in arms Now what is the cause of this misery but their Sins both such as are common to all men in general and particular to their own Nation For certainly God who lov'd them so tenderly and chose them out from all others to communicate his Covenants to them would not treat them so rigorously were there not some lawful cause in their extraordinary offenses And what a strange blindness and stupidity of mind is it to have so quick a resentment of evils relating to the body and not to acknowledge the cause of them What a depravity and perversity of understanding to groan under the strokes of the hand of God never to groan under the load of their own iniquity To pant incessantly after a Deliverer of the Body and never to think of the redemption of the soul They are driven out of Judaea and Heaven and Earth resound with their lamentations They are by their sins debar'd the hope of Heaven and make no matter of it They are inthralled to their corporeal enemies and murmure against God for it They themselves are sold to Satan and to Sin and do not understand the horror of this servitude They are impatient in a waiting the coming of some Person that may reassemble them from their dispersion and deliver them in reference to the body The Redeemer and Deliverer of their fouls is offer'd and preach'd to them and they reject him They flatter themselves with hope of a profound and plenteous tranquillity in all sorts of pleasures and delights of the Flesh and cheer up themselves with it They are invited to taste how good the Lord is in his compassions and they refute it Their thoughts are day and night upon gold silver silk scarlet fine linnen and jewels and their hearts leap with the fancy The Gospel tells them of riches and ornaments relating to the minde and they blaspheme it Is this the Posterity of that onely wife and intelligent people with whom God establisht his Covenants But above all the rest they do injury to the glory of that Messias who was promised to them to fancy him an earthly Prince For since themselves call his Kingdom the Kingdom of Heaven what other ought they to hope for but one spiritual and heavenly which beginning to be exercis'd here below in the souls of men which are of a spiritual nature is accomplish'd above in glory unspeakable And truly 't is to this that all the Prophets lead us from the first to the last What does that promise refer to The seed of the woman shall break the Serpents head but to the consolation of man by the hope of being deliver'd from the Curse of eternal Death into which he is fallen by the deceit of the Evil One For as he sin'd principally with his soul which is the source and principle of the actions of the body and alone capable of understanding the laws of piety and obedience so it was consentaneous that the condemnation of death should be directed to the soul in case of rebellion And that other promise In thy seed shall all the families of the Earth be blessed and I will give this Land to thee and to thy Posterity after thee wherein did it profit Abraham if it aim'd no further then that Canaan which himself never possess'd and was not given to his Posterity till above 400. years after Was it either a sufficicent consolation to him in all the Crosses that he underwent or a Promise worthy of God who establisht his Covenant with him For which of us cares what will be done a hundred years after his death As for those words of Jacob untill Shiloh come they promise a Prince of peace about whom neither fire nor sword shall glitter but he shall be the author of peace between God and men It shall come to pass saith Isaiah that the Mountain of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountaines and shall be exalted above the Hills and all Nations shall flow unto it But what to do Come shall they say and let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord and he will teach us his ways and we will walk in his paths Therefore 't is to be enrich'd in the knowledge of the Name of the Lord and not in Jewels or Pearls to learn to moderate and subdue their Passions and not to conquer Kingdomes Also in the 25. chap. 6. vers In this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things a feast of Wines on the lees of fat things full of marrow of wines on the lees well refined Can they take this according to the Letter It is certain there are some so stupifi'd with the wine of ignorance that they take it so and expect to be satiated with that horrible Leviathan which is powder'd up I know not where against the manifestation of the Messias Poor people who think the Prince of the Kingdom of Heaven will come to fill their bellies But behold what follows vers 7. And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people and the veil that is spread over all Nations What is the meaning of this but that all Nations being involv'd in ignorance as in the black veil of night he will dispell all that darkness to the end they may behold the light of his knowledge that they may rejoyce I say in the light of that Sun of Righteousness who carries healing in his wings And thus through out all the Prophets which would be too long to recite there needs no more but to read them For it will be found that he is a Prince of peace upon whom the Spirit of the Lord shall rest the Spirit of Wisdom and Vnderstanding the Spirit of counsel and might the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. That under his reign The Wolfe shall dwell with the Lamb and the Leopard lye down with the Kid and the Calfe and the young Lyon and the fatling together and a little child shall lead them c. That is He will unite the most hostile Nations together in the same society of Religion and cicurate and mollifie the fiercest people by the knowledge of the true God and render the most untractable natures gentle and sweet Which the Prophet himself expounds immediately after They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the Sea He shall not cry nor lift up nor cause his voice to be heard in the street A bruised reed shall be not break and the smoaking flaw shall he not quench So far is it that he shall batter all to pieces with Canon-shot or hew all down with the sword And as for his Glory it must needs be other then terrestrial and corporeal Since he was to be despised and rejected of men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief Since I say he
