DISCOURSE

DISCOURSE

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. ken to, in the following discourse. All that I shall add is, That in this, as well as in some other respects, our souls are made a little lower than the angels ; butwhentheyare uncloathed of the body, and have received it again, in anew edition, a spiritual body, then they shall be ισαγγελοι, equal unto angels, in the way and manner of life and action.

Thus I have, as briefly as I can, dispatched the first thing propounded, viz. the nature of the soul, in the explication of these seven particulars: it is a substance, a vital, spiritual, and immortal substance, a substance endued with understanding, will, affections, and an inclination to the body. And now we are come to the II . Branch, viz. Its original and in fusion.

I. As to its original, I have described it to be immediately from God, in the way of creation: an honour done to no o ther living creature except angels.

The world hath been troubled with a great many extravagant, and wild notions about the original of the soul of man; a (certain mark and argument of its apostacy from God.) " ‡ Solinus writes of one, who by

" a wound in the hinder part of his head, fell into such a degree of ignorance and oblivion, that he forgot hisownname,

" and could not tell whether he had any name at all."

But oh ! what a stunningblowdid man receive by the fall, that he should forget the very Author of his being, and rather claim alliance, and derive the being of his soul from any thing than

God; though it bears the very marks and characters of its divine Author and Father upon it! The principal errors about the origin of the soul (for that wild notion ofEpicurus hath been laid so flat by the pens ofmanylearned men, that it is ava nity tostrikeone blow more at it) maybe reduced to these three heads.

(1.) Some affirm it to be by way of|| traduction, or natural generation from the parents to the child.

This opinion is very ancient ; Tertullian, and divers of the Western Fathers, closed with it, as judging it the best expedient to solve the difficulties of the soul's taint and defilement with original fin.

†. Solinus refert de quodam, quod accepto vulnerein occipitio, ad tantam devenit ignorant i am, ut nefciret se habuisse nomen,

Augustodun. de Philosoph. Mundi, lib. iv. c. 24.

Daturagens phyficum quod aliud essenon poteft quam parens; qui ei feminis animam e materiæ finu eliciat. i. e. There is a physicalagentwhich canbenootherthan the parent, who produces the soul of feed from the bosom of matter.

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But antiquity is no passport for errors. The grey hairs of opinion, asonewell notes, are then honourable, when they are found in the way of truth.

Doctor Brown * tells us, "He " should rather incline to the creation, than the traduction of " the soul, though either opinion, (faith he,) will consist

"well enough with religion, did not one objection haunt " him, and this is a conclusion from the equivocal and " monstrous productions by unnatural copulation, as ofa man

" and beast: for, if the soul of man, (faith he,) be not tranf- " mitted and transfused in the feed, why are not these produc- " tions merely beasts, but have also an impression and tincture

" of reason in as high a measure, as it can evidence itselfinthose " improper organs ? ".

Which way the doctor's judgment had inclined in this controverly, had been of no great consideration to the determination of it; though it is a pity we should lose his confentandcompany, for the sake of such a beastly objection as this, which haunts his mind: for, if there be any such creatures that seem to have a tincture of reason, it is but a tincture, and a seeming, not areal tincture neither, which many other brutes have.

The doctor is too well acquainted with philosophy, and a man of too much reason to allow himself to think that such a production, as he speaks of,hath two natures and essential forms in one body, as of a man and a horse. He knows that every entity hath but on especial essence, and can have no more, except he will place one and the same thing under diverse species in the predicament of substance. And as there cannot be two distinct forms, so neither can there be a mix i on of them in the

Centaur or monstrous birth: for, ex duobus entibus perse, non fit unum ensperse.

But he confesseth this objection was bred amongtheweeds and tares of his own brain, (a rank foil no doubt) and I am pretty confident he had weeded it out in his latter years; for I find this notion of the Centaurs, (that is, half horses, halfman),but into its proper place among his vulgar errors,B.

1. chap . 4. And so I suppose that rub being out of the way, he returned again to us.

(2.) A second opinion was, That they were procreated by angels: and that which gave the ground, such as it is, to this opinion or fancy, is the similitudeor resemblance which is found betwixt angels and the souls of men. But this fancy needs nor anyindustrytooverthrow it; for though it be certain there is a • ReligioMedici, Se&, 36,

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. fimilitude and resemblance + betwixt angels and fouls, both being immaterial and spiritual substances, yet angels neither propagate by generation, nor is it in their power to create the least

Ay or worm in the world, much less the soul of man, the highest, and noblest, and most excellent being. Great power they have,but no creating power, that is God's incommunicable property; and procreate our souls they did not, for though they are spirits, yet spirits of another species.

(3.) A third fort there are, who deny Thecoetaneous creatithatfouls are created substances, and pro on offouls rejected. ceededfromGod; but affirm withal, that he created themfimul, etfemel, together and at once, as the angels were, and not one by one, as men are born into the world. "Of this opinionwasPlato ; who thought

" all human fouls to be created together before their bodies, " andplacedinsomeglorious and suitable mansions, as the stars ; till, at last, growing weary of heavenly, and falling in love

" with earthly things, for a punishment of that crime, they " were cast into bodies, as into so many prisons ‡."

Origen fucked in this notion of the pre-existence of fouls : and upon this supposition it was that Porphyry tells us, in the life of Plotinus, he blushed as often as he thought of his being in a body, as am an that lived in reputation and honour, blushes when he is lodged in a prison.

The ground on which the Stoics bottomed their opinion was, the great dignity and excellency of the soul, which inclined them to think they had never beendegradedand abafed, as they are by dwelling in such vile bodies, but for their faults; and that it was for some former fins of theirs, that they slid down into gross matter, and were caught into a vital union with it ; whereas, had they not finned, they had lived in celestial and splendid habitations, more suitable to their dignity.

But this is a pure creature of fancy; for, ( 1.) No foul in the world is conscious to itself, of such apre-existence, nor can

† That is perfect, which produces some other thing like itself: but substances that are immaterial, are far more perfect than those which are material ; therefore, if these last make others like in kind to themselves, much more must angels be able to procreate, some other incorporeal substance of an inferior nature, namely, the human foul.

D. Dionyf. c. 4. dedivinis no minibus.

†Plato in Timeo finxit Deum omnes animas human as ante corporafimul creaffe, et incomparibusftellis constituisse : tum eas cœleftium rerum tædio, et terrenarum a more captas, ut tantifceleris pænas luerent, in corpora tanquam in carcerem conjectas.

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remember when it was owner of any other habitation than that itnowdwells in.

(2.) Nor doth the scripture give us the least hintofany such thing. Some indeed would catch hold of that expression, Gen. ii . 2. "God rested theseventhdayfrom all the workswhichhehad made:" and it is true, hedidfo, the work of creation was finished and sealed up, as to any new species or kind of creatures to be created; no other fort offouls will be created, than that which was at first: but yet God still creates individual fouls, (My Father worketh hitherto, and I work), of the same kind and nature with A dam's soul. And, (3.)

For their detrufion into these bodies as a punishment of their fins in the former state; if we speak of sin in individuals, or particular persons, the scripture mentions none, cither original or actual, defiling any foul in any other way but by its union with the body.

Pre-existence therefore is but a dream.

But to me it is clear, thatthefoulreceives not its beginning by traduction or generation; for that which is generable, is also corruptible ; but the spiritual immortal soul,(as ithathbeen proved to be), is not subject to corruption. Nor is itimaginablehow a soul shouldbeproduced out of matter, which is not enduedwith reason : or, how a bodily substance can impart that to another, which it hath not in itself.

If it be said, the soul of the child proceeds from the soul of the parents, that cannot be; for spiritual substances are impartible, and nothing can be difcinded from them.

" * And it is absurd to think the soul of " Adam should spring from one original, and the souls of his

" offspring from another, whilst both his and theirs are of one " and the fame nature and species." To all which let me add,

That as this assertion of their creation is most reasonable, so it is !

! most scriptural.

It is reasonable to think and say, " † That " no active power can act beyond, or above the proper sphere

" of its activity and ability."

But if the foul be elicited out of the power of matter, here would be an effect produced abundantly more noble and excellent than its cause. And as it is most reasonable, so it is most scriptural. To this purpose diverseteftimonies of scripture are citedand produced by ourdivines, amongst which we may single out these four, which are offpecial remark and use; Heb. xii. 9, " Furthermore, we had

* Absurdum est aliunde esse animam noftram, aliunde animam Ada: cum omnes funt ejufdemspeciei.

Zanch.

+ Nulla virtus activa agit ultra fuum genus, fedanima intellectiva excedit totumgenus, corporeæ natura, cum fit fubftantia

Spiritual is, &c.

Conimbr.

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"" fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence ; shall we not much rather be in subjection to [the " Father of spirits, and live ?" Here God is called the Father of spirits, or of fouls, and that in an emphatical antithesis, or contradiftinction to our natural fathers, who are called the fathers of our flesh, or bodies only.

The true scope and sense of this text, is, with great judgment andclearness, given us by that learned and judicious divine, Mr. Pemble †, in these words:

" [Nothing is more plain and emphatical than this antithesis ; " We receive our flesh and body from our parents, but our

" fouls from God: if then we patiently bear the chastisements " of our parents, who are the authors of the vilest part, and " have the least right or power over us ; with how much more

" equal a mind should we bear his chastisements, who hath the " supreme right to us, as he is the Father and only giver of that " which is most excellent in us, viz. our souls or spirits ?] "

Here it appears evident, that our souls flow not to us in the material channel of fleshly generation or descent, as our bodies do,butimmediatlyfromGod, their proper Father, in the way of creation.

Yet he begets them not out of his own essence or substance, as Christ, his natural Son, is begotten, but, εκ μη οντων, out of nothing that had been before, as Theodoret well expresseth it.

Agreeable hereunto is that place also in Zech. xii.

I. " The Lord which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth " the foundations of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man

" within him:" " || Where the forming of the spirit, or foul " of man, is associated with these two other glorious effects of " God'screating power, namely, the expansion of the heavens,

" and laying the foundations of the earth ;" all three,are here equally assumed by the Lord, as his remarkable and glorious works of creation.

He that created the one, did as much create the other.

Now the two former we find frequently instanced in scripture, as the effects of his creating power, or works implying the

† Pemble de origine animae,p. 56. Nihil apertius et εμφατικότερου ista Antithefi, cranem corpusque a parentibus, animas a Deo accipimus; quodfi viliorispartis authores, et qui in nos minusjuris habent, patienter caftigantesferimus; quanto equiore animoferemus eum qui fupremumin nosjus obtinet, utpote part is, quæ in nobis eftpræftantissima, unicus Dator Conditorque.

|| Testimoniumfatis clarum, quo docemur, pari passu hæc tria ambulare ; expansionem cæli, fundationem terra, et formationem anima rational is.

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Almighty Power of God; and therefore are presented as strong props to our faith, when it is weak and staggering, for want of visible matter of encouragement, Ifa. xl. 22. and xlii. 5. Jer. x.

12. Job ix. 8. Psal. civ. 2. q. d. Are my people in captivity, and their faithnonplus'd, and at a loss, because there is nothing insight that hath a tendency to their deliverance, no prepared matter for their salvation ? Why let them confider who it was that createdtheheavens, and the earth, yea and their souls also, which are so perplex'd with doubts, out of nothing; the same

Godthatdid this, can also create deliverance for his people, though there be nopre-existent matter to work it out of.

Add to this that excellent place of * Solomon, in Eccl. xii.

" Then shall the dust return to the earth, as it was : and the spirit to God who gave it."

Where he shews us what becomes of man, and how each part, of which he consists, is bestowed, and disposed ofafterhisdissolutionbydeath. And thus he states it: The two constitutive parts ofa man are afoul and abody : these two parts have two distinct originals : the body, as to its material cause, is dust ; the soul, in its nature, isa spirit, and as to its origin, it proceedeth from the Father of spirits ; it is his own creature, in an immediate way. He gave it : he gave it the being it hath by creation, and gave it to us, i.e. to our bodies by inspiration. Now qualis Genesis, talisAnalyfis: When death dissolves the union which is betwixt them, each part returns to that from whence it came, dust to dust, and the spirit to God that gave it.

The body is expressed by its material cause, dust; the soul only by its efficient cause ; as the gift of God; because it had no material cause at all, nor was made out of any pre-existent matter, as the body was.

And therefore Solomon here speaks of God, as if he had only to do with the soul, leaving the body to its material and instrumental causes; with whom he concurs by a general influence.

