caelique sator qui tempus ab aevo Ire jubes stabilisque manens das Cunct a moveri Quem non
Thus the Soul rides forth in her three-fold Chariot Heavenly Airy Earthly upon the Circuit of the Heavens the purest Air and the Earth the true Venus the true Queen of Love and Beauty by which all things spring shine live and love through her Marriage-Union with her Lord and King the true Adonis or Adonai the Lord Jesus who died and lives again with his beloved Bride in the secret of Paradise in the midst of the Field of the Coelestial Light the pure Air in the bosome and nethermost parts of the Earth This is the Soul in its first make and proper state Plotinus teacheth That the first Soul which is the immediate Workman of this World in the order of its procession from the separate Intelligences or Angels and from God the only supream Father of all hath its face ever turned to the face of God and unmoveably fixed upon it from his Face it continually takes in as the Nectar of the Gods the Divine Light the Divine Life and Love it continually takes in as at an heavenly Feast as the heavenly Ambrosia the Ideal Beauty the first the Archetypal Forms in their most immediate sweetest freshest fullest Effulgency or Images This God-like Soul thus bred thus divinely formed thus nourished thus impregnated sends forth from it self this whole visible World in the figures of those first Glories in the similitude of their Unity Variety and Order without thought care or trouble without ever turning a look to this World As a Person with his Face to the Sun casts his shadow upon the ground behind him There is only this difference as this great Soul casts the shadow of this Corporeal World from it self there is no ground for it to fall upon besides the Soul it self All these Heavens this Earth and Sea with all their roulings springings fadings and floatings are then the soul it self in her lowest Form bearing the figures of all her superior Glories most curiously and delightfully wrought in deeper shades The Soul in this her lower form is her own living Looking-Glass of shadowy shaded Light in which she sees with a grateful Variety with a pleasing Reflection of her own Divine force and fruitfulness her own Beauties in a weaker fainter fading Image maintained only by continual beams from her self All Souls as they flow in their Order and successions from this first Soul by virtue of the first production bring forth to themselves and bear within themselves the whole World in its fairest and fullest measures Object If any ask these Philosophers what sign or appearance there is of this sublime state this amplitude this majesty in the soul of Man they will give you such answers as these Answ. 1. The Soul hath now lost her wings by which she flyes through the whole Heavens and Earth She now lies languishing contracted clouded divided wounded sick dying upon the ground of this earthly Body You can take no more any measure of the true nature of the Soul of the Soul in her own proper Divine Form and Image by her present state then you can of the humane Form Spirit and Life by a worm grown out of the putrified body of a man dead Answ. 2. As the Soul of a man sleeping is to the Light of this World so is the Soul in this Body to the Light of its own Intellectual Invisible Divine Form and Beauty As a Prince sleeps in some private Room with the Curtains drawn about him within his own Palace in the midst of all the splendors and splendid Persons of his Court seeming to himself in his dreams as he sleeps to be a naked forlorn Prisoner at the bottome of a dark and deep Dungeon In such a dream doth the Soul appear to her self sleeping in this Body in the midst of all her own Immortal Beauties in the Palace and Court of her own Divine Unity and Essence But I have now done with Humame Authority and Philosophy in its Testimony But as I part I will leave Philosophy with this Honourable Testimony The only and true Philosophy is the Light of Nature in its primitive purity as the scattered Beams and dispersed remainders of it in the midst of the ruines of Nature are collected strengthened and reflected from the most excellent of natural or Divine Spirits like Sun-beams centered in a burning-glass The second Authority I pass now to the Divine Authority which is the testimony of the Holy Scriptures I shall cite only two Scriptures one from the first of Genesis the other from the first of the Romans I being with the last which seems clearest and fullest 1. Scripture The first Testimony from the Scriptures is Rom. 1. 19 20. From this Text to the end of the third Chapter you have the Soul with a profound Depth Like a River rouling along with all her various serpentine windings from the Sea of Love the Divine Bosome till she return thither This Divine Philosopher after a Divine manner sets the humane Soul before us in the whole compass of her Essence in all her circlings through all forms of things as he saw her by a Light of Revelation in the eternal Design in her Idea in the heart of the Father the Fountain in the Bosom of the Lord Jesus the first seat of all Divine Designs and Ideas This Design is divided into three parts 1. The Soul in its primitive and pure state of Nature presented to us Chap. 1. vers 19. 20. 