was to be lowly riding upon an Ass a Colt the fole of an Ass And indeed the frail dusty ornaments of the Earth would have been too vile and wretched for him that is the Sun of righteousness of souls Wherefore forasmuch as the Christian Religion refers all the promises of the Messias to the good of the Minde making him to be the Redeemer of souls and attributing to him a spiritual Empire and glory it directs them to their right end from which the carnal imaginations of the Jews had perverted them and hath consequently as great pre-eminence above the Jewish in this point as the soul hath above the body and the Heavens above the Earth CHAP. VII That according to Right Reason and the Old Testament the means of obtaining Salvation ought to be such as the Christian Religion holds forth I Affirmed in the precedent Chapter that the Law of God and the nature of his justice require that either all men perish universally or that some person in their stead endure the punishment which they have merited But because this is the Foundation of the Christian Religion and the most usual stumbling-stone on which the Jews and divers other people fall foul it is requisite for us to discover it something more clearly in this Chapter Certainly if they will confess the truth the natural terrors of their Consciences when they consider the justice of God seriously will make them acknowledge that nature it self directs them in order to the obtaining of solid comfort to seek out a satisfaction of merit proportionate to the Majesty of him to whom it is due and to the demerit of their offenses For not onely the Jews to whom God revealed his vindictive justice more manifestly but others who never heard speak of the Law have been invaded by them Which how could it be did not punishment accompany sin as the shadow a body and that for a man to be quit from the penalty it must either be suffer'd by another or he must be exempt from sin himself And the Natural Instinct which lead them to offer sacrifices in the beginning and which was approv'd and authoris'd by the Law of God under the Old Testament is an evident argument of it For whence was it that soon after sin committed Abel offers the first-lings of his stock in sacrifice and that this example became so powerful to all the posterity of Adam that there ha's been no Nation by whom the death of beasts immolated in sacrifice was not practis'd but onely that nature it self taught him to acknowledge what he had deserved and all others have in like manner follow'd his sentiments So that though they could easily judge that the satisfaction was not proportionate to the dignity of him with whom they thus transacted yet being unable otherwise to satisfie they offer'd that which they could and withal referr'd it to the Wisdom of God to supply the rest Moreover it is apparent by several Nations mention'd above and whose names and customes are recorded both in Holy Profane Histories as the Cananaeans Tyrians Carthaginians Egyptians Cyprians Arabians Persians Scythians Cretans the ancient Grecians ancient Romans Gauls and others who sacrifis'd living men that the opinion which Caesar attributes to the Druydes That it is not possible for the Wrath of the Gods to be appeas'd but by offering the blood of men to them was naturally imprinted in their souls Otherwise man being sufficiently prone to elevate the opinion of his faults and flatter himself partly through an immoderate self-love partly by reason of the little knowledge he hath of the nature of God would never be so inhumanely animated against his own species and even against his own children which some of those Nations were wont to make victimes of And for testimony to this I appeal to mens peculiar thoughts in the administration of humane justice How do they detest murderers and robbers and those that give themselves up to perpetrate heinous crimes And when they observe a Magistrate suffering such persons to go on in impunity do not they judge that he is either like them one of their complices and partakers in their prey or that he connives at their facinorous actions through want of power Certainly when any enormous misdeed is committed there ought no dammage to arrive to the Commonwealth either by the Fact or the example But there is a kind of detestableness in the deed that of it self cryes out for vengeance the impunity of which blots the reputation of him who hath the authority and power of punishing in his hand and brings him into an evil suspition and esteem And he that shall more attentively consider the emanations of his own minde will finde that Nature ha's not onely indued us with the Passion of Anger to be inservient towards defending us from particular injuries which are offered to us but also ha's imprinted in our Minds a Hatred against Wickednesses which do not particularly reach us which causes us not to be satisfied till we have seen vengeance inflicted upon the same But assoon as we have beheld them expiated by sutable punishment our minds acquiesce in the justice done with a kind of satisfaction and our indignation ceases For corrupt qualities and horrid vices in the soul when they come to be discover'd by actions they are like Ulcers and Cancers which hideously deform the visage we divert our thoughts from the former with indignation and our eyes from the latter with nauseousness Now the Virtues which are but little in us are in God in a degree transcendently eminent he possesses as we may speak the body of them whereas we have no more then the shadow As therefore a good Magistrate do's not onely detest Crimes because they are detrimental to the Commonwealth but also by reason of the natural turpitude which renders Vice odious were it not pernitious so that he thinks he do's not satisfie the natural equity of things nor his own Conscience unless he punish it and the more upright a person the Judge is the more hatred do's he bear against Vice for its own sake So God do's not onely punish Sin being the Universal Judge and Magistrate of the World because it produces prejudice to Humane Society and is an enemy to its preservation but also by reason of that internal and essential deformity in it which is so repugnant to the Divine Nature and the natural order of things so that he cannot possibly prevail with himself not to revenge it And the more perfect his Nature is the greater is this natural detestation he hath against sin But to proceed further The Jews consent that men are naturally corrupted by sin and that they have in them from their conception an evil seminary of Vice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which they say is like a mountain to the Good and a straw to the Wicked That is they which are immerged in it are not sensible of it no more then a dead man
