Brain and that in these folds Memory and reminiscence is performed Yet here the main Questions concerning Memory remain still unexplained Namely how notwithstanding the continued wasting of the parts of the Brain and the supply of fresh parts in their Room and notwithstanding the confluence of all the vast variety of new Impressions yet the memory of the same things continues so many yeares if there be nothing but a transient Elementary matter to be the subject of these Memories Secondly it neither is nor do I ever expect to see it explained how within those Folds Light or Air or Fire or any Elementary Body should be able to Remember or Recollect when neither Fire nor Air nor Light in any other place ever appear'd to have any Faculties in any particulars like those mention'd Wee believe there is a Soul of Man that goeth upward and the Soul of a beast that goeth downward But let none of our Materialists in Philosophy boast that they have demonstrated how either of these Souls can performe its meanest Operations if to speak in Opposition to the Elements it be not a Quintessence somewhat above these Materiall Natures His enim Naturis I must repeat Ciceroes words Nihil inest quod vim Memoriae Mentis Cogitationis habeat Another of Cicero's arguments is this Quod sapit Other old Arguments for the souls immortality from its simplicity causality of its own motions and longings after eternity divinum est To be wise implieth a high and noble Intellect and is a faculty fit not for a corporeall and Elementary but for an excellent pure and simple essence and if it bee not of an Elementary but of a pure and simple Nature it must consequently be eternall Dubitare non possumus quin nihil sit animis admixtum nihil copulatum nihil duplex quod cum ita sit certe nec secerni nec dividi dec discerpi nec distrahi potest Nec interi re igitur Est enim Interitus quasi discessus secretio direptio earū partiū quae ante interitum junctione aliqua teneban tur Cicero Tusc Quaefi lib. 1. It is not to be doubted saith he that the Soul is an incomplex't Being such a one as is not mixt nor join'd nor doubled in its composure Which being so the parts of it can never be divided or sever'd one from another and consequently it can never dye because Death is but a separation of those parts that before Death were in conjuncture Other Arguments he hath for the Immortality of the Soul as that the Soul is the principle of its own Motion and so moveth it selfe and therefore seeing nothing can be deserted of it selfe the soul can never dye nor cease to move as the Body doth which therefore dyeth because it is deserted of the Principle of its Motion which is the soul That the soul hath native Breathings and longings after Eternity implanted in it And that those Breathings and longings are not in vain since God and Nature made nothing in vain Such are the arguments that were anciently used on this subject And let no Man here object the Operations of beasts For it is demonstrable that they are of a kind vastly inferior to ours and therefore we judge their souls to bee so too And truly many considering Men will rather think the Souls of beasts somewhat above Elementary which we understand not and own with Socrates our imperfect knowledge than that such Operations as are performed by the Minds of Men should be the product of Elementary matter only For surely our modern Materialists who are the Philosophers in Fashion have been so far from shewing how the Operations of the Souls of Men may be performed by such matter that they have not given any sufficient satisfaction how it is possible that by such matter and locall Motion alone the actions of bruit beasts may be elicited But enough hath been said to make it evident beyond all contradiction That the doctrine of the Souls Immortality was not built upon the Daemonology of the Greeks but was received and continued from Reasons drawn from the consideration of its own Nature Motions and Operations And Mr Hobbes should do well to answer those Reasons and to shew the credibility of his own Hypothesis seeing He hath exceeded the Atheisme not only of the ancient hereticks in Philosophy but of all pretenders to it in this last and most Atheisticall Age. For he and those of his Clubbe make the human Soul to be little or Nothing but a Modus Entis at best a kind of Motion of some parts of an Organized Body somewhat like that Harmony of parts to which some compared the soul anciently and stand confuted for their pains by Plato and other Philosophers And as if it had been a small matter to corrupt Philosophy he hath done worse and hath shew'd his endeavor to abuse Divinity also when he levells the sense of Scripture to that of his own Philosophy and when he telleth us that the Soul in our Saviors words doth not signify any such distinct and immortall substance as the erroneous world believes it to bee but only the life that is in his sense the Motion of an organized Body that the Body and Soul when spoken of together signify the Body alive that is the Body in its Organicall Motions But all his Wit and Learning will never be able to draw the holy Scriptures to favor the impious Hypothesis of his Philosophy If there be no such thing as Spirit Mr Hobbes misinterprets the scripture which speaks of the soul as independent from the body or incorporeall substance that may informe us if the Soul so much spoken of be nothing but a Modus Entis the motion or harmony of the Body it was neither safe nor wise nor good advise that our Savior gave his Disciples when he commanded them thus Fear not them that kill the Body but are not able to kill the Soul but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both Body and Soul in Hell For if the Soul were only the Motion or Harmony of the Parts of the Body he that should kill the Body must needs spoil the Harmony or motions of it also and consequently must bee able to destroy the Soul too As he who breaks the Lute must needs spoil all its Musick for ever after It is plain therefore that our Savior speaks of the Soul as of a Being independent from the Body so likewise when his Body was upon the crosse and lay under the cruelty of his deadly Enemies he commended his Soul to God as that which was above their reach The like did his first Martyr St Stephen and all his holy Martyrs and all good Christians ever since have at their Death 's commended their souls to God as that which is distinct and independent from their perishing Bodyes And yet this doctrine concerning the Independence Immateriality and Immortality of the Soul was as I have shewed no peculiar doctrine
