and is kind unto the unthankful and the Evil he counsels us to imitate God Who tho' Men be Enemies to him does nothing to them but what may be an Argument to make them his Friends Is Hatred an uneasie Passion Let us love all Men and be at ease Would we have Friends Is it better to have many than few Operative Love reconciles Enemies and heaps Coals of Fire upon their Heads not to burn them but to melt them down into streams of Love We cannot well love our Enemies as such with a Love of Complacency but the working Love of Benevolence if we are good does as much as may be to make our Enemies such as God and we would have them when Hatred does but increase and continue Hatred The Goodness of God leads us inimical Sinners to Repentance and this God-like Behaviour in us is the greatest means we can possibly use and is often found effectual to turn the Arrows of Enmity against us into Beams of Love This reconciling Message of Heaven sent by Jesus Christ to rebellious Mortals the Enemies of God and one another is not without good reason call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Good Speech or Gospel teaching Love and Friendship as the Soul of all Duty and Essence of Happiness This Gospel is not improperly also call'd the Better Testament in comparison with the Old Dispensation of Carnal and Troublesome Ordinances which God suffered the Hebrews as well as other Nations for a long time to labour under This Gospel Dispensation if Men would live to the Purity of it being most easie reasonable and alike suitable to all Men being but compleat or very little more than Exact Morality is that which would rectifie all the Disorders of Mankind that can be amended in this Mortal State Secondly As Christ taught the most plain and reasonable Doctrine so he gave the height of Argument to perswade it such as could be most prevalent on Rational Creatures to gain their Compliance with the Mind and Will of their Maker He has not only convinceingly asserted and proved himself sent of God a mighty Argument to procure the reception of his Message by very many Miracles done by his Means but manifested the things themselves delivered to be God's Message by their Excellency as most becoming God to dictate and most fit for Man to receive If the highest reason be enough to perswade the Will of Man he hath given it I challenge all the most Zealous Jew or Reasoning Deist to shew me one thing that Christ hath indeed taught or his Disciples at his Command which cannot be most rationally accounted for or where he hath imposed upon the Understanding of Man or obliged him to believe or profess any thing that is contradictory or unintelligible or commanded him to do any unreasonable thing or what is against his real Interest Let them shew me that Judaism or Deism is more reasonable and he that can may have great hopes of making me a Proselyte till that is done which I am confident will never be I am resolved to remain a Christian or a Disciple of him who hath given the most fair Copy of Truth relating to God and his Will to Man and relating to Mens present and future Condition wherein I can see no difficulty to any that fairly reasons and looks upon Christianity as it is in it self and not as corrupted and misrepresented by the Fancies and Traditions of Men in the Antichristian Defection Moreover What Christ hath most clearly declared in way of Precept he hath back'd and confirm'd by his Influencing Example his Life being most exactly conformable to his Doctrine in entire Submission and Conformity to the Will of God and constant perseverance therein against the greatest Temptations Earth and Hell could offer thereby asserting by a Home Argument that the doing the Will of God is eligible yea best tho' we should thereby loose all the good things of this life we can loose with Life it self in the grounded hopes of a future State free from all the Evils of Temptation Sin and Unhappiness Which Future State he hath so plainly taught and manifested that by him it may be well said Life and Immortality was brought to light the Immortality of the Soul and a Future Life of Body and Soul together after a Resurrection being Truths left unto him clearly to teach 38. That Christ might thus become a most fit Means or Mediator between God and sinful Men to bring them from Rebellion against God's Will to Obedience to the Will of their Maker it is to be considered what manner of Person Christ must be And first it was necessary that he should be a Man that his Conversation with Men might be most near familiar and unquestionably real A Man like unto us in all things Sin only excepted than which there cannot be conceived a more proper Medium between God and Sinners Nothing can possibly be supposed between God and the Creature There can be no Third or Middle Being that is neither God nor Creature to be a Mediator and God cannot be a Mediator himself because he is one of the Extreams Tho' God is the First Cause or Mover of Man to Repentance he cannot be said to be a Means or Instrumental Cause nor can there be any to use him or send him no nor can he be said to send himself or any one of his Attributes or Properties Nothing of God can in any proper sense be said to be absent from God and between God and Sinners A King may declare his own Will but he cannot be said to send himself on an Embassy A Sinner could not be a compleat Mediator for Sinners are the other extream Repenting Sinners may indeed be a sort of Mediators between God and the Impenitent and have been so as Moses was and others but they are incompleat ones they were but the Servants sent If God would give a compleat Mediator or Embassadour to the World of Sinners he must give such a one as his Son Christ was who tho' he might yea must be a Man like us in all things else Sin must be excepted If he were not a Man truly truly innocent a Second Adam he could not be an exact and perfect Example nor a most unquestionable Witness nor have shew'd that Man might have done his Duty But he must be capable of being tempted to disobey or he could not have been an Example of resisting and obeying None but he that might possibly disobey could yield free Obedience such as is worthy of God's Acceptance God himself who is incapable of being tempted to Sin or of Disobedience cannot be said to obey nor is there any above him to whom he can be obliged If Christ must be innocent and persisting in Obedience he must not be of the common race of Mankind that is take both his Body and Soul mediately from sinful Parents as others do but must as to his Soul the Subject of Sin or Obedience be an
