The First Treatise. That there is a God.

1 TO tell you that Every word of Scripture does prove this, because, as St. Paul tels me, 2 Tim. 3.16. All of it was Inspir'd by God; nay, to tell you, that those very words, which the Devil, in Scripture, hath spoke, do prove this, because it is God, who hath made them Scripture in that he hath vouchsafed to Relate them There, will not serve my turn, nor suit with that ground of Method, which not I make choyce of, but the Perversness of Man proposes to me, and compels upon me; if he Fights with Wood, and Hay, 1 Cor. 3.12.and Stubble, and I warr'd with Gold, and Silver, and Pretious Stones, I shall not Componere, but Dilatare his Obstreper as Fauces, for want of a [Page 14]Reply ad Idem; such a Goliah as this, must have the Neck of his Ob­jection cut off, with his own, though a Leaden, Sword; the Other, and Better way, would indeed satisfie Other and Israelited, better and Un-Philistin'd men, to Remember them, that there is a God, who already believe this Truth, but not to make him Know that there is a God, who as yet, Denies it, and, doing that, must, by Miserable Undoing Con­sequence, Deny this Book to be Made by him, whom himself he De­nies to Be.

2. Therefore, by a Rational Physick against the Pestilence, and Infection of so Ill an Air, (a Disease more dangerous than that other noysome Pestilence, Psal. 91.6. which walketh (as this hath done, though, now, it attempts to wast even at Noon-day) in Darkness, for, That does testifie a God, though an Angry one, which This out-braves, Psal. 65.8. and the People were afraid of the Tokens of That, as of God's Tokens, whom This out-dares) and with design, that that Ill Air may not onely leave off to Poyson [Page 15]the Air next to it, but begin to Purge it self, I shall first, Convince the Falshood, of the Atheists more said and Divulg'd than Beleeved opinion, out of those Principles, which it is impossible for Them­selves, as they are what they pro­fess themselves, Meer Men to Gain­say; and shall Secondly, in Ho­nour to the Scripture, and the God of them, either Convert Them, who, if they thrust not themselves with­out the Pale, thrust the Pale from themselves, or, at least Confirm those, who are within the Pale, that they may not be seduc'd to Pluck One Stake out of it, by a Mixt kind of Natural and Spiri­ [...]ual Argument, from the general manner, and Method and Stile, Aim, and sense, and Purpose of the [...]criptures, that a God is the Au­ [...]hour of them.

3. To apply my self First, to the Quality of the Opponents, Acts 5.3, 4. whose Hearts Satan hath filled, to Lye to the Holy Ghost, not to Lye unto Men, but unto God; (and is not [...]his a Sacrilege in grain, to with­hold [Page 16]God from the People, and be­yond That of them, who with-held the Gift of the People from God?) in Proving that there is a God, out of such Evident and Created Prin­ciples, which Themselves will be no more able to Disprove, than a Dog to Bite the Moon, at which He Barks; and yet, for the sake of Others, I have heeded that Coun­sel of Putean, Comus.Cavendum est, ne vel Ipso Latratu Mordeat.

4. And did not God Himself, and Moses Himself imply as much, that God might be known (though no [...] in His Simply-Intire essence, eve [...] by Scriptures themselves, or to An­gels themselves, for, Nothing bu [...] God can thus Comprehensively know God) at least, in His Exi­stence, and Being, in a more Re­mote, but Certain and Infallible though Confus'd knowledge, eve [...] by the Light of Nature? (thoug [...] there be more of Resplendency, i [...] the Sun, than in a Candle, yet it is as sure, that we Do See, by a Can­dle, as by the Sun) When God Him­self hath told us by Moses, that I [...] [Page 17]the Beginning,Gen. 1.1.God Created the Hea­vens, and the Earth, in the very Beginning of the Word of God, and hath not, First, Expresly told us [...], that God Himself Is (for, it is never to be said He was, of whom there is not Erat, quando non Erat, but in the same Line and Verse, that He is too; else, Revel. 1.4.8. Exod. 9.14. His Name, I AM, is brought into sus­picion) before that Beginning, but hath left the Heavens, and the Earth, that He Made, to tell us That.

5. And do not the Apostles them­selves do the same? and upon the same Ground? and, perhaps in re­ference to that very First Verse in [...]he Written Book of God, being [...]aught so to do, by the Example of God and Moses, as well as by In­piration of God? They do not tell [...]s, in Terminis, that God Is, much [...]ess do they attempt (that which They well knew to be a thing Im­ [...]ossible) to Prove Him to Be, à Priori; such a very Proof as this (besides the Arrogancy of it, in ta­king upon them, to be in greater [...]avour with God, and to see deeper [Page 18]into Him, Exod. 33.23. than Moses did, who saw Him, but à Posteriori, in His Back Parts) would be but an Ar­tificial, a more Elaborate, and sub­tle kind of Denying God; They only tell us Involvedly, that He is, when they tell us, that They Do, and We should, Believe in God the Father Almighty; To Beleeve In Him, He, and They have taught us in Holy Scriptures, but Credere Deum, to Beleeve Him to Be, the next Words after, teach us That, Maker of Heaven and Earth.

6. Now, if Any shall say a fresh, as Galen once did, Omnia Dicit, Nihil Probat, that Moses does but Say, God did This, and That, Made Heaven and Earth, He does not Prove it; to Reply to all such (who are themselves as Natural, as was Galens Study) let me take That Heaven, and That Earth themselves, into my Discourse, whereby to Prove their Maker; I begin, with Part of That, which God Made, and, out of which, He Made Us, the Earth, and the Inhabitants there­of. Take the Whole of it, or take [Page 19]it in Pieces, either Way there is a God.

7. All of it, and the Glory of it all, the Ʋrbes and the Civitates, the stately Buildings, and the societies of Men, whence were they? the Cities did not Build themselves; the Russet Coontryman knows as much as this comes to, that, not Orpheus [...]idle Musick, but the Hands of La­borious Men have done all this; but, whence then were Those Men? He in the Woods and Fields, and He in the Grove of City-Houses, knows that too, that, as some of them have Children, so All of them have had Pa­rents; but, whence those Parents? they know that too, that, as some of them Are Grand-fathers, so All of them have Had Grand-fathers; but whence, still, came they? from their Fore-fathers, and Those from a First of all; As certainly as you cannot tell, Any man alive Shall have a Future Child (for the same Power, Jer. 22.30. that said Write ye This Man Childless, may, if He please (for, God, and His Power, Attribute and [Page 20]Person are Convertible and th [...] same) say, Write ye This Woman untimely, Is. 37.3. for, the Children are come to the Birth, and there is no Strength to Bring forth) so certainly you may know, that there was a First Man of all, that had no Man at all to his Father

Such a First Man there must have been, Quare eti­am atque etiam Ma­ternum no­men adepta Terra tenet Merito, quo­niam Genus Ipsa creavit Humanum. Lucret. or else there must be, (that, which the Philosophers, the meer Natural Men, (and the best know­ing of All meer Natural Men,) call a Progressus in Insinitum, a Pro­ceeding even to an Infinitude, which, the meer Natural Men do, Discerningly, and Truly, and De­liberately, Deny to be Possible in Nature; which very word does signify all, I have already said, an [...] preoccupies somewhat more that [...] [Page 21]have still to say, Natura, quasi A­liunde Nata; As All Propagated Creatures which, at this day, have a Being in Nature, receiv'd it from the Prae-Being of some of the same kind, so the first Individual, which it self does partake of Nature, in its Composition, though not in the Efficiency of it, must needs have its Being Aliunde still, and therefore from That Which Is, before Nature Was; for, as it is impossible, for the First Man of all, to have Had a Father (else, He was not the First Man; else, He must be Father to Himself, in that He was the First, and His Own Child, in that He had such a Father) as Impossible, as it is for Himself, to Be, at the same Instant and Point of Time, both Before and After Himself; at the same Instant, both to Be and Not to Be, which is One Contradiction in it self, and Another Contradi­ction to the very First of Principles, in the very Chief of Sciences, Omne, vel Est, vel Non; for, Metaphyr. Who­ever Makes Any thing, is as much [Page 22]and as Really before that thing which He makes, as Any of those who Plow their Own Lands, or Plant their own Vines, were in Being, before those Vines were first Planted, or those Lands Last Plow'd, as a Shoomaker Is, Be­fore the Shoo, He Makes, a Car­penter Is, Before the Plough he Makes, and a Smith Is, Before the share He makes to that Plough: Now, as a First Man must have been, and That First Man Cannot have made Himself, so (though We already know, who That First Man was, Adam, and who made Him, God, yet, that those who De­ny God may be well forc'd to ac­knowledge Him, as I am Ill-forc'd thus to Prove Him) Either it was God, or somewhat Else, that made That First Man: if Any thing else Besides God, the Question returns, Who made that somewhat else? so that, at last, of meer and Undeni­able Necessity, God must be (as to our Understanding, as God would be, as from His own Goodness) [Page 23]the First Maker of All; the First Maker of all, must be God, and nothing else but God, because what­soever is in Him, must Necessarily be in God, and Incommunicably in Any thing else but God; such Properties are these, To have a Being of Himself, not Depending upon any thing else but Himself; To have such a Being, of which All else Depend, as well in Produci as in Conservari; To Be without Be­ginning; To be Eternal; and these four properties, are proper to God Quarto Modo, they do Convenire Soli, & semper: And thus He is driven in many Words, and per Cir­cuitus & Ambages, to Confess God, Who, in One Onely word, Denys Him; nor can His Igno­rance, any otherwise be excus'd, than if we fancy Him to be (what Erasmus does not say, Any man VVas, but only Himself fancies some One Man so to be) so besot­tedly Ignorant, as to beleeve, that Himself was never Born; This, says that Inventor would be more Pardonable, than to Deny a God; [Page 24]nay Pace Illius dixerim, This would not Deny a God, but pre­tend Himself to be One, a God, and a Christ too, as being a Stone cut out, Dan. 2.34. Deus est Re­rum omni­Causa. A­rist. Meta. Virg. l. 1.without Hands.