render them subjects requiring our adoration On the contrary if God hath a body and never discover the same to our eyes we should make but small account of it although it were more luminous then the Sun For whereas several Nations have adored the Sun it hath been onely in consideration of his light so radiant quickning beneficial and necessary to the World and which makes it self known to us in so many manners which he distributes into all the parts of the World and is therefore named the Eye and Heart of the Universe Had he never ascended above our Horizon no Nation had ever made an Idol of him in our Hemisphere for all the descriptions that could have been made of him To conclude in a word so far would men be from being drawn to the service of the Deity because they do not see him that there is even a natural propensity in our minds to contemn that which we do not see and rather to form Gods of Wood and Stone to our selves then to have such as fall not under our sense A vitious inclination indeed and condemned by the Wise among the Pagans but we are under the influence of an Institution that is powerful enough to correct this defect and root this vitiosity out of our nature Which the Epicurean can never attain to For that which hath caused great and discerning persons to penetrate so far into the knowledge of God that they have been as it were enforced thereby to conclude that he ought to be honored with the exactest purity of the Understanding without framing any material Idea of him in the phancy much less to carve him in gold or represent him in silver ha's been onely as I said above the contemplation of the mighty effects of his Virtues of which Epicurus hath no apprehension Moreover concerning his meer existence forasmuch as that is common to him with all other things good and bad honorable and contemptible high and low corruptible and secure from mutation reasonable unreasonable indued and destitute of sense the Heavens I say the Elements Brutes Insects and Plants he can challenge no degree of eminence above us in that respect nor by consequence can we own an obligation from thence to render him our submissions and reverence As for the expression of Plato that the Being of God is the onely true Being and that ours is no other then a shadow of that infinitely inferior to it in dignity he did not consider it simply as a Being but as an eternal Being that wasts not away with duration nor is obnoxious to any kind of change that includes in its eternity all the several successions and revolutions of times and all whose Proprieties and Virtues are as invariable as its essence But this is not the subject of our present consideration no more then it is the meaning of Epicurus Hereafter I shall no longer doubt that the piety of the Epicureans is worn onely on the outside and lies wholly in shews and countenances Of which we can scarce have a more pregnant or evident argument then experience In the Christian Religion all the inducements are found that ever led men to the service of God among the Pagans and an infinite number of others besides For it presents us to contemplate in him an immense Power an ineffable Wisdom an exquisite Providence an inexorable Justice an incomprehensible Mercy and in the conduct of all things agreeably to the design of his eternal constitutions there appears an administration transcendently admirable One Religion proposes not so great recompenses for piety and Virtue and another denounces less horrid punishments against Vice and irreligion So that all that which the most devout Nations have ever believed of God as we shall see in its due place hath comparatively been nothing but darkness and all the devotion which their measure of knowledge enkindled in their breasts hath only been a dream of piety and a very languid and faint zeal And notwithstanding all this the number of people is very small whom Christianity hath incited seriously to fear that Great God who hath revealed himself unto us What affection therefore can men have for the doctrine of Epicurus If the fire it self cannot inflame piety in us is it possible we should be warmed by his Ice Certainly if the representation of those rich compassions in that God hath sent his Son into the World to redeem us from our offences by an ignominious death are not effective to incite men to his Love there remains no hope any other thing should have power to do it Wherefore how can we expect the same from this imagination that God beholds from Heaven the calamities of men here below without being at all affected therewith unless it be with resentments of joy because they do not reach him like as one should enwrap himself under the coverings of a warm and close-curtain'd bed while others are half dead with cold or should stand on the Sea-shore beholding a Ship in inevitable danger of being wrack'd Furthermore if Religion be not powerful enough to induce us to the love of God by sentiments of gratitude which we ought to have for his benefits at least the fear of his justice impressed on our minds serves as a boundary to check the over-flowing of our Passions and to retain them in some outward shew of esteem of Virtue should this Fear once be removed out of their breasts although it is impossible wholly to root it out thence what pains soever be taken to do it there would be such disorder in the Lives of men and so dreadful an irregularity in all our passions that there would not be left so much as a shadow of Virtue and probity upon the face of the earth For seeing there are in our Souls as the Philosophers themselves have observed such appetites as naturally war against reason subjecting and captivating the same upon all occasions as experience also demonstrates and the Pleasure of the body meeting with so many baits and incentives there is no vice to which we should not without all regret abandon our selves upon hope of impunity They which are subject to Laws peradventure might abstain from those wickednesses which are punish'd by them yet would permit themselves to act such as fall not within their cognizance and if they us'd any kind of Prayer it is likely it would be no other then that of some in Juvenal Pulchra Laverna Da mihi fallere da justum sanctumque videri Noctem peccatis fraudibus objice nubem Besides that there are yet several persons whose madness being above the checks which the representation of punishments used amongst men suggests is notwithstanding awed with the apprehension of Everlasting Pains And then for such as do fear the punishments inflicted by the stroke of Magistracy or even by the hand of nature who recompenses debaucheries with the Gout and Stone and other such afflictions at least they would not restrain themselves from being