or of the Mother in Conception It is by Virtue of the Word of God Increase and Multiply that there is any Generation at all and why may not the same Word give a power to the Soul to beget a Soul as well as to the Body to beget a Body The Word is spoken to Man as a Compound of Body and Soul and neither part is excepted Isaac was a compleat Man consisting of Body and Soul if Abraham begat only Isaac's Body he did not truely beget Isaac But you will say perhaps the Body is divisible and part of it may be separated and become another Body but the Soul does not consist of parts and so cannot be thought capable of producing another Soul I answer This is no difficulty for the Soul to be begotten does not consist of Parts has no Quantity or Bulk and so needs not a Bulky thing to spare a part to make it of Why may not the Soul the Immaterial and more Noble Part of Man by the Will of God be as capable of begetting a Soul as the Body the Bulky and more ignoble is for the Production of a Body Why must the Soul be thought capable of less in its kind than the Body in its kind Why may not Cogitation break forth into new Heads of Cogitation as well as Body sprout out into new Organical Bodies tho' we may be ignorant of the precise Manner of both But there is a second Opinion which possibly may be true whether the Soul be propgated or no and that is That every Son and Daughter of Adam is tempted and falls as soon as they are capable of choosing Good or Evil tho' not as their first Father with a forbidden Apple yet with many other forbidden things tho' how soon or precisely when they thus fall is uncertain That Children are for some time Innocent seems to some very probable not only because the Scripture in divers places speaks of them as not having done Good or Evil not knowing the right hand from the left not knowing to choose the Good and refuse the Evil not to have sinn'd after the Similitude of Adam 's Transgression c. but because it is not reasonable that Sin should be reckon'd where there is no Law and there can be no Law where there can be no Knowledge of a Law Had God not told Adam himself he should not eat of the Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge he could not have transgress'd in so doing And that all transgress and become Sinners is no wonder if Adam a Man in his perfect use of Reason having but one thing forbidden and but one immediate Tempter was so soon tempted and fell much more liable are they to fall who have not such a Capacity of discerning have many things forbidden many Tempters within and without yea and many Examples of Transgression the strongest Temptation and are thereby inured to those Actions before they can judge of them which when they are capable of knowing what they do become Sins and tho' they come to know such Actions are sinful Custom is as it were natural and not presently changed Moreover Children are not only tempted and taught to sin by Example but even by Precept from Parents from Nurses from Servants from Play-fellows c. to be Proud to Revenge to Lye to Covet to Steal c. so wretched a World is every Mother's Child brought forth into that there are none but the Son of the Blessed Virgin who was not only begotten by the special Operation of the Most High but was strong in Spirit and filled with Wisdom by the special Grace of God from his very Infancy I say there are none but he who have not fallen by divers Temptations Yea we are often falling even after Repentance and have every day need to renew our Repentance and come to the Throne of Grace for the Pardon of our Sins Now if every Man's Sin is his own and not anothers and no Man can justly suffer for anothers Sin much less can the Sins of Fallen Men be truely imputed or reckon'd to Jesus Christ As Christ is not really guilty of the Commission of any Sin or the Cause of any Man's Sins so it is impossible God should think he is or reckon him guilty Neither the Will of God nor of Christ can be in such an Untruth and Injustice Neither God nor Christ nor any but Sinners can charge Sin upon the Innocent or punish him for it Tho' Christ be said to bear the Sins of the Sinful it is not the Guilt of them because he is not guilty and God can't reckon him so nor the Punishment of them justly or from God but it is either meant he bears them away that is saves them from them by being an Effectual Means of bringing them to Obedience or that he with Patience and Compassion suffer'd under their sinful Actions and Miseries bore their Affronts Injuries Mockings Scourgings condemning and crucifying of him and was grieved at their Unhappiness in so doing Neither is Christ's Righteousness or any ones else truely imputed or reckon'd to others God cannot reckon or think Christ's being obedient is my obeying because it is not so or reckon any Man obedient till he is so because Christ is obedient If he could he would reckon amiss I cannot but admire at many who reckon themselves special Christians how they dare affirm that God reckons us guilty of Adam's Sin or Christ guilty of ours and punishes the one for the other notwithstanding God has declared the contrary saying The Father shall not bear the Iniquity of the Children nor the Children of the Father and that he will not clear the Guilty nor condemn the Innocent I believe the blind fancy of our Sins being imputed to and punish'd in Christ and Christ's Righteousness being transferred on us has been a means of transferring Righteousness and consequently Salvation from many a Soul 46. Another Fancy common among us and near of kin to this is That we are to be saved by the Merits of Christ and that he meriteth of God Life and Salvation for us c. The notion of Merit is this The Person meriting does something or other more than his Duty whereby he obligeth the Person he merits of to something or other as due and the Meritor so deserves that he ceaseth to be beholden for what is become by his Action due to him but it is a Debt that cannot be withholden without Injustice in the Person he merits of Now that it is a groundless Fancy that God should become indebted to Christ or to us for any thing Christ hath done or suffered will appear if we consider that it is impossible for any Creature to merit any thing of God for it self and if not for it self much less for another It cannot merit for it self because all that the Creature has or is except Sin it has from God and all the Acts of Obedience it can do are naturally due to God God can receive
the Same Power that caused the Creature to be and continueth its Being can be suppos'd a reason of its Cessation We can prove no such Death as an Adnihillation of any thing nor does it appear to any that consider the matter that even any Bodily Creature ceaseth to be But the contrary might be shewn by many Arguments if it were doubted of Even those things which seem to the ignorant and inconsiderate to be most likely to be destroyed such as things that are burnt I can at any time demonstrate even to the eye that none of their parts cease but are only separated or altered The Death of the Body is but some kind of alteration or change of its Modes or Circumstances as a Separation of the parts of its Organical Structure or an Alteration of such and such Motions requisite to continue its Particular Mechanism or Animal Oeconomy The Body remains I mean all the Matter of it after the Division of its parts and it cannot rationally be suppos'd that the Mind the more Substantial and as all are ready to acknowledge the more Noble Part of Man should suffer more alteration by the Dissolution of the Body than the Body it self does The Change the Body undergoes is apparent but what Change you will say may the Mind be reasonnably suppos'd to suffer at its Separation from the Body or whether not enough to be call'd Death Many Treatises have been written and Discourses made to prove the Immortality of the Soul and some for its suppos'd Mortality but the Authors have not been so happy as to agree in the Notion of Life and Death with one another nor all so considerate as to fix any determinate Notion for themselves or to tell their Readers what they mean by its Living or Dying so that it may be true or false for them But I shall here state the question more plainly and tell you first that by the Life of the Soul I mean a Continuation of Thinking or of Understanding and Willing Where there are these Actions and Passions there is enough to be call'd Life and that which better deserves to be named Living than any whatsoever Organization and Motion in Bodies And the plain Question is this Whether upon the Death or Dissolution of the Body Thinking wholly ceaseth A Cessation of some of the Modes of Thinking cannot be enough to be properly call'd the Death of the Soul for so it would not only be always dying but dead as it alters so continually at least every night and day An Alteration of some of the Modes