It is God, not man alone, or God by man, that hath given us these bodies ; but it is not man, but God alone, who hath given us these souls. He therefore passeth by the body, and * Solomon resolves both the parts of man into their first principles; as therefore he resolves the body into the dust, whence it was taken; so also, if the foul had been made of an heavenly substance, or, (as Plato says), of the soul of the world, Solomon would have resolved the soul into it; but when he says simply of the soul, that it returns to God who gave it, he teaches us, That it was created of nothing, into which it could not be resolved.

Zanch.

VOL. III.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. speaks of the soul as the gift of God; because that partofman, and that only, flows immediately from God, and, at death, returns to him that gave it.

All these expressions, The Father of spirits, the former of the spirit of man, the giver of the spirit ; how agreeably are they to each other, and all of them to the point under hand, that the soul flows from God by immediate creation ? You fee it hath no principle out of which, according to the order of nature, it did arise, as the body had ; and therefore it hath no principle into which, according to the order of nature, it can be returned, as the body hath ; but returns to God, its efficient cause if reconciled, to a Father, not only by creation, but adoption ; if unreconciled, as a creature guilty of unnatural rebellion against the God that formed it, to be judged.

11. God created and infused it into the body, with an inherent inclination and affection to it.

The † nature of the soul and body is vastly different, there is no affinity or fimilitude betwixt them: but it is in this case, as in that of marriage.

Two persons of vastly different educations, constitutions, and inclinations, coming under God's ordinance, into the nearest relation to each other, find their affections knit and endeared by their relation to a degree beyond that which results from the union of blood : So it is here.

Whence this affection arises, in what acts it is discovered, and for what reason implanted, will be at large discovered ina distinct branch of the following dilcourse, to which itisaffigned.

Mean while, I find myself concerned to vindicate what hath been here asserted from the arguments which are urged against the immediate creation and in- / fusion of the fout, and in the defence of the opinion of its traduction from the parents.

To conceal, or dissemble these arguments and objections, would be but a betraying of the truth I have here asserted, and give occasion for some jealousy, that they are unanfwerable.

To come then to an issue ; and first, Object. 1. It is urged, that it is manifest in itself, and genewally yielded, that the fouls of all other creatures come by generation, and therefore it is probable that human fouls flow in the fame channel also .

+ The body is necessary to the soul, which is the perfection of theorganicalbody, for it is not a separate form, i. e. a form properly so called, therefore it requires matter, in so much that the soul, when separate from the body, till retains its relation and inclination to it, which is followed with the resurrection of the body. Came ron prælect. in Mat.p. 124.

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Solut. There is a specific difference betwixt rational fouls, and the souls of all other creatures, and therefore no force at all in the consequence. A material form may rise out of matter ; but a spiritual, rational being(as the soul of man is) cannot fo rife, being much more noble and excellent than matter is.

What animal is there in the world, out of whose soul the acts of reason spring, and flow, as they do out of human fouls !

Are they capable of inventing, (or which is much less)of learn ing the arts and sciences ? Can they correct their senses, and demonstrate a star to be far greater than the whole earth, which to the eye seems no bigger than the rowel ofa spur ? Do they foreknow the positions, and combinations of the planets, and the eclipses of the fun and moon many years before they suffer them? And if they cannot perform these acts of reason, as it is sure they cannot, how much less can they know, fear, love, or delight in God, and long for the enjoyment of him ! These things do plainly evincehuman fouls to be of another species, and therefore ofa higher original than the souls of brutes.

If all have one common nature and original, why are they not all capable of performing the fame rational, and religious acts ?

Olj. 2. But though it should be granted, that the soul of the first man was by immediate creation and inspiration from God; yet it follows not, that the souls of all his posterity must be fo too. God might create him with a power of begetting other fouls after his own image. The first tree was created with its feed in itself to propagate its kind, and so might the first man.

Sol. 1. Trees, animals, and such-like, were not created immediately out of nothing, as the foulofmanwas; but the earth was the pre-existent matter out of which they were produced by the word of God's blessing and power; butman's foul was immediately breathed intohimbyGod, and had no pre-existent matter at all : And besides, all human fouls being of one spe. cies, have thereforeone and the fame original : The soul of the poorest child is of equal dignity with the soul of Adam.

And if we consult Job xxxiii. 4. we shall findElihu giving us there the fame account, and almost in the same words, of the original of his soul thatMoses in my text gives us of the original of Adam's foul : " The Spirit of God hath formed me, and the " breath of the Almighty hath given me life."

Sol. 2. But it is evident, fouls spring not from the parent, as one plant, or animal doth from another; for they have their seed in themselves, apt and proper to produce their kind; but the feed of fouls is not to be found in man: It is not to be found

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. in his body; for then(as was said before) a spiritual and nobler essence must be produced out of a material and baser matter,

(i. e.)the matter must give to the soul that which it hath not in itself, nor is it to be found in its foul ; for the soul being a pure, simple, and invisible being, can suffer nothing to be descinded from it, towards the production ofanotherfoul. A spirit, as the soul is, substantiafimplex et impartibilis ; anuncompounded, and indiscerpible, or impartible being.

Nor can it spring partly from the body, and partly from the soul, as from con-causes; for then it should be partly corporeal, and partly incorporeal, as its causes are.

" So that there is no matter, " seed, or principle of fouls found in man ; and to be sure (as *

" Baronius strongly argues) he cannot produce a soul without " pre-existent matter; for that were to inake him omnipotent,

" and assign a creating power to a creature."

Besides, that which is generable, is also corruptible, as we see trees, animals, c. which are produced that way, to be ; but the soul is not corruptible, as hath in part been already proved, and more fully, in the following discourse. So that Adam's soul, and the souls of his polterity spring not from each other, but all from God by creation.

Ohj. 3. If the foul be created and infused immediately by God, either it comes out of his hands pure, or impure ; if pure, how comes it to be defiled and tainted with fin ? If impure, how do we free God from being the author of fin ?

Sol. If the question be, whether fouls be pure or impure, as soon as they are united with their bodies ? The answer is, they are impure, and tainted as soon as united: For the union constitutes a childofAdam, and consequently a sinful impure creature.

But if it respect the condition and state in which God created them, I answer with Baronius †.

They are created " neither morally pure, nor impure; they receive neither puri-

ty nor impurity from him, but only their naked essence, and " the natural powers and properties flowing therefrom." He inspires not any impurity into them; for he cannot be the au- *Pater nequeproducit animam filii ex aliqua repræ-exiftente; nequeproducit eam ex nulla re præ exiftente: hoc enim eft creare; ergo nullomodo eamproducit.

Baronii dissert, secunda de Origine Animae, p. 120.

+ Anime noftra aDeo creante neque accipunt puritatem, feu justitiam ; neq; impuritatem et propenfionem ad malum :

Sed tantumeffentiamspiritualem,etproprietates ab effentia dimanantes.

Bar on i exercit. p. 103.

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thor of fin, who is the revenger of it.

Nor doth he create them in their original purityandrectitude; for the fin of Adam loft that, and God justly withholds it from his posterity. Who wonders (faith ‡ one) to fee the children, the palaces, and gardens of traitors to droop and decay, and the arms of his house, and the badge of his nobility, to be defaced and reversed? That which is abused by man to the dish on our of God, may justly be destroyed (I add in this case, or with-held) by God tothedetrimentofman. Adam voluntarily and actually deprived himself, and meritoriously deprived all his posterity of that original righteoulness and purity in which he was created. As anholyGod, he cannot inspire anyimpurity, and as a just and righteous God, he may, and doth with-hold, or create them void and destitute of that holiness, and righteousness, which was once their happiness and glory.

Obj. 4. But how come they then to be defiled and tainted with original fin ? It is confefsedGoddidnot impure them, and thebodycannot; for its being matter, cannot act upon a spirit ; yea, of itself it is a dead lump, and cannot act at all.

Sol. What if this be one of those mysteries reserved for the world to come, about which we cannot in this state solve every difficulty that may be moved ? Must we therefore deny its divine original ? What if I cannot understand some mysteries, or answer some questions about the hypostatical union of the two natures, in the wonderful person of our Emmanuel ? Must I therefore question whether hebe Θεανθροπος, God-man? We must remain ignorant of some things about our souls, till we come into the condition of the spirits ofjustmen made perfect||.

Mean time, I think it much more ourconcernment to study how wemayget fin out of our souls, thantopuzzleourbrains to find howitcame into them.

But that the objector may not take this for anhandfsome slide, orgo by to this great objection, I return to it, in a few particulars.

(1.) That I think not original fin follows either part singly; it comes in neitherbythefoulalone,nor by the body alone, apart from the soul ; but upon the union and conjunction of both in one person. 'Tis the union of these two which constitutes a Jenkins on Jude, Vol. 1. p. 5 , 9 .

Man since the fall,being lessthanhimself, understands not him. self; nor will he fully, till he be fully restored to himself in glory.

Norton'sOrth. Evang. P. 237.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man . child of Adam, and as such only we are capableofbeing infected with his fin.

(2.) * And whereas it is so confidently asserted in the objection,that fin cannot come into the soul by, or from the body, because it being matter, cannot act upon a spirit: I say, this is gratis diftum, easily spoken, but difficultlyproved. Cannot the body act upon, or influence the soul? Pray then how comes it to pass that so manyfoulsbecome foolish, forgetful, injudicious,

&c. by their union with ill-disposed bodies? Nothing is more sensible, plain and evident, than that there is a reciprocal communication betwixt the soul and body.

The body doth as really (though we know not how) affect the soul with its dispositions, as the soul influences it with life and motion. The more excellent any form is, the more intimate is its union and conjunction with the matter.

The soul of man hath therefore a more intimate and perfect union with the body, than light hath with the air; which is made,by some, the best emblem, and fimilitude to shadow forth this union.

But the union betwixt them is too intimate to be conceived by the help of any such fimilitudes.

That this infection is by way of physical agency, as a rusty scabbard infects. and defiles a bright (word, when sheathed therein ; I will not confidenly affirm as some do.

It may be by way of natural concomitancy, as Eftius will have it ; or to speak, as Dr. Reynolds (modestly, and as becomes men that are conscious of darkness and weakness) byway of ineffable refultancy and emanation.

(3.) Upon the whole, original fin consists in two things. viz..

1. In the privation of that originalrectitude which ought to be in us.

2. In that habitual concupifcence which carrieth nature to inordinate motions.

This privation and inordinate inclination, make up that original corruption, the rifewhereofwe are searching for : And to bring us as near as we can come, without a daring intrusion

*The soul (say some) inthemomentofits creation and in fusion by God, being united with the body by the plastic and formative virtue of the parental feed: the parent maybe truly said to generate the man, though he do not produce the form : Because proper gèneration consists in the union,and not in the production of parts.

So that original sin is notpropagated from body to body, nor yet from foul to foul, but from man to man.

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into unrevealed secrets, our solid divinės proceed by these steps, in answering this objection.

(1.) If it be demanded how it comes to pass that an infant becomes guilty of Adam's fin ; The answer is, because he is a childofAdam by natural generation.

(2.) Butwhyishedeprivedofthat original rectitudeinwhich Adam was created ? They answer, because Adam loft it by his fin, and therefore could not transmit what he had loft to his posterity.

(3.) But how comes he to be inclined to that which is evil?

Their answer is, because he wants that original rectitude: For whosoever wants original rectitude, naturally inclines to that which is evil. And so the propenfion of nature, to that which is evil, seems to be, by way ofconcomitancy, with the defect or wantoforiginal righteoufuefs.

And thus I have given some account of the nature and original of the soul of man: though alas ! my dim eyes fee but littleofits excellency and glory.

Yet, by what hath been said, it appears the master-piece of all God's work of creation, in this lower world.

But be a use I suspect the description I have given of it will be obscure and cloudy to vulgar readers, of a plain and low capacity, by reason of divers philosophical terms which I have been forced to make use of; and reckoning myself, a debtor to the weak and unlearned, as well as others, I will endeavour to trip this description of the soul, for their fakes, out of those artificial terms which darken it to them, and present it once more in the most plain and intelligible epitome I am capable to give it in; that so the weaker understanding may be able to form atruenotionofthe nature, and original of the soul, in this manner.

Thisfoulofmineisatrue andrealbeing; not a fancy, conceit, avery nothing. It Thefoulasubstance. hath a proper and true being in itself, whether I conceit it or not. Nor indeed can I conceive of it, but by it.