Doth not our Savior tell us that not only the fire but every Mans punishment in Hell shall be everlasting punishment even equally everlasting with the life of Glory Mat. 25.46 And it is not only said by our Savior Mark 9.48 that in Hell the worme dyeth not but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their worme the vultur at their liver the pain in relation to the patients shall have no End If the Scripture had thus express't it That the worme of Conscience and fire of Hell should abide for ever the subtlety of the same serpent might have suggested to them as anciently it did to the followers of Origen that the word for ever did sometimes signify a limited Duration but the Text in St Mark is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mark 9.48 Their worme shall not shall never dye their fire shall not be quenched How will they answer these Negatives will they determine the time when that shall cease that our Savior saith shall not at all shall never cease Or will they can they engage to suffer the Remainder of that Torment which they whom they thus beguile must abide even after this their phancied and appointed period Nor is this subtlety that the fire but not the burning of particular sinners shall be eternall a newly devised subtlety but ancient enough to bee opposed by St Augustine who asserteth Neque illud hic dici poterit in quo nonnulli seipsos seducunt ignem aeternum dicentes non ipsam combustionem aeternam per ignem quippe qui eternus erit transituros arbitrantur eos quibus propter fidem mortuam per ignem promittunt salute ut videlicet ipse Ignis aeternus fit combustio verò eorum hos est Operatio ignis in eos non sit aeterna c. lib. de Fide Operibus c. 15. that those deceive themselves who affirme the fire to bee eternall but not the burning of the severall individuall persons cast thereinto This Opinion and the confutation of it those who desire to see may read in the 15th chapter of his excellent Treatise De Fide Operibus Give me leave to speak a few words in answer to their Arguments and I shall Conclude One great argument that they alleadge for their Opinion is this All well appointed punishments say they are Curative in their designe that is they intend some reformation But no eternall punishment can be Curative Therefore the punishment appointed by God cannot be eternal Now whatsoever fault besides there may be in this argument it is certain the Minor is false For even the eternall punishments of Hell have a Curative designe Not to the damned themselves But a Curative design and a Curative effect also to all us that believe this damnation to come How many sinfull wretches being first awakened and affrighted with the thoughts of an eternall punishment hereafter have been straitway converted to the service of that God who is as well able to save as he is to cast Body and Soul into Hell fire But might not these torments say they be more Curative if they were not eternall but so that after a while Men might be released from those chaines and sent up into the world above to declare the horridnesse of those Hellish torments To this our Savior gives them an answer by the mouth of Abraham in that Parable Luke 16. wherein when Dives proposed thus Nay father Abraham but if one went to them from the Dead they will repent Abraham said unto Him If they hear not Moses and the Prophets neither will they be converted though one rose from the Dead Another argument of theirs against the Eternity of Hell torments is That there should allwaies be an Equallity between the Sin and the Punishment And that the pain or smart ought not to be eternally great and long when the pleasure reapt by the transgression hath been but short and transitory But here the very argument is to bee denied I am sure the Fathers anciently denied it Joannes Episc Constantinop in Epistolâ ad Theodorum Monachum We find John Bishop of Constantinople affirming just the contrary Namely that it was Reason the obstinately wicked should suffer eternall pains though the Pleasure of their wickednesse had been but as dreams and shadows and that the punishment of sins should never End though the Pleasure of those sins ended before the sinfull Acts themselves were perfectly compleated Nay they confute this argument themselves by what is laid down in their former For if all punishment must be curative then must the pain of it be not only equall to but greater than there is pleasure in the Offence For if there be present pleasure in Sin who would loose that present pleasure for fear of the future pains of Hell if those pains were not to be greater than this pleasure And it may be question'd Whether lesse than an eternall pain would prove at all curative to the world For if even eternall punishment doth now scarce suffice for this effect then lesse than an eternall punishment would prove too little There is no proportion or Equallity in the value between a Mans life and a mans goods Yet by our Law