8. This is that, which they call the Chain of Causes; and as much Evidence as this, will arise out of any Other Cause, in respect of any Other Effect, when it is thus driven up to the Head, to that God, who may Article with some Heady men now, and aske the que­stion of them, Jud. 11.8. Virgil. Ovid. which Jepthah ask'd of the Elders of Gilead, shall I be your Head! Jovis omnia plena; and Jupiter est, quodcunque Vides; you may see God, on Quid est Deus? quod Vides to­tum, &c. Senec. every thing you see; the most Minute, most Con­temptible Production in Nature, is not at all Minute, is not at all Contemptible, in that it is a De­monstrative Argument, to Prove a Creator, a God; the very Mice, and the very Frogs will do it, not only when they come upon Gods errand, Exod. 8.2. to execute His Judgements upon Pharaoh, and by the wonder­fulness of the Judgement, in the [Page 25]Feebleness of the Instrument, had it not been Impower'd from above, to declare a God, whose Name is wonderful, Ps. 9.6.qui Solus facit Mira­bilia, but when they Come of their Own Errand, to Feed upon the Crumbs from under thy Table, and to Drink the Dew of Heaven from off Thy Grass, even These, and even Then, will be Arguments and Doctrines, Proofs and Inferences of a Deity; Not to Dispute whence they have their Being, whether as some say, the One out of the Dust, and the Other out of the Air; be it from these, or be it from what else it will, whence had this Dust, and this Air, and this Any-thing else, their own Beginning, whereby they Contribute to the Origination of these? I must not now tell you, out of Scriptures, that the very Dust, and the very Air, Mat. 8.26.27. John 9.6. the Winds which Christ Commanded, and the Clay which He bad be Physick, and Cure the Blind, did testifie Christ to be God, and God to be their Maker, by their Obedience to Him; but I must tell you, out of Nature, that [Page 26]God was the Maker of That, which, by the Descent, and Continuation of second Causes, became Frogs, and Mice; for, if Man, the most Excel­lent of Sublunary Creatures, and as this self-minded Atheist is apt to believe, the Paramount subsistence amongst all those which have Any Being, was not able to bring forth Himself, but (as we have already prov'd) must needs be beholden to a Superiour Power, an Original Maker, a First Cause, for the Relative, and Dependent Being which He has, much less could those more Ignoble and Servile Creatures, the Air (which it self He is, perhaps as ready to Believe not to Be as the God, and for the same Reason, (which may equally make Him doubt, whether He has a Soul or no) because Both of them, because all three of them are Invisible) or the Dust of the Earth (that sluggish Creature, which He disdainfully tramples under His Foot, not Con­sidering that, That Foot, and the whole Body besides, is, now, but Compacted Clay, and will, anon, [Page 27]be Viler, more putrified (I must speak modestly) More Offensive earth than That, and Stand in need of that very earth He Scorn'd, to Pellu­cidum Te­git, Opa­cum Ab­scondit. Cover, and to Hide too, not his Na­kedness only, but His very Stench, lest the Survivers hide their faces at Him) much less could these Sense­less, (and therefore, much more, Unvoluntary) Atomes at first, make themselves, and then the World, however one (Himself as Unworthy to be Nam'd as His vain opinion to be Particularly confuted) though he durst not fancy the former, did in­vent, and vent the latter, and then why does He deny God in One Word, when he Confesses Him in two; that it is the First Cause which hath deriv'd efficiency into all of these? tis all one to my Understanding as if he said it were God Himself; and I could well wish these Naturall men would learn one more Principle of Nature, Frustra Dicitur per plura quod potest Dici per Pauciora, that they would save some expence of Breath and call Him God in One Syl­llable, as well as in a Periphrasis of Two.

Of Both these Arguments, let me speak two words more in the Persuasive way I propos'd; Perse­quamur & Flores rerum,Rhodig. l. 1. c. 5.ut, si nil a­liud, Varietatis Jucunditas, & inde, Genius aliquis non absit.

9. To the first Argument, from Parentage. Consider, when your Child, which was Born of you, does aske You Blessing, That very Child, and the humble Acknowledging practice of it, does Teach you, (what you should have taught that very Child) to Crave a Blessing from Him who is your Father in Heaven; Let Him not be less your Father, because He is Out of your sight, though you are not out of His, then your own Child is the less your Son, when neither of you see each Other; you see Him not, Col. 2.21. you Touch not, Taste not, Handle not, and there­fore, Is He not? O doe not un-God Him by such a strange and Answering reason, the very Contrary of which would Un-God Him! for He were a Body, if He could be Toucht, a Sapid Body, if He could be Tasted, and a Colour'd Body, if He could be [Page 29]Seen, and therefore, not a Spirit; and a God, which does neither Eat nor is Eaten, neither Handle, nor is Handled, any otherwise than in such a Discourse as this; nay amongst all the Bad ones, let Me tell you, the most seemingly-prevailing Argu­ment, that He is not, is, that you your self Deny Him, unless That of the Poet be an Argument against this; Nullos esse Deos, Inane Coelum, Martial. Amantissi­mus Pater Filiis, quanquam Ingratis, ve­ram felici­tatem optat. P. Martyr.Affirmat Coelius, probat (que) quod se Factum, dum Negat hoc, Videt Beatum; and yet let me once again, send you to School to your own Child, to be Reclaim'd by Him, whom you Begat; It is an Undu­tifull, and Rebellious Child; but are not you, still His Father? that very Rod you now take in your Hand tells Him that you are so; it is a wayward and Denying Child; yet, because it is a Child, and because yours, you sollicit His Obedience to you, with Bribes and Mercery; and is God the less your Father, the more He Loves you? God forbid; — Patrio pater esse Metu probor; Ovid. Met. I and Patrio Viscere too, His Care, and [Page 30]Feare of, and for you, who care not for the Lord, unless He Thunders, and are feareless of Him, when he has laid his Bolt aside, even this, proves Him to be a God, a Father of Mercyes, 2 Cor. 1.3. Psal. 94.1. though not, as yet, such a God to whom Vengeance belongeth. When you blesse your own Child consider, as, whence it was, from God and you (tis Sol & Homo, but it is Sol Justitiae, Aristot. Mal. 4.9.quae generant Ho­minem; from God, as the chief A­gent, from you, as His weak Instru­ment, more weake, and useless, and unactive, when He takes you not in­to His Hand, and cooperates not with you, than your own lazy Axe, when you take it not into yours, or when the Head of it falls from the heft of it, [...] Ki. 6.5. into the Water) so, whence you, and your Fore-Fathers and Their First Father was, from the Earth, and That, Originally, from those two Extreme-Opposites, Nothing & God, who, Himself, in Making it, was the Only Agent, and His Power, and Will, and Love (which are Himself) all the Instrument He us'd; Consi­der, that He made you of Earth, that [Page 31]sedentary, and groveling, and un­derfoot Element, that you should have nothing to boast of, least of all such a vile, and worse than earthly Opinion (nay, even Worse than Hel­lish too for, Jam. 2.19. the Devills also believe a God, though it puts them into an Ague of Trembling Fits) as if God Himself was such a Nothing against which to Boast; if you are so stout­hearted, that Nothing will make you Fall down and Worship, Let such a Nothing as This do it; and yet Consider too, that it is He that made you of that Earth, and therefore, acknowledge Him your Father for Making you, and your God for Making you so Powerfully, out of That, which but a few dayes before, was Nothing; Beg of that Father that Made you, to Blesse you; desire of that God who so Powerfully Made you (what your Re-maker, your Redeemer Christ, hath desir'd of Him for you) that He would Keep you by His Power, that he would pro­sper first, the Work of His Own Hands, Joh. 17.11. your selves, and then Guide and Succeed Your Handy-Work.

10. To the Pursuit of That First; Whatever you see, even the Basest Creature in the account of Man, be it some Apostolicall Man, 2 Cor. 10. v. 10. who is that Base Creature, whose Presence is Base, as Pauls, and Speech Contemp­tible as His, or be it He who accounts Him and His speech and His Presence so, Act. 28.3. or be it that very Viper on Pauls Hand, or that Coale of Fire at His Foot; Look agen, and see the Dig­nity of that Office, and of that Crea­ture, in that God hath made the One, and Ordained the Other; Let not the Heathen be more quick-sighted than Thou; Juven. Hic putat esse Deos; if He Himself sayes Jovis omnia plena, say thou so too, only, change that Name of His God into the Etymon of that Name, In every thing, see, and ac­knowledge One God, Ephes. 4.6. Psal. 46.and Father of All, who is a very present Help in the needfull time of trouble; Disdain not any Thing, much less any Person, which He hath Made; thou, who shouldst see a God, in a Frog and a Mouse, nay in a very Viper, be not thou, too suspicious to see a Devill, in a Man and a Woman; nay in a [Page 33]very Saint; Tell the Atheist, who will not see a God in any thing, that thou seest a God in every thing; Wonder at the Atheist, who makes God to be Nothing at all, when thou, even by Nature, knowest Him to be what His own Word tells Thee He is, 1 Cor. 15.28. All in All.

11. Such another Argument is That concerning Motion, which, be­cause it is not Altogether the For­mer, but Another, I shall Name, and because it is so like the Former, and Such, I shall But Name.

12. We see Motion every where; and yet we must know, that every thing is Mov'd of somewhat els be­sides It self; Second Movers there are, or else there is no Motion at all; the Tongue, that Denyes this, let it ly still, if it can, whilst it De­nyes this; and yet Second Movers there are not, unless they partake of Motion from the First of all, so that, at length to avoid a process into In­finitude, we must at least in our Con­cessions, Ascend up to a First Mover, and that is God. Anes. l. 7. This was Aristotle's Argument, to prove a First Mover, [Page 34]and That Terme is equivalent to a God; and though in His Entrance upon that Discourse, He sayes, Corpus Naturale, habet, In se, principium Mot us, yet He sayes not Habet A Se, the Naturall Body hath the Prin­ciple of Motion, Within it self, it has it not Of, or From it self. It was that Aristotle, who knew not God at all, by His own Word, but only by that innate Principle which God had grafted into His Soul, and by the Book of Creatures, the Verbum non loquentium, which exerted that in­nate Principle, and brought it into Act, which blew the Hidden Fire in­to a Light Flame, and awaken'd the discursive Faculty, and Power of Knowing God, into an Actuall Ra­tiocination, and Argument, and Dis­covery Of God.

13. Act. 17.28. I must not, in this case, ap­ply That of S. Paul, In Him (i. e. in God) we Move, because the Di­vinity of His Authority is above that Faith, and Capacity, of Him whom I undertake to Instruct, and of those (woe is me, that there are Those, a­mongst whom we are Constrain'd to [Page 35]Dwell, or They, suffer'd to dwell a­mongst us!) whom to Confute; and yet, I may too, apply the Words, and leave out the Paul, as. well as the Saint, because He does not quote God but Man, and Him not Inspir'd unless with Poetical heat, Aratus [...] Pythago­ras. when He adds—As certain of your own Poets Also (as well as we Evangelists, and Apostles) have said, [...] we are his Of spring too, it is God that Made us, aswel as God that Moves us.

14. And now, tell the Atheist, how much thou admir'st that He will not confess a God, by the great and speedy Volubility of the liveless Hea­vens (to the Circulations of which, we may adapt that of Pliny, The Na­turalist.Inido­neum vel Coeli spectaculum, si tantum Praeterirent, and fit a reason to it, which was none of His, they were a useless spectacle if they did not de­monstrate a God above them, which whirl'd them about, as well as fe­cundate the earth beneath them) vvhen thou Confessest Him by the lesser and retarded Motion of every Creeping thing, since it is the first Mover, God, that has imparted the [Page 36]Gift of Motion to All of these; As the Philosopher rebuk'd and silenc'd Him, by Taking a Turn, and by Ge­sture, vvho denyed there vvas any Motion, so, do thou but Walk, and every step thou takst, does out-pace and out-Argne Him, vvho denyes there is a God.