of Thinking may in a figurative and improper Sense be called Death but the Question is not of any such Death It is probable that many if not all those Thoughts and Ideas we have by occasion or on condition of our Body as so and so disposed may cease tho' it cannot easily be thought absolutely necessary for we cannot conceive the Body to be a natural Occasion of any Thoughts but so by the Will of God who if he please we may well think can cause the same Ideas and Thoughts without it tho' it seems not to any purpose or probable that he will For on the other hand it is more likely that God permitted Death for the Cessation of those Thoughts or at least many of them the Body is the occasion of since Man's fall into Sin in Good and Bad For as much as we are tempted to most of our Disorders by occasion of the Body and to gratifie some Sense or other disorderly or besides the Direction and Will of God seems to be the first and most constant Temptation every Man is drawn aside with Now the Good Man or Repenting Sinner through the Goodness of God on this Supposition of such Thoughts ceasing gets this by Death tho' in it self an Evil that he is freed from all the Allurements of this Life occasioned by his use of this Body The undue Gratifications of Sense can now no more perswade him the unprofitable care of avoiding little Bodily Displeasures now takes not up his Thoughts the Difficulties from the Injustice and Cruelty of Sinners press him now no more to act against his Maker's Will but he seems perfectly freed from Temptation having perhaps now no Object of desire present but God and nothing to interpose for his Love as a Rival with his Maker Nothing now seems necessary for him to know but God and himself Nor needs he or values he could he have them any little pleasures in Creatures when he is at God the Fountain and Cause of all On the other side the Evil Man also looses all those Gratifications of Sense he so much affected and erringly counted his chiefest Good and must needs find that he foolishly set his Heart on that which would not make him happy but so soon left him And as his Will is not reconcil'd and subjected to God's but he desires still that which cannot be God cannot so communicate himself to him to make him joyous but he must be subject to all that Anguish that the Reflection on the loss of the Creatures he so much delighted in and that he hath miss'd the Fountain of all Good can cause in him with all the Vexation and Trouble that all the disorderly Thoughts of such a Soul can raise to it self But to come to the point in hand again It cannot well be thought that the Soul or Mind of either Good or Bad should die or Thinking wholly and for ever cease or yet for a time upon the Body's Death because the Continuation of Thinking or Life of the Soul can't rationally be suppos'd to depend on the Body a thing more ignoble than it self being very unlikely to be its cause but upon the Will of God its Author And God cannot well be suppos'd thus to let any of his Creatures cease or disown his Works that are good as the Beings of all things are much less can Minds the Intelligent and Active Beings be thought to be adnihilated or cease Thinking so soon and to no purpose Change they may and do as all Creatures are mutable but what of God would be seen in the Cessation of any especially of Minds who are the only kind of Beings capable of beholding God If the Soul ceaseth to think and so dies more than a figurative Death it ceaseth to be for Thinking and Mind are the same Being which if you will not be perswaded to believe you must at least acknowledge them inseparable For a Mind that does not think or a Thinker that cannot think is a Contradiction and to call that a Power or Agent that can do nothing is absurd for that which can do nothing is no Power or Agent and a Power or Agent that will do nothing is as great a Contradiction for Willing is Doing even Thinking Again Nothing is more strongly implanted I may say concreated in the Mind of Man than a desire to continue and if Being is good the Continuation of Being is good
if the Desire to continue be good God is the Cause and Implanter of such a Desire and consequently wills we should have such a Desire I think none can but desire to continue if it were the Will of God we should cease to be the desire to continue would be a Sin but God can't be suppos'd to will we should desire that which he don't will should be that would be to will us to will contrary to his Will Now whatever God wills to continue cannot be supposed to cease If God wills to manifest himself in and to his Creatures to be loved and feared by them he must continue them for by their Cessation all these things will cease and be impossible Every Good Man that loves God would continue to love him it 's God's Will he should love him Can God be suppos'd to make him cease to love his Maker To what purpose Let it but be granted that it is not God's Will I should cease to love him and the Immortality of my Soul is secured for while I love I live viz. mentally Nor can the Evil Man that don't love God nor fear to act contrary to his Will be suppos'd to be for ever or for a long time exempted from the Evils of his Rebellion against his Maker or rendered by God himself uncapable of all Conviction Or can it be thought probable that God should make Creatures to deny him a little while and then cease under so great a Mistake as never to believe and confess God to be their Sovereign Lord and Sufficient Benefactor But if God approve himself and his own Works he will rather continue them and suffer them to make themselves miserable and find they are not God's than not assert himself God one way or other to all his Intelligent Creatures Besides the Soul either of Good or Bad cannot with any reason be suppos'd to cease for a time and then be again for if it cease to be it is not and nothing can be properly affirm'd or deny'd but of that which is Where there is no Being neither Life nor Death can be asserted So that if a Soul cease to be and a Soul be afterwards it cannot be the same but a new one to whom can be charged no account of the ceased Souls past Actions There must be a Continuation of Being or there can be no Identity or Sameness and the Essentials of the thing must remain or there is not the thing but another If there be not a Continuation of Thinking and Conscience of former Thoughts it cannot be conceived how the Sameness of a Mind can be ascertained and if a Soul in this present State be wicked and cease at the Dissolution of the Body it can neither be just nor good that a new one should be miserable because the ceased Soul was unrighteous nor be determined what new one should be so Nor that a Soul penitent in this World should not it self be happy hereafter but have its hopes of future Happiness utterly frustrated and be put off with the Mock-happiness of being happy in another Soul What Encouragement can I have to my Duty if I suppose I must not continue to the Perfection and Happiness of my Obedience but must perish and only now be contented to think that God will create a Soul hereafter and perhaps give it my Dust to be happy because I only began to be holy Or how shall I be deterr'd from Sin if I am perswaded I my self must be discontinued and that it is not I but another Mind that is in danger of everlasting Vexation it may be with my old Body if I now die impenitent When we say a Man is dead if we talk like Rational Creatures we must have some determinate Sense of those words He is dead Who is dead He. The He or Person must remain What is dead Such a thing A Man The thing or Man is tho'dead A Man is a Compound of Soul and Body Or a Mind doing and suffering with or by occasion of an Organical Body