the Man that robs you of your goods forfeits his own life And there was a necessity of this Law because some men are so addicted to Robbery and stealing that a lesse punishment would be no terror to them And so we may reply that it is reasonable upon that account as well as diverse others that the punishment of Hell should be eternall because a lesse punishment would Scarce suffice to affright wicked men from their sinfull course of life Another Argument they draw from the goodnesse of God and his fatherly affections to his creatures But this argument is like that of Cotta in Cicero Cicero 3. de Nat. Deorum ad finem who urgeth that because God can do all things and that without labor he out of his Majesty and mercy should not have suffered the two Eyes of the sea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basii tract de vera Fide Tom. 2. pag. 588. Carthage and Corinth to be put out But Gods Actions are to be regulated by his own pleasure not by our Phansies St Basil telleth us that even by asscribing all fatherly affections to God we may be guilty of great Ungodlinesse We are to attribute to him infinite Amplitude and liberty as well as infinite Mercy And at last he can say to that infinite Mercy as he doth to the sea Hitherto shalt thou go and no further What saith Zophar to Job If God cut off or shut up or conclude together who shall hinder him Besides so Zophar proceeds and I do not find any Body can answer him God knowes vain Man and hath seen Wickednesse in Him should he not consider it should he not animadvert and punish for it Job 11.7 2 Esdras 4. Surely his Justice and severity ought as well to bee magnified in
his Animadversions upon obstinate Offenders as his Mercy in shewing kindnesse to the humble penitent Another objection they flourish from that Axiom of Epicuâ—us Si gravis brevis If say they the punishment be very great it cannot be very durable Because it is inconceivable how the Soul should suffer great pains and not be disunited from the Body by reason of them But my Brethren we must be so modest as to allow many things to be true which yet are not conceivable by us I speak a bold word All the Philosophy in the world old and new can never declare the manner how our Souls that are immateriall can be pain'd by the diseases of our Materiall Bodies But yet we find they are so How then should it be thought that we should be able to explain the manner how the Souls of wicked men shall be enabled to endure the great and eternall pains of Hell when we cannot explain the manner how we become sensible of any thing we now feel We believe also that the Constitutions both of the damned and of the blessed shall be altered For as St Paul saith we know not what we shall bee and we dare affirme as little concerning the Nature of the damned as of the blessed Secondly neither do we know the Nature of the Infernall fire I am sure it was anciently believed to be so farr from destroying the Body of the tormented as to give a kind of Incorruptibility unto it and if you will be contented with the doctrine of the primitive Church I may God willing shew you hereafter that it was the Opinion of the Fathers in Generall that such shall be the fire of Hell and such the constitutions of the damned that they shall be capable of paines eternall and yet very great some difference in their greatnesse there may be some beaten with more and some with fewer stripes but none in their duration The Soul shall suffer pain it self by the immediate hand of God and shall be tortured also by the harsh and discordant Motions of the tormented Body whereunto it shall be most firmly and therefore in that time and place most unhappily united It shall feel its tenement uneasy noisome tempestuous but shall find no divorce no way of separation Nor shall those pains be slight that shall immediately be inflicted on it by an Allmighty power Zealous in the pursuance of his just Revenge It is true those pains would quickly extinguish the life of the tormented were their constitutions then not to differ from ours now But the ancient catholick Faith is otherwise Namely that the passive faculties of the Devils and Wicked Men shall be susteyned eternally or eternally repaired to make these patients eternally miserable Mr Hobbes indeed supplies them with an argument against this Doctrine from that text in the Revelation Leviathan part 4. Cap. 44. where the punishment of the Wicked in Hell is called a second Death Whence he argueth that the Wicked shall dy or be annihilated under that punishment But I hope Mr Hobbes will allow St John to be a fit interpreter of his own words Surely he calls the eternall torment of the wicked in Hell by the name of the second Death For if you compare Rev. 14.10 and Rev. 21.8 you wil find that there is a Lake of Fire and Brimstone prepared that the Unbelieving and abominable shall bee cast into it that the smoke of their torment shall ascend up for ever and ever and in conclusion that this is the second Death We affirme further to conclude the Objections that whereas the fireing of Sodom and Gomorrha is made by St Jude a Type of the fire of Hell that there is no necessity that the Type should agree in every particular with the thing typified but that St Jude is so to be understood that what the Inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrha suffered for their lusts in one day that in Hell they and such as follow their lew'd Waies must undoubtedly suffer to all Eternity I must conclude and the conclusion of my present Discourse shall bee this That we must all appear before the Judgement seat of Christ 2 Cor. 5.11 and there accordingly as our works have been in the flesh be sentenc'd either to everlasting blessednesse or to this everlasting Misery Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord as St Paul speaks we persuade Men that they would live as men and not as beasts that they would deny Ungodlinesse and worldly lusts Knowing the terror of the Lord we are Ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs steed be ye reconciled unto God Knowing the terrors of the Lord we intreat Men that they would not live unto themselves but unto him that dyed for them and rose again What saith St Paul 1 Cor. 16.11 shall we provoke the Lord to Jealousy are we stronger than He The Judge of Heaven and Earth is a mighty and terrible Judge He spared not his own Son when he found him under the sins of others and will he spare those rebells of his whom he shall surprise Glorying in their sin and shame Are our Muscles Iron or our Membranes brasse Can we break the rod of God or conquer him by suffering all his wrath Can we fly from it or have we my Brethren any Fence against it Whether shall we go from his Spirit or whether shall we flee from his presence If we climb up to Heaven He is there and if we make our Bed in Hell he is there also He is even in Hell to be a consuming fire to the wicked If we say the darknesse shall cover us the darknesse hideth not from him Psalm 139.7 8. What then Can we as the three children did walk in the firie furnace and be untoucht Can we dwell with devouring fire or lye everlastingly in beds of flaming Sulphur and be contented with that condition If we Can neither endure the Wrath of God nor have any defence against it nor can fly from the effects of it there remains only that We use such Caution and live so in these few dayes of our try all here that we may escape that place of torment whereas our Savior hath declared the Worme shall Never dye and the fire Never shall be quenched Oh that there were such a heart in Us that we might fear God and keep his commandments allwaies for then it should be well with us for ever I should now have shewed you that what I have spoken concerning the greatnesse and Eternity of hell torments was the Constant sense of the ancient Catholick Church and comes not from my private interpretation of the holy Scripture But I must leave that argument and the conclusion of this whole discourse untill some other Opportunity Gloria Trinuni Deo SERM. III. PSAL. 34.11 Come ye children and hearken unto me and I will teach You the fear of the Lord. IN my last discourse from this Text I affirmed two
Torments of Hell are infinite and intolerable that the fire is unquenchable and the worme punisheth immortally that the place is darke and horrible V. Basil citat in Epistolâ Justiniani Imper. ad Menciam Archiep. Constantinop apud Binium concil Tom. 4. concil Constantinop 60. the wailings bitter and unpleasant and that these complicated miseries shall have no end In another place in answer to that Text where it is said that some shall be beaten with few stripes He telleth us that those who suffer fewest must suffer at least an eternall punishment they must endure the everlasting biteings of the worme that dyeth not and the everlasting burnings of the fire that never shall be quenched Elsewhere he telleth us that it is the craft of the Devill that persuadeth men the contrary when our Saviors speech is plain That the wicked shall go into everlasting punishment Basil in libro Regularum and the Righteous into life everlasting and that men may as well say that everlasting life in Heaven shall have an End as that there shall be an end to the punishment in Hell seeing they are both by our Savior equally said to be everlasting This is St Basils Doctrine and his advice is as safe and good That while we have Opportunity we would secure our future condition and fly from that eternall punishment whereinto if we are once plung'd by Gods dreadfull sentence we shall never afterwards bee able to escape To day therefore if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts Strive to enter in at the strait Gate for wide is the Gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and as Salomon spake in another case None that go in thither returne again nor take they hold of the paths of life St Ambrose declares as well the greatnesse and extension as the perpetuity of the pains of Hell Ambros De fide resurrectionis that as both body and Soul sin'd So Body and Soul should suffer what the Soul imagined and contrived the Body put into Act the law of the flesh wrought upon the law of the mind and therefore it was reason that no part should have any rest but that as all parts and faculties sin'd so all should suffer together This is answerable to what is spoken by our modern Divines and by some Jewish Rabbins also That the Wages of sin in Hell should be commensurable to the Body of sin on Earth We know it is the nature of Evill to spread like Venome over every part and faculty of Man when once it hath gotten an Empire or Dominion in him And so it is the will of God that Punishment in the time of its Reign that is in Hell should spread also and that every faculty that hath been the seat of sin should be made the seat of torment Did Lust enter at the Eye from corporeall Beauties In Hell Horror shall more abundantly enter there from Ghastly sights Did the Ear delight in Vanity and let in laughter when Religion was abused or the holy Scriptures jested upon and turned into Burlesque Now let the same profane ear take its farewell of its ancient pleasures and content it self if it can with the variety of Noises that shall be found in the howlings and drummings of Tophet Was Dives his tongue curious in tasting its delicate meats now it shall be parch'd with a continued infernall Feaver and be denied the cheap refreshment of a drop of Water from Lazarus his finger And that grosse sense of touching which is the bed of the fowlest Sin