it all referres to the body and so it feeds and satisfies the corporeal eyes onely If there be any contentment for the Mind it is in the consideration of that Wisdom from which all the excellent order we behold proceeds Which is an object destinated to the Understanding and not to the corporeal sight Much more therefore when she is no longer in this lodging of Earth will she contemn sensible things to give her self to such as are conformable unto her And indeed the most excellent faculty of the Soul is the Understanding and the perfection of that consists in contemplation of noble and excellent objects Now there is in the perfection of every thing its supreme end and contentment by reason of which either the Soul must be extinguished which we have shewn is impossible or she must be imployed in the contemplation of things worthy so sublime an intelligence And what can there be even in the opinion of the Epicureans more worthy to be considered lov'd and ador'd then God or consequently which so much perfectionates the soul of man and his understanding or which gives him so much satisfaction and joy Therefore his supreme Pleasure will be to approach unto God to behold and know him to dive into his wonderful nature as much as is possible to be founded in so great an Abysse And this cannot be done unless God communicate himself to the Soul and suffer himself to be as I may so speak touched and tasted by it But what If that be the perfection of the Soul and consequently its aim is it consentaneous to Reason that those which are polluted with all sorts of wickedness should likewise have free access to the Deity and receive as high contentment from his communication as he will admit the Good unto Or shall Fortune have then also a Soveraign power over spirits to bring some of them fortuitously to their supreme Good and as rashly debar others from it Certainly altogether otherwise As they which have most rever'd the Deity and his image which resplends in Virtue and not in sensible things or who to speak better have not esteemed sensible things further then as they are necessary to the body to render their Minds more free to its functions and dextrous to the exercise of Virtue shall in reward of their affections obtain the injoyment of that which they loved here below which is a thing agreeable to the Goodness of God so those shall by his justice be deprived of the same who have slighted it in comparison of things visible and transitory Now to be deprived of the contemplation of the Deity and of that delectation which it affords in communicating it self to the creature is that which we account the punishment of sin committed in the body which also cannot be without transcendent sorrow and unspeakable distress We refer these things as much as we can to the experience of all men It is not questioned by any but that we are designed to a supreme Good and that such supreme Good is of it self so great that all our desires ought to concenter in tendency thereunto The debates of Philosophers concerning its Nature are infinite and their dissenting opinions about it can never be composed by the help of Philosophy Not to amuse my self in rehearsing the Fancies of others which are almost without number in the first place the Epicureans place it in the Pleasure of the Body The Stoicks determine it in Virtue And the Peripateticks define it in the exercise of Virtue yet account it not complete unless it be attended with the Pleasure that accrues from injoyment of corporeal and external things such as Beauty Health Riches Peace the love of ones Fellow-Citizens and Prosperity in Enterprises As for Bodily Pleasure the Philosophers have long since driven that out of the School as too soft and effeminate wherein to place the soveraign happiness of good men For is it equitable to attribute the same to Lais with Cornelia the Mother of the Gracchi or to Marcus Brutus with Heliogabalus And what a strange supreme Good is that which renders men of neer resemblance with beasts Yet supposing it were so experience shows that 't is impossible to be obtain'd For who ever tasted a Pleasure in the world so pure that had not in it a touch of bitterness If any one ha's tasted such yet who ha's been able to continue and rellish it for a long time Whether soever Pleasure be plac'd in a sensible jollity for the injoyment of some desired thing or establish'd in the Absence of all Evils which they call Indolence those Pleasures which tickle us are but of a moments duration and no man ever yet pass'd an intire day without complaining of something Now the supream Good is a thing firm and constant and which not only ought to be difficultly shaken as Aristotle observed but absolutely immutable They who have confin'd it to Virtue were without doubt more generous and worthy the prerogative of men But there never yet liv'd any person that attain'd to such a degree of Virtue as it ought to be had in to make up a happiness for it is requisite that it be accomplished in all its degrees and parts The Stoicks indeed were arrogant enough to imagine themselves to have attained thereunto but we have too much experience both of their imbecillity and our own to believe them And although some one should have reached to that high pitch of Virtue yet cannot he be called a happy man who is subject to fall into the misfortunes of Priamus and who really falls into them If there have been any Sages amongst the Stoicks Cato Vticensis and Brutus were the men And notwithstanding Cato in despair of ever beholding the affairs of the Commonwealth restor'd disputes in the first place against the Providence of God and accuses its conduct of a strange instability and prevarication as if it had favour'd the tyrannical attempts of Caesar and then kills himself to go seek his happiness in another place since his Virtue could not give him it in this world And for the other being transported with the same dispair he slew himself with his own hand after he had reviled Virtue calling her weak and wretched as if she were no more then a meer name or shadow Which deportments of theirs sufficiently detect and convince the vanity of those magnificent words of the Masters of their School That a Wise man is invulnerable by all the Accidents of Fortune and that he can never lose the support of Virtue so unmoveable is she in him and always like to her self Aristotle ordered the matter better when to the injoyment and practise of Virtue he adjoyned the felicity which accrues from things external Which opinion is no doubt more conformable to our desires and natural inclinations But though he had a capacity quick enough to discern that where one of those two things is wanting the supreme happiness is defective yet had he no more