A Man's being dead is the Cessation of this manner of Life not of either of the Components Beings or Essential Properties The Body unacted by the Mind is useless among Men and tends to Corruption or Dissolution of parts so the Living put it out of their sight the Soul or Mind is invisible of its self and can neither converse with Men nor Men with it without the use of Body so when separate it is not to Men yet it no way follows but that it may well be to God and to it self which is Being enough But the Soul consider'd apart can have no Dissolution of parts having none to be separated nor can it die otherwise than in a figurative or Metaphorical Sense As it may be said to be morally dead or dead in Sin when it is impenitent and not conformable to its Duty To be Spiritually dead when it thinks not of or is not busied about Spiritual things To be dead to Sin or dead to this World when its disorderly Thoughts or undue Manners of Thinking on earthly vile sordid things cease It may be said to be dead to Joy or Comfort when it has lost all pleasant Thoughts and has only grievous horrid anxious ones without all hope or rest continually and if such a State always continue whether the Soul be separate from or joyned to a Body it is that which is properly call'd everlasting Death Thus I think it is apparent that the Soul is immortal and that which is its proper or natural Life viz. Thinking does not cease Tho' to suppose the Soul immortal of its own Nature or that it is or has any thing in it self which necessarily infers its Continuance would be as great or a greater Error than to fancy it mortal for that would be to suppose it immortal as its Author is But it cannot be suppos'd thus to be immortal for whatsoever had a Beginning or had not Being always may be supposed to have an End and cease to be Such are all Creatures who would fall into nothing if God should not will their Continuance But that he does will them to continue I think we may be perswaded by the foregoing Considerations 32. Moreover we have not only reason to believe that Souls do continue tho' separate from that is disusing their Bodies and such a Life they lived with them but that they shall have their Bodies again after some time because the end of the Souls having a Body cannot easily be thought to be fully attained in this Life This material World seems to be made chiefly for Man to be concern'd with and the things therein to be Objects of his Knowledge and Subjects of his Actions It is by means of his Body that he is now capable of knowing and acting in Bodily Nature but what he knows and does therein is so imperfect notwithstanding all the Wonders that have come within the reach of his Understanding and great things have
Immediate Work of God as the first Man was Whatever comes immediately out of the hands of the Creator cannot be thought to be other than pure but out of an unclean thing cometh that which is unclean That Christ might be a Second Man in Innocence he must not be begotten by the sinful Will of Man as other Men are Conceptions of Self Will and Erring Understanding so determin'd to Evil rather than to Good that their at first weak Understanding or Reason is not sufficient to counter-ballance the manifold Temptations by occasions of Evil within and without Instructions and Examples to sin they meet with very early from Parents and others whom they little suspect such Enemies to them who use them to those Actions which tho' Ignorance makes innocent Reason when they come to know what they do makes culpable and use determines to But Christ besides his pure Original doubtless had the special Grace of God keeping him from Temptation so long as God saw fit that he might have at least the same advantage of strength of Reason the First Man had who was to undergo far greater Temptations But tho' he might not be a Soul derived from Man's corrupt Soul yet his Body might well be taken from the Matter of Mankind without his being thereby sinful or the more inclinable to sin For the Body is not the Subject of Sin or that which infects the Soul it may be an occasion of Temptation to Sin but Sin entirely resides in the Mind being but a disorderly Act of the Will That a Soul coming pure out of the hands of God should become a Sinner by using a Body taken from a Person that was a Sinner is unreasonable to be thought while Matter has nothing in it but Quantity Figure and Motion which howsoever disposed or modified has nothing of the Notion of Sin in it We might as well suppose a Man must needs become a Thief or a Murderer if he dwell in a House given him by one that was such Christ we all acknowledge received the Body God prepar'd him from the Virgin Mary whom all suppose a Sinner except some of the Roman Church yet we suppose him not made a Sinner thereby It was convenient Christ should receive a Body from Mankind that he might be a Real Man and a near Kinsman or Brother A Rational Soul using an Organical Body such as a Man's is really a Man tho' the Soul do not begin mediately by Generation as much as if it did otherwise the first Rational Creature using an Organical Body would not have been a Man the same in kind as others The First Adam's Soul could come no way but by Inspiration and his Body was a more Immediate or Special Work of God than the Bodies of others his Off-spring therefore he is called the Son of God in a nearer respect than they And that Christ's Soul was produced by the Immediate Power of God and his Body by a Special Work of the Most High he is the more properly said to be the Second Man or Adam God forming a Seed in a Woman a Virgin that we might be sure he was not a common Man when a Woman is naturally or commonly a Creature whose Seed is not in her self originally but in the Man or perhaps to speak more properly that hath no Seed This Seed of the Woman inform'd with this Holy Soul this One Exception from the common Order of the Production of Men is therefore with good reason call'd the Son of God eminently as distinct from others who on any lesser or more common Accounts are said to be his Children And the same reason for Subsistance we have given us in the Gospel Luke 1.31 The Angel said unto Mary thou shalt conceive in thy Womb and bring forth a Son and shalt call his name Jesus Ver. 32. He shall be great and shall be called the Son of the Most High and the Lord God shall give him the Throne of David 〈◊〉 his Father Christ is said to be the Son of Abraham the Son of David only according to the Flesh because Mary from whom he received his Body materially was of the Off-spring of Abraham and David Ver. 34. And Mary said unto the Angel how shall this be seeing I know not a Man V. 35. And the Angel answering said unto her a Holy Spirit shall come upon thee and the Power of the Highest shall over-shadow thee therefore also that holy Thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God And to strengthen the Virgin 's Faith he tells her ver 36. Her Cousin Elizabeth who was old and accounted barren had conceived For v. 37. with God nothing shall be unpossible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every word shall not be unpossible viz. whatever can be said in reason to be a thing to be done shall not be unpossible with God He brings her from the less to the greater he that has caused the Old and Barren to be with Child a thing above the power of Nature can do more even cause thee a Virgin to conceive without the means of a Man Thus Christ that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that holy Soul Spirit or Mind that received his Body from Mary and so became the Compositum call'd a Man was truely call'd the Son of the Most High as God the Father of all was in a special manner his Efficient Cause and the Son of Mary and her Progenitors as she was the Material Cause of what was material in him And least any should think the Holy Ghost the Efficient Cause of Christ's Conception and so rather to be called his Father from whence would arise a great difficulty from those Expressions ver 35. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Math. 1.18 and 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let it be considered that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Spirit is put without the Article and is rather to be rendered a Holy Spirit and of a Holy Spirit then the Holy Spirit A Holy Spirit shall come upon thee or into thee Signifying thereby either that she should have a Holy Disposition in order to the over-shadowing Power of the Highest viz. of the Father coming to effect such a Conception or that she should receive a Holy Conception in her or both So she was found with Child of a Holy Spirit That which is conceived in her is of a Holy Spirit that is she hath a Holy Conception in her was found with Child of a Holy Conception neither a Spurious as Joseph thought nor a Common Conception The Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does not denote the Efficient Cause any more here than it does when spoken of Mary Luk. 1.35 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of thee in thee or by thee and Matth. 1.16 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Mary or in Mary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was born or conceived Jesus not that she was the Cause
loath to repent and try him except she were sure She can't find in her heart to forgive her poor Debters Some-body or other has wrong'd her and she 's resolved to have Satisfaction it is but just So she thinks God must have Satisfaction for her Sins or he can't be just and tho' she has heard a Sin-sweetning-Story that Christ hath made Satisfaction for Sinners she can't believe she is of that number she is not sure she 's one of the small number predestinated Shall I tell her yet more plainly what 's her Disease She loves Sin too much Duty too little her Heart is not inflam'd with Love to God so as to influence all her Actions She has not had him represented to her so Good Merciful Loving Ready to Forgive all freely as indeed he is Besides that Witness for God the Conscience that testifies when Man hath done well or ill is not clear perhaps and according to the measure of Obedience or Disobedience in known Duty will the Comfort or Discomfort generally be to a convicted Soul and faith that there is Forgiveness with God is one Duty without which Comfort is seldom securely enjoy'd Now let us consider has God left or afflicted such Persons No they have left God and hid themselves from him let them but be perswaded to turn to God and believe his Infinite Love and Goodness and love him with all their Hearts and they will quickly find that Perfect Love casts out Fear their Troubles will cease with the restifying their Judgments and changing their Wills Now of all the Miserie 's sinful Creatures are lyable to the Eternal Torments as they are call'd of the Damned in Hell can I think with least reason be thought to come from the hand of the Best Being as the Inflicter or Executioner when these Miseries may well be thought chiefly to consist in the Exasperation and height of those uneasie Thoughts which are the very Acts of Sin as Wrath Envy Hate Despair Desire impossible to be satisfied c. Add unto these their Effects with whatsoever Devils and Immortal wicked Men may be able to inflict upon one another and the most uncharitable Soul can hardly desire a greater Hell for his greatest Enemy But what I have said already of Displeasure merely Mental and that which comes by the means of the Body may be easily applied here if well considered But yet farther methinks it is a very hard Thought to think that God who as the beloved Disciple tells us is Love should hate and take Pleasure or Delight in tormenting his poor foolish frail Creatures or that he should afflict willingly or from his Heart or affect with Grief the Children of Men and that for ever But he must be supposed either to do it willingly and take pleasure in so doing or he cannot properly be said to do it for God cannot with any reason be said to do any thing against his own Will or in which he has not pleasure that cannot be suppos'd of a Perfect or Self sufficient Being nor can any action of the Creature be thought to bring God under a necessity of doing any thing he delights not in and he swears he hath no pleasure in the Death of the Wicked Ezek. 33.11 chap. 18.32 It is the Sinner that will die or chooseth Death he seeks pleasure indeed but he hath it not because he seeks it where it is not to be had viz. in his own foolish disorderly Will distinct from God's Will when God cannot give it him that way it being impossible The Damned doubtless are exceeding uneasie why they have turned from God the Fountain of Pleasure They have lived and died in a course contrary to God's Will contrary to the only possible way of Happiness and God is just in suffering them to have their own choise in leaving them after innumerable Arguments to perswade them to real good to make the Experiment how happy they can be without being beholden to him and it is enough to shew that God approves not of their Sin if he continue their Being his Work under the greatest Misery they can bring themselves into and as they are no more sinful than they themselves and their fellow Sinners can make them so if they have no more Misery than what they can work in themselves and one another it will be proportionable to their Sins and both may be exceeding great God can't be thought to work or cause Despair Wrath Malice Hate and Envy at the greatest Good Extream Discontent at his Will and the Happiness of others fierce furious unsatisfied Desire c. in his Creatures he must not be thought to be the Cause or Agent of those sinful Passions they are all against his Will as he hath clearly manifested And we cannot suppose that God's Justice requires that Sinners for a short life of Rebellion against their Maker in this World should be bound to rebel against him for ever or believe that they can satisfie for some Sins here with a Continuance of all Sins they are capable of in a State of Immortality hereafter No there is no necessity of Unhappiness but what the Sinners own perverse Will brings upon him his disorderly Passions are let loose and to what extremity Passions may be carried out who knows These will be Tormenters if there were no Devils able to vex And where these evil Passions are in their extream how can it be thought that the Bodies such Anxious Souls would delight in can be other than the Occasions of far greater Misery than they were capable of being in this Life wherein some of the Passions disorder'd have brought the Bodies to be very uneasie Concomitants with this Aggravation that they have then no more Death to expect to rid them of that uncomfortable Companion unless we could suppose that Hell it self hath at least this Happiness to be a Remedy for the Diseases of the Body and a Safeguard from all those Evils Sinners could lay upon one another in this life or that their Folly could bring God under a necessity to disown his well-wrought Work their Being and to let them fall into nothing As for the Examples of external Judgments as they are call'd which we have especially in Scripture wherein some may think the immediate Act of God as inflicting is always required when they were more than Preventions of greater Evils the Persons would have run into they may easily be accounted for by supposing Men sometimes left to the power of the Devil the Prince of the power of the Air who seems eagerly covetous to enlarge the Dominion of Hell or to do any kind of Mischief Of this we have an Example in Job Or that God sometimes withdraws his Providential hand from protecting a People or a Person that leaves him and suffers them to fall into the hands of others that are wicked their Enemies As were the Judgments on Israel or others by Inimical Nations in which Instances we can't suppose God does