2. The Soul in her fall as she passeth through the shades beneath of Sin Suffering Death and Wrath from the 21. verse of the first Chapter to the 20. verse of the third Chapter 3. The Soul in its return and re-ascent to a greater Glory from the 22. verse of the third Chapter to the end of that Chapter I shall very briefly with all the perspicuity that I can point out the Heads of things in these three parts of the Souls course and design in the Divine Mind 1. The Soul in its primitive and pure state of Nature is presented to us Rom. 1. 19 20. That which may be known of God is manifest in them for God hath manifested it to them For the unseen things of him from the Creation of the world are seen being understood by the things that are made both his eternal Power and Godhead I shall make two Notes upon the Grammar of the words 1. That which may be known of God is manifest in them This relates to the pure state of Nature not to the Corrupt For of that it is said vers 21. Their foolish heart was darkned Things are manifest only in the Light The expression runs in the present time after the manner of the Divine and Prophetick stile which sets before our eyes all forms of things as they appear in the Divine Light where all things are ever present and appear at once in one Besides this as Paradise so the pure Image of God in the Soul seems to some not to be lost or destroyed but
Angel every Creature was a Garment of Light sweetly shaded in different degrees and manners of diverse Fashions but all Divine in which Jesus Christ the essential full Image of the Godhead walked in the midst of Paradise Thus in all the Creatures as in diverse Figures of his distinct Glories he walked forth conversing with himself and entertaining himself in the compleatness of his Divine Person through all Thus as all things were made by Christ and for him so nothing was made without him apart from him until Sin made the wound which let out the Divine Life of all Beauty Love and Joy to let in Death with its deformity and horrors The Divine Unity was entire every where All things stood together in Christ. Christ with all his Glories in every Angel with all the Angels in every Creature rode forth as in his Chariot The whole Creation was as a Contexture of Angels As the Chariots of the Lord thousands and ten thousands All were every where composed into one Chariot All were as wings of pure Light and perfumed Air on which God flies through all spreading and scattering abroad the ravishing Glances the Divine Impressions of his Beauties and Sweetnesses as he flies What a Paradise transcending all Description by any words the richest Image in any fancy was the whole World now in its primitive state What a Paradise was the Humane Soul when it comprehended when it enjoyed this Paradise with its full and distinct Glories within it self Now the Soul within it self saw within it self the eternal Power and Godhead with all their invisible Glories in an Angelical Light and Form together with all the Angels in every thing that was made 4. Proposition The Soul seeth within her self God in his own distinct and Divine Form shining forth through the Intellectual Angelical Image in the universal Composure in the full Harmony of all created Forms and through the particlar Angel or Intellectual Image in every diverse Form Those are the words of the Apostle By the things that are made are seen being understood the invisible things of God his eternal Power and Godhead This is brought in as an Argument to illustrate and confirm the foregoing assertion That which may be known of God is manifest in them Those two words have an aspect of deep Wisdome of a lively sweetness upon each other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Things not seen or uncapable of being seen are seen The word seen importeth a two-fold sense 1. A distinct discerning sight 2. The sight of an Object through a diverse intervening form God is seen through the form of the Creature in his own Form infinitely distinct from it and transcendent to it In that Character of the Fall They glorisied him not as God It is clearly implyed that man in the pure state of nature glorified him as God which could â—…ot be if he saw not his Glory as the Glory of God in its distinction from all the Creatures from all Similitudes and Representations in his supream Unity and Infiniteness This is that which is clearly presented to us in those full expressions His eternal Power and Godhead Power saith Proclus is an Unity which like a spring comprehendeth in it self variety of Forms sendeth them forth from it self appeareth in them without as it pleaseth An eternal Power which is not lessened by any Acts or exertions of its self is an infinite Power never to be exhausted ever fresh full and flourishing This is an absolute unlimited Unity spreading it self within it self after a Divine manner distinctly without any Division or Diversity into the glorious and majestick amplitude of an unbounded equally-beautiful ravishingly-harmonious-variety This is the eternity as it is the infiniteness of the Divine Nature These two Eternity and Infiniteness being the measures of the Essence and the Existence or Duration of the Godhead are both one in this Unity inasmuch as the Essence and the Existence or Duration are here the same This Unity in which both these meet is also the Godhead it self which describeth it self to us by no Character like to that The Lord thy God is one God These expressions His eternal