Church Militant to be most like the Church Triumphant for in Heaven which is nothing els but one great Temple ther is among the Angels which are compounded of Essence and Existence as you and I are of matter and form ther is I say a most exact order They are divided to three Hierarchies in every Hierarchy ther are three orders The first consists of Seraphims the second of Cherubims the third of Thrones The second consists of Dominations of Vertues and powers The third consists of Principalities of Archangels and Angels Now those of the supremest Hierarchy partake of Divine illuminations in a greater measure then of the inferior and they one to another in respective manner who are subordinat unto them you and I are created in a capacity to dwell in that Temple of Eternity you after the Resurrection and I as soon as I part with you to see the face of my Creator and converse with those holy Angels by thoughts and looks Body 'T is hard for flesh and blood to beleeve that considering the immense distance which is twixt this ball of earth and 〈◊〉 Empyrean Heaven you should so instantaneously arrive thither to behold the beatificall vision For the lowest neighbour to earth of all the celestiall bodies which is the Moon is by the opinion of the best Astronomers computed to be 52. Semidiameters distant from the earth every diameter containing nere upon 3500. miles so that put case one could fly thither and mount 100. miles an hour yet he would be above four months in his journey moreover from the first sphere the primum mobile put case a millstone should descend thence to the centre it would be 60. yeers a coming down though it make 40. miles every hour as the prime of Astronomer averrs therfore under favor how is it possible that you should immediatly upon your separation from me post up with such inexcogitable speed up to Heaven and behold the blissfull vision Soul Touching the operations the movements and conveyancies of Spirits you must know that they are instantaneous and so wonderfull that the speculation thereof strikes Philosophy dumb They need no succession of Time or place as bodies require in their motions they meet with no stop or resistance at all in their passage Now if Light which is nothing els but dilated fire to the utmost tenuity that can be and comes neerest to the nature of a spirit of any corporeal creature if light I say doth exercise its function with such an admirable agility and suddennes as to expand it self from East to West over the whole surface of the Hemisphere what shall we think of Spirits that are far fuller of activity But you must understand that when I am devested of you the wall of partition that interposition is instantly taken away which stood 'twixt me and my Creator who is the Son of the Invisible world as that in the Firmament which you see with the sensitive optiques here is of this Materiall therefore I shall immediatly behold that infinitly more glorious Sun the veyl of flesh being taken away I shall be instantly within the Temple of glory wherof every Corner is fill'd with the light of his countenance insomuch that who is once in it can never be able to go again out of it Therefore though the blessed Angels are employed up and down the world upon his service yet they are alwayes within the verge of the Beatificall vision Body Let it not be held a petulant or impertinent curiosity in me if I covet to know since you now speak of Angels what degrees of difference ther may betwixt Them and separated souls in Heaven Soul As they agree in many things so they also differ in many Angels and separated souls agree in that both of them are spirits both of them are intellectual and eternal Cretures They behold the blissful vision They are Courtiers of Heaven and act meerly by the understanding The merits of Christ was beneficiall to both it made the one capable of the state of glory and it confirm'd the other in it that they can never be Apostats hereafter besides as som hold at the day of judgment they are to receive augmentation of bliss by being freed from further employment cares and solicitings for men and continue in an uninterrupted rest Now as the blessed Angels and separated souls do thus agree so they differ also in sundry things They differ in their very Essentialls for the principles of Angels are meerly metaphysicall viz. Essence and existence but a separated soul continueth still a part of that compositum which formerly consisted of matter and form and is still apt to be reunited to the body till then she is not absolutly completed for all that while she changeth not her nature but her state moreover they differ in the Exercise of the understanding and manner of knowledg for a separated soul knowes still by discours and ratiocination which an Angel doth not They also differ in dignity of nature for Angels have larger illuminations and at the first instant of their Creation they beheld the beatificall vision yet separated souls are capable to mount up to such a height of glory as to bee like them in all things both in point of vision adhaesion and fruitio◠Body But when you are setled in that state of blissfulness how can I expect that you will desire to bee united again to re-efform so frail and foul a thing as this body of mine why may not I think rather that