15. There is a Third of a distinct kind, but of the same Conviction, the different Degrees of Entity, of Be­ing, which we observe in the Scale of Creatures, which does evince Them to be Creatures, and that there is a God, the Creator of them; we find that there is a lesseness of Entity, a worseness, an Inferiority of Being in some, and a Greater Entity, a more Excellent, and Superiour kind of Being in Others; Some things have a Being and no Composition, which, though they are not Compounded themselves, are yet of a Degraded Quality, because they are Ordained to Serve others as the first Ingre­dients, and Principles of their Com­position; some things have a Com­pounded Being, but no life at all, such, as the Grosser Earth and the Parts [Page 37]of it, Stone and Metall, &c. These are the Foot of this Ladder, and those Before as the Ground upon which it stands; (I will not stay to open and Anatomize the Parts of this un­elementall Earth (for it is not, it self One Element, but made up of more) the severall Species of Liveless Be­ings, the severall Differences of them, according to the more or less worthy Operations of them, to the more Lazyness, or quicker Activity in Producing their effects; This may be the work of Another Pen, and of another Coat, and to Ano­ther Purpose) the Degree of Being, more worthy than This, is in those which have Meer Life and no More, the Lowest, the most Ignoble kinde of Life, and neerest of kin to that Earth, within which it Lives, and is quite Dead when it is, All, Above it, only to Grow and Increase, and not to have Any Sense at all, as the seve­rall kinds of Plants, Flowers, Herbs, and Trees; for, That which is call'd Plant-Animal, has but Quid Analo­gum Sensui, and does not Sentire; the Being Above That, is that of [Page 38]Beasts, which have the Advantage of sense, added to the Faculty of Ve­getation; the Being Above these, is that of Man, the Lord of these, who has, besides His sense (or else He is Beside Himself) Reason and Understanding; and yet this Man too has one more Created Being A­bove Him, the Spiritual Being of Angels, and their more Immediate, and Instantaneous, and Intuitive Reason and Understanding; and must there not Be, the Stagyrite's Ens Entium, a Being of Beings A­bove All these, and from which. All these have their Communicated Be­ings? the very Difference of these kinds of Being, the More and Less, that Better and Worse, does Evi­dence that there Must; for, Nothing has Less, and Worse of Being, but as it does more approach to That, which has the Least and Worst of Being, nay to That, which is Less yet, even to Nothing it self; and nothing has more, and Better of Being, but in some. Approximtion, and Likeness, and Reference to That which has (or rather Is) the [Page 39]Most, the Best Being of all, in whom we have our Being afwell as in whom we Move; Acts 17.28. and That Chief, that Best, that Universal, that Original, that Essential Being can be no Less than God; the very Or­der of these Beings, and the several steps of this Scale does Evidence as much; for, as there is a Lowest Be­ing, that Vilest, and most Deprest, the very Center and Element of the Earth, which has a Being and no­thing else; and a Compounded Be­ing of a Body made of Parts, which is nothing else but Body; and a Being one Step above that, a Body, but yet a Live, a Veget, a Grow­ing Body, which hath Arms, but not of Flesh, and Stomack, but not above ground; a Being, one step higher yet, a Live and growing Bo­dy, but a Body that has sense too, aswell as growth, that can Feel, as well as be Felt, that can Tangi, & Angi too; and a Being, still one step Higher, partly-Body, partly-Spirit, Man; and a Being one step Higher yet, Purely-Spirit, but Crea­ted and Depending Spirit, Angel; [Page 40]so there must be, to make this Scale Perfect (the Top of which must reach not only to Heaven, Gen. 28.12. but to God in it) a Supreme, Soveraign, exact, essentially, and selfly-Spiri­tual, Independent Being, who is [...] (Nam Veteres Theo­logi,Caeli. Rhid. Praefat.Centri Nomine, Deum esse in­telligendum prudentiortbns insinu­arunt) Opposite to the Other ex­treme, the Center of the Earth the most Deficient, and beggerly ele­ment of Being, nay to the very No­thing, to which the Nobler sorts of Beings Approach, and Of which, All sorts of Being Partake, as well as a weaker, more Infirm, and Par­tial Being, to which the more Ig­noble Beigns do Declien; and That Being must needs be Deum qui non summū putet, Re­rum impe­ritum exi­stimo Cae­cilius in Cicerone. Philo Jud. God; so that, even by Natural help, such as this Ladder is, Man might reach up to the Belief of that Jehovah, who is Fons Essentiae.

16. When thou seest, and obser­vest this Difference of Beings, One to partake more of Entity, and A­nother, less; One Meerly to Be (Est, & Praeterea Nihil) and A­nother [Page 41]to Be, and Live; One, to Live, and Grow, and Another to Live, and have Sense, Virg. Superatque & Vescitur Auris Aethereis; One to Live Partly Body, and Partly Spi­rit, as Thy self does, and Another to Live only Spirit, as an Angel does; tell that No-man that denys a Being Above all these, which gave a Being to All of these, that He is not a Man, He has no Reason; He is not a Beast, He has no Improbum & Ʋislen­tum est, Ra­tionem its ascribere, qui Notitia Dei Ca­rent. Plu­tarch. in Gryllo. Qui Deos negant, Ab­jectum Ge­nus Homi­num, & sine sensu. Max. Ty­rius Serm. Deo [...]esse, omnes sana mente prae­diti, arbi­trātur. Plu­tarch. de Homero. Sense; He is not a Plant, for He does not Grow, unless it be worse; He is not so much as a Dead Chip, for there was not a Live Tree, out of which He was Cut; He is Nothing; Less than That, for, That Nothing is in an Objective Power, and Can be Produc'd by the Soveraign Being, and the very Production of it, when it is In Fieri, nay, the very Capa­city to Be Produc'd, while it is but in Posse Fieri does Confess a God; worse then That, for That Nothing Cannot Disbelieve.

17. There is a Fourth, Natural, and Invincible Argument of a Deity, that All these severall Be­ings [Page 42]do Certainly Operate to a Fixt, Design'd End and Purpose; This Concludes, that, not All things, no, not Any thing, is Casual and Fortuitous, by meer Dull, and Ig­norant, Frustraneous and End-less Chance; and therefore, they are all guided by an Intelligence grea­ter than They, which hath Created them All for their Distinct uses, and That Intelligence must needs be God.

Whence is it, Jer. 35.7. Domus An­tra fuerunt & Densi Feutices, & junctae Cor­tice Virgae. Ovid. Me­tam. l. 1. that Stones, and Wood, have This End (which Themselves know not that they Have) that we may not be Recha­bites, but Build Houses, make Fires, Dress Meat, and Live? Whence is it that the Sheep and Oxen, wear their own Hides, and Wool, till they have worn them fit for Our Use, and then, we wear them After, and yet they cannot tell, that they are Stewards and Providers for us? whence is it, that we Live by Air, and yet the Air understands not that we Breath it? or, if it did, knows not in what secret Caverns to hide all of it from our Nostrils, but that [Page 43]we do still in spite of its fleetness and Invisibility Haurire, & Red­dere, take hold of it when we List, and bid it Go as Cato came, Ideo Tantum ut Rediret, Auson.etiam dum Loquor, Redi? Whence is it that Men make Laws, whereby Man may Live Innocent, and safe? not safe only Though He be Innocent, but Because He is Innocent? or who is it, that hath taught Man so much Goodness and Protection? why is it, the Bad Man, who knows He should keep Laws, does yet break them, but that Himself pro­poses an Omuis Ho­mo Agit per Intellectum cujus est, ex Fiue, Ope­ratio. End, though a wrong One, to Himself? and whence is it, that the Good Man does not utterly Perish in the overthrow of those Laws, but that the God-Intelli­gence does supply the Defect of Law, and Protect Him, who Pursu'd a Right End? Is it not hence, that the very Iniquity of some, does Confirm the Integrity of Others? All would be Casualty, and Breach, and Destruction, were there not a God to Over-see and Over-Power All, and Nothing is Casualty, and [Page 44]Breach, and Destruction to the Good-Man, because there is (and He knows there is) such a God; whence is it, that the Ill Man is Never at Home? but may answer Truly, and in sober sadness, out of His own Window, as the Merry Man in Erasmus did, Colloq. Ego non sum Domi? that He Lives and Dyes, Amaz'd, and out of Himself, now stupify'd, and Anon Terrify'd in his heart? Fickle and unconstant in Tongue, how undaunted soever he be in haughty Brow, and For­head of Brass? and whence is it, that the Good Man Lives Above, nay upon his miseries, reckons upon them as the unawares Preferment Bestowd upon him by the very Ma­lice of Man? as the Purpos'd Me­dicinal Gifts, and Counsels, and Instructions of his God? then, Dyes, and Conquers Death, Moriens, Animam abstulit Ho­sli. Vir. Ae­neid. l. 9. as his Christ did, by † Death it self? Dyes, with more Joy, and Comfort, and Try­umph, (because it is much deeper than a Face-Joy, and a Comfort Wealthier than all the Indies can administer, and a Triumph over his [Page 45]very self and all his Frailtyes) than those, who make him dy, and, in Dying Make him Live? Dyes with an unmoveable serenity in his Heart and Mind and Conscience? has the Image and Picture of That serenity, graven and imprinted in the Coutage and stedfastness of his eyes and Coun­tenance, in the solidity and unrecan­tingness of his expressions? and wi­shes that his very Words were written, nay printed too in a Book, nay Graven too, and that with an Iron-pen, such words these, Job 19.28. v. 24, 25, 27. I know that my Redee­mer liveth, whom these very Eyes of mine shall stedfastly Behold? whence all this? but because as another Poet of their own hath said, Est Deus in nobis, God, the Influences, and Com­forts of God, are in him, and upon him, and Men may see (if they will not, Maliciously to their own Soul, Blind the Better ey of their Soul, Reason) in such a Life, and in such a Death, that there is an Ever-Living, a Never-Dying, an Immortall, a Providentiall God.

18. From the end for which e­very thing is Made, and to which [Page 46]every thing does Collime; Ask the Atheist, Wherefore He is Made? and to what End He Denyes that God, for whose Honour He was made? If He can tell Thee neither this, nor that, believe Him in No­thing else; and if He can tell Thee, believe a God; For, if He deale plainly with thee, Why He denyes a God. His only, and Bosome Reason is this, that He would not have a God to Punish Him; and such a Reason as this, does not Deny but Confess God, nor does only Confess God, but Prove Him too. Whence came this Fear of After Punishment, which stands at the elbow of every despe­rately-bad Attempt? but that it was Non solum Innatum sed etiam Animo In­sculptum, esse Deos. Cicero l. 3. de Nat. Deorum; & Laertius in vita Ze­nonis. imprinted with indelible Characters into the Soul of Men (who may soo­ner wash away His own Soul than wash these signatures out of it) by that God who would be Known and Acknowledg'd (when Protected Man Will not do it by due) by Fear of being Out-Lawd from that Pro­tection, and Providence, by which He Rules and governes the Whole Great World, and that Prowd little-Great [Page 47]World Man, who thinks Himself to be Bigger, and of more Consideration, than the Whole.

19. Which last Epithetes of Ru­ling Protection and Governing Pro­vidence, casts me upon a fift Argu­ment, by which Nature Herself in the Best desires, even of the Worst of Men, does testify that there is a God Of Nature, a God Above Nature; And that is, the Naturall Inclina­tions and Propenseness, and even-Beseechings of Man, to partake in the Blessings of God.