Power and Godhead Eternity Power in its absoluteness and infiniteness the Godhead are exegetical explications of each other All these are names of one thing the supream and soveraign Unity God in the High and Holy Place of his own proper Form set infinitely above the Head and Eye of every Creature in its most exalted Glories Object How is the Soul capable of the sight of God or any Intellectual Image of transmitting his Divine Form All Sense Understanding Commerce is founded in suitableness and similitude The ground of this is an Unity a meeting in some one thing God is infinite every Creature is finite Between infinite and finite there can be no proportion This Objection lies so plain before every common Eye that it is not easie to miss it I wish the Answer were as near or capable of being made as clear to the Understanding of every Reader I hope and shall use my best skill that every Understanding may see some light breaking through this obscurity which may be at once sweet and in some degree satisfactory Answ. 1. I shall first give a general Answer which I shall afterwards make more plain in two particular Answers We are taught by our Masters in Divinity That God is the subject of no Relation to the Creature For then he were compounded and not a simple unmixt Unity yet doth he terminate in himself Relations to the Creature Upon the same ground it is unsafe and unsound to say That God is like to man It is very sound and very safe to say That man was made in the Image and Similitude of God A finite Creature may bear a similitude and so a proportion to the infinite God although there be no mutual proportion or likeness between them God in himself converseth with nothing without himself All things to him are himself a pure undivided Unity God in the Creature cloaths himself as the Scriptures and the Jewish Rabbins speak with Garments of Light and Darkness Similitude and Dissimilitude Unity and Contrariety He turns the Heavens and the Earth as the Clay to the Sea He first himself putteth on every form so he formeth every Creature as the reflection or shadow of himself upon himself The sight of the eternal Power and Godhead in the Soul is the work of that eternal Power and Godhead God in the Creature beareth a proportion to himself and hath an Unity with himself as he is above the Creature By the same absolute Unity and Infiniteness by which he is present with each single dust in the fulness of his undivided Glories and Godhead doth he also appear in the Soul His presence is suitable and suitably virtual to each degree of Being whither it be essential in meer Being Vital Intellectual or Superintellectual more then Intellectual All things according to their several Natures have
Curse with all evils in their greatest extent and extremity shame pain the pain of loss and of sense then fell most sensibly upon him when he cryed out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me A Wound is said to be a solution or separation of the Continuity or parts united by one common Life The Sun was eclipsed at the Death of Christ beyond the course of Nature for it was eclipsed totally not by the interposition of a dark Body between that and the Earth but by the failing of the Light it self in the very body of the Sun Was ever any Wound so bitter so full of pain and anguish as this Was ever any Eclipse so prodigious so dreadful and direful God in his own Person in the most sweet most vital the supream Unity of his Divine Person is separated and divided from himself by the force and fury of an unexpressible Wrath. The Person of God in his own Spirit in its Divine Strengths Solaces and Glories by a fury sharper and fiercer than any Sword or Flame is divided from himself in his own Flesh. The all-chearing and all-quickning Light of the eternal Sun faileth in the Person of God as he is in Flesh being turned into Sack-cloth and Blood Jesus now truly suffereth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Torments not only of an Eve-eternity but of Eternity for his Sufferings are extended and heightned not only according to the capacity of a particular individual man in flesh of an immortal Soul or an Angel great in Power but according to the proportion of the Super-Angelical Head of the whole Creation eminently and transcendently comprehending all Creatures in himself And not only so but his Sufferings in this nature are suited to the Divine and eternal Person subsisting and supporting the Nature and to the Divine and eternal Person offended coming down upon him in the full weight of his Wrath in the full Opposition the full Contrariety the full Enmity of all the Attributes of God of his entire Godhead to his proper most contrary irreconcilable Enemy the evil of Sin This is the manner of Christ's Sufferings Thus God personally suffered in Flesh. The merit of these Sufferings consisteth in this that this Flesh which suffereth and the Sufferings of this Flesh stood in the Unity of the Divine Person Our Jesus was God and Man in one Person that being Man he might suffer and this Man being God might merit by suffering By this hypostatical or personal Union by this mutual and indivisible Unity of the same Person in both Natures the Righteousness the Beauty the Sweetness the Glory all the united Excellencies and Blessedness of the Godhead stood entirely in every Wound in every Sigh in every Blush