you will assume some body of a nobler and more refined matter according to the speculation of him who imagin'd that rationall soules be they never so pious and pure mount not up presently after their separation from the corrupt mass of flesh to enjoy the Beatificall vision which is the height of all celestiall happiness but first they are carried to the body of the Moon or som other Star according to their degrees of piety and goodness in this life where they enter into and actuar som bodies of a purer mould and being refin'd then they reascend to som higher Star and so to som higher then that till at last they be made capable to behold the lustre of so glorious a Majesty in whose sight no impurity can stand which fancy may be illustrated by this comparison that if a prisoner as I touch elswhere after he hath bin kept close in a dark dungeon for many yeers should bee taken out and brought suddenly to look upon the Sun in the Meridian it would endanger him to bee struck stark blind So no humane polluted soul sallying out of a dark dirty prison as the body is would be possibly able to appear before the incomprehensible Majesty of God or be susceptible of the fulgor of his all-glorious countenance unless he be sitted before hand by certain degrees thereunto which might be done by passing from one Star to another who we are told in a good Text differ one from the other
you and to partake with you of that knowledge and blissfullness which so far surpass all my senses and your Imagination I believe as yet Soul I do not say you shall rise but you shall be raised for solus Christus resurrexit alii suscitati Christ only did rise again by the power of his Godhead all others shall be raised that same body of yours shall be rais'd the same in substance not in quality for it will be made purer and freer from Corruption as I during the time of my separation on I shall not change my nature but my state I may be said to have no integrity but remain as a part of you till our reconjunction wherunto I shall still incline and propend because you were the instrument wherby I became first a soul which may be the cause that all the Saints in Heaven do so much long after the day of Judgement because they may bee reunited to their bodies and by that consortship have a fuller fruition of bliss Those eyes of yours shall then receive their reward for their liftings up to Heaven those hands of yours for being instruments of charity those eares of yours for their attention to holy duties those knees of yours for their bendings in Gods holy house that mouth of yours for receiving the blessed Sacrament in such humiliation that tongue heart and brain of yours for their praises and ejaculations and all other parts of yours that were the interpreters of your piety shall all then receive their reward in the Temple of Eternity Body But after your recesse and separation from me let it not bee esteem'd a too overbold curiosity if I desire to know whether you will give then a finall farewell to Earth and bee seen no more in the Elementary world because ther be so many stories told of spirits that walk to discover hidden tresures to detect murthers c. As also that they have appear'd in Churchyards and Charnell houses Soul Touching this speculation and doctrine of walking of Spirits it hath gravel'd the highest wits both in Divinity and Philosophy they are all put to a nonplus concerning the latter they would produce naturall reasons why in Cimitiers and other places they somtimes appeer and one is by the example of a vegetall body which being burnt and reduc'd into ashes the form of the same numericall plant by a curious Artist may be reviv'd visibly to the eye of the beholder and made to start up out of those ashes being shut uâ— in a glasse and heated in the botâ—tome in regard that the fixed faâ— though much of the volatil hatâ— flown away remaines there still so a humane body or cadaver beinâ— reduced to ashes in the grave bâ— the heat which the penetrating beams of the sun insuseth therinto the shape of the said body may be exhal'd up and made to appeer in the air Now touching the Theologues the common opinion is that it pleaseth God Almighty to give the Devil a priviledg and permit him to assume any shape that of man not excepted wherby he deludes and makes compacts with the weaker sort of peeple to destroy their souls for ther is no Creture that the Devil maligneth and hates more then mankind in regard he succeedes him in the beatitude that he lost which makes som Divines hold that when that number of Angels which fell and were tumbled down to Hell is filled up by humane souls the day of judgment will come But as I said before the ill spirit hath power by Gods permission to transform himself to sundry shapes and to transfer that power to his petty cacodaemons and imps to beguile and inveagle the simplest sort of mankind and most commonly women the weaker vessels who somtimes out of a desire of revenge and to wreck their malice somtimes for lucre and som petty supplies of money use to indent and make pactions with him though alwayes without a witness And hereof these times affoord more instances then ever any age did therefore whosoever denieth ther are such kind of actuall delusions and ill spirits sheweth that he himself as was said