It is not such a thing as whiteness is in snow, a mere accident, which depends upon the srow in which it is, for the being it hath, and must perith as soon as the snow is dissolved :

Myfouldoth not fo much depend upon my body, or any other fellow-creature for its being ; but is as truly a substance as my body is, though not of fo gross and material a kind and nature.

My soul can, and will fubfift and remain what it is, when my body is separated from it; but mybody cannot fubfift and remainwhatitnow is,when my soul is feparatedfrom it: So that

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I find my foul to be the most substantial and noble part of me; it is not mybody, but my soul which makes me am an. And if this depart, all the rest of me is but a dead log, a lump of inanimate clay, a heap of vile dust and corruption.

From this independentsubsistence it hath in itself, and the dependence its properties and affections have upon it, I truly apprehend and call it a substance.

But yet, when I call it a substance, I Butaspiritualsubstance. must not conceive of it as a gross material, palpable substance, such as my body is, which I can fee and feel : No, there are spiritual substances as well as gross, visible, material substances. An angel

isa spiritual substance, areal creature, and yet imperceptible by my fight or touch, such a substance is my soul.

Spiritual substances are as real, and much more excellent than bodily substances are.

I can neither fee, hear, nor feel it, but I both fee, hear, and feel by it.

My foul is also a vital substance.

It is a A vital substance. principle of life to my body: It hath a life in itself, and quickens my body therewith. My soul is the spring of all the actions and notions of life which I perform .

It hath been an error taken in from my childhood, that sense is performed in the outward organ, or members of my body ; as touching in the hand,seeing in the eye, hearing in the ear, &c. in them, I say, and not only by them, as if nothing were required to make sense, but an object and an organ. No, no, it is not my eye that feeth, nor my ear that heareth, nor my hand that toucheth, but my foul, in and by them, performs all this.

Let but an apoplex hinder the operations of my soul in the brain, and of how little use are my eyes, ears, hands or feet to me ? My life is originally in my soul, and secondarily byway of communication inmybody. So that I find my fout to be a vital, as well as aspiritualsubstance.

And being both a vital and spiritual An immortal substance. substance, I must needs conclude it to be an immortal substance .

For in such apure, spiritual nature, as my soul is, there can be found no feeds or principles of death.

Where there is no composition, there will be no dissolution. Mybody indeed having fo many jarringhumours, mixed elements, and contrary qualities in it, must needs fallanddie at last : but my foul was formed for immortality, by the simplicity and spirituality of its nature. No swordcanpierce it from without, nor opposition can destroy it from within ; man cannot, and God will not.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.

And being an immortal spirit, fitted and framed to live for ever, I find that Endued with underStanding, will, and God hath, answerably, endued and furnished it with an understanding, will, and affections, whereby it is capable of being wrought upon by the Spirit, in the way of grace and fanctification, in this world, in order to the enjoyment of God, its chief happiness, in the world to come. affections.

By this its understanding, I am distinguished from, and advanced above all other creatures in this world.

I can apprehend, distinguish, and judge of all other intelligible beings.

By my understanding I discern truth from falfhood, good from evil; it shews me what is fit for me to chuse, and what to refuse.

To this faculty or power of understanding, my thoughts and confciencedobelong; the former to my speculative, the latter to my practical understanding. My thoughts are all formed in my mind or understanding in innumerable multitudes and va riety. By it I can think of things present, or absent ; visible, or invisible; of God, or myself; of this world, or the world to come.

To my understanding also belongs my conscience, a noble, divine, and awful power : By which I summon and judgemyfelf, as at a solemn tribunal; bind and loose, condemn and acquit myself and actions, but still with an eye and respect to the judgment of God. Hence are my best comforts, and worst terrors.

This understanding of mine is the director and guide of my will, as the counsellor; and my will is as the prince : It freely chusethand refuseth, as my understanding directs and suggests to it.

The members ofmybody, and the passions of my soul, are under its dominion : The former are under its absolute command, the latter under its fuafions and insinuations, though not absolutely, yet always with effect and success.

And both my understanding and will, I find to have great in fluence upon my affections.

These passions and affections of my soul are of great use and dignity. I find them as manifold, as there are considerations of good and evil.

They are the strong and sensible motions of my foul, according to my apprehenfions of good and evil. By them my soul is capable of union with the highest good. By loveanddelight I am capable of enjoying God, and resting in - him, as the centre of my soul.

This noble understanding,

VOL. III .

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. thoughts, conscience, will, passions, and affections, are the principal faculties, acts, and powers of this my high and heaven born foul. And being thus richly endowed and furnished,

I find it could never rise outofmatter, or come into my body by way of generation; the souls of brutes, that rise that way, are destitute of understanding, reason, conscience, and such other excellent faculties, and powers, asI find in my own foul.

They cannot know, or love, or delight in God, or set their affections on Created and infused with an inclination to the body.

things spiritual, invisible, and eternal, as my soul is capable to do; it was therefore created and infused immediately into this body of mine by the Father of spirits, and that with a strong inclination, and tender affection to my flesh, without which it would be remiss and careless inperformingits several duties and offices to it, during the time of its abode therein .

Fearfully and wonderfully, therefore, am I made, and designed for nobler ends and uses, than for a few days to eat, and drink, and sleep, and talk, and die. My soul is of more value thantenthousand worlds. What shall a man give in exchange for his foul?

USE.

From the several parts and branches of this description of the soul, we may gather the choice fruits which naturally grow upon them, in the following inferences and deductions of truth and duty. For we may say of them all, what the historian doth of Palestine, that there is nihil infructuofum, nihilfterile, no branch or shrub is barren, or unfruitful.

Let us then search it branch by branch: and, Infer. 1. From the substantial nature of the soul, which we have proved to be a being distinct from the body, and fubfifting by itself, we are informed, That great is the difference betwixt the death of am an, and the death of all other creatures in the world. Their souls depend on, and perish with their bodies ; but ours neither result from them, nor pe1. The soul is afubftantialbeing. rishwith them *. My body is not abody, when my soul hath forsaken it; but my soul will remain a soul, when this body is crumbledintodust.

Men may live like beasts, a mere sensual * So great a prerogative manifestly proves that the soul, which is the governing part, is not material and mortal, but of a superior and moreexcellentnature, greatly different from the condition of other fouls, Conimb. Disp. onseparatefouls, p. 584.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.

life; yea, ia some sense, they may die like beasts, a stupid death; but in this there will be found a vast difference : Death kills both parts of the beasts, destroys the matter and form ; it toucheth only one part of man ; it destroyeth the body, and onlydislodgeth the soul, but cannot destroy it.

In some things Solomon shews the agreement betwixt our death and theirs, Ecclef. iii. 19, 20, 21. " That which befal- "leth the sons of men, befalleth the beasts ; even one thing

" befalleth them : As the one dieth, sodieth the other; all go " to one place ; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again."

We breathe the same common airtheybreath ; we feel the fame painsofdeath they feel ; our bodies are resolved into the same earth theirs are. Oh! but in this is the difference, The Spirit of man goeth upward, and the spirit of a beast goeth downward to the earth. Their spirits go two ways at their dissolution; the one to the earth, and the other to God that gave it; as he speaks, chap. xii . 7.

Though our resolution and expiration have some agreement, yet great is the odds in the consequences of death to the one and the other. They have no pleasures nor pains besides those they enjoy or feel now; but so have we, and those eternal, or unspeakable too. The soul of man, like the bird in the shell, is still growing or ripening in fin or grace, till at last the shell breaks by death, and the soul flies away to the place it is prepared for, and where it must abide for ever. The body, which is but its shell, perisheth; but the soul lives when it is fallen away t.

How doth this consideration expose and aggravate the folly and madness of this sensual world, who herd themselves with beasts, though they have fouls so near a kin to angels ! Te princes and nobles of the world abhor to associate themselves with mechanics in their shops, or to take a place among the fottish rabble upon an ale-bench ; they know and keep their distance and decorum, as still carrying with them a sense of honour, andabhorring to act beneath it: But we equalize our high and noble souls in the manner of life with the beasts that perish ,.

Our tables differ little from the crib at which they feed ; or our houses from the stalls and stables in which they lie down to rest, in respect of any divine worship, or heavenly communication that is to be heard there. Happy had it been for such men(if U 2 + They grow up together, and are again separated, and both return to whence they caine; The earth downward, and the spirit upward.

Epicha.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. so they liveanddie) that their souls had been of no higher extraction, or larger capacity, or longer duration than that ofa beast : For then, as their comforts, so also their miseries had ended at death. And such they will one day with they had been.

A Separate foul immediately capable of blessedness.

Infer. 2. The soul ofmanbeingasubstance, andnotdependingin its being on the body, or any other fellow-creature, There can be no reason, on the soul's account, why its blessedness should bedelayedtillthe resurrection of the body.

It is a great mistake (and it is well it is so) thatthefouliscapable only of social glory, or a blessedness in partnership with the body; and that itcanneither exert its own powers, nor enjoy its own happiness, in the absence of the body. The opinion of a sleeping interval took its rifefrom this error (as it is usual for one mistake to beget another) ; they conceived the soul to be so dependent on the body, at least in all its operations, that when death rends it from the body, it musl needs be left in a swoon, or sleep, unable to exert its proper powers, or enjoy that felicity which we ascribe to it in its state of separation.

But certainly its substantial nature being considered, it will be found, that what perfection soever the body receives from the soul, and how necessary soever its dependance upon it is the soul receives not its perfection from the body, nor doth it necessarily depend on it, in its principal operations; but it can live and act out of a body as well as in it.

Yca, I doubt not but it enjoys itself in a much more sweet, and per feet liberty than ever it did, or could, whilst it was clogged and fettered with a body of flesh.

" Doubtless, (faith † Tertullian) when it " is separated, and as it were strained by death, it comes out

" of darkness into its own pure, perfect light, and quickly finds " itself a substantial being, able to act freely in that light."

Before the eyes of the dead body are closed, I doubt not, but the believing foul, with open eyes, beholdeth the face of Jesus

* The rational foul receives no perfection from matter, which it could not receive without it.

Conimbr. difp. 2. art. 3.

† Procul dubio cum vi mortis exprimitur de concretione carnis. et ipfa expressione colatur, certo de oppanfo corpore erumpit in a pertum, admeram etpuram, etfuam lucem,statimfemetipfamin expeditionefubftantiærecognofcit,utdefomno emergens ab imagi nibusad veritates, Tertul. in lib, de Anima.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.

Christ, Luke xxiii. 43. Philip. i. 23.

But this will also be further ipoken to hereafter.

Inter. 3. The fouis of men being created immediately out of nothing, and not teminally traduced; it follows, That allfouls by nature are of equal value and dignity ; onefoulis not more excellent, honourable, or precious than another; but all by nature equally precious.

The soul of the poorest beggar that cries at the door for a crust, is, in its own nature, of equal dignity and value with the soul of the most glorious monarch that fits upon the throne.

And this appears to be to, 1. Because all fouls flow out of one and the fame fountain, viz. the creating power of God.

They were not made of better or worse, finer or coarfer matter, but ex μη οντων, out of nothing at all.

The fame Almighty Power was put forth to the formingofone, as of another.

Allfoulsare mine, laith he that created them, Ezek. xviii. 4. the soul of the child as well as of the father; the soul of the beggar as well as of the king ; those that had no pre-existent matter, but received their beings from the same efficient cause, must needs be equal in their original nature and value.

The bodies of men, which are formed out of matter, do greatly differ from one another; some are moulded

(as we say) emeliori luto, out of better and finer clay ; some are more exact, elegant, vigorous and beautiful than others ; but fouls having no matter of which they consist, are not fo differenced.

2. All fouls are created with a capacity of enjoying the infinite and blessed God. They need no other powers, faculties, or capacities than they are by nature endued with (if these be but fanctifiedanddevoted to God) to make them equally happy and blessed with them that are now before the throne of God in heaven, and with unspeakable delight and joy behold his bleffedface. We pass through the fields, andtakeupaneggwhich lies under a clod, and fee nothing in it but a little squalid matter; yea, but in that egg is seminally and potentially contained fuchamelodious lark as itmaybeatthe fame time we fee mountingheavenward, and fingingdelicious notes above.

So 'tis here, thosepoordespised souls, that are now lodged in crazy, despicable bodies on the earth, have, in their natures, a capacity for the fameemployments and enjoyments with those in heaven.

They have no higher original than these have, and these have the fame capacity and ability with them.