shall be laid not to repose but to be eternally disquieted in a Bed of flame After a like manner shall all the internall senses that have been the servants of sin bee entertained in punishment And the faculties of the soul that have been debauch't to wickednesse shall be distracted with greater torments than all these Some Jewish Doctors are of Opinion that the Souls of the damned shall be violently rap't upwards and downwards by most painfull and contrariant Motions that they shall endeavor upwards in order to associate themselves to the purer Spirits Vide Pocockii notas Miscell in Portam Mosis Maim c. 6. but having no principles nor skill to attain that purity nor use in it shall by the power of their old use and custome with ineffable torments be hurried downwards They shall be continually toss't from one desire to another and yet shall have no waies or means to attain either the new spirituall delights or the old earthy pleasures And these they affirme are greater than any torments of fire or Ice of Knives or Swords of Serpents or Scorpions and that their Minds shall be so distracted by these Opposite desires that their pain shall bee thence as great as if two Angels stood one on the north Pole and another of the South and did thence continually from severall slings Vide Pocock autores ib. p. 170. sling these miserably tormented Souls from one End of the world unto the other without giving them any intermediate Quiet And for the continuance of this Torment St Ambrose affirmeth also Ambros lib. De Fide Resurrect that the sinner in Hell shall be preserv'd for punishment as the just is perpetuated for Glory and that there shall be no more decay in the worme of the wicked than in the glorified Bodies of the Just Ambros in 1. Cor. c. 3. tom 5. and he expresseth the perpetuity of that Torment in another place to the full when he telleth us that the wicked and perfidious or Apostate Christians igne aeterno in perpetuum torquebuntur they shall be tormented for ever in an eternall fire So that it is not the fire only as our Patrons of Vice would have it but the torment in that fire that shall be eternall also Lactantius asserts the extension of the pains of Hell not only over the Soul but over their Bodies also Lactantius de divino praemio lib. 7. c. 21. which saith he shall be indissoluble and eternally permanent that they may hold out against the torments of everlasting fire That the Fire shall be pure and fluid rather like that of melted metals and minerals and consistent with that blacknesse of darknesse mention'd by St Jude than like our Culinary fire or any other luminous flame That it shall endure of it self and preserve it self without aliment And not only so but that it shall even restore what it consumes Idem divinus ignis saith he unâ eademque potentia cremabit impios recreabit The same fire of God shall by the same faculty and power burn the wicked and recruit them Et quantum a corporibus abjumit tantum reponet sibiipsi eternum pabulum subministrabit It shall restore so much of the Body as it consumes and so furnish it self with an eternall fuell He doth not only say that the passive faculties of the damned shall be strengthned and made hard as an Anvil
filial fear is the End and perfection of it It is the Disposition of an adeptus of one that hath allready attained to the greatest Wisdome St Basil in his exposition of this 34th Psalme undertaketh to tell us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil in Psal 33. al. 34. which of all these fears it is that the Psalmist desired to teach his children and he declareth in plain termes that the spirituall Scholemaster meant it of the fear of Gods wrath and punishment in Hell He meant it even of that which the Scholemen call Slavish fear He would have his Scholars when they were tempted to any Sin to have recourse to this fear as to an Antidote He would have them fear the last and terrible judgement He would have them fear the tormenting Devils executioners of the Wrath of the Almighty Judge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He would have them fear that lowermost Hell that labyrinth of Darknesse out of which there was no passage that burning allwaies but never shining fire And he proposeth that not only young beginners and Novices in Christianity but that grown and well instructed Christians should use this fear to restrain their sinfull lusts Their Great proficient David would by no means be without his part of this Religious Discipline The same Father tells us that this was his prayer Psal 119.120 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Nayl down Lord and crucify my flesh through thy fear We read that Text otherwise but suppose that St Basil St Augustin St Ambrose Theodotion and the LXX had some reason for it else they had not rendred it so The Scholes and their great Master Aquinas Aquin. 22. q. 19. art 4. Art 6 7. Doctores in S. Tho. ibid. though they have nicely distinguish't the fear of God into servile and filial initiall and perfect yet give very good Characters of that fear which they call initiall and slavish concluding that it is good that it is consistent which the love of God that it is a principle disposing us to Wisdome that it is a gift of the holy Ghost and a Remedy against Sin Parisiensis observes Cum diligentiorem considerationem de timore seceris inâ—enies eum evidenter supra omnia alia dona deprimintem cor humanum subiicientem ei quem timet Parisiensis 1. Part de Universo p. 3. c. 4. Magna est vis Conscientiae quòd poenas semper ante oculos versari putent qui peccaverint Cicero Orat. pro Milone Qui opibus hominum sibi contra conscientiam septi muniti esse videntur Deos tamen horrent c. apud Cic. de Fin. 1. that this fear doth soften and humble the heart of man