as deep as heaven is high above us he lodges the Titans the Aliodes and Salmoneus There is also Tityus who covers nine Acres of Ground with his body and whose growing entrals are perpetually devoured by a Vulture And not far from him the Lapithâ— with Ixion and Pirithous over whose heads hang great rocks ready to fall upon them He assigns there to some for their punishment to roul a great stone eternally and fastens others to the Spokes of a Wheel that turns about incessantly and tortures as it turns He fixes the poor Theseus upon his seat and condemns him never to stir from it being a torment fitted to a man that loved to travel and at last concludes that if he had a hundred tongues and as many mouths he could not recount all the sorts of punishments wherewith sinners are tortured in that place As for good men he allots them more liberty of air and a more spatious habitation where the skie is display'd with a fair purple light and they behold their Sun and their Stars as we do ours there some exercise themselves in various sorts of combats as leaping running on the grass and wrastling on the Sand others dance to the Musick of Orpheus's Violin and so others divert themselves with other sports and recreations Are not these whimsies very capable of giving satisfaction to those which read them Nor can it be said these extravagances are peculiar onely to the Poets but that other men and especially Philosophers held more rational opinions For as I formerly said the Poets were the Divines of the Pagans chiefly in these matters so that the Philosophers themselves admitted their fancies into their doctrines Indeed Plutarch in the Treatise which he writ upon this Motto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seems to offer at some more reasonable interpretation of those follies then what they present to the understanding at the first view but nevertheless all the explication which he gives of them amounts onely to this that the wicked Souls are plunged and overwhelm'd in the perpetual oblivion of all things And in his Consolation directed to Apollonius he adheres to the opinion of Pindar concerning the place and state of the Happy which Pindar in the place which he alledges describes almost after the same manner that Virgil doth who seems to have imitated him If an Author so grave and judicious as Plutarch was suffer'd himself to be deluded with these fine imaginations what shall we think of all other people who were of meaner capacities then he not of the vulgar pitch only but even among Philosophers But truely their blindness in this matter must be favourably censur'd since in other things they could discourse and argue against Fables and observe perhaps that the combates of the Gods one against another their Loves Hatreds and Jealousies their imployments of the Forge and Spinstry their Nectar and Ambrosia were but pleasant fictions or Romantick fancies of Homer and his posterity of Poets The light of Reason ennabled them wherewith to encounter these stories so that they were not onely convinced of their vanity but invented somewhat of greater solidity but in this particular if they beheld absurdities which they were not able to maintain they were not able to substitute any truths in their place So that it was necessary for them either to admit such Trifles as some did or to live in a most profound ignorance of the estate of their Souls after the dissolution of the body which was indeed most ordinary And Epicurus knew no better way to interpret the Allegory of those â—ables then to bring Hell up into the Earth and to affirm that all which the Poets relate of the things below as of the rock which hangs over the head of Tantalus and the Rowling-stone of Sisyphus and Tityus's Liver which is continually devoured by birds of prey and the Tun of the Danaides which could not be fil'd wtth all their pains in lading water into it is felt onely in this life by covetous ambitious and fearful minds exagitated with their own exorbitant passions In a word the soul of man being extinguisht when the body dyes all that is reported of Hell and things done there is frivolous and Cerberus and the Furies Et lucis egenus Tartarus horriferos eructans faucibus astus are nothing at all in his opinion but Metus in vita paenarum pro malefactis Est insignibus insignis scelerisque luela Carcer horribilis vesano jactu deorsum Verbera carnifices robus pioe lumina taedae Quae tamen etsi absunt at mens sibi conscia facti Prametuens adhibet stimulos torretque flagellis Now it cannot be exprest of how great importance this ignorance is to the life of men For as the hope of recompense is a quick spur to Virtue so is the fear of punishment a most efficacious bridle to restrain from Vice so that the study of that and the hatred of this increases or diminishes according to the proportion of knowledge which we have of the reward prepared for us And the more men are corrupt as experience shows they are infinitely the less do they prize Virtue for it self and on the contrary their inclinations are more violently carried forth to vice Which is an argument that 't is only the fear of punishment and the hope of compensation which moves them not the native beauty of Virtue or deformity of Vice Whence in so gross an ignorance of their condition after this life it was impossible that they should be effectually reclaimed from the one or duely excited to the other So that the conclusion clearly results that God must reveal himself from Heaven to be the rewarder of Virtue and the severe avenger of Vice not onely in this Life but also in that which is to come by giving a sufficient information of the quality of the reward And because so long as we are cloathed with this body and accustomed to sensible and corporeal things we can scarce comprehend any thing but by the Ministery of the Senses or under the image of sensible things if such revelation be express'd in Allegoricall speeches taken from what is most ardently desired or feared in the world it is requisite First that such description be grave and savouring nothing of the weakness of the mind of man which is evident in those of the Poets In the next place there must be in such a revelation in which the penalties and recompenses to come are veiled under the shadow of corporeal and sensible things other simple descriptions to explain such as are typified and give us to understand that both what it promises and what it threatens shall be in a manner proportionable to the nature of humane Souls and not extravagant or incompatible therewith And lastly it is necessary that such revelation be accompani'd with so clear evidence of its celestial and divine original that the assurance which it gives that those promises and threatnings come from God himself as if