They are beings improvable by grace, to the highest perfections attainable by any creature.

If thou be never fomean, base, and despicable a creature, in

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. other respects, yet haft thou a soul, which hath the fame alliance to the Father of spirits, the same capacity to enjoy him in glory, that the most excellentandrenowned faints ever had.

3. All fouls areratedand valued in God's book, and account, atoneandthesame price; and therefore, by nature are of equal worth and dignity. Under the law, the rich and the poor were to give the fame ransom, Exod. xxx. 15. " The rich shall not " give more, and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel."

The redemptionoffouls, by the blood of Christ, costs one and the fame price. The poorest and the most despised soul that believes in Jesus, is as much indebted to him for the ransom of his soul, as the greatest and most illustrious person in the world.

Moses, Abraham, Paul, &c. did not cost Christ any thing more than poor Lazarus, or the meanest among all the saints did.

" The righteousness of Christ is unto all, and upon all that be- " lieve, and there is no difference," Rom. iii. 22.

But yet we must not understand this parity of human fouls universally, or in all respects. Tho' being of one species or common nature, they are all equal, and those of them that are purchased by the blood of Christ are all purchased atone rate ; yet there are divers other respects and considerations, wherein there are remarkable differences betwixt foul, and foul. As,

(1.) Some fouls are much better lodged and accommodated in their bodies than others are, though none dwell at perfect reft and eale. God hath lodged some fouls in strong, vigorous, comely bodies ; others in feeeble, crazy, deformed, and uncomfortable ones. The historian faith ofGalba, Anima Galbae male habitat ; the soul of Galba dwelt in an illbody. And a much better man than Galba was as ill accommodated.

John wishes in behalf of his belovedGaius, that his body might but prosper as his soul did, epistle iii. ver. 2. Timothy had his often infirmities.

Indeed the world is full of instances and examples of this kind.

‡ If some fouls had the advantages of fuchbodies as others have, who make little or very bad use of them; oh, what service would they do for God ! (2.) There is a remarkable difference also betwixt foul, and foul, in respect ofnaturalgifts and abilities of mind. Some have great advantages above othersinthisrespect.

The natural spirits and organs ofthebody being more brisk and apt, the foul is morevegete,vigorous, and able to exert itself in its functions and operations. How clear,

†To status bishop ofAbulumhad so strong and firm a constitution to endure severe studies, that he is saidænea inteftina habuisse, to have had abodyofbrass.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.

nimble, and firm, are theapprehenfions, fancies, and memories of some fouls beyond others ! What a prodigy of memory, fancy, and judgment,was fatherPaultheVenetian ! and Suarez, of whom Strada faith, " Such was the strength of his parts,

"that he had all St. Augustine's works (the most copious and " various of all the fathers) as it were by heart, so that I have

"feenhim, faith he *, readilypointingwiththefingertoanyplace " orpagehedisputed of."

OurDr Reynolds excelled this way, to the astonishment of all thatknewhim,so that he was a living library, a third university.

But above all, the character given byVivesof Budaeus is amazing, That therewasnothing written in Greek or Latin which he had not turned over and examined; thatbothlanguages were alike to him, speaking either with more facility than he did the French, his mother tongue ; andallbythe penetrating force of his own natural parts, without a tutor ; "fo

" that + France never brought forth a man ofsharperwit, more "piercing judgment, exact diligence, and greater learning, nor,

" in his time, Italy itself." Foelix etfoecundum ingenium, quod inseunoinvenit, etdoctorem,etdiscipulum !Ahappyandfruitfulwit,which in itself found bothamasterandascholar! And yet

Pasquier relates what is much more admirable ofayoungman, who came toParis in the 20th year of his age, and in the year

1445 , which shewedhimselfso excellent and exact in all the arts, sciences, and languages, that if am an of an ordinary good wit, andfoundconstitution, should live anhundredyears, and during thattimestudy incessantly, without eating, drinking, sleeping, or any recreation, he could hardly attain to that perfection.

(3.) And yet a far greater difference is made betwixt one soul and another, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit of God.

This makes yet a greater disparity; for it alters and new-molds the frame andtemperofthe foul, and restores the loft image of God to it; byreasonwhereofthe righteous is truly said to be " more

" excellent than his neighbour," Prov. xii. 26.

Thisennobles the soul,and stamps the highest dignity andgloryuponit, that it is capable of in this world.

It is true, ithathnaturallyan excellencyandperpetuity in it aboveotherbeings; as cedarhath not onlyabeautyand fragrancy, but a soundness anddurability far beyond other trees of the wood: but when it comes under the *Satim quo loco quaquepagina dissernerit, eafuper re expedite docentem, abdigitocommonftratemfæpe vidimus.

L + Quo viro Gallia, acutiore ingenio, acriore judicio, exactiore diligent i a, majore eruditione, nullam unquamproduxit : hoc vero etate nec Italia quidem. Lud. Viv. in 17 cap,deCiv. Dei,

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. sanctification of the Spirit, then it is a cedar over-laid with gold.

(4.) Lastly, a wonderful difference will be made betwixt one soul and another, by the judgment of God in the great day.

Some will be blessed, and others cursed souls, Matth. xxv. 46. some received into glory, others shut out into everlasting misery; Matth. viii. 11 , 12. "Many shall come from the East, and " West, and shall fit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,

" in the kingdom of heaven; but the children of the kingdom " shall be cast out into outer darkness, there shall be weeping

" and gnashing of teeth." And that which will be the sting and aggravation of the difference which will then be made, will be this parity and equality in the nature and capacity of every soul: by reason whereof they, that perith, will find they were as naturally capable of blessedness, as those that enjoy it; and that it was their own inexcusable negligence and obstinacy that were their ruin.

Infer. 4. IfGodbethe immediate Creator, and former of the soul of man, Thenfin must needs involve the most unnatural evil in it, as it is an horrid violation of the very

III. The foul a law of nature. No title can be so full, fo created substance. absolute, as that which creation gives. How clear is this in the light of reason ? If God created my soul, then my soul had once no being at all : that it had still remained nothing, had not the pleasure of its Creator chosen and called it into the being it hath, out of the millions of mere possible beings : for as there are millions ofpossiblebeings, which yet are nothing; so there are millions of possible beings, which never shall be at all. So that since the pleasure, and power of God was the only fountain of my being, he needs must be the rightful owner of it.

What can be more his own, than that whose very being flowed merely from him, and which had never been at all, had he not called it out of nothing ?

And seeing the same pleasure of God, which gave it a being, gave it also a reasonable being, capable of, and fitted for moral government, by laws, which other inferior natures are incapable of; it must needs follow that he is the supreme governor, as well as the rightful owner of this foul.

Moreover, it is plain thathewhogave my soul its being, and such a being, gave it also all the good it ever had, hath, or shall have; and that it neither is, nor hath any thing but what is purely from him: and therefore he must needs be my most bountiful benefactor, as well as absolute owner, and supreme governor.

There is not a soul which he hath created but stands bound to him, in all these ties and titles. Now for such

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. a creature to turn rebelliously upon its absolute Owner, whose only, and wholly it is ; upon its supreme Governor, to whom it owes entire and absolute obedience ; upon its bountiful benefactor, from whom it hath received all, and every mercy it ever had, or hath ; to violate his laws, flight his sovereignty, despise his goodness, contemn his threatnings, pierce his very heart with grief, darken the glory of all his attributes, confederate with Satan his malicious enemy; and strike, as far as a creature can strike, at his very being (for in a sense, Omne peccatum eft Decidium, every sin strikes at the life and very existence of God) : Blush, Oheavens, at this, and be ye horribly afraid !

Ocursed fin, the evil of all evils, which no epithet can match ; nonameworse than its own can be invented, finfulfin.

This is as if some venomous branch should drop poison upon the root that bears it.

Love and gratitude to benefactors, is an indelible principle engravenby nature upon the hearts of all men.

It teacheth children to love and honour their parents, who yet are but mere instruments of their being. O how just must their perditionbe, who casting off the very bonds of nature, turn again with enmity against that God, in whom they both live, and move, and have their being ! O think, and think again,

*on what an * holy man oncefaid; What a fad charge will this be against many a man at the great day, when God shall fay,

Hadst thou been made a dog, I never had had so much dish on our as I have had ? It is pity God should not havehonourfrom the meanest creature that ever he made, from every pile of grass in the field, or stone in the street; much more that he should not have glory from a soul more precious and excellent than all the other works of his hands.

Surely it is better for us, our souls had still remained only in the number of possible beings, and had never had an actual existence in the second rank of beings, but a very little lower than the angels ; than that we should be still dishonouring God by them. O that he should be put to levy his glory from us passively; that it should be with us as it was with Nebuchadnezzar, from whom God had more glory when he was driven out amongst the beasts of the field, than when he fat on the throne. In like manner, his glory will rise passively from us, when driven out among devils, and not actively and voluntarily, as from the saints.

Infer. 5. If God create and inspire the reasonable foul immediately, This should instruct and incite all Christian parents to *Mr. Burrough's Excellency of the soul of man, p. 232,

VOL. III .

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. pray earneßly for their children, not only when they are born in to the world, but when they are at first conceived in the womb.

It is of great concernment both to us and our children, not only to receive them from the womb, with bodies perfectly and comely fashioned; but also with such fouls inspired into them, whereby they may glorify God to all eternity .

It is natural to parents to desire to have their children full and perfect in all their bodily members; and it would be a grievous affliction to see them come into the world defective, monstrous, and misshapen births; should a leg, an arm, an eye be wanting, such a defect would make their lives miserable, and the parents uncomfortable.

But how few are concerned with what foul they are born into the world ? "Good God, (faith † Musculus),

" how few shall we find,who are equally folicitous to have such " children as may live piously and honestly, as they are to leave

" them inheritances upon which they may live splendidly and " bravely ? " It pleaseth us to fee our own image stamped upon their bodies ; but, O ! how few pray, even whilst they are in the womb, that their souls may, in due time, bear the image of the heavenly, and not animate and use the members of their bodies, as weapons ofunrighteousess against the God that formed them?

Certainly, except they be quickenedwith such fouls, as may in this world be united with Christ, better had it been for them thattheyhadperishedin the womb, whilst theywerepureembryo's and had never come into the number and account of men and women ; for such embryo's go for nothing in the world, having only rudiments and rough draughts of bodies, never animated and informed by a reasonable foul, Job iii. 11 , 12.

But as soon as such a foul enters into them, though for never so little a time, it entails eternity upon them.

We also know that as soon as ever God breathes,or infuses their souls into them, fin presently enters, and death by fin, and that by us, as the instruments of conveying it to them : which should have the efficacy of a mighty argument with us to lay our prayers and tears for mercy in the very foundation of that union.

Think on this particularly, you that are mothers of children, when you find the fruit of the womb quickened within you, that you then bear a creature within you of more value than

†. Bone Deus ! quam paucos reperias qui tamfoliciti quomodò pie et honefte vivamfilii, quam curant ut amplam relinquant ill is hæreditatem qua post obitum illorumsplendideet otiofedeclientur?

Mufculus in 8 Gen.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.

all this visible world; a creature, upon whom, from that very moment, an eternity of happiness or misery is entailed; and therefore it concerns you to travailas in pain for theirfouls, before you feel the sorrows and pangs of travail for their bodies.

Owhat a pity is it, that a part ofyourselves should eternally perish! that so rare and excellent a creature as that you bear, should be cast away for ever, for want of a new creation fuperadded to that it hath already ! O let your cries and prayers for them, anticipate your kisses and embraces of them.

If you be faithful and successful herein, then happy is the womb that bears them; if not, happy had it been for them, that the knees had prevented them, and the breasts they have fucked. O ! ye cannot begin your suits for mercy too early for them, nor continue them to long, though your prayers measure all the time betwixt their conception and their death .

Infer. 6. Moreover, if God hath created our souls vital substances, to animate and act those bodies, How in. difpenfably necessary is it thatfucha principle of spiritual life, do quicken and govern that foul which

IV. A vital substance. quickens and governs our bodies and all the membersofthem ? Otherwise, though in a naturalfenfe we have livingfouls, yet they are dead whilst they live.

The apostle, in 1 Cor. xv. 45, 46., compares the animal life we live, by the union of our souls and bodies, with the spiritual life we live, by the union of our souls with Jesus Christ.