of shame in every pang of pain in every part in every degree of sufferings through the whole flesh of Christ. All these reciprocally were filled and encompassed with the full Glory with the united Excellencies of the Divine Nature Thus were they a Divine Price indeed paid down for us in the Blood and Life of our dear Saviour Now the same Divine Person the God of all Loves and Lovelinesses the God of all Peace Righteousness Joy and Immortality in the Tempests and Flames of Divine Justice and Wrath from above In the tempests and flames of all guilt sufferings and shame from below meeteth with himself on both sides in all these So the tempests and flames of Justice and Wrath from above in a moment vanish into a golden Calm and Sun-shine of Divine Loveliness and Love In the same moment the tempests and flames of guilt shame and sufferings below are transformed into the Divine unspotted Beauty of an everlasting Righteousness into the triumphs of an eternal Life Love and Joy In a word the whole Contrariety thus come to its utmost point returns into and is swallowed up in the most pure the most perfect Sweetness and Harmony of that Divine Unity from which it went forth So is our Jesus become Hylasterion the Propitiation the Atonement Thus the Blood of God in the Person of Christ washeth Crimson and Scarlet sins double died in the Blood of God himself unto the whiteness of the wool of the Lamb of God and of the Snow coming down new unstained from Heaven As Jesus Christ was a Divine Person so was he an universal Person in his Sufferings As Christ is God he is the universal Being in which all things have their Being which is most intimately and universally in each thing as the Being of every Being He is the Mediator by which all things in every kind or degree of Being descend and ascend He is the Head the Root the pure and primitive Spirit of the whole Creation as the Spirit containeth in it self the outward Form and Image He goes forth into all forms and states of things from above the highest Heavens to the nethermost parts of the Earth filling all He espouseth into the Unity of his Divine Person the Humane Nature the Harmony and Model of the whole Creation unconfined by any particular personality He takes upon him the Humane Nature in its lowest state in fading frail and dying flesh The Father hath given him to the World and for the World Joh. 3. He hath â—…iven himself for us Gal. 2. ult Thus he suffereth as an universal Person and becomes a ransome for all So St. Paul layeth down the ground of this Ransome and this Ransome 1 Tim. 2. There is one God the Father of all there is one Mediator between God and man the man Christ Jesus who gave himself a Ransome for all The Death of Jesus Christ is the finishing of his Sufferings and of his abode in Flesh. This is as the Mid-night that Point in which the Sun of the Godhead in the Heaven of Christ's Person is gone to the utmost distance from him to the utmost degree of Contrariety to him and now is returning towards him again in the beautiful and blessed Unity of the Divine Love There is a two-fold mystery in the Death of Christ 1. An universal Dissolution 2. An universal Resolution 1. The Death of Christ is an universal Dissolution He spoiled Principalities and Powers making a shew of them openly and triumphing over them on his Cross Col. 2. This true Sampson dying taketh hold of the Pillars of the World by a Divine force in his Death pulls them down and the whole Creation to fall together with himself into his Grave Some teach us That the Sun is the Center the Corner-stone the immediate Foundation of this visible World and that if this should fall out from Heaven or should lose its Light and Course in Heaven all Motions and so all Forms of things here would cease and be no more Jesus Christ of a truth is the true Sun the shining Pillar which holds the Foundation of all things visible and invisible the Root of all created Light and so of the whole World He dying all things die in him all things die together with
him If any man be in Christ saith St. Paul he is a new Creation old things are passed away 2 Cor. 5. It is a known story recited by Plutarch That of a great Cry with dreadful shrieks and groans to Thamus a Pilot as he passed by a desolate Island in the Reign of Tiberius under whom Christ was put to death Great Pan is dead this great All is dead The Heathen figured the whole Creation in the Person of their God Pan the Angelical Coelestial and Elementary parts of it 2. The Death of Christ is an universal Resolution or Return of all things as they stand in Christ into their first and Divine Principles The Light the Life the Forms the Essences of all things return into their Ideal Forms their incorruptible Originals and Patterns their pure eternal Springs in the Mediatory Form and Divine Nature of Christ. The shadowyness returns into that blessed shade that fell immediately from the Person of Christ in Glory that Primitive and Divine Darkness which was before the first Day the Womb of the first Light and of the whole Creation which composed those Nights of Beauty Peace and Pleasure the Nights of the six Days the Night of the seventh Day and all the Nights of Paradise Thus was Jesus with the good Thief and all things with him in him in Paradise at his Death The Jewish Rabbins distinguish Paradise from Heaven thus Heaven is a state of