elswhere is possessed with the spirit of contradiction and obstinacy For ther are no nations new or old but have published laws against such who adoperat and make use of the devil for the ends afore mentioned as also for other curiosities and predictions 〈…〉 against them Ther are Edicts in France and Acts of Parlement in England against such who invoke ill spirits make any contracts with them wherof the very instrument and deed hath bin discover'd in divers places with the Devils claw for his signature together with the injunctions that he layed upon them before hand which in the Romish Countreys are that they must first renounce Christ and the extended woman meaning the blessed virgin they must contemn the Sacraments tread on the Cross spit at the Eucharist c. As I have noted els where Therefore without any controversy ther are airy spirits that hover up down perpetually about us But when I shall become a spirit which will be immediatly upon my dissolution from that body of yours I hope I shall appeer no more in this Elementary world till I attend my Saviour at the day of judgment to fetch you up also to Heaven as soon as we part from one another here you shall return to earth whence you first came and I to God that gave me you to your common Mother and I to the Father of lights whence as a beam of immortality I was sent to quicken organize and inform that body of yours and make it capable of heavenly beatitude in time being refin'd and fitted first for that purpose I thank my Saviour I have that within me which assures me hereof I am not left to such incertitudes anxietie that have any thing of despair in them such that an Italian Prince expressed when being upon his death bed and comforted by his friends touching the joyes of the other world whereunto he was going he fetch'd a deep grone said Oh I know what 's pass'd but I know not what 's to come much like another in the same condition who said Dubius vixi anxius morior quò vadam nescio I liv'd doubting I die anxious I know not whither I go To these may be added an odd speech of a French Baron not long since who meeting two capuchins going barefoot in cold frosty weather with their scrips upon their backs a begging knowing them to be gentlemen of a good family He said How grosly are these men cosen'd if ther be no Heaven That of Rablais was not so bad as this who being upon his death bed and the extreme unction applied unto him a friend of his who had come to visit him among other passages of consolation wish'd him good speed for he was upon his journey to a good Countrey viz. to heaven He answer'd so it seems that I am upon a journey for you see they are
doth descend therefore Erasmus cannot be much blamed for canonizing Socrates for a Saint so confident he was of his salvation And it were no profaness to say That as the Holy Prophets were Harbengers to the Second Person of the Trinitie so the Philosphers were the Heralds of the First Touching your Passions Senses and Organs though the first have been Traytors so often unto me within doors and the other Rebells without yet you apologize indifferently well for them Age will take off their teeth and ougles in time for they are no other than wild Beasts Insomuch that it was not said improperly of him who having pass'd his gran Climacterique viz. 63 said that he was got loose from his unruly Passions as from so many Tygars or Wolves But I like it well that you have so much of Hope and Love Touching the first you say well it maybe a cause of longevity because it keeps the Spirits in a temperat motion and preserves them from wasting too fast And this may be one reson why Kings and Soverain Princes are not commonly so long liv'd as others because they have fewer things to hope for and more things to fear Touching the largeness of your Love that it extends to a tender compassion towards sensitive animals it is a thing not to be altogether discommended in you though it may be smild at by some nor are you alone herein but there be some Noble Christian Authors that are of your disposition who say that they could find in their hearts to inveigh against the cruel bloudy and nasty sacrifices of the Jews had they not served as Types of the great Oblation for Mankind nor is your charitable large Love towards all those that bear God Almighties Image to be blam'd being well interpreted specially towards Christians considering that they have the Decalog wherein there are omnia facienda all things to be done and the Dominical Prayer wherein there are omnia petenda all things to be asked for and lastly the Creed wherein there are omnia credenda all things to be believed though the Roman Church be accus'd to mutilat one of them 'T is true there have been Haeretiques and Hetroclits in Divinitie from all times specially in this doting age and not only in Divinitie but also in Philosophy and Policy The Church of Christ like Saint Peters bark must expect in this troublesom World to be toss'd with cross winds and somtimes with tempests which proceed from the light and airy opinions of human brains and while they think to make the said bark tite and stop the leaks they make more holes in her Others going about to exalt the Church do raise her upon the Devils back And the worst is that Peeple fall out about meer nicities and