the same which dye in the cradle and so are prevented of ever exercising themselves in Virtue So great are the advantages of them which have this particular revelation above those which reject it to wit that we know for what reason we dread death so much and why it is indeed to be feared what the sources are from whence we are to draw our consolations against its agonies and lastly what is the way to ascribe glory always to the Deity whatsoever accident happens in the World CHAP. VI. Of the Corruption of Mankind How much it imports true piety to know the Original of it which we cannot do without a particular Revelation THe excellence of the Nature of man is such that he cannot be considered either in his body or his mind or in the dominion which he claims over all things but there are presented very eminent testimonies and tokens of it The Stature of his body is comely and graceful not despicable for its smallness nor unsightly and incommodious by too great bulk the Symmetry of his members his delicate skin and tender flesh have an air so transcendently pleasing that all other Animals may seem coursely composed and made for laborious services but man alone formed and designed for empire Especially in his countenance shines a majesty that speaks him made to contemplate the heavens no less then to command on earth And whereas Brutes have their heads inclined downwards Os homini sublime dedit coelumque tueri Jussit erectos ad Sydera tollere vultus As for his Mind the Sciences and Arts of which he is Author the capacity to govern Societies and conduct Armies the Dexterity of forming a design with understanding and carrying on the same with prudence of contriving the means industriously to their end and guiding them thereunto by courses that seem oftentimes contrary the faculty of conceiving the Ideas of things which are not as if they were although compounded of parts absolutely discrepant the sagacity of knowing how to make use of expedients for long Navigations and tracing wayes in the Sea by direction of the Stars are sufficient proofs and evidences to evince its excellence So that they are without comparison more to be excused who conceiv'd that the Spirit of Man was a small particle deriv'd from the Deity then they which reduc'd it to the condition of Beasts Phocylides had indeed some reason when he said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As if God in creating man and indowing him with so divine an understanding had lent him a little portion of his essence In like manner the Empire which he hath over all other creatures shews sufficiently that it is not for nothing that his mind and body have been indued with so many eminent qualifications above all other things The Earth produces for him the necessities and pleasures of life to his contentment and like a soveraign he employs its stones marbles metals to build his palaces and guild the roofs which he makes of its Cedars He covers himself with the wool of animals and insects spin silk for his service Notwithstanding his own weakness he ranks Elephants in battel and makes them subservient to his passions without their knowing that they are so He hath put the bridle in the mouth of Horses and tamed that proud and fierce animal for his convenience Even the life of poor beasts is nothing to him for his sustenance and how terrible soever the Sea be yet he hath found out means to fail upon it securely and to conjoyn nations by commerce whom vast distances of Oceans have divided But notwithstanding all this his corruption appears so manifestly that there is none but ha's observ'd it For one comely and perfectly well composed person there will ever be found a hundred that have somewhat of difformity There are always some impotent and less-favoured by nature some one-ey'd and lame and even some persons born to Kingdomes whose structure and conformation of members is pitiful or ridiculous We are subject to so many diseases that sometimes one single person suffers more of them in his life then all other animals together of a whole province The corruption of his Mind is extremely great Not to speak at present of that ignorance which is common to all and the most knowing complain of with good reason although it may seem that man having been made to serve himself with all things he ought at least to know them The Evil which he commits both against others and himself hath given occasion to One heretofore to say That as it were better to give no wine to sick persons because if it profits one it hurts more so it would have been better not to have allow'd man the use of reason since for one good that it does it causes ten thousand evils in the World There are nothing but Wars of Nation against Nation yea of the same Nation in its own bowels In Cities there are seditious in families tumults The Husband and Wise do not accord in the same bed whose souls notwithstanding ought to be cemented together And that which is more strange every one is not at agreement with himself our natural instability disquiets us our passions turmoile us our desires and jealousies fret and devour us and which is a lively token of our corruption in what condition soever we be I do not say tolerable onely but even honorable and desirable by others we are never contented with it That which a while since we ardently desired we soon after despise and what we made no account of when we injoy'd we resent its loss with sorrow thus condemning our own judgement of error frequently with remorse for suffering our selves to be transported with passion and appetite Witnes that excellent Satyre of Horace in which he introduces old soldiers complaining that they are not Merchants and Merchants envying the happiness of the military life The Lawyer there extolls the tranquillity and peace of the Husbandman who also esteems himself miserable in comparison of those that dwell in Cities So that whether it be chance or the wish and choice of reason that puts men upon their course of life yet there is not one but finds something to dislike in his own and repines that he is not well at ease nor so favourably treated as his Neighbor And notwithstanding were a proffer tender'd to exchange conditions and the Merchant sent to the Campe and the Soldier to traffick at Sea as also were the Husbandman become a Lawyer and engaged in the toilesome affairs of Law-Courts and the Lawyer oblig'd to drive the Waine there is none of them but would asmuch disapprove the change Lastly we need not much exalt our selves for the Dominion which we have over other things for the Earth produces nothing but with the labor of our armes and sweat of our brows and besides recompenses us oft-times with bryars and thistles The Frost and Mill-dew blast our Vines and Corn the Caterpiller and Locust