inspire the evil Agents with malicious Desires of Murders Robberies Rapes c. God may indeed be thought to permit yea commissionate a People to stand up against another in just defence and to cut off the declared and dangerous Enemies of Mankind but such wicked Persons have brought others under a necessity of preserving themselves and them that are better than these wicked ones or of delivering the Unhappy that are in their hands God may likewise leave Persons obnoxious to be surprized by the Elements as by Thunder and Lightning Earthquakes Inundations things not evil in themselves Falls of Houses Infectious Diseases Casual Fires by which wicked Men may suffer yea the Good be translated from this wretched life without any special Act of God But all these things or I think whatever you can name of Evils would be absent were Men but as wise and good as they ought Wisdom would foresee and prevent and Goodness do no ill the Wise and Good would not expose themselves or others to the too strong Motions of Bodily Nature nor want God's special Preservation which the Rebellious have forfeited Were but the Evil of Sin absent from the World I do not see that there would be any other Evil for which Mankind could be thought unhappy or could be unthankful for their Being tho' all things else were just as they are yea were Man to lead his Life on this Earth for ever Had I but this one Point to handle I think I could easily shew how were there not Sin all the Defects in Nature would be remedied To conclude God hath made all things in an excellent Order such as is most conducive to Man's Happiness but if Man foolishly affect to be his own Rule and strive to cross the most wise Order of his Maker it is no wonder that those things God made for his Good and Service are often the Occasions of his Hurt and too hard for him God continues the Natures and Qualities of things and it is not fit he should alter the Creation at the foolish Caprice of every silly Man that Fire may not burn and Water not drown when Sinners please to have them changed but tho' Fire burn and Water drown him that foolishly abuses them yet those noxious Effects cannot properly be looked on as Punishments inflicted by God any more than he that hangs himself can be said to die by the hands of the Executioner And if God cannot be said to give Good to his Creatures as obliged so to do but still gives of Grace how can he be thought to be so bound to give Evil as that he cannot be said merely to permit the Creature to make it self miserable 45. Another Opinion that hath passed long with Credit in the World without any good ground is the Doctrine of Imputation of Sin and Righteousness Adam's Sin say some is imputed to his Off-spring and so they become guilty in the sight of God and are deprived of original Righteousness Let us consider the Plain English of it and it is this God reckons Adam's Children guilty of Adam's Sin They don't mean the same Sin in kind but that God charges them as guilty of their Fathers very Acts of Transgression which is all one as to say that Adam's Act of Sin is his Childrens Act. But this cannot be true for as my Father's Action is not my Action nor my Action my Father's God cannot be deceived and suppose the doing of one Man is the doing of another Men commonly say we sinn'd in Adam but it is absurd to say a Man sinn'd before he had a Being that which is not can have nothing said of it nor can it do till it is We were indeed potentially in Adam but not actually and where there is no actual Being there can be no Action to be guilty of God himself tells us by a Prophet The Father shall not bear the Iniquity of the Son nor the Son the Iniquity of the Father but the Wickedness of the Wicked shall be upon him and the Righteousness of the Righteous shall be upon him and the contrary would be unjust One Man may commit the same Sin another did commit and in that sense be guilty of the other Man's Sin or rather of the same kind of Sin the other did commit Or one Man may tempt another to sin and so be guilty of the others Sin but still a Man's Guilt is his own and not anothers It may with more reason be said that Adam is guilty of our Sins and we of the Sins of our Off-spring than that we are guilty of his or they of ours because sinful Parents are the cause of bringing a sinful Off spring into the World and often their Instructers in Wickedness It is certain that one Man may suffer by the Sins of another but not for the Sins of another justly The Father may waste his Estate and so the Children may be brought to Poverty the Father may teach his Child to do Evil either by Precept or Example and so bring him to Misery As for the Propagation or Original of Sin in Adam's Posterity there are Two Opinions either of them much more likely to be true than the Fancy of Imputation of Sin or God's taking away original Righteousness which is no better than to say my First Father sinn'd and God charges me with it tho' not guilty of it and causes me therefore to want Righteousness or to become a Sinner Taking away ones Righteousness is tempting one to sin The one of the two more probable Opinions is that the Soul as well as the Body is propagated and a sinful Soul is uncapable of begetting a Soul without sinful Inclinations a pure thing being unlikely to come out of an impure Now least it should seem that the Soul is suppos'd propagated without any ground for such an Opinion I say both Scripture and Reason do at least favour it Adam begat a Son in his own likeness and Abraham begat Isaac and Isaac begat Jacob. 'T is not said Adam begat a Body but a Son in his own Likeness if he had begat only a Body he had not begat a Son in his own Likeness Adam was the Image of God as he was an Intelligent Being and a Lord over the inferiour Creatures and if Adam had not begat an Intelligent or Thinking Son he had not indeed begat a Son in his own Likeness It is said of the Regenerate they were not begotten of Bloods nor of the Will of the Flesh nor of the Will of Man which implys that a Natural Man is so begotten as to his Body of Bloods that supplies Matter to the Seed and of the Will of the Flesh that is Carnal Desire instigating its Projection but as to his Soul of the Will of Man desiring to get his like That the Body of a Man proceeds from the Bodies of his Parents none doubts why may not the Soul as well proceed from the Soul of the Father in the Act of Generation