And so it is written, (viz. in my text), "The first man Adam " was made a living foul, the lastAdam was made a quickening

Spirit." He opposes the animal to the spiritual life, and the twoAdams, fromwhomtheycome; andshews, in both respects, the excellency of the spiritual above the animal life ; not in point of priority, for that which is natural is before that which is spiritual, (and it must be so, because the natural foul is the recipient subject of the Spirit's quickening and sanctifying operations); but in point of dignity and real excellency.

To how little purpose, or rather to what a dismal and miserable purpose are we made living fouls, except the Lord from heaven, by his quickening power, make us spiritualandholy fouls ? The natural foul rules and uses the body, as an * artificer doth his tools: and except the Lord renew it by grace, Satan will rule that which rules thee, and fo all thy members will be instruments of X 2

* The body bears resemblance to an organ, the soul to an artist.

Iren. b. 2.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.

"iniquity to fight against God. "The actions performed by our bodies, are justly reputed and reckoned by God to the " foul †," because the soul is the spring of all its motions, the fountain of its life and operations.

What it doth by the body, its instrument, is, as if it were done immediately by itself ; for without the soul itcandonothing .

Infer. 7. Moreover, from the immaterial and spiritual nature of the soul, we are inV. A spiritual substance. formed, That communion with God, and the enjoyment of him, are the true and proper intentions andpurposesforwhich the soul of man was created.

Such a nature as this, is not fitted to live upon gross, material, and perishing things, as the body doth.

The food of every creature is agreeable to its nature; one cannot fubfift upon that what another doth: as we fee among the several forts of animals, what is food to one, is none to another.

In the fame plant is found a root which is food for swine, a stalk which is food for theep, a flower which feeds the bee, a feed on which the bird lives: the theep cannot live upon the root, as the swine doth; nor the bird upon the flower, as the bee doth : but every one feeds upon the different parts of the plant, which are agreeable to its nature.

So it is here, our bodies being of an earthly, material nature, can live upon things earthly and material, as most agreeable to them; they can relish and fuck out the sweetness of these things; but the soul can find nothing in them suitable to its nature and appetite; it must have-spiritual food, or perish. It were therefore too brutish and unworthy of a man that understood the nature of his own soul, to chear it up with the stores of earthly provision made for it, as he did, Luke xii. 20. " I will say to my soul, Soul, thou haft

" much goods laid up for many years, take thine ease, eat, " drink, and be merry."

Alas ! the soul can no more eat, drink, and be merry with carnal things,than thebodycan with spiritual and immaterial things : it cannot feed upon bread that perisheth, it can relish no more in the best and daintiest fare of an earthly growth, than the white of an egg: but bring it to a reconciled God in Christ, to the covenant of grace, and the sweet promises of the gospel; set before it the joys, comforts and earnests of the Spirit; and if it be a sanctified renewed foul, it can make a rich feast upon these.

These make it a feast of + Omnia quocunquefecerit corpus, five bonum,five malum, anima reputantur.

Origen in Job.

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165. fat things, full of marrow, as it is expressed, Ifa. xxv. 6. Spiritual things are proper food for spiritual and immaterial fouls.

Infer. 8. The spiritual nature of the soul farther informs us, That no acceptable service

VI. A spiritual canbeperformed to God, except the soul be emsubstance. ployedand engaged therein.

The body hath its part and share in God's worship, as well as the soul ; but its part is in considerable, in comparison ; Prov. xxiii. 26. " My son give me thy heart," i. e. thy soul, thy spirit.

The holy and religious acts of the foul are suitable to the nature of the object of worship: John iv. 24. " God is a Spirit, and 66 they that worship him, must worship him in spirit and in " truth."

Spirits only can have communion with that great Spirit.

They were made spirits for that very end, that they might be capable of converse with the Father of Spirits,

They that worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth ;" that is, with inward love, fear, delight, and desires of foul, that is, to worship him in our spirits; and in truth, i. e. according to the rule of his word which prescribes our duty.

+ Spirit respects the inward power; truth the outward form.

The former strikes at hypocrisy, the latter at superstition and idolatry: the one opposes the inventions of our heads, the other the loofeness and formality of our hearts.

No doubt but the serviceofthebody is due to God, and expected by him: for both the souls and bodies of his people are bought with a price, and therefore he expects we glorify him with our fouls and bodies, which are his: but the service of the body is not accepted of him, otherwise than it is animated and enlivened by an obedient foul, and both sprinkled with the blood of Christ.

Separate from these, bodily exercise profits nothing, 1Tim. iv. 8.

What pleasure can God take in the fruits and evidences of mens hypocrisy ? Ezek. xxxiii. 31."God

Holy Paul appeals to God in this matter; Rom. i. 9.

" is my witness (faith he)whom I serve with my spirit;" q.d.

I ferveGodinmy spirit, and he knows that I do fo.

I dare appeal to him who searches my heart, that it is not idle and unconcerned in his service. The Lord humble us, the best of us, for our careless, dead, gadding, and vain spirits, even when we are engaged inhisfolemn services. Oh that we were once fo spiritual, tofollowevery excursion from his fervicewith agroan, and retract every wandering thought with a deep sigh! Alas, a coldandwandering spirit in duty is the disease ofmoftmen, and the very temper and constitution of unsanctified ones. It is a weighty and excellentexpreffion of the Jews, in their Eucho-

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. logium or prayer-book, " * Wherewithal shall I come before " his face, unless it be with my spirit? For man hath nothing

" more precious to present to God than his soul."

Indeed it isthebestman hath: thy heart is thy totum posse: it is all that thou art able to present to him.

If thou cast thy soul into thy duty, thoudost as the poor widow did, cast in all that thou haft : and in such an offering the great God takes more pleasure than in all the external, costly,pompous ceremonies,adorned temples, and external devotions in the world.

It is a remarkable and astonishing expression of his own in this case, Ifa. lxvi. 1, 2.

*Thus faith the Lord, The heaven is my throne, and the earth " is my footstool: Where is the house thatye built me? and "where is the place of my rest ? For all these things have

" mine hands made, and all these things have been, faith the " Lord; but unto this man will I look,eventohim that is poor,

" and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word;" q. d.

Think not to please me with magnificent temples, and adorned altars; if I had pleasure in such things, heaven is a more glorious throne than any you can build me; and yet I have more delight in a poor contrite spirit,that trembles with an holy awe and reverence at my word, than I have in heaven or earth, or all the works of my hands in either.

Oh ! if there had been more trembling at his word, there had not been such trembling as now there is, under fears of the loss and removal of it.

Some can superftitiously reverence and kiss the sacred dust of the sanctuary, as they call it, and express a great deal of zeal for the externals of religion, but littleconsiderhow small the interest of these things is in religion, and how little God looks at, or regards them.

Infer. 9. How much more are the spirits of men funk by fin, he low the dignity and excellency of their nature ?

Our souls are spirits by nature, yet have they naturally no delight in things spiritual: they decline that which is homogeneal and suitable to spirits, and relish nothing but what is carnal and unsuitable to them.

How are its affections inverted and misplaced by fin! That noble, spiritual, heaven-born creature the soul, whose element and centreGod alone should be, is now fallen into a deep oblivion both of God and itself, and wholly spends its strength in the pursuit of sensual and earthly enjoyments, and becomes a mere drudge and slave to the body.

Car- *םאיכובגיבפ רשפנמ רבבנ שאילזדא ' יכיחורכ םרקא המח h. e. Qua re pot i us preæveniamfaciem eujus, nisi

Spiritumeo ? nihil enim eft homini preciofius animafua

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nal things now measureoutand govern its delights and hopes, its fears and sorrows. Oh ! how unseemly is it, to behold such a high-born spirit lacqueying up and down the world in the service of the perishing flesh.

" Their heart (faith the prophet) " goeth after their covetousness," Ezek. xxxiii. 31. as a servant atthebeck or nod of his master.

Oh, how many are there to be found in every place who meltdown the precious affections and strength of their souls,

"Ye in sensitive brutish pleasures and delights ? James v. 5.

" have lived in pleasures upon earth," as the fish in the waters, or rather as the eel in the mud; never once lifting up a thought or desire to the spiritual and eternal pleasures that are at God's right hand.

Our creation did not set us so low; we are made capable of betterandhigher things.

Goddidnot inspire such a noble, excellent, spiritual foul into us, merely to salt our bodies,or carry them up and down this world for a few years, to gaze at the vanities of it.

It was a greatsayingof an Heathen, " I am greater, and born to greater things, than that I should be a slave to my body † . " We have a spirit about us, that might better understand its original, and know it is not so base a being, as its daily employments speak it to be.

The Lord raise our apprehenfions to a due value of the dignity of our own souls, that we may turn from these sordid employments with a generous disdain, and set our affections on what is agreeable to, and worthy of an high-born spirit.

Infer. 10. Is the soul of man a vital, spiritual, and immortalfubftance ? Then it is no wonder, that we find the resentments and impressions of the worldtocome, naturally engravenupon thefouls ofmenalltheworldover. These impressions and sentiments of another life after this, do as na . turally and necessarily spring out of an immortal nature, as branches fpringout ofthebodyofatree, or feathers out of the VII. The soul an immortal substance. body of a bird. So fairly and firmly are the characters and impressions of the life to come sealed upon the immortal spirits ofallmen, that no man can offer violence to this truth, but he must also do violence to his own soul, and unman himself by the denial of it, who feels not a cheariness to spring from his absolving, and an horror from his accusing conscience ? neither of whichcouldrife from any other principle than this. We are

†Majorfum, et admajoranatus, quam ut corporis meifim mancipium.

Seneca.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. beingsconfcious to ourselves of a future state,and that our souls do not vanish when our breath doth; that we cease not to be, when we cease to breath .

And this is common to the most barbarous and savage Heathens : " They shew (faith the apostle) the work of the law

" written in their hearts, their consciences also bearing them 66 witness, and their thoughts in the mean time accusing, or " else excusing one another."

By the work of the law, understand the sum and substance of the ten commandments, comprising the duties to be done, and the fins to be avoided.

This work of the law is said to be written upon the hearts of the Gentiles, who had no external written law; upon their hearts it was written, though many of them gave themselves over to all uncleanness ; and they shewed or gave evidence and proof, that there was such a law written upon their hearts.

They shewed it two ways : (1.) Some of them shewed it in their temperance, righteousness, and moral honesty, wherein they excelled many of us, who have far greater advantages and obligations...(2.) In the efficacy of their consciences ; which, as it clearedandcomforted them for things well done; so it witnessed against them, yea, judged and condemned them for things ill done.

And these evidences of a law written on the heart are to be found, wherever men are to be found.

Their ignorance andbarbarity cannot stifle these sentiments, and impressions ofa future state, and a just tribunal to which all must come. And the universality of it plainly evinces, that it springs not out of education, but the very nature of an immortal soul.

Let none say that these universal impressions are but the effects of an universal tradition, which have been, time out of mind, spread among the nations of the world: for as no such universal tradition can be proved; so if it could, the very pro pension that is found in the minds of all men living, to embrace and close with the proposals ofa life to come, will evince the agreeableness of them to the nature of an immortal soul.

Yea, the natural closing of the foul with these proposals, will amount to an evidence of the reality and existence of those invisible things.

For as the natural senses, and their organs, prove that there are colours, founds, favours, and juices ; as well as, or rather because there are eyes, ears, &c. naturally fitted to close with, and receive them ; so it is here, if the foul naturally looks beyond the line of time, to things eternal, and cannot bound and confine its thoughts and expectations within the too narrow limits ofpresentthings,furelythere is such a future state, as well as fouls made apprehensive of it, andpropense to close

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with the discoveries thereof.

So natural are the notions of a 'future late to the souls of men, that those who have set themselvesdesignedly to banish them, and struggled hard to suppress them, as things irksome and grievous to them, giving interruption to their sensual lusts and pleasures ; yet still these apprehensions have returned upon them, and gotten a just victory over all their objections and prejudices ; they follow themwherefoever they go ; they can no more flee from them, than from themselves ; whereby theyevidencethemselves to be natural and indelible things.

Infer. 11. Hath God endued the soul of man with understanding, will, and affections, whereby it is made capable of knowing, loving, and enjoy withunderstandingGod? It is then no wonder to find the maing,will,andafliceand envy of Satan engaged against man, more than any other creature, and against the sections. foul of man, rather than any thing else in man.

VIII. Endued Itgrates that Spirit of envy, to see the soul of man adorning and preparing, by fanctification, to fill that place in glory from which he fell irrecoverably.