we if the truth was there of which we are in despair ever to have any intelligence Shall we then have recourse to find it in the books of the Poets Truely it would be an excellent design to go about to build a Religion upon the model afforded us in the Theology of Hesiod the Hymmes of Orpheus the Poems of Homer the Odes of Pindar the Metamorphoses of Ovid and the divine Theology of the great Virgil who is so hard put to it to save the gods of the poor Aeneas from the sack of Troy and who trusses them up in the same fardel with the little Ascanius as companions of the same fortune It were more rationally credible that the beasts and trees held that rare converse together which Aesop reports of them in his Fables then to give belief to the adventures and exploits which those Poets ascribe to their Deities For in the first there would be nothing but childishness or at most but brutishness in the latter impiety and blasphemy And if as some would have it believ'd of them though perhaps themselves never thought of any such matter their intent was to cover under the veil of those fables several true mysteries pertaining to the knowledge of the Deity and understanding of the secrets of nature so far was the teaching the same after such a manner from being a divine intention that on the contrary the honor of the Deity hath thereby been unworthily impaired and the truth smother'd under most horrible lies It follows therefore that we go to the writings of Philosophers to which we cannot without great injury to truth ascribe the commendation of being proceeded from celestial inspiration since the authors themselves though sufficiently presumtuous do not pretend they were so And indeed we have shewn above that they were either wholly ignorant of the requisites to a true piety towards God or if they had knowledge of some few it was wonderfully obscure and dubious But how could the revelation of God have suffered them to groap and wander in that ignorance To conclude is it then to those Oracles of Delphos Dodona Jupiter Ammon and others the like that we owe the glory of this divine knowledge Truly it moves both shame and pity to hear themselves speak both of the original and faculty of divination and cessation of Oracles It was a heard of Goats that first brought that of Delphos which was the most famous and venerable of all into reputation But the virgins that were placed there to give answers to inquirers which they receiv'd by their obscene parts were not long there but there arise most notorious scandals of them All their predictions were ambiguous and doubtful like our Almanack-makers who prophesie by hap-hazard and themselves gave this account of it that the Daemons which spoke there not knowing things to come but by inspection of the Stars and so being able to gather from thence but incertain conjectures they shrouded their ignorance under the ambiguity of words capable of different interpretations to the end they might make good their credit whatsoever the event of things might be In a word afâ—er Plutark had bestirr'd himself on all sides to finde out the causes of these Oracles and their ceasing and sometimes conceiv'd them perishable and mortal Daemons sometimes immortal but that they chang'd place he seems to resolve upon this worthy Philosophy That the earth was in some places indued with certain prophetick Virtues which come by exhalations to be mingled and insinuated into souls fitting to receive those inspirations and so cause in them those Enthusiasmes and predictions of future things Afterwards when all the virtue is spent and the whole mass that was made thereof in the subterranean caverns evaporated then the prediction that was made by the Oracles of things to come ceases and is extinguish'd Without question those divinations could not but be very clear which proceeded onely from the fumes of the earth and the religious devotions very good that were paid to these divining exhalations and the persons who received the impressions of them in their souls But perhaps though the evidences of this divine revelation be lost I mean the books in which it was recorded yet it ha's remained in the memory of man and is preserved by practise as by a living transcript Be it so Let us therefore now examine the Pagan Religion in it self Which certainly if it was divine ought to have afforded a great knowledge of those supreme truths in the understanding of which consists the perfection of our souls And yet it ha's been pitifully defective herein For setting a part at present those principles of Christian Religion which seem most incredible and by reason of which profane men reject or suspect it there is no person that ha's a dram of common sense but will freely confess that we have beyond comparison more knowledge of the nature of the Deity and true virtue then the ancient Greeks or Romanes ever had which notwithstanding we have drawn from books more ancient then them by many ages and which condemn the Gods of all other Nations Whence therefore came it to pass that if they had that particular revelation we enquire after they were so ignorant of those indubitable truths of which we are so knowing who have learnt the same from those that are profess'd enemies to the Pagan Deities If what they believ'd in matter of Religion was truth whence do those truths which we perceive now so clearly and comprehend so certainly convince them of falshood And if the Gods which the Pagans ador'd were true Gods why do the books which have taught us so many excellent things whereunto humane reason cannot repugne call them Gods of clay And indeed they were marveillous Gods for even those that ador'd them knew their parents and could shew their tombes and tell a thousand debaucheries of them which confirm that they were so far from being worthy to reign in the heavens that on the contrary they deserved publick punishment upon earth Their thefts their rapes and adulteries their attempts against parents their whoredoms whereby if we believe their authors they filled the heavens with bastards their Sodomies and incests would not have been suffered unpunish'd by those that built Temples and Altars to them if they had apprehended them in the jurisdiction of their respective Republicks And the supreme Jupiter himself must not be excepted of whom Menelaus exclaimed with more reason then he imagin'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jupiter pater nemo Deorum est te perniciosior What a kind of Religion is that whose Gods have had a beginning and that a long time after men of whose history we have certain knowledge For Jupiter and Saturne and Vranus are none of them so ancient as Abraham On the other side what Gods had the Nations before these came into the world Whosoever saith Plutark would search into the histories of the times that preceeded Theseus and Hercules shall find therein nothing