Divine Glory and Pleasure above in the open Light of â—…e Godhead Paradise is a state of Divine incorruptible Glory and Pleasure below beneath the shades of the Earth This is that pure primitive Divine Darkness of which I speak which was the shade out of which the pure Earth with all the unstained Forms of things at first arose and into which they now return again in Christ. This is the Divine sleep of all things in the Death of Christ their retirement into their Divine Patterns their sweet and entire rest in them their contemplation and fruition of all the immortal Joys and Glories of their Patterns and of themselves in those Joys and Glories as a Divine dream in this sleep within this sweet this amiable this more than Angelical shade which over-spreads them Here they desirously and delightfully wait for the Day of the Resurrection from the Face of God which they see by degrees dawning and rising upon them when the sweet Peace of this lovely shade shall break up into the more full and glorious sweetness of the supream Light and that eternal Day St. Paul expresseth all this to us when he teacheth us That Christ hath gathered up all things into one in himself Col. 2. The Greek word properly signifies there the Resolution or Return of things back into their first Principle their Original Spring and Pattern 3. The third and last part of the Mediation of Christ in our Redemption as it was accomplished in his own Person is his Resurrection and Ascension These two agree are the same in nature and kind differing only in degree The Resurrection of Christ is the breaking up of that primitive shade which over-spread him into a clear Light of Glory Now he springs up and flourisheth throughout his whole Person and all things together with him in his Person in the Beauty and Immortality of his Mediatory Form He is now become an entire Spirit in his Humane Nature both Soul and Body This two Scriptures make clear to us Jesus Christ saith to Nicodemus Joh. 3. 6. That that which is begotten of the Spirit is Spirit The word there is a Substantive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a spiritual substance or substantial Spirit Now it is manifest in the Scriptures that the Resurrection of Christ in the Body was an immediate Generation by the eternal Spirit So Divines interpret and apply those words Heb. 1. 5. cited from the second Psalm Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee Suitable to this is that Scripture Rom. 1. 4. Declared the Son of God with power according to the holy spirit by the Resurrection from the dead Two things are manifest from this Scripture 1. That Jesus Christ was raised from the Dead by the immediate Power and Operation of the holy Spirit 2. That this Resurrection was a Divine Generation by the Spirit through which he was brought forth into the proper Form of the Son of God That which we read declared 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth properly defined or determinately formed This receives further Light from St. Peter 1 Pet. 3. 18. Being put to death truly in the flesh but quickned in the spirit We read it by the Spirit but in Grâ—… the Flesh and Spirit do so exactly answer one another in the construction and manner of expression that one would think nothing to be plainer than the intention of the Holy Ghost to signifie that the Flesh and the Spirit had both the same relation to the Person of Christ in those different states of his dying and rising again that by this change the Spirit came in the place of the Flesh and that the Flesh was changed into a Spirit as by a natural Generation that that was Water or Air is made Fire The words are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the same sense in which he died in Flesh or to the Flesh So he rose again in the Spirit or to Spirit That same Body which died a fleshly compounded mortal substance rose again a simple pure immortal Spirit As the Humanity of Christ rose again a Spirit so it rose in an immediate inseparable Union with the eternal Spirit upon the same Root into the same Life and Image St. Paul instructeth us in this mystery 1 Cor. 15. 45. The first Adam was made a living Soul the last Adam a quickning Spirit vers 45. The subject of St. Paul's Discourse there and in many verses before is the Resurrection of the Body He said immediately before It is sown a natural Body 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Body proper for a Soul It is raised a spiritual Body a Body proper for a Spirit vers 44. He illustrates this afterwards The first man is of the Earth earthly the second man is the Lord from Heaven vers 47. Then he distinguisheth them by the names of the earthly and the heavenly man or the Super-Coelestial vers 48. He likewise distinguisheth their two Images the Image of the earthly and the Image of the heavenly or super-coelestial vers 49. Then he concludes with a a positive and emphatical Declaration But this I say brethren that flesh and blood cannot enter into the Kingdom of God vers 50. From these Scriptures laid together these particulars seem evidently to arise 1. Jesus Christ by the Resurrection in his whole Humane Nature both Soul and Body is a supernatural super-coelestial Spirit far above the nature of Souls or Angels in the first Creation 2. The humanity of Christ hath now its Root in Heaven in that Heaven out of which it comes forth