and subjects him to the Obedience of God more than any other gift It is this fear that in Naturall Conscience is powerfull to restrain Men from sinning Great saith Cicero is the power of Conscience because they that Sin have the Idea of Punishment allwaies before their Eyes And though as he saith in another place some men by their power and popularity may seem to have a fence against their Consciences Yet no wicked Man was ever so mighty Luke 12.5 as to be able to deliver himself from the dread of the Wrath of God And therefore it was not without Reason that our Savior himself adviseth to this fear also even to fear God who after he hath killed hath power to cast both Soul and Body into Hellfire And truly the last Judgement of God and that eternall punishment which he hath prepared for Wicked men deservedly entertains the apprehensions and feares of the wisest and soberest Man that lives This was an ancient fear among both Jews and Gentiles though there were some to use St Pauls phrase both of the Circumcision and of the Uncircumcision that were of the Sadducean principles Epicurus it seems and his followers were grieved at the communesse of this fear Lucret. lib. and therefore complain by their Poet Lucretius that Nothing could prevail against Religion Aeternas quoniam poenas in morte timendum Because Men were so apt to be carried away V. S. Paulinum pag. 5â—0 with the fear of eternall punishment after Death The thing that ruined the power of that Tradition of Hell among the Gentiles was the fabulous interposition of the Poets and their corrupting the Truth of God by adding stories of Styx and Acharon Cerberus and the Furies which look't indeed but like Poeticall Bugbears of these it is that Cicero speaks Quis tam excors ut ista moveant Who so void of reason as to be moved by them But I shall shew you that our Religion doth not advise us to fear that which is only an empty Shadow For as in my last discourse I declar'd unto you against the Atheists that there is a God So now against our Socinians and Atheists in divines cloathing I shall make it as evident that there is a Hell or a state of great and of eternall punishment prepared for the Devills and wicked Men. First this was an old Testament Truth For the proof of it I shall now produce but what I find in the single Prophet Esay He affirmes c. 30. 33. That there is a Tophet prepared of old for the King I adde and for the Subjects too For the Priests and for the people a place of howling and torment is prepared God hath made it deep and large the pyle thereof is fire and much wood and the Spirit or breath of the Lord like a stream of Brimstone doth kindle it A dreadfull fire and horrid shall be the punishment by it when the Revenging breath or Spirit of God kindles and continues that fire Then for the eternall continuation of that torment he testifieth in the End of his Prophesy That such as obey not God shall be an abhorring to all flesh and shall be tormented with that worme that dyeth not and with the fire that never shall be quenched Isaiah 66. ult For the Testimonies of the New Testament we shall produce but what we find in St Matthew He in his 13th chapter v. 41. and sequ reports it from our Saviors own mouth that in the End of the word the Son of Man shall send forth his Angells and shall gather all them that do iniquity and shall cast them into a furnace of fire where there shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth These expressions signify the greatnesse of their punishment And for their Eternity he reports in another place from our Savior Math. 25. v. ult that the wicked shall go into everlasting punishment and the righteous into life everlasting Which the Fathers thus expound that the life of Glory in Heaven shall not be more everlasting than the punishment of the wicked in Hell shall bee Nay Grotius who of all Interpreters is most narrow and scanty in the Exposition of those phrases wherein the torments of Hell are thought to be signified yet alloweth that these Texts are truly meant
this world you will easily beleive that it is free from the pains of the other world also Heaven were not Heaven if there could be any danger of the second Death or if the pains of Hell might interrupt the delights and Gloryes of the Blessed there The prophet Esay telleth us indeed that there is a Tophet prepared of Old Esay 30.33 and our Savior that there is an everlasting fire prepared for the Divell and his Angels Math. 25.41 a Torment that as St John speaks shall neither have End nor Intermission Rev. 14.11 The smoke of their Torment saith he shall ascend up for ever and ever and they shall have no Rest day nor night The Eternity of this Torment is sufficiently asserted and proved by the Fathers in Opposition to the Heresy of Origen which same proofs may serve to convince all Hereticks and Men of loose principles that now endeavor to Renew the same pernicious doctrine I gave you a particular of them with Answers to the matters objected in another Discourse when I commended unto you the fear and dread of God even of that God who as our Savior declareth is able to cast both Soul and Body into Hell fire And I shall not repeat now what I delivered then It then being granted that the condition of the second Death and the pains of Hell therein are very dreadfull it will be a doctrine worthy of our acceptance that those who are accounted worthy to wear the livery of Christ and to be Citizens of the Heavenly Jerusalem shall have security from those pains also David speaks it as well of Himself as of Christ Thou shalt not leave my Soul in Hell For the Souls of the Just are all in the hand of God and no Torment shall touch them Wisd 3.1 The Plagues of Egypt shall not bee seen in Goshen Our Savior who knowes it best hath described