upon him But of this more at lage hereafter But in the next place there is discover'd in the Gospel an incomparably greater depth of Mercy For it is evident he obliges less by pardoning that conceives himself less offended and he conceives himself less offended that apprehends he may pardon without doing himself any injury or diminishing the reputation of his virtue or his courage On the contrary he obliges more that forgives an offense so sensible and atrocious that to make expiation of it there needs a great preceding satisfaction Since therefore the Christian Religion represents the justice of God inexorable and nevertheless tenders absolute remission to men by his mercy of necessity this mercy must be of a more transcendent benignity that swallows up an implacable fury And lastly his Wisdom is admirably resplendent in the Christian Religion whereas in the Jewish as the Jews understand it there is scarce a glimpse of it in all that mystery For if he punish according to the curse dâ—nounced in the Law 't is an act of pure Justice not of Wisdom If he pardon without other satisfactiâ—◠〈◊〉 then the death of beasts 't is a work of pure Mercy and not at all of Wisdom But to finde an expedâ—ent to punish and pardon both together to display his Mercy without derogation from his Justice this is it which the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of man was unable to penetrate into and wherein now it is revealed appears an admirable design of Wisdom And now what more natural conclusion can there be then that the Christian-Religion is incomparably more proper to induce men to Piety and Virtue then the Jewish For as we have intimated elsewhere there are three motives alone that incite us thereunto Fear of Punishment Hope of Reward and the Admiration of the excellence of the Nature of God in it self and of the beauty of piety and virtue in which his image is resplendent Now as for the Fear of punishment it is always so much the greater as â—ustice is vigorous and inflexible And therefore the more implacable Religion represents the Justice of God the more powerful is it to reclaim and keep men from vice by the terror of punishment In like maner the Hope of reward ought to be greater where Mercy is greater too For our Conscience bears us witness that 't is on this score we are to expect it And if Admiration of the Perfections which are in God can be to us an efficacious attractive to goodness as indeed there is no true and sincere Piety which is not principally rooted and fixed on this foundation besides the great and incomprehensible Wisdom that is eminent in him the immense depths of his Mercy ought to ingulf all our thoughts and inflame all the affections of our souls with a holy devotion For ever since the time of the first sin all our piety is nothing but a gratitude towards his mercy And lastly for that Contraries mutually illustrate one another the Beauty of Piety and Virtue will be more resplendant by the opposition of Sin the horror of which appears so much the greater as the punishment that attended it is more terrible Now how much this consideration that God hath discharged the vengeance due to the sins of men on the person of his own Son exalts the lustre of all the precedent doctrine we shall not now insist upon for we have not yet consider'd the qualifications of his Person who hath made this satisfaction for our offenses But truely every one may of himself readily judge Lastly The Christian Religion infinitely excels the Jewish in the understanding of the Promises which concern the Messias For what Messias is that which the Jews expect A Triumphant King who by force of arms may subdue the Nations and bring Emperors under his yoak and break Empires in pieces may extend his conquests from East to West and from North to South and fill the whole Earth with the terror of his Legions and advance the Jewish Nation as high as it is now miserably abased For as for many more impertinences which they are otherwise guilty of in this matter I shall forbear to mention them as less intending their shame then their conviction And I cannot but pity them when I observe the race of Israel the Posterity of Abraham and the people once beloved of the Lord to equal and surpass in this all the extravagances of the Mahometans and the Pagan fopperies In that which I have propos'd which is the most tolerable of all their imaginations they sufficiently manifest that they are of the flesh and the world since they apprehend nothing but carnal and mundane things For if their remain'd in them any spark of spiritual Light they would acknowledge that they are compos'd of two Parts Body and Soul and that the body being earthly and material and endued with organs and faculties like to those of beasts do's not come neer the dignity of the nature of the soul which is spiritual inmaterial intelligent next the Nature of Angels and as it were a beam of the very Deity If therefore they expect glory and advantage from the appearance of their Messias it ought to be chiefly in reference to the soul and not for the body saving so far as it is the servant and dependant of the mind Now as we have shewn above in what can the glory of the soul consist but in Wisdom and Virtue And wherein do's wisdom lye but in the knowledge of him who is the Author and Fountain of all Virtue Prudence and Understanding Should he have turned the rocks into Diamonds and the flints trampled on at each step into Gold and Jewels the Snow of the Alpes into Butter and the rivers into milk the Wine of Judah into Nectar and the bread of Asher into Ambrosia and driven all the Kings of the earth fetter'd before his triumphant Chariot into Jerusalem yet all this terrene pompe and magnificence had not been comparable to his lively illumination of minds by the knowledge of the Most-high and to his victory over hearts their passions and appetites For there is so little proportion between the mind and the body that the greatest and most triumphant Emperor of the Earth if vicious and ignorant of things worthy the excellence of man is to be contemn'd in comparison of the most miserable slave that in the servile condition of his body excells him as to the understanding in Virtue and Prudence And I think there is not any so unworthy the being of man that would not choose rather to loose all the Kingdoms of the Earth if he possess'd them and after that even the limbes of his body then the use of Reason which advances him above the equality of beasts Moreover let them speak in conscience whether it be not the sense of their present calamitie and the miserable estate they are reduc'd into by their dispersion throughout the whole world that makes them breath after a Deliverer powerful