It cut Haman to the very heart, to see thehonour that was done toMordecai; much more doth it grate and gall Satan, to fee what Jesus Christ hath purchased. and designed for the souls of men. Other creatures being naturally incapable of this happiness,do therefore escape his fury ; butmen shall be sure to feel it, as far as he can reach them ;

1 Pet. v. 8. " Your adversary the devil, goeth about like a roar- " ing lion, seeking whom he may devour." He walks to and fro; that speaks his, diligence ; seeking whom he may devour that speaks his design; his restlessness in doing mischief, is all the rest and relief he hath in his own torments.

It is a mark of pure and perfect malice, to endeavour to destroy, though he knows he shall never be successful in his attempts. We read of many bodies possessed by him; but he never takes up his quarters in the body of any but with design to mischief the soul. No room but the best in the house will satisfy him ; no blood so sweet to him as foul-blood.

If he raise persecution against the bodies of men, it is to destroy their souls : holiness is that he hates, and happiness is the object of his envy : the soul being the subject of both, is therefore pursued by him as his prey.

Infer. 12. Upon the consideration, both of its excellent nature, and divine original, it follows, That the corruption anddefacingoffuchanexcellent creature by fin, deserves to be lamented,

VOL . III.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man.. and greatly bewailed; and the recovery of it, by fanctification, to be studied, and diligently prosecuted, as the great concern of allmen.

What a beautiful and blessed creature was the soul of man at first, whilst it stood in its integrity ? His mind was bright, clear, and apprehensive of the law and will of God: His will chearfully complied therewith ; his sensitive appetite and inferior powers stood in an obedient fubordination. God made man upright, Ecclef. vii. 29.

רשו streight, and equal, bending to neither extreme.

The law of God was fairly engravenupon the table of his heart.

Principles of holiness and righteousness were inlayed in the frame of his mind, fitting him for an exact and punctual discharge of his duties both toGodandman,

This was the foundness of his constitution, the healthful temper of his inner man, whereby it became the very region of light, peace, purity, and pleasure.

For think how serene, lightfome, and placid the state of the soul must be, in which there was no obliquity, not a jar with the divine will ; but joy and peace continually transfused through all its faculties !

But fin hath defaced its beauty, razed out the divine image which was its glory, and stamped the image of Satan upon it ; turned all its noble powers and faculties against the author and fountain of its being. Surely if all the posterity of Adam,from the beginning to the end of the world, should do nothing else but weep and sigh for the fin and misery of the fall, it could not be fufficientlydeplored : Other sins, like single bullets, kill particular persons; but Adam's fin, like a chain-shot, mowed down all mankind at once.

It murdered himself actually, all his posterity virtually, and Christ himself occasionally.

Oh ! what a black train ofdoleful consequents attend this fin! It hath darkned the bright eye of the soul's understanding, 1 Cor. ii. 14. made its complying and obedient will stubborn and rebellious, Job v. 40. rendered his tender heart obdurate and senseless, Ezek. xxxvi. 26. filled its serene and peaceful contciencewithguilt and terror, Tit. i. 15. The consideration of these things is very humbling, and shouldcausethose that glory in their high and illustrious descents, to wrap their silver star in Cypress, and cover all their glory with a mourning veil. But this is but one part of their duty.

How should this consideration provoke us to apply ourselves with the most serious diligence, to recover our loft beauty and dignity, in the way of sanctification ! This is the great, and most properute of the fall, as Mufculus excellently speaks ; ut

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gratiam Christo eofubnixius ambiamus, to inflame our desires the more vehemently after grace.

Sanctification restores the beauty of the soul, which fin defaced,Eph. iv. 25. Col. iii. 10.

Yea, it restores it with this advantage, that it shall never be lost again; holiness is the beauty of God impress'd upon the soul, and the impression is everlasting.

Other beauty is but a fading flower : Time will plough deep furrows upon the fairest faces, but this will be fresh to eternity.

All moral virtues, homilitical qualities, which adorn and beautify nature, and make it attractive and lovely in the eyes of men, are but separable accidents, which discinds and crops off like a sweet flower from the stalk, Job. iv. 21. " Doth not their

" excellency that is in them go away ?" But fanctification is inseparable, and will ascend with the soul into heaven.

Oh ! that God would set the glass of the law before us, that we may fee what defiled fouls we have by nature, that we might come by faith to Jesus Christ, who cometh to us by water and by blood, 1 John v. 6.

Infer. 13. To conclude. Upon the consideration of the whole matter before us, if this excellent creature the soul receive both its being and excellencies from God ; Then he that formed it must needs have the full, and only right to possess and use it, and is therefore most injuriously kept out of the possession of it by unfanctifiedand disobedient persons.

The soul of man is a building of God; he hath laid out the treasures of his wisdom, power, and goodness in this noble structure ; he built it for an habitation for himself to dwell in ; and indeed such noble rooms as the understanding, will, and affections, are too good for any other to inhabit.

But fin hath set open the gates of this hallowed temple, let in the abomination which maketh desolate.

All the doors of the soul are barred, and chained up against Christ, by ignorance and infidelity ; he seeks for admission into the soul which he made, but findeth none. A forcible entry he will not make; but expects when the will shall bring him the keys of the soul, as to its rightful owner.

So he expresseth himself to us in Rev. iii. 20.

Behold I stand at the door and knock : If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come into him, and sup

" with him, and he with me."

His standing at the door, denotes his earnest desire and patient waiting, in the use of all those means that are introductive of Jesus Christ into the souls of men.

His knocking, signifies the various essays he makes by "

Y 2

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. ordinances and providences externally, and the convictions and perfuafions of his spirit, and the consciences of sinners internal ly: Every call of the word, and every conviction of conscience is a call, a knock from heaven, at the door of the soul, for admission of Christ into it. By the soul's hearing his voice, and openingthedoor, understand its approbation, and consent to the motion and offer of God. By Christ's coming in, is meant his uniting that foul unto himself that opens to him.

And as his coming in denotes union, so his supping with the soul, and the soul with him, denotes his sweet communion; imperfect here, compleat and full in heaven.

O the admirable condescensions of God to poor sinners ! The God that formed you with a word, and can as easily ruin you with a frown, yet waits at the gates of your souls for admission into them.

There be many souls within the found of this complaint, that have kept God out of his own right all their days.

They have shut out Jesus Christ, and delivered up their souls to Satan: If he but knock by a flight temptation, the door is presently opened; but Jesus Christ may wait in vain upon them from sabbath to sabbath, and from year to year : But the longest day of his patience hath an end ; and there is a refusal of grace, after which no more tenders of mercy shallever be made.

What say you, Souls ? Will you at last open the door to Jesus Christ , or will you still exclude him ? If you will open to him, he will not come empty-handed, he will bring a feast with him, such a feast as you never tasted any thing like it in your lives : But, if you will not open to him, then Icallheaven and earth to witness against you this day, that you have once barred the doors of your soul against him, whose pleasure and power gave them their very beings ; against him, who is their sovereign Lord, and rightful owner: And consequently this act of yours must stop your mouths, and deprive you of all pleas and apologies when you shall knock hereafter at the door of mercy, and God shallever thut it up against you, according to his just,but dreadful threatnings, Mat. vii. 22. Prov. i. 24, 25.

And thus much of the divine original,and excellent nature of thefoulofman.

Having taken a view of this excellent creature the soul, in o peningtheformerproposition ; we come next to the consideration of its union with the body, in this second propofiti

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Doct. II. That thefouls and bodiesofmen are knit together, by thefeeblebandofthe breath in their nostrils.

" There is (faith a learned * man)no greater mystery inn a- " ture, than the union betwixt the soul and body; that a mind

" and spirit should be so tied and linkedwithaclodofclay, that " while that remains in a due temper, it cannot by any art or

" power free itself.

Itcanbyanact of the will move an hand, " or a foot, or thewholebody,butcannotmove from it one inch.

" If it move hither, or thither, or, by a leap upward do ascend " a little, the body still follows it; it cannot shake or throw it

" off.

We cannot take ourselves out; by any allowable means " we cannot; norbyany at all (that are at least, within mere

" human power) as long as the temperament lasts.

While that " remains, we cannot go; if that fail, we cannot stay ; tho' there be so many open avenues (could we suppose any mate- " rial bounds to them in, or exclude a spirit) we cannotgo

" out or in at pleasure. A wonderful thing! and I wonder "wenomorewonderatourownmakeandframes in this respect.

What so much a-kin are a mind and a peace of earth, aclod and a thought, that they should be thus affixed to one

" another ?"

My design here is to shewby what ligament, tie, or bond it hath pleased the great and wife Creator, to affix and link these, so different parts of man together: And this Moses in the text tells us, is no other but the breath of his nostrils .

The breath and foul of man are two distinct things.

His breath is not his soul, nor his soul his breath, but the nexus or bend that couples and unites his soul and body in a personal union.

The body hath no life in itself, but its life results from its union with the soul, Jam. ii. 26.

This union is maintained by the breath of our nostrils, which upon that account is here called the breath of life.

Breath is an act of life, proceeding from the souls union with its body, and ending with the dissolution of it.

Life is continued by its refpi. ration, and ended by its expiration.

Whilst What breath is. we live, and whilst breath is in our bodies, are termsfynonimous.

That little quantity of air, which we thus breathe in, and out at our nostrils, is more to us, than all the three regions of air, which fill up the vast space between earth and heaven.

It is, inafenfe, our life.

For this use and office of respiration, the lungs were formed Mr. How in a funeral Sermon, p. 9, 10.

A Treatise of the Soul of Man. andplacedwhere they are, not without the most wife counsel and direction of God. They are that organ

What the lungs in the † Body, which, by the help of that are. artery called arteria trachea, leading to them asa channel, for the passage of air from the mouth and nostrils, the air is transmitted to, and ventilated by them for the refreshment of the ‡ heart, and exhalingthefumes thereof.

The heart hath continual need of such a vent and refreshment; and therefore the lungs, like a pair of bellows, must be kept continually going. No longer than breath is going, is the heart a dying; that which stops the one, suffocates the other.

And here we may, with admiration, contemplate the wondders by which our lives are continued.

These lungs are the most frail and tender part of the body, and kept in continual motion and agitation ; yet are made serviceable for seventy or eighty years together, which is the wonder of providence.

Were a piece of brass, iron or steel, kept in continual and incessant use, it would not endure half the time.

In a word, the heart that noble part of the body, is the shop wherein the spirits are labouredand prepared, which therefore is in continual motion and heat ; and so needs continual cooling and refreshing. We can live no longer than it labours, it can labour no longer than it is refreshed and cooled by respiration.

Godhaththerefore prepared the lungs for this service; which being ofa thin, porous, and spungy substance, can easily be

† The lungs are the instrument of breathing and respiration ; to the lungs there lead a pipe,which is calledthewind-pipe, formed for two uses, &c.

‡ The heart is moved by a twofold motion, namely, that of its contraction, and dilatation, whereby its innate heat is mitigatedand cooledbymeans of the air fuck'd in.

Alsted. Theol. Nat.p. 614- |Because the heart is the fountain of life, and the laborious forge where the animal spirits are framed; so that being in the posture of a pendulum, it is agitated bya perpetual motion; by which means it is vehemently heated, even to so great a degree, that, unless that heat was moderated by respiration, of necessity it would happen, that both the natural heat and moisture would be destroyed by the excessive heatoftheheart.

The lungs are nothing else but a certain kind ofnaturalbellows, which by being dilated, draw in the air and transmit it to the heart, so that the heart, though always hot, is cooled by the air ; which air, after being warmed within the recesses of the heart, is again sent out from the heart into the lungs, which by contracting themselves, emit it again by expiration. Keckerm, Phys.p.

560-70.

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dilated and contracted. By dilating themselves, they attract and fuck in the air into themselves; first duly to prepare and temper it, and then communicate it to the heart for its refreshment ; which being quickly heated in the heart, is again breathed out by the lungs, by contracting themselves again.

This double motion of inspiration and expiration, we call respiration; and this respiration is the bond that holds our souls and bodies together.

And indeed, this is but a feeble bond, a very slender and weak thread, which holds our souls and bodies in union. What more volatile, evanid and uncertain, than a puff of breath ?

The nostrils are the outer door of the body, our breath is continually in our nostrils; and how soon may that depart, which is day and night at the door, as if it were still taking leave of us ? Our breath is always going ; and what is still going, will be gone at last. How small a difference is there betwixt respiration and expiration, a breathing and a breathless luinp of clay? Breath cannot continue long, and life cannot stay amo ment behind it, Psal. civ. 29. "Thou takest away their breath,

" they die, and return to their dust." Life is breath given, and death is breath taken away. The breath of man is like a written sentence, in which there are divers comma's, or short pauses, after which speedily follows a full stop, and there's an end of it.