extern indifferent forms for though they agree in the fundamentals and doctrin yet they come to exercise mortal hatred one to the other but it hath been so from the beginning what a huge clash did one little Vowel made in a great general Councel whether {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} or {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} was more Orthodoxal and what a huge gulph of separation is made now among Christians whether in the holy Eucharist we take panem Domini or panem Dominum There may be garments of divers fashions made of one stuff the same faith may admit of divers rites And indeed it is very observable how the Genius of a Nation may be discovered by their outward exercise and forms of Religion The Romans who had large souls did always delight in magnificence and Pomp in stately Fabriques in rich ornaments in exquisit Music in curious sculptures and Paintings in solemnities and stately Processions all these the Italians who are extracted of the Romans as also divers Families in Spain and France do exercise in the practice of their Religion thinking nothing too costly and precious for their Churches and that it concerns all Arts to contribut their best and most quintessential Pieces for the beautifying thereof wherein all others who are under the Roman Church do imitat Her But there are other Peeple that have souls of another temper they care not for Exterior shews and appearances of pomp or for feeding the eyes And whereas the other Nations do deck trim up and imbellish Religion with the rarest Ornaments and richest Jewels and furniture they can find to set a good face upon Her whereas they house Her in the stateliest manner they can adorning perfuming and keeping her Temples as neat and decent as possible can be to draw the Peeple to a love and frequentation of them The other sort of Peeple put Her in homely plain attire being loth to spend much money upon her least if devotion shold produce too much welth the daughter wold devour the Mother Touching the charitable conceit you bear towards those sects of Christians which you have nam'd discovers a candid charitable nature in you for though the number of the Elect be few yet to confine them to one clime and coop them up in one corner of the Earth is a presumption Yet every one shold be so confident of his own religiō as to wish that all Mankinde were of the same as He. I like it extremely well that you reserve the best and purest motions of love for your Creator who is the source and wide sea who is the sum and center of all happiness This love you may be well assured will not be lost towards him who taketh delight in nothing more than in the good of his cretures and to see them do well He is always more ready to open than they to knock more ready to hear than they to cry more ready to bestow than they to begg moreover I like well those submissive and decent postures wherein you prostrat your self before him there can be no exces of humility in your comportment that way the inward man is known by the outward carriage and when the members bow without 't is a signe that the heart doth so also within I like it well also that your praises are more frequent than your prayers prayers bend God but prayses bind him prayer concerns our own interest but praise aymes principally at his glory and they who doth truly preform this part of piety may be saied to discharge the duty of an Angell upon earth God who is omniscious knows all our wants before hand and what 's fitting for us therfore to be too importunat and over-tedious in one praier to eflagitat him with reiterations of the same thing discovers a doubting and diffident heart therefore it more becomes a Christian to be more vehement in prayse rather than in prayer the one issuing out of the foggy vapours of sin the other from the pure exhalations of piety and gratitude which sooner ascend to heaven Therefore a Christian should not stand always knocking and begging at the gates of heaven but endeavour to bestow some thing upon his Creator
and there cannot be a better gift than praise with expressions of thankfulness and with admiration of his longanimity and love of his preservation and providence of his power and greatness yet prayer should have a longer preparation than praise in regard by it we make our addresses immediatly to God in the second person and familiarly speaks to him as it were face to face whereas oblations of praise are commonly in the third person Therefore under favour I do not much approve of their custom who before and after meat when their brains are ful of worldly thoughts and tied to civil compliances do rush rashly into a speech with him in the second person having no time for a fitting praemeditation At such times a short ejaculation expressed in the third person though it be only mental if the case requiers may be more acceptable and freer from presumption than a long grace For among those innumerable sins which man is subject unto the sin in prayer though least thought upon is one of the greatest when without trembling precogitations God Almightie is spoken unto and thou'd in the Vocative case Now those Benedictions and strains of prayses which are utterd in the Nominative and other Cases have a larger scope of boldness and a greater