20. That there is such a Natu­rall inclination in Man, in the whole Species, because in every Individu­um of it, will appear most dilucidly and uncontradictorily, when Any That Man is surpriz'd and beset with a Weight of Suddenness of Danger and Death, which He would escape, & out of which, He cannot Extricate Himself by all the Wit of Man, so, that He will even Faile, rather than Faile, & Mori, ne Moriatur, Mart. so that He will make Choice of one kind of Death, without any Hic rego, non Furor est. id. Fury, or Pre­posterousness, since His designe is [Page 48]not, simply, to avoyd Death, but Comparatively, a worse and more formidable kind of it, so that, to Him, the less painfull Death has some proportion and Analogy to Life it self, in respect of those fiercer anguishes, which He thus avoyds, and in some sense escapes Death, by Incurring it: Bring we to such a Test, that most daring Atheist, who all His Life, Deny'd God, and see, if His Practice, in that eruption and Uncounseldness be not some­what Godly, in defiance of His O­pinion! At That Instant you shall hear Him both Confess God, and Invoke God; Invoke God that He would not Vicem rependere, and De­ny Him also, Matth. 4.5, 6. Lege Talionis; Walk up with Him to the Brow of a Hill (suppose it like that Pinacle upon which the Devill set our Saviour, Himself Tempting One Person of the God-head to make Him Deny Ano­ther, by Tempting God His Father) where all the way, He sees nothing else but Hill; at that Instant and on that Top and Brow of the Hill, do Thou Stand, and suppose Him to Fall, [Page 49]to See nothing, into which He must Fall, but Pitch, and Brimstone, and Flames of Fire; tell me now, Didst thou not hear him Cry out, with as much Acknowledgment as with hor­rour, God Bless me! God Protest me! God Deliver me! Such a Cry, when he had not Leisure to be ill-advis'd by his deprav'd Corrupted Reason, must needs flow out of a Naturall Inclination to believe, that there is a Supreme Invisible Povver, vvhich is the Preserver of Men; Job 7.2 [...]. and to Believe such a Preserver, such a Governing and Providentiall Power, is to be­lieve a God, in vvhom such a Povver does Reside and Dvvell; And, that This is a True Belief, does follow out of the Convinc'd Truth of the Naturall Inclination, and the Natu­rality of the Cry; for Nature her­self will bear witness, that no Incli­nation and Desire, which proceeds meerly and Directly, firstly and Originally from Her, was ever in vain.

21. And then why does the A­theist Rashly deny him, from whom, at his Most Need, by an Innate Im­pulsion, [Page 50]he does Soberly begg Ayd? Thou knowst, that there is a God; and thou hearst That Denying Man, when He is Ready to Perish, cry out, God save me; Remember then that Thy God hath said (said, and sworn) As I live, Rom. 14.11.saith the Lord, Every Tongue shall Confess to God. Every Tongue, the most Blasphemous Tongue Shall do it; when you hear such a Tongue Deny God with the same Oath, with which God hath sworn It shall Confess him; when you hear It swear by the very Name of Him whom it Denyes to be, think, that, Matth. 21.16. as Christ hath said, Out of the Mouth of Babes, and Sucklings, thou hast perfected Praise, so, God hath perfected Truth, out of the Mouth of them, who are but Once Born, and are not New-Born Babes, who, either, have not suckt the Sincere Milk of the Word, 1 Pet. 2.2. or else by a Di­vellish Assmilation (for, they them­selves, are Satan Manifested in the Flesh, and like Spiders, turn what they feed upon into their vicious selves) have converted That Milke into Poison: Beseech we God, [Page 51]that, as All things, even Persecuti­tions, and Miseryes of All sorts, do work together for Good, Rom. 8.28.to them that Love God, so All things, even A­theismes and Blasphemyes of all sorts, Believed, and Done, may work to­gether to the Magnifying of God, by all Saints, so much the more, as He is Vilify'd by a Desperate Few, of this Untoward Generation.

Thus the whole Earth does attest that God who Beares up the Pillars of it. Psal. 75.3. And the whole Heavens do so too.

22. I must not now rest upon That Text of David, The Heavens De­clare the Glory of God,Psal. 19.11and the Firma­ment sheweth his handy-worke; I must not stay to Disprove the God-Confessing, though the Christ-God Denying Socinus, in His Com­ment upon that Text, that the Heavens declare the Glory of God, only by a pre-supposition that God was known to be, before the Hea­vens were seen, for, That Text Clears it self (and saves me the labour) God, was not only known Before, but Made known by them, the Firma­ment, [Page 52]sayes David, sheweth his handy­work, sheweth by the very Prospect of it self that it self is the handy­worke of God; Here, I must not stay; but, as, to Christiaus, the right Me­thod is, to Prove, and Confirme Any Truth in Nature, by the Greater Truth of the Word of God, so, to the Atheists, we must Prove, the very Truth of God himself in his Word, by the lesser Truth, because more evident to them in Nature; the Good Christian, I know, will Pardon me, for his sake, Aesop. who is so Cockish as to Preser One single Grain of Corn, a­bove that Rich Jewell, which might Purchase to him an intire harvest.

23. And yet, in This (that I may not only dwell upon Nature, or ra­ther, that whilst I do so, I may shew you that I have the Authority of the Ancient Fathers (who are Patres though Patrati Patres) and of the more Ancient, and Father to them, the Apostle S. Paul, so to do) I shall confirme that Text, by a Rea­son of Theodorets, drawn out of Na­ture herself, and shew, by the Con­sent of Other Fathers, that Nature [Page 53]herself does much help us in the In­choative knowledge of a God; nay by the Practice of S. Paul himself, who does Countenance such kind of Arguments as These, by his own ex­ample.

24. First then (perhaps in too much Civility of Complyance; but as Austin said, he would rather speak false Latine, Ossum to Edify, than True Os, not to be understood; Veritas in dicto. so I must rather choose to write a Naturall Theology, whereby to re­claime an Atheist, than a Disbelie­ved supernaturall, whereby to leave him still in that Pit, in which there is no Truth) give me leave, as the Importunity of the Atheist Compels me, to wave both the Testimony of David, and of Theodoret too, and to strengthen the Truth of David, with the Reason of Theodoret; When we see any stately Palace Well-built, it is Impossible for us, but to reflect pre­sently upon the skill and Contrivance of the Architect and Master-Buil­der, whose Wit and Industry brought This to passe; To him we refer all the Prayse of the Edifice; what is [Page 54]there more a Palace, more Stately, better Built, than Heaven? (certainly, none, of the Fools Imaginary Para­dises upon Earth) and can he be lesse than God, that Raisd such a sumptu­ous Structure? thou art less than Man, thou art worse than Devill that thinkst so; Satan himselfe knew, what a Powerfull God he was, in shaking heaven, aswell as in Casting him out of it.

25. Luke 10. [...]8. But, though He fell from hea­ven, like Lightning, Bonum est nob is, esse Hic; Matth. 17.4. I am so in Love with it, that I cannot, on the sudden, let passe the discourse of Heaven, but, in a Continuation, and Inhancement of that Naturall Argument, must call upon my Reader, by occasion of those heavens above him, Psal. 2.4. to acknowledge that God, who sitteth in the heavens, and to let his Name, Psal. 8.1.be excellent in all the Earth, who hath set his Glo­ry above the heavens.

26. In the Motion of them, there is Nihil Temerarium, nihil Fortui­tum, nihil Varium, sayes the great Orator, L. 2. de Na­tura D [...]rū. Nothing Rash, and unad­viz'd; nothing Casuall, and by meer [Page 55]Chance; nothing altering and un­stable; but a Constancy, and Order in them All; (and yet, were there not This Constancy, but, That Ca­sualty, Quodest ex his, vel, si omniahaec sunt, Philo­sophandum est; sive nos Inexorabi­li lege, Fata cōstringunt; sive, Arbiter Ʋniverst, Deus, Cun­cta dispo­nit; sive Casus Res Humanas, sine Ordine, Impellit, & Jactat, Philosophia nos tue [...]t de­bet; Haec adhortabi­tur, ut Deo Libenter Pa­reamus; ut Fortunae Contumaci­ter Resista­mus; haec docebit, ut Deum sequa­ris, Feras Casum. Se­nec. ep. 16. 1 Cor. 14.33 he that was as great a Phi­losopher as the other an Oratour, would Infer God, and Dispute an Acquiescence in God, even from thence) and therefore he infers That very Deity, to Regulate them, whom Our S. Paul cals, the God of Order and of Peace: If the wit of his meer Speculation, could discover and un­veile so much of the Godhead to him, how much more and Better, might he (as he did) have known That God, by the Sense, and experience of those many Benefits, which those heavens distill hourely upon us? Why does the Sun so Constantly, and in­defatigably, Travell, but that all we, upon the Globe of the Earth (those who dwell upon the One Face of it, and those, who upon the Other) might have a Vicissitudinary Com­fort, and Benefit of his Light? that by It, we might See One Another, See what to doe, and how to live? See That Sun it self, and see, through [Page 56]That, Psal. 19.6. to God? Why is nothing hid from the heat thereof, but that the heat of That Sun, might Inanimate and Quicken Us, and All other Li­ving Creatures For us? So much it is of that Nature of God, of which, God would have us to be, Gal. 6.9. Not to be Weary in Well-Doing, that we may Piously Imagine, This it selfe to be One Reason, why God does not suf­fer the Sun, which does so much Good to us, to Run his own Proper and Naturall Course, but to be wheeld about by the Motion of another, and by another Motion Contrary to his own, lest so Beneficiall a Giant, as the Sun, might be suspected to do that Good he does, willingly, and knowingly, and thereupon, might be ador'd, as God: And yet, the Persian Excesse of Religion, (though a Lofty and Damnable Crime) in worshipping the Sun it self for God, out of a mistaken Gratitude for those Benefits which he receives by the Influences, but not by the donation of the Sun (which very Benefits themselves do enough teach him that There Is a God, though they do not [Page 57]teach him enough, Who that God Is) this Idolatry, in esteeming somewhat else to Be God, which Is not so, Is more excusable, and will be Lesse, though Grievously Punisht, than the Atheists defect of Reigion (which is a sin, if not the same, to be com­par'd with That against the Holy Ghost,) in worshipping No God at all, and, out of a base Plutarc. in His Book De superstitio­ne, define. Atheism to be Stupor quidam, Deos non sentientium. Stupidity, not seeing a Footstep, or Image of God in any thing, though every thing he sees, is, either, a dimme Creatura, est quosi De [...] vestiginm. Suarez. Disput. 2. sect. 2. Foot­step at least, or a Brighter Exem­plum (que) Dei, quis (que) est i [...] Imagine p [...]vo. Ma­nil. l. 4. c. ult. Psal. 14.1. & cur dici [...] insipiens, quod non est Deus? Cur? nisi quia stultus, & Insipiens? Anselm. In corde, non in ore, quiae si velit Hoc verbis eloqui, stultus esse (sicut est) Publici As­sensus Judicio arguretur? Hilar. in Psal. 52. Image of God; since our School-men have told us true, and our own Naturall Reason hath approv'd their doctrine, Imago Dei, in Rationalibus, in Coe­teris, Vestigium; sure Our David did not erre, when he tells us what a Foole such an Atheist is, though he be (which, yet, is the worst, be­ing so, of all) but in his Heart an Atheist; not only A Foole, but The Foole, no such Foole in the world as he; and how can he be otherwise, [Page 58]who has no Light of Reason in his Soul (for want of such a Light as this same, in the Gospel, though Vir­gins are called Foolish Ones) or how can he have that Light, Mat. 25. who, by that, does not See, and Grant, an Image, a Delineation, a Reflection of the Godhead, in that very Soul of his?

27. Let us leave the Atheist a­while, and put him off to another sheet, and let us once more return to our own, our more enlightned David, and cry out with him, Let Heaven and Earth praise the Lord; Ps. 69.34. let us acknowledge that they do so, by exhibiting Copious Matter of Divine Praise, to every eye that be­holds them; let us apply that of David once again, and call upon that other Heaven, our Soul within us, Ps. 103.1. which came from thence (Bless the Lord, O my Soul, and all that is within me bless his holy Name) and upon that other Earth, our Flesh about us, which was made of it, that our very Soul may worship Him, and our very Body, all the outward works of our Lives, testifie, to Him, [Page 59]to our Selves, and to the World, that we Believe him to be; that we Believe in him, according to his Commands upon us; that we Mag­nifie him, for his Goodness to us.