Some conceive Solomon points at the continual motion of the lungs, in that figurative and elegant description of the death of man, * Ecclef. xii. 6. " Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or " the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the " fountain, or the wheel be broken at the cistern." " The " double motion of the lungs he seems here to compare to the " double motion of the buckets ina well; the turn of the wheel

" sends one down, and draws the other up."

But as we use to say proverbially, The bucket or pitcher that goes fo often to the cistern or well, is broken at last : So much we say of these, they will fail at last.

One fitting by the bed-side of a dying person, sighed out this compassionate expression, Ah! quid fumus ? His sick friend hearing it, replyed Pulvis et umbra fumus, dust, a shadow, a puff of wind. The wind without us is fickle and inconstant to a proverb, and so is that within us

*The lungs are like the pulleys ofa cistern, for as the pulley first lets down thebuckes into the well, then raises it again, in like manner, the lungs by a perpetual motion attract and expel the air. Al

Sted. Theol.nat. p. 623 .

Treatise of the Soul of Man. too. Many grudge at the shortness of life; but considering the feebleness of this bond,we have more cause to wonder at the flowness of death.

For let us feriouslyconfider the frailty of our breath, on a double account, viz.

1. In respect of our breathing instruments.

2. Or of breath-stopping accidents.

1. Great is the frailty of our breathing instruments.

What is flesh but weakness ? even the most solid and substantial; it is as fading grass, Ifa. xl. 6. " But our † lungs are the most lax, spungy, and tender of all flesh, if that which is so airy, light,

**andspumous, deserves the name of flesh." And as it is the mostfrail of all flesh,so it isincontinualmotion,labouringnight and day, without rest or intermission; and that which wants alternate rest cannot be durable. We see motion wears out the wheels of the watch, though made of brass ; but our Strength

(as Job speaks) is not the strength of stones; nor our bones (the most solid, much less our lungs the most frailand feeble parts) of brass.

Beside, 2. There are a multitudeofbreath-stooping accidents,which may,and dailydobeat the laftbreath out of mens nostrils, beforeanydecay of nature cause it to expire.

Many mortal diseases are incident to these frail and tender parts.

Phthifics, interenations, ulcers, easily bar the passage of our breath there; yea, and lighter accidents, which immediately touch not that part, are sufficient to stop our breath, and dislodge our fouls. A fly, agnat, the stone ofa rafin, a crumb of bread,haveoftendone it.

There is not a pore in the body, but is a door large enough to let in death, nor a creature fo despicably small,but is strong enough (if God commission ate it) to serve a writ of ejection upon the soul: The multitudes of diseases are fo many lighted candles putto this slender thread of our breath, besides the infinitediversityofexternal accidents,by which multitudes daily perish. So that there are as great and astonishing wonders in our preservation, as in our creation.

Infer.

1. How admirable then is the mystery of providence in the daily continuation of the breath of our nostrils?

That our breath is yet inournottrils is only from hence, that he who breathed itintothemat first is our life, and the length of

our days, as it is Deut. xxx. 20. It is because our breath is in his hand, Dan. v. 23. not in our own, nor in our enemies hands.

Till he take it away, none shall be able to do it; Psal. civ. 29.

+ The substance of the lungs isa lax spungy airy kind of flesh, and like thecoagulated from blood.

Alsted. Theol. nat. p. 623.

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" Thou takest awaytheirbreath, they die, and return to their " dust."

It is neither food, nor physic, but God in and by them, that " holdethour fouls in life," Psal. lxvi. 9. We hang every moment of our life over the grave, and the gulph of eternity, by this slender thread of our breath : But it cannot break, how feeble soever it be, till the time appointed be fully come. If it be not extinguished and suffocated, as others daily are, it is because he puts none of these diseases upon us, as it is Exod.xv.

26. or if he do, yet he is Jehovah Rophe, the Lord that healeth us, as it follows in that text.

We live in the midst of cruel enemies, yea, among them " that breathe out cruelty," as the pfalmist complaineth, Psal. xxvii. 12. Such breath would quickly suffocate ours, did not he, in whose hand ours is, wonderfully prevent it. Oh what cause have we to employ, and spend that breath in his praise, who works to many daily wonders to secure it !

Infer. 2. Is it but a puffof feeble breath which holds our foulsandbodies in union? Then every man is deeply concerned to make allhaste, to take all possible care and pains to secure a better, and more durable habitation for his foul in heaven, whilst yet itfojourns in this frail tabernacle of the body.

The time is at hand,when all these comely and active bodies shall befo many breathless car cases, no more capable of any ufeor service for our souls than the seats you fit on, or the dead bodies that lie under your feet. Your breath is yet in your nostrils, and all the means and seasons of salvation will expire with it; and then it will be as impossible for the best minister in the world to help your souls, as for the ablest Physician to recover your bodies. As physiccomes too late for the one, fo counsels andperfuafions for the other.

Three Things are worth thinking on in this matter.

1. That you are not without the hopes and possibilities of salvation, whilst the breath of life is in your nostrils. A mercy,(how lightly foeveryouvalue it) that would ravish with joy thosemiferable fouls that have already shot the gulf of eternity, and turn the shrieks and groans of the damned unto joyful shouts and acclamations of praise.

Poor wretch, consider what thoureadest; that thy foul is not yet in Christ, is thy greatest misery; but that yet it may be inChritt, is an unspeakable mercy; thoughthysalvationbenotyetfecured, yet what a mercy is it that it is notdefperate?

2. When this uncertain breath is once expired, the last hope

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Treatise of the Soul of Man. ofeveryunregeneratepersonisgone forever: It is as impossible to recover hope, as it is to recover your departed breath, or recal the day that is past.

When the breath is gone, the compofitum is dissolved; we cease to be what we now are, and our life is as water spilton the ground, which shall not be gathered up till the resurrection.

Our life is carried like a precious liquor in a brittle glass, which death breaks to pieces. The spirit is immediately presentedtoGod, and fixed in its unalterable state, Heb. ix. 27.

All means of salvation now cease for ever ; no ambaffadorsof peacearesenttothedead; no more calls or strivings of the spirit: no more space for repentance. O ! what an inconceiva blew eight hathGodhangedon a puffofbreath !

3. And lince matters stand thus, it is to be admired what shift men make to quiet themselves in so dangerous a state as most fouls live in; quietandunconcerned, and yet but onepuff ofbreathbetwixtthem and hell ! O the stupifying and befottingnature of fin ! O the efficacy and power of spiritual delusions ! Are our lives such a throng and hurry of business, that we have no time togoalone and thinkwhereweare, and where we shortly must be ? What shall I say ? If bodily concerns be so weighty, and the matters of eternity such trifles; if meat and drink, and trade and children, be such great things, and Christ, and the soul, and heaven, hell and the world to come, such little things in your eyes, you will not be long in that opinion, I dare

!i affureyou.

Infer. 3. Is the tie so weak betwixt ourfouls and bodies?How closeandnearthendo all ourfouls confine and border upon eternity?

There is no more but a puff of breath, a blast of wind betwixt this world and that to come. Avery short step betwixt time and eternity : There is a breath which will be our last breath: refpirationmust, and will terminate in expiration : The dead are the inhabitants, and the living are borderers upon the invisible world.

This confiderationdefervesadwelling place in the hearts ofallmen, whether, I.Regenerate, or II. Unregenerate.

I. Regenerate fouls should ponder this with pleasure. O it is transporting tothinkhowsmalla matter is betwixt them and theircompletefalvation. No sooner is your breath gone, but the full desire of your hearts is come; everybreathyoudraw, draws you a degree nearer to your perfect happiness ; Rom. xiii. II.

" Now is your falvationnearer thanwhenyou believed ;" therefore, both your chearfulness, and diligence should be greater

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than when you were in the infancy of your faith.

You have runthroughaconsiderable part of your Christiancourseand race, and are now come nearer the goal and prize of eternal life.

O despond not, loiter not now at last, who were so fervent and zealous in the beginning.

It is transporting to thinkhownear you approach the region oflightandjoy. O that you would distinctly confider,

1. Where you lately were.

2. Where now you are.

3. Where shortly you shall be.

1.You that are now so near salvation, were lately very near unto damnation, there was but a puff of breath betwixt you and hell. How many nights did you sleep securely in the state of nature and unregeneracy ? How quietly did you rest upon the brink of hell, not once imagining the danger you were in ?

Had any of those sickneffes you then suffered, been suffered by God, like a candle, to burn asunder this slender thread of life, which was so near them, you had been as miserable, and as hopeless, as those that now are roaring in the lowest hell.

I haveheardofone thatridover a dangerous bridge in the night, who, upon the review of the place next day, fell into a swoon, when he was sensible of that danger which the darkness of the nighthidfromhim. O reader, shallnotanescapefromhell affect thee, as much as such anescapewoulddo?

2. It is no less marvellous to confider where you now are ; you that were afar off are now made nigh, Eph. ii. 13 ,

You that were not beloved, are now beloved, Rom. ix. 25.

You were in the state of death and condemnation.

You are now passedfromdeath to life, by your free justification, I John iii.

14. Your union with Christ hath set you free from condemnation, Rom. viii. 1. Die you must though Christ be in you, but there is no hazard, or hurt in your death.

The stopping of your breath can put no stop to your happiness, it will hasten, not hinder it: If the pale horse come for you, heaven, not hell will now follow him ; your fins are pardoned, the covenant of your salvation sealed. Death is disarmed of its fatal sting ; and what then should hinder you from a like triumph, even upon your death-bed with that, I Cor, xv. 55. "O death, where is thy

" sting ? O grave, where is thy victory ?

Z2 * He says this, because the faithful hadbeenwhen they firstbelievedmorediligent and chearful in good works, butafterwards grew cold, or turned lukewarm.

Eftius on the place.

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3. And yet you have more room for joy, whilst you confiderwhere you must, and shall shortly be. You are now in Christ, but in a few days you shall be with Christ as well as in him; it is well now, but it will be better e'er long. Your fin is now fully pardoned, but not fully purged out of your souls.

Your persons are freed from guilt, but your hearts are not either freed from filth or grief: But in a little time you shall be abso lutely and eternally freed from both.

Your present condition is in heaven, compared with your former, and your future state will be in heaven indeed, compared with your present.

" path of the just is as the shining light, which shineth more "The " and more unto the perfect day," Prov. iv. 18 .

II. But on the other side, what meditation canbemore starthng and amazing to all the unregenerate, and christless world?

Ponder it, thou poor christless, and unsanctified soul. Get thee out of the noise and clamour of this world,which makes such a continualdin in thine ears, and confider how thou hangest over the mouth of hell itself, by the feeble threed which is spun every moment out of thy nostrils ; as soon as that gives way, thouartgone for ever.

What shiftdoyou make to quiet your fears, and eat, drink, and labour with anypleasfure ? It is storied ofDionyfius the tyrant, that when Damocles would have flattered him into a conceit of the perfection of his happiness, ashe was an absolute sovereign prince, and could do what he pleased with others, as his vassals ; Dionyfius, to confute his fancy, caused him to be placed at a table richly furnished, and attended with the most curious music, but just over his head hanged as harp and heavy sword by one single hair; which when Damocles saw, no meat would godownwith him,but he earnestly begged for a discharge from that place.

This is the lively emblem of the condition, thou unregenerateman.

There are three things in thy state, sadly opposed to the former state last described.

1. The state you were born in, was bad.

2. The state you are now in, is worse.

3. The state you shall shortly be in, if you thus continue, will be unspeakably worst of all .

1. The state you were born in, was a fad state ; you were born in fin, Psal. li. 5. and under wrath, Eph. ii. 3. The womb of nature cast you forth into this world, defiled and condemned creatures .

2. The state you are in now, is much worse than that you were born in : for what have you been doing ever since you were born, but treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath

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* :

Rom. ii. 5. For every sand of time which run out of the glass of God's patience towards you, a drop of wrath hath been running into the vialsofhis indignation against you .

Oh! what a treasure of fin and wrath then, is laid up in fomany years as you have, lived in sin! Every fin committed, every mercy abused, every call of God neglected, and flighted, adds fiill more and more to this treasure.

3. It will be much worse shortly than it is now, except preventing, renewing grace step in betwixt you and that wrath, into which you arehastning fo fast.