themselves uncapable of Forgiveness and Happiness yet it is commonly blind to see God as he is and is more apt to fly from him than come to him measuring God by its own standard it having been very apt to account it Justice to revenge the crossing its Will on those it was able to affect thinks God like it self not considering that the perfect Good-will of God cannot take Pleasure or Satisfaction in the Miseries of his Creatures tho' they are Enemies much less in their Sin or continuing Enmity the formal Cause of their Unhappiness But tho' Man is so apt to look upon God as an inraged Enemy hardly to be appeas'd severe to reckon with the Sinner resolved that the Sinner shall never be happy unless something can be given him to purchase his favour that he values more than the Sinner's Repentance or new Obedience Yet I say tho' Man is so apt to look upon God as such like himself we must affirm that God is not nor can he properly be said to be an Enemy to Man or any of his Creatures as they are to him and to one another He hates or sets himself against nothing but their Sins their Unhappiness wills nothing but what is for their good nor can he but love whatsoever is his own Work as the Beings of all his Creatures are and their Good Order which is their Happiness therefore he cannot but will their Reconcilement to him or to their Duty 30. Now all that God hath done does or will do in order to Man's Recovery from Sin and Misery tends unto this one thing To bring Man again to will as God wills Where ever this is done it is done and the End of God's Dealing with Sinners is accomplished whatever the means were by which it was brought about and so far as we are come towards this so far we are in the way of Salvation or saved To will as God wills or to love our God with all our Heart Soul and Strength and our Fellow Creature as our self is the whole Law that God does so much to perswade Man to keep To will and n'ill the same is perfect Love and Love is manifested by doing the Will of the Beloved In doing the Will of God is Life I mean Happiness not only in this Present State but also in that which is to come 31. And that there is a Life to come and Immortality discoverable clearly even by Reason and divers Notices thereof implanted in Nature we shall a little attempt to shew That Men are mortal and live in this Life but a little while is the experience of the whole World That the Body is subject to decay or the Order of its Motions wherein its Life consists liable to be destroyed and cease and by another as to Life disorderly Motion to be separated and so its Organical Figure to be spoiled and changed all Men perceive by the least Observation But that Death is not a Termination or End of our Being I think will appear by these Considerations First We have no reason to conclude that the End or Design of our Being is fully accomplished in this Life The Manifestations of God's Perfections to Man and Man's Pleasure or Happiness in beholding them the End of Man by reason of Sin are not so clear and so great in this Life as they may be should be and are to be desired God is not seen and enjoy'd by any now as he may be by some but very little The desires of some I may say of all that desire God are not satisfied in this short and sinful State None have unerringly and sufficiently beheld the Divine Excellencies and acknowledged God as he ought to be acknowledged Some have lived and died and hardly ever truely confess'd and own'd their Maker few or none have loved and obeyed him to their capacity and been as pleas'd or happy in him as they may be Therefore it is reasonable to conclude nay we cannot well think otherwise that there is a Life to come wherein the Ends of the Creation shall be accomplished God cannot be thought to let his Works perish without fulfilling his or their true Ends in them The Good those that have been so far convicted of the Disorders of Sin as to repent and change their Minds from willing contrary to God's Will in some measure to will as God wills and to desire that they may do so more yea perfectly and always Those that have some-what beheld God lovely have not yet or in this Life been brought up to so great a degree of Obedience as they are convinced is their Duty nor seen so much of God's Excellence as they desire to see nor been satisfied with the sense of his Love as they would If these their Desires Duties and Happiness are good convenient suitable to the Natures of God and his Creatures as evidently they appear to be certainly God wills them sometime or other to be and that more than the Creature can will them because God is the Supreme Good-will So that it is altogether unlikely that the Good Man should perish and not attain the Good that he is capable of desires is convenient and God wills more than he Nor is it any more likely that the Bad Man he that hath seen no greater Delight than in contradicting the Will and Order of God by the disorderly Enjoyment of the Creatures should perish or cease under so great a Mistake as never to see and be convinced of the Absurdity and Evil of prosecuting his own proper Will as the chief Good as never to find that the way of Happiness is not in acting contrary to the Will of God That God should have an Intelligent Creature never to be made acknowledge his Maker is a thing hard to be thought It is more probable that even the Bad Man will remain one way or other to be convinced of his Disorders of his Rebellion against God Injustice and want of Goodness to his Fellow Creatures The Good Man in this Life seems often to be the Man of Sorrow the Son of Adversity that doth not gather the full-ripe Fruits of his Repentance and Obedience being among a world of unhappy and injurious Impenitents Therefore it is requisite there should be a Future State wherein he may reap in Joy what he has sowed in Tears The Evil Man seems often to be the Man of Joy and Pleasure in this Life he rejoyceth and even glorieth in his Disorders yea in that very great one of afflicting the Man that is better than he Now it is most equal and just that he should some time or other come to see the Good Man before-hand with him rejoycing and happy in God when he is sorowing to see he hath turn'd from the fountain of Joy and Blessedness These things are not accomplished in this Life therefore we must necessarily suppose a Future Again It is certain that no Creature can cause it self or another to cease Nothing but the withdrawing
depends on its Capacity of Knowledge and Circumstances it is then naturally in or how far it is liable to be mistaken in it self or impos'd upon by such Agents as will certainly as much as they can deceive it and when and where and how far God will permit or interpose by his special Acts of Information and Perswasion But that God should decree absolutely or will any Evil is an Opinion so full of Absurdities yea and in its tendency so apt to over-throw all Religion that no single probability or other difficulty can perswade a considerate Man to believe it therefore I think I need say no more in this matter 51. And now after all these Considerations I cannot but reflect and consider with Grief the miserable State of Christianity and the Professors thereof as well as of the rest of Mankind of the generality of those that call themselves the Reformed and Protestants as well as of the Papists between whom I can see but very little difference they agree so much still in many the same Unreasonable Doctrines as the Fundamentals of Religion as well as consent in the like wicked Practices as the Upholders and Effects of those Doctrines How much is the World and many the highest Pretenders to Religion in it alienated and changed from True Religion and the Scope and Design thereof in its Primitive Purity and Plainness How much more busie and concern'd are Men in contriving and contending for idle and uncertain Speculations and Niceties than in doing the plain undoubted and necessary Duties of the Gospel Natural Religion or the Practice of Love Goodness Mercy Brotherly Kindness Patience Meekness Humility Truth c They seem much more intent in considering according as every ones Fancy and Education leads him how Men are or may be saved or not saved than in working out their own or in furthering other Mens Salvation Whilst they place the main business in hitting the right notion how Salvation is wrought and in this they are also commonly mistaken they labour very little in conforming to the easily known Will of God according to the Precepts and Pattern he hath given us in the Man Christ Jesus whose pure holy Life seems hard and uneasie to the Rebellious Will but to be saved in the