28. Hitherto I have (with Sadness enough (but that scarce any Sadness can be enough) that such Times as these force such a Calling as ours to Prove such a Truth as this) evinc'd such a Fundamental Truth (without which, there can be no Truth, as well as no Salvation) that there Is a God, by the Testimony of Heaven, and Earth, of Man, and of all the Inferiour Creatures, and Inferiour Principles resulting from these, which, by some, who have the Shape of Men, and the Contradiction of—(there is nothing to Compare them to, but Themselves) are more Be­liev'd, and Betroth'd Truths, than that Principle of Principles, as well as Being of Beings, that there is a God.

29. I go on to Confirm this Truth by Nature, with the Coun­tenance which those Spiritual Men, the Fathers (who have had an Oa [...] [Page 60]in the same Boat) and that more Spiritual Man, the Apostle St. Paul, (whose Example is my Just War­rant) and the general sense and pur­pose of the Scriptures of God (which make Them, and Him, to be Spiritual Men) do shew, to this kind of Ar­gument.

30. In his He­ [...]mer. [...] (saies St. Basil) [...], The whole World (take it in its Latitude, and full Comprehension, as it is made up of Both Globes) is a School, which does Instruct and Discipline us in the Knowledge of God; So that, in the sense of that holy. Father, we have not done amiss, to prove a God, by the Testimony of the Wor [...]d, the witness-bearing of Heaven and Earth.

31. Facil ùs credas Prophetiae, Discipulus Naturae, [...] Resur­ [...]ect. saies Tertullian; we shall, the more easily, be induc'd to believe the Old, and New Testa­ment, the Prophecy, and Gospel, if we have, first, been the Disciples of Nature, and study'd those Le­ctures which she has read to us, in this Nether Orb, the VVorld Below; [Page 61]so that, in the sense of that Pious Father, we are much Excusable, in drawing arguments through the whole Map of the Earth, to Convince a God; though we cannot choose but be sorry, that Ortelius, who was, never, till now, fit to be quoted in Divini­ty, is, now, fit, all over.

32. St. Bernard saies, that he had Nullos, aliquando, Magistros, nisi Quercus, & Fagos, no other Masters, and Tutors in Divinity, for some space of time, than the Oken, and the Beechen Trees; and yet these Dumb Masters, these Un-mov'd Tu­tors, who were not more Ignorant in Themselves, than an occasion of Knowingness to him (though no Preacher were clos'd up in the Hollow of the Trees) even these could Teach him that there is a God; so that, in the sense of that humble Father, we have un-heretically sub­mitted, to ask Counsel of the Mea­nest Creatures, and to Learn [...]e Power of God, from the very Feeble­ness of Frogs and Mice.

33. And though Irenaeus (twenty years Elder than the Eldest of these) [Page 62]hath said, Deus, sine Deo, non cog­noscitur, that, as we cannot see the Sun, L. 4. ad­vers. Haer. c. 14. Sicut Oculus Lu­ce nos tan­tùm suâ, sed Solu Ipsum Luce solem con­spicit, Idem (que) qui Videtur, & Visum fa­cit. Grot. Silv. l. 1. Eucharist. but by the * Light of the Sun, so, without God, we cannot Know God: yet that may be, either Cum Favore understood, that we cannot know God at all, not Confusedly, not Remotely, by any, by all of the Creatures, unless we see the Power and VVisdome of God in the Order and Disposition of Every of them; or else Rigidly, that we cannot Sa­vingly know God, without the more Especial Light of his own Word and Gospel; and then the Inference will be, that he that does not know God at all, not so much as by the Crea­tures, is without God in this World, (without the Acknowledgement of him, Natura Humana, nec Ratio­nem, nec Orationem De Diis sus­cipere po­test, sine Diis. Iam­blicus, c. 26. not without the Subsistence by him) He, that does not know God savingly, not so much as by his VVord, shall be without God, in the Other VVorld (without the Be­nefit and Mercy of God (unless a Metaphysical Benefit, a meer No­tional Mercy, to Be, though in Tor­ments) not without the Severity and Judgement of God) All this it [Page 63]argues, but it argues not at all that God Himself Is Not, no more than we may conclude there is no VVealth in the VVomb of the Sea (as, in­deed, in some sense there is not, if it be either Ʋse or Possession, and not a Bare Being, which does dare esse to Wealth) because we do not know, what Jewels are bred, or what Gold has been cast away, in the Bowels of the Main.

34. To all these let me adde that Axiom of the Schools, Media Per­fecta and quae-Ordinantur, that, as all the Means, which God hath or­dain'd, are Compleat and Perfect, to the Production of that Effect for which God ordain'd them, so the Chain of Causes, the Scale, the Mo­tion, the End, the Inclination of Creatures, the whole VVorld, and every part of it, are Joyntly, and Severally, Perfect, and Sufficient Means, whereby to know a God Est quae­dam Imper­fecta Per­fectio, at sciat Homo, se non esse Perfectum in hac Vi­ta. Pri­masius in Col. c. 1. in Fine.Imperfectly (and let none sus­pect he stumbles at a Contra­diction in the repugnancy of those two words; for, is there not a Di­stinction of Aquinas, Perfectio in [Page 64]Viâ, & Perfectio in Patriâ? and is not that, in Via, an Imperfection, if compar'd to that, in Patria?) at least that He Is, fince they were ne­ver ordain'd to reach out to us, any further, and more Clear; Distinct, and Exact Knowledge of God; though they will not enough speak All the Praises of the Almighty, yet, even They, will enough stop the Mouth of the Atheist, and put his Lying Lips to silence, Ps. 31.18. which speak Derogatory and Blasphemous things, Proudly and Disdainfully, against the Righteous Judge of all the Earth.

35. And, above all these, let me adde, that Paul and Barnabas us'd the like Natural Argument, to prove the Invisible God; and, if you weigh the Circumstances, you cannot choose but Grant', that such an Ar­gument had great Weight and Power in it, or else you must Condemn those two Great and Greatly-Illumin'd Doctors, to have been unskilfull Divines, 2 Tim. 2.15. and Workmen that had need to be ashamed, in that they did not Rightly Divide that very word of Truth, which the God of Truth [Page 65]spake in Nature her self. The Oc­casion which brought them to such a Proof and Conviction of an Eternal, All-seeing, and Un-seen God, was This; When St. Paul, by a word onely, Act. 14.10, V. 8.10. had Recover'd the Impotent Man, who was a Creeple from his Mothers womb, and so Recover'd him, that he Leaped and Walked, the People lift up their Voyces, and said, V. 11.The Gods are come down to us in the Likeness of Men (This God does some Mi­racles, to Shew his Omnipo­tency, and to Prove his Do­ctrine. Jo. Huart. Ex­amen de In­geniis, c. 2. Miracle was enough to make them Confess One God at least; and, what is there in Nature, that is not a Miracle, but that it is Ordinary? and yet as Ordinary as it is, is above the Self-Power of Man to produce) Now, when they were so far prepar'd, as to believe that there Is a God, that they might not Honour Men as Gods, but Believe and Worship the True God, This was the Proof; V. 15 He is the Living God, which made Hea­ven, and Earth, and the Sea, 16 and all things that are therein, who, in Times past, suffer'd all Nations to walk in their own waies (and we may Grie­vingly apply—Who, at this present [Page 66]Time, hath suffer'd Some Men in This Nation to walk Peculiarly in their own waies; (the Atheist's waies are more Peculiarly than any Mans alive, His own, and therefore I said Some Men—) for whatever else were the Sins of Nations, whatever else were the Sects of Schismaticks, what­ever else were the Societies and Com­binations of Men, there Apud nos, Veritatis Argumen­tum, Ali­quod Om­nibùs vi­deri, tan­quam De­um esse in ter alia, sic colligimus, quod Omni­bus de Nu­mine Opinio Insita est; nec ulla Gens un­quam ade [...] extra Leges Mores (que) projecta, ut non Aliquos Deos credat. Senec. Ep. 118. Nemo Barbarorum, ad Contemptum Deorum excidit unquam, neque in Dubium Vocant Illi, sintne Dii, an non sint? & curentne Res Humanas, an non? Aelian. l. 2. dé Var. Histor. c. 31. never was an Entire Nation, there never was a Characteris'd Sect, there never was a Profess'd Society, and Combinati­on of Atheists; so Ridiculous, as well as so Irrational, it has ever been, and will alwaies be, to Deny a God) and yet, though God has Permitted some Nations, and Sects, and Societies, to Commit such Di­stinguishing Sins, whereby they might be Known, and some Few Atheists, different from the Guise of the whole VVorld, to be Guilty of [Page 67]a Monstrous and Dis-own'd, Un­confederated and Unsociable Sin, yet, saith St. Paul, God left not Himself without Witness (to either of them, the Several VVhole Bodies, or that Small Handfull of Men) Illud Pr [...] ­fecto, quod Precamur, non fieret, nec in Hunc Furorem, omnes Mor­tales Con­censissent, alloquendo Surda Nu­mina, & Inefficaces Deos, nisi hoc in Aper­to foret, Ipsos Bene­facere. Se­nec. de Be­nef. l. 4. c. 4. Deus est, cui Nomen Omne Convenit; Vis Illum Fatum Vocare? Non errabis; Hic est, ex quo Suspensa sunt omnia, Causa Causarum; Vu Illum Providentiam dicere? Rectè dices; Estenim, cujus Consilio huic Mundo Providetur, ut Inconcussus eat, & Actus suos explicet; Vis Illum Natu­ram Votare? Non Peccabis; Est enim, ex quo Nata sunt Omnia, cujus Spiritu Vivimus. Id. Natural. Quaest. l. 2. c. 45. in that He did Good; after he had first made the VVorld by his Power, and ever since Govern'd it by his Providence, the very Being, and Orderly Being of the VVorld, was, in St. Pauls ac­count, a Witness-bearing to the God that Made it, and Keeps it; He goes on, to Instance, in the most Dis­cern'd, and Popularly-Known acts of his Providence, In giving Rain from Heaven, v. 17. every Globular Drop of which, does, in some faint manner, Resemble and Attest, that Eternal Circle, which God Himself Is; and the Fructification, the [Page 68]Plenty, which follows those Drops, does Evidence and Manifest the Goodness and Bounty of that God; That's his second Instance, the se­cond Link of that Chain of Provi­dence, the second Branch of that Ac­cumulative Argument, whereby he proves a Deity, In giving fruitfull Seasons upon Earth, 17 every Least Grain of which (to use his own ex­pression elswhere, 1 Cor. 15.37. It may chance of Wheat, or of some other Grain) does Convince a Providential God against the Atheist, as well as a Raising God to the Christian; and then he drives his Proof home, to the very Heart and Soul of Man, in that God does, by these, as the Effect of these, Fill our Hearts with Food and Glad­ness; 17 He had need be a Blind Man, not to see Rain; a Tastless Man, not to Eat Bread; that is resolv'd to be an Ungratefull Man, in being Fed, and Glad, by These, and not giving God the praise for These; He that does not this, at least by acknow­ledging God to Be (for That it self is some slender part of our Sacrifice of Thanksgiving) takes himself to be [Page 69]more wise and learned, than the most wise, and most learned of all Christs Disciples; for, here, it is not a beseeching, and you are In­exorable if you grant it not, 'tis not a persuasion, and you are Unkind if you yield not, 'tis not a Counsel, and you are Self-will'd if you obey not, nay, 'tis not bare Doctrine neither, and you are Ignorant if you believe not, but it is Doctrine, Ar­gu'd and prov'd, powerfully evinc'd, and even sensibly demonstrated, that there is a God, and you are malici­ously stupid, wilfully Blind, if your solitary testimony runs-cross to that of all the world besides, that a God there is.