It is fad to be under the Sentence of condemnation, but unspeakably worse to be under the execution of that sentence. To be a Christless man is lamentable, but to be a hopeless man is more lamentable.

For though you be now without Christ, yet whilst the breath of life is in your nostrils, you are not absolutely without hope : But when once that breath is gone, all the world cannot save or help you.

Your last breath and your last hope expire together.

Though youbeunderGod's damning sentence, yet that sentence, through the riches of forbearance, is not executed, but as soon as you die, all that wrath which hanged over your heads, so many years, in the black clouds of God's threatenings, will pour down in a furious storm upon you, which will never break up whilst

God is God. Oh ! think, and think again, and let your thoughts think close to this fad and solemn subject, there is but a breath betwixt you and hell.

Infer. 4. Doth God maintain your life by breath? Let not that breath destroy your life, whichGodgave to preserve it.

No man can live without breath; and yet some might live longer than they do, if their breath were better employed.

Some men's throats have been cut by their own tongues," as the *Arabian proverb intimates.

Life and death (faith Solomon) are in the power of the tongue.

Critics observe, that a word and a plague grow upon the fame root in theHebrew tongue.

It is certain, that some mens breath hath beenbaneful poison, both to themselves and others.

It was a word that cut off the life of Adonijah, 1 Kings ii. 23. and thousands, fincehis day, have died upon the point of the fame weapon.

It is therefore wholesome advice that is given us, Plal. xxxiv.

12. " What man is he that defireth life, and loveth many days, " that he may fee good; keep thy tongue from evil, and thy

" lips from speaking guile. "

*Cave, ne feriat lingua tua collumtuum.

Scal.Arab. Prov.

Cent.1.

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And the more evil the times are, the stricter guard we should keep upon our lips. " It is an evil time, the prudent will keep silence," Amos v. 13. When wicked men watch to make a man an offender for a word, as it is, Ifa. xxix. 20, 21. itbehoves us to be upon our watch, that we offend not with our lips.

It is good to keep, what is not save to trust.

David was a deaf and dumb man, when in the company of wicked men, Psal. xxxviii. 13. he thought silence then to be his prudence.

It is better they should call you fools, thanfindyou so.

Infer. 5. Employ not that breath to the dish on our of God, which was first given, and isstillgraciously maintained by him for your comfort and good.

It were better you had never breathed at all, than to spend your breath in profane oaths, or foolish and idle chat, whereby, at once, you wound the name of God, draw guilt upon your own souls, and help on the ruin of others.

That is a starthng text, Mat. xii. 36. " But I say unto you, that every idle word

" that men shall speak, they shall give an a count thereof in the " day of judgment."

To give an account, is here, bya metalepsis of the antecedent for thecousequent, put for punishment in hell-fire, without an intervening change of heart, and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus.

And there is more evil in this abuse of our breath, than we can easily discern, especially upon two accounts; (1.) Because it is a sin most frequently committed, and seldom repented of.

The intercourse betwixt the heart and tongue is quick, and the sense of the evil as easily and quickly passeth away.

(2.) Because the poisonous, and malignant influence thereof abides and continues long after : our words may mischief others, not only a long time after they are spoken, but a long time after the tongue that spake them is turned to dust. How many years may a foolish, or filthy word, a prophane scoff, an atheistical expression, stick in the minds of them that heard them, after the speaker's death : A word spoken is physically transient, and passed away with the breath that delivered it; but morally, it is permanent : For as to its moral efficacy,no more is required, but its objective existence in the minds and thoughts of them that once heard it: And, uponthatvery ground, Suarez argues for a general judgment, after men have past at death their particular judgment; because(faith he)long after that, abundanceofgood and evil will be done in this world by the dead, in the persons of others that over-live them.

For look, as it was said ofAbel, that being dead, he yet speaketh; so it maybe said of Julian,

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Porphyry, and multitudes of seoffingAtheists, that being dead they yet speak. Oh therefore get a sanctified heart to season your breath, that it may minister grace to the hearers.

Infer. 6. Let your breath promote thespirituallife of others, aswellasmaintain the natural life inyourselves.

Though the maintaining of your natural life be one end why Godgaveyoubreath, yet it is not the only, or principal end of it.

Your breath must be food to others, as well as life to you :

Prov.x. 21. "The lips of the righteous feed many."

It will be comfortable to resign that breath to God at death, which hath been instrumental to his glory in this life.

It was no low encomium Christ gave of the church, when he said, Cant. iv.

11. " Thy lips , oh my spouse,drop as the honey-comb, honey " and milk are under thy tongue." Sweet, wholsome, andpleafantwords, drop from her lips.

They drop (faith Christ) as the honey-comb.

Some dropsever and anon fall actually, and others hang, at the same time,prepared and ready to fall.

Such a prepared and habitual disposition should every Christian continually have.

Your words may stick upon mens hearts to theiredification and salvation, when you are in your graves.

Yourtonguesmaynowfow thatpreciousfeed,which may spring up to the praise of God, though you may not live to reap the comfort of it in this world, John iv. 36, 37.

'Tis a rich expence of your breath, to bring but one soul to God, and yet God hath used the breath of one,as his instrument, to fave, edify, and comfort the souls of thousands, Prov. xi. 30. "The " fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and he thatwinneth

" fouls is wife." The good Lord make all his people wife in this.

Surely, whether we consider the invaluable worth and preciousaess of fouls, the benefits you have had from the breath of others yourselves, the innate property of grace, where-ever it is, todiffuseandcommunicate itself, how short atimeyou have to breathe, and how comfortable it will be,when you breathe your last, to remember how it hathbeenemployed for God, all this should open your lips, to counsel, reprove, and comfort others, as often as opportunity is miniftred.

Did Christ spend his blood for our souls, and shall not we spendourbreath for them ! Oh! let our lips dispense knowledge. If you will not spend your breath for God, how will you spend your blood for him ? If you will not speak for him,

Idoubtyou will notdieforhim. Awaywithasullen refervedness, awaywithunprofitable chat; all subjects of discourse are not fit for a Christian's lips. 'Tis a grave admonitionGodonce

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"gave his peoplebythepenofafaithful * minister. "You may rue (faith he) the opportunities you have loft.

Here lay a poor wretch with one foot in hell, would he not have started " back, if he had had light to discover his danger ? Well, you

" are now together, something you must say; the fame breath "would serve for a compassionate admonition, as for a com- " placent impertinency, which will redound to neither of your

" advantages.

You part, the man dies, and in the midst of " hell cries out against you, one word of yours might have

" saved me; you had me in your reach, you might have told " me my danger; you forbore, I hardened; the Lord reward

" your negligence."

Infer. 7. If breath be the tie betwixt foulandbody, How are we concerned to improve, and draw forth the precious breath of ministers and Christians, whilst it is yet in their nostrils ?

The breath of many ministers is judiciously stopt already, their breath serves to little other use than to preserve their own lives; it will be stopt ere longbydeath, and then those excellent treasures of gifts and graces, wherewiththey are richly furnished, will begone out of your reach, never to be further useful to your souls. You should do by them therefore (as one aptly speaks) as scholars do by some choice book they have borrowed, and must return in a few days to the owner : They diligently read it night and day, and carefully transcribe the most useful and excellent notes they can find in it, that they may make them their own, when the book is called out of their hands.

But alas ! we rather,divert, than draw forth these excellencies that are in them. You may yet converse with them, and greatly benefit yourselves by these converfes; but (as one speaks) by the stream of your impertinenttalkthat season is neglected : Afterwards you fee your lack of your knowledge, but then the instrument is removed. How must it gall an awakenedJew, to think what discourse he had with Jesus Christ ! Is it lawful to give tribute to Cæfar ? Why do not thy disciples fast?

Oh! had i nothing else to enquire of the Lord Jesus ? Would itnothavebeenmore pertinent to have asked, What shall I do to be saved? But he is gone, and I dead in my sins. How many persons have we sent away, that had a word of wisdom in their hearts, having only learnt from them what a clock it is, what weather, or what news; forgetting to ask our own hearts, what is all this to us ? and to enquire of them things worthy

* Mr. West

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"of their wisdom and experience. "Wherefore is there a price in the hand of a fool, seeing he hath no heart to it ?" Prov. xvii. 16.

The expence of one minute's breath in season, may, ifGodconcur with it, be to you the ground of breathing forth praises to God to all eternity.

Infer. 8. Are fouls and bodies tacked together by so frail a thing as a puffofbreath ? How vain and groundless then are all those pleasures men take in their carnal projects and designs in this world?

We lay the plot and design of our future earthly felicity in our own thoughts ; we mould and contrive a design for a long and pleasant life.

The model for raising an estate is already formed in our thoughts, and we have not patience to defer our pleasure till the accomplishment of it, butpresentlydrawa train of pleasing confequents from this chimera, and our thoughts can stoop to nothing less than fitting down all the remainder of our days in the very lap of delight and pleasure; forgetting that our breath is all the while in our nostrils, and may expire the next moment: and if it do, the structure of all our expectations and projects comes to nothing in the fame moment. "His breath

" goeth forth, he returneth to his dust : And in that very day " his thoughts perish," Psal. cxlvi. 4. The whole frame of his thoughts falls instantly abroad, by drawing out this one pin, his breath.

'Tis good with all our earthly designs to mingle the serious thoughts of the dominion of providence, and our own frailty; James iv. 15. " If the Lord will, and we live."

'Tis become a common observation, that as soon as men have ⚫accomplished their earthly designs, and begin to hug and bless themselves in their own acquisitions, a sudden and unexpected period is put to their lives and pleasures, as you may fee Luke xii . 19, 20. Dan. iv. 30.

Oh then drive moderately; you will be at the end of all these things sooner than you imagine. We need not victual a ship to cross the channel, as they do that are bound to the Indies. "What is your life ? It is even a vapour, which appear- " eth for a little while, and then vanisheth away," James iv. 14.

In one moment the projects of many years are overturned for ever.

Infer. 9. Is it but a puff of breath that holds men in life ?

Then build not too much hope and confidence upon any man.

Build not too high upon so feeble a foundation. "Cease ye " from man (faith the prophet) whose breath is in his nostrils ;

" for wherein i she to be accounted of?" Ifa. ii. 22. There are

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A Treatise of the Soul of Man. two things that should deterus fromdependance upon anyman, viz. his falseness and his frailty. Grace in a great measure may cure the first, but not the last.

The best of men must die, as well as the worst, Rom. viii. 10. 'tis a vanity therefore to rely upon any man.

It was the saying of a philosopher when he heard how merchants lost great estates at sea in a moment, Non amo felicitatem e funibus pendentem ; I love not that happiness

(faith he) which hangs upon a rope. But all the happiness of many men hangs upon afarweaker thing than a rope, even the perishing breath ofa creature.

Let not parents raise their hopes too high, or lean too hard upon their children. Say not of thy child, as Lamech did of Noah, " This son shall comfort us," Gen. v. 29.

The world is full of the lamenting sand bitter cries of disappointed parents.

Let not the wife depend too much on her husband, as if her earthly comforts were secured in him against all danger. God is often provoked to stop our friend's breath, that thereby he may stop our way to fin, 1 Tim. v. 5. The trust, and dependance ofa foul, is too weighty to be hang'd upon such a weak, androttenpin, as the breath ofa creature.

Infer. 10. To conclude; if this frail breath be all that differenceth the living from the dead, then fear not man whose breath is in his nostrils.

There is as little ground for our fear of man, as there is for our trust in man.

As death, in a moment, can make the best man useless, and put him out ofa capacity to do us any good; so it can in a moment, make the worst man harmless, and put him out of a capacity to do us any injury.

Indeed, if the breath of our enemies were in their power, and ours at their mercy, there wouldbejust cause to tremble at them; but they are neither masters of their own, or ours. " Who art

" thou, that thou shouldestbe afraid of a man, that shall die ?" faidGod to Jacob, Ifa. li. 12.

The breath of the mightiest is no better secured than of the meanest, nor never in more danger to be flopt than when they breathe out threatnings against the upright.

Julian's breath was soon stopt after he threatned to root out the Galileans.

Queen Mary resigned her breath, at the very time when the had filled the prisons with many of Christ's sheep, and designed them for the slaughter. Read Ifa. xvii. 12. and fee what mushrooms we are afraid of. The best way to continue your relations, and friends, to your comfort, is to give God and not them, your dependance; and the best way to secure yourselves against the rage of enemies, is togiveGodyour fear,

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