latitude of notion they keep at a further distance and consequently require not so much reverence and recollection of the thoughts beforehand but may be extemporal 'T is one thing to say God be praisd another thing to say O God I praise thee the latter requires much more premeditation for one presupposeth he is as it were locally and presentially before him though the first may have as much of the heart be as effectual as the other This makes me to take some paines when I invoke God in the second person by my orison to obstract my self from all commerce with you for the present and elevat my self upon the wings of Faith in the sublimest posture I can towards Heven taking the choicest affections and ideas with me along where I figure to my self a huge mountain of most pure and inexpressible light wherein me thinks I discern a glorious majesty but the more I look upon him the more he dazles mine eyes that I cannot make him a fix'd object or discover any shape in him in regard of the refulgencie of his glory during this action I endeavour to mingle with that light for true love is nothing else but an appetit of Vnion and if I hold my self to be a spark or part of that light from the beginning and to be dart thence into that body of yours and made a soul may be no extravagant speculation Now touching this last Notion and the other concerning extemporall Prayer it is not utter'd to give the least occasion of scandal to any other soul but onely to intimat that there are for Acts of Devotion as well as for all things else fit places and times where there may be a greater opportunitie for one to summon his spirits to marshall his irregular thoughts and raise his affections towards that glorious object to whom Prayer is directed Bodie Dear soul my spirits are raised to an exceeding great height of comfort that in the first part of this last discours you are pleas'd with the method of my Devotions and carriage towards Heaven that I reserve my purest and most intense Affections for my Creator which I shall be most carefull ever to do dum spiritus hos regit artus He being my sole soverain good and truly I must tell you that when by my lubricities as by too free a genius in the fruition of a friend or otherwise I chance to have offended him I can never be friends with my self till I am reconcil'd to him and that I conceive his countenance to be turn'd again towards me yet I had once a long fit of dejection of Spirit that made me break out into these complaints which you may well remember for they were Emanations from you Early and late both night and day By moon-shine and the Sun's bright ray When spangling starrs emboss'd the skie And deck'd the World's vast canopy I sought the Lord of life light But oh my Lord kept out of sight As at all times so every place I made my Church to seek his face In Forrests Chaces Parks and Woods On Mountains Meadowes Fields and Flouds I sought the Lord of life and light But still my Lord kept out of sight On Neptun's back when I could see But few pitch'd planks 'twixt death and mee In freedom in bondage long With grones crys with Pray'r and song I sought the Lord of life light But still my Lord kept out of sight In chamber closet swoln with tears I sent up vowes for my arrears In Chappel Church and Sacrament The soul's Ambrosian nourishment I sought the Lord of life and light But still my Lord kept out of sight What! is mild Heven turn'd to brass That neither sigh nor sob can pass Is all commerce 'twixt earth and sky Cut off from Adam's Progeny That thus the Lord of life light Shold so so long keep out of sight Such Passions did my mind assail Such terrors did my spirits quail When lo a beam of Grace shot out Through the dark clowds of sin and doubt Which did such quickning sparkles dart That pierc'd the Centre of my heart O how my spirits come again How ev'ry cranny of my brain Was fill'd with heat and wonderment With joy and ravishing content When thus the Lord of life light Did re-appeer unto my sight Learn sinners hence 't is ne're too late To knock and cry at Hevens gate That Begger 's bless'd who doth not faint But re-inforceth still his plaint The longer that the Lord doth hide his face More brighter wil be his afterbeams of Grace Thus at last I made mythridat of that Viper which me thought had gnaw'd so long upon my Conscience which prompted me all the while of my dangerous condition and exhibited me my Quietus est at last Soul I like it very well that you make the Conscience your Guide and that you use to listen to his counsell for he is my Dictator may be said to have a coordinat Power with God himself Therefore it is the chiefest part of a wise Christian to take his Conscience for his Admonisher here least he become his Accuser hereafter He is Fraenum and Flagrum he is a bridle before but a Scourge after sin But I hope those turbid intervalls of grief and gripings bettered you afterward for confession and sorrow without amendment as one truely said is like the pumping of a Ship without stopping the leaks It is a pithy and ponderous advice that an ancient Father gives Commissa dole dolenda non committe repent of things committed and commit not things to be repented there is another saying that administreth both comfort and caution that if sins present do not delight thee