36. And did not Holy Job teach St. Paul, or rather, did not the Ho­ly Ghost teach Both of them, that such an Argument as This, was un­gain-sayable, that the Contrary to This was undisputable? so far from being Thetical, and Dogmatical, Evident Truth, that it was not so much as Hypothetical, and Proble­matical, suspicious Truth? when Holy Job proves the validity, and [Page 70]sufficiency of that Aggregate Uni­versal Argument, by Proving that Universal Argument, by Induction, by Enumeration of all Particulars, not only that All the World to­gether does Argue a God, but that every Particle, and Fraction of it, severally, does do as much (Quaeque Probant strictim singula, Juncta Magis) and does effectu­ally do it, even in answer to the most Colourable Objection that ever was, against the Being of God? The Tabernacles of the Robbers Prosper, Job. 12.6.and they that provoke God are secure. When we name a God we Mean a Duty of Piety from Man to God; and, to Incourage that Duty, we mean a Reward from God upon pious Man; we declare what that duty of Piety is, to do that, which is Conscionably Right, what ever Vir Bonus quod Ho­nesti se fac­turum pu­taverit, fa­ciet, etiam si Laborio­sum erit, & Damnosum. Senec. Ep. 76. Ps. 115.16. wrong befalls us here, for doing it; we declare When that season of Reward Is, not, alwaies here, in Our World, in that Earth, which God hath given to the Chil­dren of Men, but, ever, hereafter, in Gods world, in that Heaven, [Page 71] which is the Lords, and which he will give to the Children of the most high; and yet, Ibid. 82.6. Damnum Tu [...]pi Lu­cro Prote­rendo Chil [...]. the wrong which befalls, here, to Right and Conscio­nable Men, is the strongest Wea­pon, which the Natural Man (I can scarce call him so, for Nature, which God made, will never be so Ungrateful, as not to Acknowledge her Maker, which, the Unnatural Man) takes into his hand, where­with to War against the very Be­ing of God, and to beat down the useless, unprofitable, dis-advantagi­ous, nay, sometimes, the dangerous, Ruinating, Capital Integrity of Man, who, not only, in Vain, Ps. 73.13. Ps. 35.12.Clean­ses his heart, and washes his hands in Innocency, but, is evilly Rewarded too for his Good, to the spoiling of his Soul indeed, if such an Opinion as this, once enter into it.

This, the best of Heathen, the wisest of meer Natural Men, Seneca, Ep. 74. does confess to have been a great stumbling-block, whereby to shake the honesty of Man, and to over­throw the very being of God; ex Has Deploratione nascitur, from [Page 72]this deplorable wretchedness, which betides the wisest and best Men, it is, that Men are so Ingrateful E­stimators, and Interpreters of Di­vine providence, and Abrogators of Divinity it self.

37. The Adversariness to St. Paul's and Job's Argument, is set down to the height by Job, and Se­neca; let us see what Job and Se­neca themselves Reply, to what themselves, out of worse Mouths than their own, Object. Job goes on, with shame and indignation, that so falsly-confident and undi­sturb'd an inference should be made out of so feeble a Ground, that Men should be more Insensible of a Deity, than the very Beasts, that to them he sends them for better In­formation, V. 7.8. But ask now the Beasts, and they shall teach thee, speak to the Earth (upon which those Beasts feed) and It shall Teach Thee; the Beasts are provided for, and will not that God, which Caters for them, sustain Men? the Beasts, are all alike, neither better nor worse, and they feed all alike, and shall [Page 73]not Men, who have a difference in goodness (amongst themselves, as­wel as a difference in being from the Beasts) have a divers Portion? and that divers Portion distributed according to the Rules of Equity and Judgement, Mercy and Truth? Reason it self will tell you, they shall, though not secundum hic & nunc; any, not only Reason, but (if you will take his word, whose Name is word and Reason, [...]) the [...] Volatilia will tell you the same, Ask the Fowls of the Air, Mat. 6.26.and they shall tell you; They sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into Barns, yet your Heavenly Father feedeth them; from these our Saviour proves that providence more ex­presly, which Job only intimates; and proves it by such a Reason, which, is Cognoscible even to Na­tural Men; and that providence proves a God and a Father too, a powerful God, and a loving Father, a Heavenly God and Father. V. 8. Job goes on; the Fishes of the Sea shall declare unto thee; the parts, and joints, of which they are compa­cted [Page 74]and made, the Fins and Scales, with which they are arm'd, and drest, is it not a wise and an infinite power, that made them, and put them on? Is it not, by providence, that they Live, out of that Air, which is Causa sine quâ Non, without which thou canst not Live, and within the glassy Element, under which, thou canst not choose but Dy? and is not that wisdom, and power, and providence, the three Letters, which spell a God to thee? and are not those Muta Animalia thy Tutours, to teach thee to read a God in the great Book of Crea­tures, some scatter'd leaves of which themselves are? At length he des­cends, peremptorily, and Irrefra­gably to his Conclusion, Who know­eth not, (who? 'tis an Universal challenge, and no Atheist will ever dare to give in an Answer; He will rather learn one Lesson more, a sober silence, from those Dumb, and yet Teaching Counsellours, V. 9 to whom Job sends him to School) who knoweth not, in all these that the Hand of the Lord hath wrought this?

38. And that Conclusion of Job is as a Premise, which makes way for that other Conclusion of Seneca; Ibid. since there is a God that made all these, since there is a God, who suffers Ill (that, which Appears to be Ill) to befall really good Men, Placeat Homini, quicquid Deo pla­cuit, Let that be acceptable to Man, which Man cannot choose but see to be pleasing to God, and to be allotted to Man by God, whether the Lot be fallen to him in a fair Ground, Ps. 16.6. or whether he hath neither part nor Lot in this matter, Acts 8.21. in any good Ground at all; Let it suffice, for the Child of Abraham by Faith, and the Brother of Abraham by A­doption, as being Son of the same God who was Abraham's Father, that he only Inherits that penuri­ous condition of his Father Abra­ham, Luke 12.13. that that only No-Inheritance be divided betwixt his Brother A­braham and him, in that, Acts 7.5. God for a while, Gives no Inheritance to either of them, no not so much as to set their foot on, whilst he has some hopeful assurance, that as God was [Page 76] Abraham's, so he will, hereafter be his, [...]en. 15.1. exceeding great reward.

39. That other Heathen, who was more Poet, than Philosopher, and less wise, than witty, into what a Maze, Ovidius in Morte Ti­bulli. and Labyrinth, and Intri­cacy was he brought upon such a Ground as this? Cum Rapiunt Mala Fata Bonos—That's the quar­rel he has against God, that Good Men suffer Ill things and untimely Deaths; upon this occasion, how does he strive to Hoodwink his rea­son? and yet, in his own expression elsewhere, Sic certat, tanquam qui vincere Nollet, for, that reason breaks through the transparent Veyl which he puts upon it, and, velit nolit, will be his Clue to bring him back to his right wits agen; for, throughout, he does confessingly deny, and Grants against himself; First, Ignoscite Fasso, He would be Pardon'd for what he says; and, certainly, it is a fault, that needs a pardon; truth though it cannot alwaies protect, does ever forgive it self; and then—Sollicitor Nullos esse putare Deos; 'tis but Sollicitor, [Page 77]'tis not Vincor; his Passion stirr'd, and mov'd and tempted him, but it did not quite orecome him; and 'tis but Sollicitor putare, 'tis not, cre­dere, it mov'd him scrupulously to doubt, not infallibly to believe, that there is No God; and, at last, All this is but a piece of his Poetry, and Invention, 'twas no part of his Atheism and incredility.

40. From these preparatives and foundations, with the addition of two more Concessions, one, by the ablest, and the other, by all Natu­ral Men, First, that all Men are sinners, and Secondly that all Men desire to be happy (for the very Nerve of Reason, why some few Men deny a God, is, because they would be happy here; and, because that, which we truly call sin, would be a means to impede their happi­nesses since themselves (notwitstan­ding that Comick truth, Non est quod nos magis Asie­na judices Adulatione perire qu [...] Nostra. Se­nec. de Tranquil­lit. Nemo tam alteri adblanditur, quam quis (que) sibi) cannot so much flatter them­selves, as to believe that sin and happiness can go, Hand in Hand together, therefore they take the wise course (the worldly, the helly-wise [Page 78]course) to deny that there is any sin, upon this foundation, be­cause there is No God; for, say they, if there were such a thing as sin, it must be a breach of a command of God, we our selves, and [...]. 1 John 3.9. our God himself, they say, defines it so, Di­ctum, Factum, vel Concupitum con­tra Legem Divinam; and, if there be no God, there is no sin; That's the next word in the Atheists Mouth, and that's the very desire of his Heart, that, upon that score, he may do, fearlesly, what he list; (and, because, this, I know, to be his profession, I must to reclame him, suit my discourse in an Imme­thodicalness, proportionable to his speech and practice) and, if the foundations be shaken, Ps. 11.3. 139.7.(nay destroy'd) if there be no God, what shall the righteous do? whither shall they go, to his spirit? or whither shall they fly, 1 Cor. 15.19.to his presence? If there be hope only in this Life, they are, indeed, of all Men most miserable; and, if the foundations be destroy'd if there be no God, then there can be no Devil neither, and to what Hell shall the unrighteous go? If there be Hope, [Page 79]only in this Life, Job 14.7. if there be no Hope of a Tree, when it is Cut down, that it shall sprout again (Et Homo est Ar­bor Inversa; 2 King. 19.30. in the grave He takes Root downward; There He lyes a Mel [...]owing till the Resurrection, and shall then, bear fruit upward, sprout above the earth) they are, of All Men, the most Happy, I and the most Vertuous too, Senec. Trag. Prosperum scelus Vir­tus vocetur) from these prepara­tives, which make way for it, I shall proceed to the Scripturall Argument, in the manner I proposed.

41. That there is a God in Hea­ven (eminently, and Inthron'd there, but essentially every where) is, not only One Part of the Righteousness of Man to Confess, and Another part of His Righteousness to Worship that God, but the very sinfulness of Man does confess as much, in that, Man is, ex ore Ipsius, Confessedly sinfull; and in that, sin is, by the Naturall and Morall knowledge of Man, a Violation of the Commandements of God.

42. That, which, long since, cost me some paines (but that the delight [Page 80]I took in it, did defray the Charges of my Industry) after their Vintage and whose Harvest of Morality, to pick up, in my severall walks after them, some Gleanings and Resem­blances of Christianity, dropt from the very heathens, may perhaps ad­minister delight to the Reader too, when he shall receive all of them which have a Pertinency to the mat­ter in hand, Bound up in a Sheaf to­gether; for, believe it, as All is not Gold that glisters, and we have, at this day too many Leaden, and false­coin'd, and even-heathenish Chri­stians, how faire and shining an outside soever they show to the de­luded world, 1 John. 5.19. which is not only in Malitia but In Tenebris positus (and, Then, a Gloworme can do asmuch) I and those too, such a kind of Tene­brae as I have somewhere read of, when Men did Ingenuously Confess that they were Nimia Luce Occoe­cati, so, All is not Tares, which growes in a Field situate on the to­ther side of Christendom; such hum­ble Confessions as these, if they are not wheat, sure they are not Cockle Neither.