unto us the management of that whole affaire and the different portions of the good and the bad Math. 25.30 When saith he the son of Man shall come in his glory and all his Angels with Him All Nations shall be gathered before his Throne and He shall separate the good from the bad as a shepheard separates his sheep from the Goates The good he shall blesse and receive into his own kingdome but unto the wicked shall this sentence be Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Divell and his Angels so these shall go into everlasting punishment and the Righteous into life everlasting Give me leave to adde one Observation more It is this That though the damned shall have a sight of Heaven and of the state of Glory yet that sight shall be so far from being any comfort or refreshment to them that it shall greatly augment their torment For that sight shall Cause envy and we know that Envy naturally causeth greif There shall be as our blessed redeemer testifieth weeping and gnashing of Teeth when they shall see Abraham and Isaak and Jacob in the kingdome of God and themselves thrust out This very Circumstance of their seeing Abraham and Isaak and Jacob and the whole company of the professors of Religion men whom they formerly contemned and despised in the possession of that Glorious Happinesse and themselves with all their wisdome and Policy thrust out and excluded this uncomfortable Contemplation shall cause no small accession to their torment Secondly though the blessed have seen sorrow for the time past and shall then see the horror of Hell before their eyes Yet both the Remembrance of the one and the sight of the other shall be so far from causing greif and sadnesse in them that these Contemplations shall greatly augment their Joy Suave mari magno turbantibus aequora Nautis E Terrâ alterius magnum spectare laborem Non quia Vexari quenquam est jucunda voluptas Sed quibus ipse malis careas quia cernere suave est It is a delight saith Lucretius for one that hath escaped to the shore to look back upon the Tempest and to see it break the masts and tear the Sails and create trouble to the mariners who are yet toss't like a Tennis on the waves Not that it is a pleasure for one man to see another toyld but a joy to stand in security and to view so great a danger that He himself in his own particular hath so neerly escaped So likewise the Blessed in Heaven when they are secured in their own particulars then shall they with pleasure remember all the troubles and greifs that they have waded through in the life past and with pleasure look upon the pains of Hell which they see other plunged into but themselves have by the Mercy of God so strangely escaped and thence even from this consideration shall they take Occasion to sing praises to Him who hath placed them in a blessed estate not obnoxious to any of their former greifs and hath also redeemed them from the dreadfull Region of darknesse and brought them to his own marvellous light And now the summe of what I have discours'd is this That there is nothing more desireable to mankind in generall than joy or Happinesse That the greater joy is by all wise men to be prefer'd before the lesse That to the greatest possible joy besides other requisites the absence of all greif is required That the estate of Glory hath this requisite First it is free from all those cares and greifs and pains to which we are here obnoxious by reason of our Bodies For the proof of which I shewed you in particular That though the usuall cares and pains to which we are here obnoxious by reason of our mortality are of Use and necessity in this present world Yet they have no Use nor place nor possibility in the state of Glory Then I shewd you that there shall be none of those pains in Heaven that are purely mentall and last of all That though after this life there is a Tophet of everlasting punishment prepar'd yet that the pains thereof shall not touch the blessed but that the contemplation of them shall even augment their Joy All this have I done to prove that the first condition namely Indolence or security from greifs is one part of the portion of Religious and good men in Heaven But this is but the Negative part but the removing of the Rubbish that there may be a good foundation laid for the superstructure of Happinesse When I shall draw the next Curtain I shall shew You that I may further provoke You to the practice of a Religious and Vertuous life The Glory of the Mansion it self the joy of Heaven the fullnesse of that joy the pleasures of that state even those pleasures that the Psalmist affirmes shall last for evermore Now let the great God of his infinite mercy pardon our sins and purify our hearts and make us first as desirous of his Rewards in Heaven as they are worthy of our Desire then let Him
that the souls of Men were substances distinct from their Bodies and therefore that when the Body is dead the Soul of every Man whether godly or wicked must subsist somewhere by vertue of its own Nature But it is as untrue that the same Author in the same place affirmeth That this doctrine concerning the Immortality of the Soul was an error that sprang from the Demonology of the Greeks For in truth these doctrines were so distinct and independent one upon another The doctrine of the Souls immortality sprang not from the Demonologie of the Greekss that the greatest deriders of the Greek Demonology were the greatest and most cordiall assertors of the Immortality of the Soul Such was the famous Socrates in particular whose principall Accusation was That He made himself and his Scholars sport by deriding the Gods worshipp't in Greece And this his crime was publickly presented upon the stage so as to make Him odious to the People by Aristophanes in his Witty comedy that he calls his Clouds And yet this Socrates who laught at their Demonology so much had the doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul so fix't and rivetted in him that as all History concerning Him consents V. Platonis Phaed. Cicer. 