Theory is look'd upon now as more pleasant and desireable And how apt are Men now a-days to judge and condemn one another and that merely on the account of their Differences even in their idle Speculations in which Censures some are so ridged that they will hardly allow any but themselves and a few whose Noses are just of the same length and fashion to have smell'd out the way of Happiness or to be fit for Christian Brotherly Communion with them But we will not be afraid to affirm That whosoever truely loves God and his Neighbour shall certainly be saved or happy nay is pass'd from Death to Life Whosoever does not cannot be happy till he does tho' he may have the finest yea the best System of Divinity in his Head Tho' he have all Faith even to remove a Mountain of Contradictions to believe the greatest Mysteries Absurdities or Nonsense imaginable That one pure simple Act and Habit of Child-like Love to God is really more influencing to persevering Obedience and pleasing to God than the most Catholick Orthodoxy in the World He more truely knows God even by experience that loves him tho' but a Child than the most eloquent and subtile Teacher in the World that does not love But I am afraid nay I think I need not question it that the life of Religion is very much eat out and weakned by those many unreasonable Doctrines Whilst we have it taught either implicitly or expresly That God is the Author of Evil. One that made the greatest part of the Creation for that very end to be inevitably miserable for ever and consequently that they must needs be and continue Sinners to make them so That he is one that loves the Miseries of his Creatures and takes such pleasure in their Pains that he will bear with their Rebellion for ever rather than not have them unhappy That he made the most of them on purpose to shew his Power and Sovereignty in their everlasting Disorders Yea that that little number that he is said to be dearly hired and hardly perswaded to spare are continually afflicted with one Mischief or other from his hand tho' they are seeking him and crying after him continually he is not so ready to hear but often hides himself from them And yet that tho' this little number is sohardly saved they are infallibly sure of Salvation do or not do what they will Who would not rather be astonished and confounded and render'd inactive than influenced to love and obey God by these Doctrines When farther I am told that I cannot keep God's Commandments but that Christ hath keept them for me consequently my keeping them is not so necessary if suppos'd possible and God reckons Christ's Perfect Righteousness to be mine and I am perfect in him tho' I am not like minded all is done for me without me if I can but believe that is fancy so Ah but my Heart misgives me may one that considers say I fear that if Christ hath done all for me without me he will be happy also for me without me and I shall go to Heaven but by Proxy Who will be humbled before God and thankful for his free Beneficence and Forgiveness when we are perswaded that Christ hath purchased it at a full rate of him by his Doings yea and Sufferings for us and we may demand Happiness of God as our due But I fear many such Confidents will be put off with I know you not Nay how do we acknowledge God just and good and ready to forgive when we are perswaded that tho' he does not satisfie himself in punishing us for our Sins yet he will have them punished somewhere or other and rather than any where in the most Innocent Man Jesus on whom they say he laid all the Punishment or Misery due for the Sins of all Men and yet nevertheless most of them are damn'd and all of them die and that he reckon'd him guilty of others Sins tho' he were not so O Justice how unjustly hath the Malice of the Adversary represented the Fountain of Goodness and Justice But what shall the Generality of Mankind do What Encouragement shall they have to their Duty How shall they be stir'd up to seek Life and Happy Immortality especially the poor Convinced Souls that cannot get up so high as to read their Names in the Eternal Decree of Life or see yet much of the Effects thereof in themselves When they are told unless they are of that little number Christ has made Satisfaction for and ten thousand to one whether they be or no all their Repentance is in vain and their best Works are Sins in the sight of God tho' perhaps splendid Ones When they are taught that greater Goodness Justice Mercy Truth c. in one Man is less acceptible to God than much less in another and so God a Respecter of Persons Supposing I cannot perswade my self as I think all Predestinarians do that I am one of the Elect or do not believe that God has absolutely decreed either to save or damn any I am nevertheless convinced of my Sin and Duty as the way of Unhappiness or Happiness and would fain be happy Shall not I do my Duty on a Fancy that God has not decreed the Event or must I despair in it the former were but Madness the latter a miserable Condition But I must leave these things to the Thoughts of the Considerate and to them I would propose this Question What has been the reason that no more of Mankind have embraced Christianity and where has the fault been I think surely Original Goodness has not hinder'd nor has the fault been in the Christian Religion it self or in the want of the Love of Happiness in Mankind I believe you must confess that the generality of its Professors have discredited Christianity and given the World a false Draught or Picture thereof Till which is mended what hopes can we have of the Conversion to Christianity of those who have not from their inconsiderate years its Deformed Doctrines impos'd upon them and the disagreeing Lives of its Professors recommended to them What Expectations can we have of convincing Jews Turks and Pagans when not only the above-named Doctrines and an hundred more perhaps have represented Christianity as full of Contradictions and Absurdities and unsuitable to the Condition and Nature of Man But we even seem to differ in our Notions whether there be One or More Objects of Divine Worship insomuch that if those that have not yet embraced Christianity were to hear our Discourses and Forms of Worship they could not I believe but think that a great part of Christians believe and worship more Gods than One and even enjoin such a Faith and Practice upon pain of Damnation yea some of them having no better Arguments urge it by the Rack of Persecution while their Lives also are as different from Unity in pure Christian Morality Which now adays is distinguish'd from Religion O Times and a Moral Man is spoken of with Contempt in comparison with the Religious as a different Person But I must confess I look upon nothing as a Doctrine of Christianity or think can reasonably be represented as such or proved so to be by Scripture which does not naturally tend to promote Morality or Influence to those Good Manners which become our relation to God and which are convenient and profitable towards the true Interest of Mankind I would that Men would once come to try Doctrines by their natural Inferences and Tendencies then I should hope Truth would more appear But I must here conclude tho' I have been very short on every Particular I have been discoursing as unable now to write all I could wish to say of the Natural of the True Christian and of our Laodicean Religion promising my Reader an Answer to what he shall rationally object against whatever has been said in this Discourse and therewith a fuller Demonstration of things if God give me Life and Opportunity supposing that my whole Life must be spent in labouring against our common Errors if the Appearance of Christ don't bring on their Period sooner FINIS