43. As, That All Men are sinners. Annal. l. 20. If That of Tacitus, Vitia erunt, Do­nec homines, does only acknowledge the perpetuity of Guilt, but not of the Guilt of all Men, (and yet, even in him, Vitia seemes to have the same extent as Homines, and may perhaps not unfitly be call'd the Name of Man, as well as of Zoilus, Marr.Non vitiosus homo es, Zoile, sed vi­tium, if thou art homo, thou art Vi­tium too) yer That of Propertius will reach Home to, and arrest the most Righteous Man, as being in arrears by sin, Unicui (que)Lib. 2. Eleg. 10.dedit Vitium Natu­ra Creato; and if That does not Im­peach Every Man, as Born in sin; (and yet Vitium seems to have re­ference to Creato, and to conclude Man a sinner, as soon as He was Man; what? Psal. 58.3. Serm. l. 1. sat. 3. had He read King Da­vid? They goe astray as soon as they are Borne) That of Horace will swathe the whole kind of Man in the Red Mantle of Sin, and that, from His very Craddle, Vitiis sine nemo Nascitur. Here is the Confession of Originall sin, even by those, who ne­ver heard of an Originall Adam; and that without any Romish excep­tion; [Page 82] Nemo; not so much as One Virgin, a single Mary, unattainted.

And for Actuall sin, They are as Copious in their acknowledgments, as we are in our Transgressions; they not only tell Us, that we had a Be­ginning of sin from another, but that we have no end of it in our selves, Quis—Peccandi Finem posuit sibi? Quisnam Hominum est, Juven. sat. 13.quem tu Con­tentum videris uno Flagitio? Every Man is guilty of Many sins; they speak it as plainly, as if they had learnt it from S. James, for in Many things we offend All; and eve­ry of those Many, Ch. 3. v. 2. is a Grievous sin too; Little in the sight of Man, but Mediocribus esse, non Dii Concessere; — Old Rome was not so mincing in this point, as New Rome is; He would believe no sin to be Veniall, Tull. Tuse. Quaest. l. 3. who said Omne Malum, etiam Me­diocre, Magnum est.

44. And, as All are sinners, and, notwithstanding the Popes Dispen­sation Grievous ones, so, no sin is allowable in any, notwithstanding that Precise Opinion, that, when two Men commit the same Act, God sees, and detests Murther in One, and [Page 83]does neither detest nor see so much as the Act in the Other, unless with eyes which have left off to be pure, and can behold, Hab. 1.13. but not Chide Iniqui­ty; Peccare, certè, licet nemini; Tull. Par. 2. it is sin, if thou dost it, as well, as if another Man, and thou hast as little leave to offend as he; nay though thou pretendst a very good and ho­ly end, yet, not only S. Paul forbids Thee to doe evill that Good may Come thereof, but Seneca himself, Rom. 3.38. would fain Indoctrinate Thee out of it, De Ira. l. 1. Nunquam Virtus vitio adjuvanda est, se contenta; and Reason Thee out of it, Ab sit hoc à Virtute malum, ut unquam Ratio ad Vitia confugiat; and shame thee out of it, c. 9. c. 10. Non pudet virtutes, in Clientelam vitiorum de­mittere; and abhor thee out of it, Abominandum Remedii genus est, sanitatem debere morbo; and, if none of these will do it (what thou canst least of all indure) Epictetus will even Foole. thee out of it; Cap. 12. he will not suffer thee to think any Colour to be Title enough for a Contradi­ction, an Impossibility, that That, which is sin in the Deed, should be­come Not sin because of the Person, [Page 84] [...], the little great Philosopher seemes, Cap. 19. in this particu­lar, to be a great, though conceald, Christian, whilst thy self art but a ittle one, though a Professour.

45. Nor is Man only, by Nature, acknowledged a sinner in those Open Impure and Unholy acts, which man can take cognisance of, and forbid, and punish by Law, but in those se­cret deeds, which no man knowes of besides the base and unseen Commit­ter, in those Thoughts, and wishes, and desires, against which man could never Frame a Law; for though the nine former Statutes in the Deca­logue, are by some of the Heathens, made Precepts and Lawes, though in other words, and one of them in the very words of Moses, as that of Solon, Non Furaberis, and that of Diodorus Siculus in the very words of Christ [...], and that Word of Severus (when He sentenc'd any to death) which is a Compendium of the second Table, and is the express and Comprehensive Law of Christ, Mat. 7.12. Fac, quod vis pati; but That Non Concu­pisces, is a Law Purely-divine, and [Page 85]yet even against That guilt, though they could not Sancire Edicta, yet they would, and did advize and warn against, with That exclamation in Lucan, Heu Quantum poenae Misero Mens Conscia Donat, Lib. 7. and with that just terrour, and Christian doctrine of a very Juvenal, that the sin is not the lesse, because there are not more eyes upon it, prima est haec ultio (it is prima, Satyr. 13. it is not sola) quòd se Judice ne­mo Nocens absolvitur; nay, though he hath only purpos'd to sin, He must answer for That; for He hath already sin'd in the very purpose; (He that looketh upon a woman to this end, Matth. 5.28. that he may Lust, hath not only Lusted, but Adultered too) Has pa­titur poenas, peccandi sola volunt as; Nam scelus Intrase Tacitum qui Co­gitat Ullum, Eacti Crimen habet. Not only Tertullian, (that good Chri­stian, and the lesse a sinner, for that for Confessing himself to be the more so) would say of himself that He was Omnium notarum peccator, De poeniten­tia De se. that he had sin'd all these kinds of sins; or Theodorus [...], but a very Seneca too, would Paul-like, and Austin-like [Page 86]write his own Confessions in the most extensive latitude, Ego in pro­fundo omnium vitiorum sum.

46. And, as all men, are by nature, sinners, originally, actually, inten­tionally, so, by nature, they know, God to be offended at the sin of man, and Hell to be Threatned to it.

47. So certain it was with them, that God was displeased at sin, that they could not invent so much as a Cupidinean God, but, in the same line in which He is a God, He is told to be Fierce and Angry at the sinfull lover, Aristainet. ep. 10. [...]. How Gracious soever they ac­knowledge the Eternall Power, yet, their own sin, they say forces the Bolt from out His Hand, Horat. Carm. l. 1. Od. 3. Ne (que) per nostrum patimur scelus, Iracunda Jovem po­nere Fulmina; which though it comes a slow (non Ocius Alti In Terras cadit Ira Jovis) yet it comes a sure pace, Statius Theb. l. 3. and will Metam Figere, Hit the Right Mark, for it comes from Him, whom Homer calls [...], and, of whom Statius sayes—Sed videt hoc, Theb. l. 5.videt Ille Deum Regnator, & Ausis, Sera qui­dem, manet Ira tamen—And yet, [Page 87]that none should Courage them­selves in Mischief, because, though the Vengeance of God be Certain, yet it is Tardy, Another of them will dis-hearten Vice by the Weight of the Punishment, which makes a­mends to the Justice of God for the Lateness and Delay, Val. Max. l. 1. c. 1. Lento Gradu ad Vindictam sui Divina procedit Ira, Tarditatem (que), Supplicii Gravi­tate Compensat.

48. And the Punishment too of Un-reconcil'd Sinners, even in Their Black Book, is no Less than Hell. Not onely Punish'd they must be, those who are Alive in the Flesh, and Dead in Sin; and Punish'd they Are, those who are, Both waies, Dead—Exercentur Poenis, Virgil. Ae­naeid. l. 6.Veterum (que) Malorum, Supplicia Expendunt, but they they are Punish'd in Hell too, so Undoubtedly, as that he is a very Bold and Saucy Sinner who thinks to purchase a Mitigation of his Tor­ments, either with Gold, which is al­together Light in the Balance, or with Counterfeit Holiness, which is but a base Metal within, and onely Co­lour'd and Beam'd about, like Gold, [Page 88]

How particular and express, as well as resolv'd and peremptory, they are in this Doctrine of Hell! like some good, staid, Primitive Christians, and Unlike the Modern, Neutral, and Lukewarm Christians! Does Gospel say, that there are Lower Parts of the Earth? Eph. 4.9. Act. 2.27. that there is a Hell, out of which none but that. Christ Return'd, who, Alone, was Free among the Dead? Ps. 88.5.Humanity saies both This, and That, and saies it with a Check to the Boyishness of those who will be Diffident in One Article of our Creed,

And those such Kingdomes which are Irremeable; Senec. in] Morte Claudii. Avernus est, unde Redire negant Quenquam; does Infallible Scripture say again, Luk. 16.26 is a great Gulf betwixt Hell and [Page 89]Heaven, and no Passage from One to Other? Honest Heathenism will say again,

And that a Labour, like the washing of a Moor, which is Proverbially call'd the Labour in Vain; a VVork, like that of Sisiphus, to Role a Stone up Hill, that it may Role down it self. Does Christ say, Broad is the Way that Leadeth unto Destruction, Mat. 7.13, 14.and strait is the Gate that Leadeth unto Life, and Few there are that find it? Ibid.Virgil saies so too—Facilis Descensus Averni—and—Pauci Laeta Arva tenemus. Mat. 8.12. Ps. 49.19. Is the Un-Christian Christian's Hell a Place of Utter Darkness? in which he shall Never see Light? the Un-Christian Hea­then's Hell is so too;

—and [Page 90]bury'd and hid from its very self in an Everlasting Darkness, which hath no Communion at all with any Light;

Does Moses tell us, Gen. 3. that the Devil tempts Man to Sin? Does Peter ex­pound Moses? 1 Pet. 5.8. and the Saint de­clare to us the Devil's Design in his Temptation, that by yielding to his Suggestions, we may Obey our Selves into his Jaws, and he Devour us? that we our selves may be that Dust, which Moses tels us, Gen. 3.14. In Piman. Dial. 1. the Serpent shall eat? and does not Trismegistus tell us the same? Daemon, ad Pa­tranda Scelera Armat Hominem, ut Turpioris Culpae Reus, Aeriori Supplicio sit Obnoxius.

49. And, since, by their own Confessions, every Sin does Attest a God, whom That Sin offends, and a Devil, whom God imploys to Chastise that Sin, and a Hell, in which to Chastise it, Dux E­rebi Popu­los poscebat Crimina Vi­ta, Nil Hominum miserans', Iratusque omnibus Ʋmbris. Impartially, and without Respect of Persons, [Page 91]Have they not, therefore, rightly charg'd upon us the Practice of those Attoning Virtues, contrary to those Provoking Sins? One of them, in that One Verse, which Scaliger commends to be the very best of all Virgil's Poetry, ‘Discite Justitiam Moniti, Aeneid. l. 6. & non temnere Dives?’ And, not onely Justice, and Virtue, in Genere, but, Specifically, 1 Cor. 13.13. S. Pauls three Theological Virtues, Faith, Hope, and Charity? and do they not plentifully tell us, that we have all these, and all the other Good we do, from God? Cicero, l. 1. De Naturâ Deorum. Si inest in Homi­num genere, Mens, Fides, Virtus, Concordia, unde haec in Terram, nisi à Superis, defluere potuerunt? They, in whom these Graces shine, like the Moon at Full, have attain'd to the Perfection of Virtue; and yet when they have done that, a very Pinda­rus will tell them who they are to thank for it—Ad summitatem Vir­tutis pervenerunt, cum Dei autem Favore; and, not onely these Choy­cest Graces, of Gold, and of Silver, 2 Tim. 2.20. but every more Feeble Virtue, of [Page 92]Wood also, and of Earth, are Fashion'd in us by a Hand from above, by him whom Isaiah cals our Potter; 64.8. None at all of them come from our selves, either by Nature, Arist. Eth. l. 2. c. 1. Nulla fit Virtus Morum in nobis, Natura, or by Art, Non fit ab Arte, Maximus Tyrius, Serm. 22.quòd Evadimus Bon [...], but All of them by the Gift and Grace of God, Sed potius Bene­ficio Jovis, Aristainet. Ep. 13. [...].