1 Tusc Quaest Xenophontem c. the confidence of it made Him slight his present life and the favor of his Tyrant judges and chuse to dy that he might bee possess 't of that Immortality And that this generall doctrine concerning the Immortality of the Soul was founded not upon their Demonology but upon good Arguments taken from the Nature and Operations of the Soul it self may bee seen in Plato's Phaedrus and his Phaedo and in Plotinus and in Cicero and other Philosophers And to put this out of doubt I shall give you a Tast of their arguments out of Cicero The ancient arguments for its immortality out of Cicero which for the Reputation of ancient learning let me speak it I think are strong enough to break the Opposition of our modern Wits and in particular to withstand the force of the great Leviathan Animorum Cicero in Tusc Quaest lib. 1. saith he nulla in terris Origo inveniri potest Nihil enim in animis mixtum aut ex terrâ natum atque fixum esse videatur Flabile aut igneum male vulgò leg stabile aut igneum nihil aut humidum aut flabile aut igneum His Conclusion is this that the Soul hath not its Originall from any of the Elements nor from the Fire nor from the Air that is flabile and Spirituous nor from the moist Water nor from the fixt Earth nor from a mixture of all these His enim Naturis nihil inest quod Vim Memoriae mentis cogitationis habeat There is nothing in any of these Elements that is capable of doing those things that are ordinarily performed by the memory the understanding and thoughts of Men. We will pursue the first Instance of his concerning Memory Let therefore Mr Hobbes or any other of our new Wits shew how an Elementary Body or any part of it that is in perpetuall Flux should retain the memory of things done long since it may be sixty or seventy yeares ago A River that is allwaies running may as well keep an Impression figured upon the surface of the Water by a seal as the Body of Man that never continues the same for one day can retain those infinite impressions that every Man remembers without alteration or difference when this Body and all its Elementary parts wherein these memoires are supposed to inhere is in so perpetuall a Flux that they never are the same entirely for the least time that is considerable All our modern Men and virtuoso's grant this transient Nature of the Elementary parts of the Body and that what thus dayly and hourly perisheth is dayly and hourly supplied with fresh Nourishment Seeing therefore the Elementary parts of our Bodies are allwaies flying of and never continue fixt our ancient men of learning such as Pythagoras Heraclitus Socrates and Plato and Cicero and the Arabique and other Philosophers after them argued See the arguments of Avicen and Ibnalcatib in Raymundi Martini Pug. Fidei p. 1. c. 4. that not the fluxile part of this transient Body but an Independent and Immateriall soul must be the subject of Human Memory For Memory or any other Faculty Action or other Accident cannot be supposed to inhere in a subject that ceaseth to bee or to endure long when the parts of the Body supposed to bee its subject are of very short continuance And if the Acts of memory which is Tullye's first instance cannot be performed by Elementary Bodies alone 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vide Plotin Ennead 4. l. 7. c. 6. imointeger lib. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 much lesse can those curious and intricate Acts of Reason and discourse by which a man not only remembers single propositions but corrects Notions and deriveth arguments and therefore Cicero concludeth as the learned did before and the learned have done ever since that there is an extraordinary singular and divine being within us somewhat above our commun and Elementary Natures that is able to performe these Acts. And surely all the Industry and Endeavors of our modern Philosophers to explain or prove the contrary are utterly in vain The explication of those that make Souls corporeall impersect Great is the power of wit and learning but weigh their Wit and learning in the Balance and in this attempt all their wit and learning will be found defective For suppose we grant to comply with the latest and best of them that there are all those chambers in the Brain that he there most ingeniously delineateth Glaze those chambers with all variety of Dioptrick Glasses that shall bee usefull to the Operations designed Let the Nerves serve as so many Tubes to carry in the Images of all sensible Objects Let those images passe through the Corpus striatum and let that whatsoever be objected concerning its incapacity to that purpose serve insteed of an Objective Glasse Finally through that objective Glasse let all the Images conveied and represented be laid down upon the Corpus callosum as upon a white Table Here is you see a great deal supposed and if we could have any competent evidence all this were true yet we were not much the neerer For the main questions concerning the manner of sensation Phancy and memory do still remain unexplained For it is still unresolved how Light or Fire or Air or any Elementary Body which appear to us in all other cases to be dead and insensible Beings can within the Brain be so much advanced as to be quite other things and execute such high and noble Offices of sensation conception and giving judgment concerning those Representations And suppose further we grant that the figures represented upon the Corpus Callosum may by some secret undulations be cast into the folds of the