50. And yet, these Virtues, how eagerly soever pursu'd, and in some intense degree practis'd, since, by the Frailty of Man, they cannot be entirely practis'd, or, if they were so, could merit nothing at that God's hands, who gave the Virtues, there­fore he who is the bright Morning-Star, and the very Sun, amongst the Heathens, when he had done all he could, would expect his Reward onely by Grace and Mercy; and, had he done more than he could, he would yet have done One thing more, (that which our God and Christ commands us to do, Luk. 17.10 When we have done all those things which are Commanded us) confest, that he was [Page 93]an Unprofitable servant; one of these, He confesses, throughout a whole Book of His, for the Title of it is De Clementiâ, and, almost, in the ve­ry entry of that Book, Lib. 1. c. 1. Non est Quis­quam cui tam valdè innocentia sua placeat, ut non stare in Conspectu Cle­mentiam paratam humanis erroribus gaudeat; and theother, in His B. De Ira, Lib. 2. c. 17.Quis est islequi se profitetur Omnibus Legibus innocentem, ut hoc it a sit, quàm Angusta Innocentia est, ad Legem Bonum esse? to which pur­pose is it excellently said by Auso­nius (who, though he be wholly Christian in one Copy, is extremely Heathen in Ʋbi Cas­tissimum Maronem lasciviis inquinat non suis. Another, and very little Christian in any else, so that I may well suspect that one Copy to be Il­legitimate, thrust into his Book by the Charity of another man, and not thrust out of his Head (as the Poet's Minerva. E [...]yss. 2 [...] Goddesse out of Jupiters) by his own Devotion) Deliquisse Nihil, nunquam laudem esse putavi.

51. And as they acknowledg God, Jam. 1.17. Plato in Eutryphone c. 47. to be wrathfull against sin, and from whom every Good gift does come, (Ni­hil nobis est Bonum, quin Dii Prae­beant, [Page 94]the same Dii, whom Homer Stilo Jacobino calls [...], & whom Jamblicus does singularize into Lar­gitor Bonorum Omnium) so, do they not, in some manner too acknow­ledge the Trinity of Persons? the Fa­ther is in every Mouth of them, Aristot. l. de Mundo. Deus, sine dubio, servator omnium est, & Pa­rens eorum quae in Mundo Conficiun­tur; and not only the Father of all in this World Below, but of all, in That Above too, the Father which is, Himself, in Heaven, and the Fa­ther, of all them which are There with Him, Virgil. Ae­ [...]aid. l. 10. O Pater, O Hominum, Divum (que) aeterna Potestas! The Son, is upon the Tongue of severall of them, Aenaid. l. 1. Nate, meae Vires, mea magna Potentia solus; the Godhead of That Son, Ad te Confugio & supplex Tua Numina posco; His Birth of a Vir­gin,Eclog. 4.Jam Redit & Virgo, redeunt Saturnia Regna; Aenaeid. 10.His Cruell Death, and the Salvation of Man by That, Tua haec, Genitor per Vulnera Servor, Morte Tuâ Vivo; nay, almost, the very Sacrament of His Body and Blood too, which is the Seal to Our Faith, and to His Promises; Mira­ris [Page 95]Hominem ad Deos Ire? dos any wonder that Man goes up to God? Seneca will tell you a more wonder­full thing, Deus ad hominem venit, Ep. 73. God Himself, (by His Birth) comes down to Man; imò, quod propius est, In hominem venit; nay, neerer yet, God (by His Sacrament) comes Into Man; Nulla sine Deo, Mens Bona est, the Heathen will say, that no man has a Good Soul within him, unless he has a Good God within that Soul; and the Chri­stian will say, the Soul of the Best Man, is then at Best, when his Christ is, Thus, within it; and the Holy Ghost is within the lips of One of them, of Him, whom a Learned, and right estimatour of All Antiqui­ty, an Authour of our own, Donne ser­mon. p. 362. calls the Morall Mans Holy Ghost, Seneca, what else did he mean, when he des­cribes very much of the Gracious and Peculiar office of the Holy Ghost? when he earnestly desires to know by what Name he might call such an in­spiring and sanctifying power, which makes us to forbear That Ill, which [Page 96]we would do, and to do that Good, which we would not? Quid est hoc, quod nos, Aliò Tendentes Aliò Tra­hit, &, eò, unde Recedere cupimus, Impellit? quod colluctatur cum Ani­mo nostro, nec permittit nob is semel velle? which suffers us not to will an evill thing, Once & only-Once, Once & unalterably? Fluctuamus inter va­ria Consilia, the Spirit of God draws One way, and the spirit of Man, another; Mans spirit is willing to o­bey God, but mans flesh is weak and will obey it self; Nihil liberè volu­mus, we have not so much as a Will, ad Bonum, of our selves, but we have it by an operation and influx from God, it is he that worketh in us, both Motum ad Actum and Actum too, Phil. 2.13. both to Will and to Do, Nihil Absolutè, Our will is dependent up­on Gods, Nihil semper, our will here is fluid, and Alterable, and ne­ver fixt and unchangeable, till our state be so in Heaven; Stultitia, in­quit, est, cui nihil constat; if you charge Him, and such His Various and Mutable Condition, Job 4.18. as God hath Charg'd Hit very Angels with [Page 97]folly, His next words do Darkly and secretly implore the Wisedom of the Holy Ghost to Unfool Him, All of it, in epist. 5 [...]. Sed quo­modo, aut quando, nos ab illa re­vellemus? oportet Manum Aliquis porrigat, Aliquis Educat; And who is this Aliquis, but the B. Spirit of God? Thus, severally, both in Human persons Confessing, and in Divine Persons Confest, they ac­knowledge a Holy Trinity; and do they not so together too? what els doth Virgil mean in that Mysterious Clause—Numero Deus Impare gau­det? Eclog. 8: what else do the Platonicks un­derstand in their Tria Principia, [...], and Iniellectus, and Mundi Anima? by their Bonum, do they not Antedate a Comment upon that of our Saviour, There is none Good, Matth. 19.17.but One, i. e. God? by their Intellectus, do they not Understand that Saviour Himself? and are not they the Greeks to whom S. Paul sayes, 1 Cor. 1.24. Col. 2.3. Christ is the Wisedom of God? in whom are hid all the Treasures of Wisedom? or, is This part of the Gospell hid, quite out, to them that are lost in Obscure Philo­phy? by their Anima Mundi, what [Page 98]else could be the thought of their own Souls, Gen. 1.2. but that Spirit which Mov'd upon the Waters, and hatcht the whole Creation into Form and Shape, Light and Life?

52. All this Heap of Heathen Authorities, and the Corresponden­cy betwixt them and Gospell, agrees, both with the Title, in the head of the Book, and with the Design in the Heart of the Authour, in that every, even the most Remov'd quo­tation does, at least Inclusively, argue a God; Sin, does do it, and Hell, does do it; Sin proves a God, with­out the Rebelion against whom sin is not sin; Hell proves a God, with­out the wrath of whom, Hell would not be Hell, but only a Philosophi­call Fable, or a State-Device; and by the complyance betwixt Scripture and Thefe, I would Recall my A­theist, as S. Paul, His Infidell, to the searching of Scriptures, and the worshipping a God by them, since their own Books have some Allusion to the most Abstruse articles of these; He that sees Men walking like trees, may, in time, see so clearly, as to [Page 99]let Trees be Trees, and Men Men.

53. Nay, not only Sin at large, be it what sin it will but the largest sin, which is every sin in semine, This it self, of Denying God, does prove Him to be, and the adverse Practices of this sinfull Denying Man, do, in a secret & clancular way, acknowledge Him, though with an unwilling Fear; and that, because This very Man would have some Hopes in the very God whom he denyes; such a prin­ciple there is in Him, even in Him also, Psal. 65.5. that God is the hope of all the ends of the earth, although That Prin­ciple be much weakned, and That Hope, as to Him, Impaird by his o­verswaging sin.

54. The very Denying of God does Confess Him, not only in that, Man has not the power to do this, so much as in a Thought, to say this, so much as in his Heart, but that Himself had his Heart, and that Heart the Power and Faculty of Thinking from his God, though himself hath Poisond that Innocent heart, which God gave him, and corrupted that [Page 100]advantagious power and faculty, which God gave unto his heart, not only in these (for, though this be in it self true (so true, that no Parcel­sus could ever make a Man, and put a live Heart into him, nor any other, but that Infinite Power, which put that heart into a man could put that thought into a heart) yet to this af­fectedly wilfull doubter, all this is but Petitio Petitii) but in that very Rea­son, (which himself cannot deny to himself, though he disguise it to his opinions enemy, and his own friend) why he denyes a God, Hiero­cles c. 10. because he would not have a God to sentence, and execute, and torture him; why he denyes a God, faintly, but wilily, to this only end, that he may corrupt others, to speak the same wicked Blas­phemy; that, of them, he may learn Reasons, and Arguments, to streng­then his very weakness, and to con­firm his doubt; to turn his Que­stion—Is there Knowledge in the most high? Psal. 73.11. (and yet, if he be the Most High, there cannot choose but be Knowledge in Him) into a Doctri­nall Negation, that there is no such [Page 101]thing as the Most High, much less any knowledge at all in him who himself is Not. Hast thou ever met with this Would-be Atheist? hath he to Thy Face, deny'd that there is a God? and made thy face blush, for want of that Red in His, which is Virtutis Color, in whom there is not so much as Color Virtutis? Quintil. Search Him, weigh Him, Dive into Him; This is all he means, he would be taught by thee to deny a God, if not, by thy Impossible Reason, either by thy concurrent Testimony, or, at least, by thy unrebuking Patience; something he has got, if thou abhor him not, if not a new string to his Bow, some waxe at least to make his old string the sleeker, and he will de­ny God Turpe est contra Ar­denter per­versa asse­rentes nos pro veritate Frigidiores inveniri. Rusticus Diaconus L. adversus Acephalos. Excede Pietas si modo in no­stra Domo­unquam fu­isti. Atreus apud Senes. in Thyest. Act. 2. the more, the less Zea­lously thou dost Confess him, and the lesse stoutly defend him; If instru­ction will do no Good upon him, loath him, despise him let him alone, Let him be alone, and his own soli­tariness and retirements, and Trem­blings, will be his effectuall Instru­cters, that a God, and an Angry God there is. For,

55. Marke the practices of such a gainsaying man; as you can never find any Tincture or Relish of Holy­ness in all his Words, Actions, and Conversation, who (like the Fixt honest man, but in wrong Constan­cy) is so resolved a Devill, that he will not so much as Hypocrise for Virtues sake, whose very mask he loathes, and will not take it up, though it lyes before him in every street; so, This you will alwayes find in him that he loves man, only to undoe him, and the So­ciety of man, that That man may Insensibly, be as himself, unsocia­ted, unacquainted with God; he loves the company of Man, only that he may be his companion in sin, and the sin which he commonly makes choice of, is the sin of Riot, and Excess, and Drunkenness; and why all this, but that when he is in Com­pany he may not have leisure for se­rious Afflicting Thoughts, and when he is Alone, he may not be himself, but fall asleep, charm'd with those Inconsidering Fumes, and Wake An­other man, till he comes to another [Page 103]Man, and returns to his stupifying Circulation of excess and drowzi­ness.

56. As this sottish sin is a Gra­dual and Imperfect, and prepara­tory Atheism, in those other sinners, who strive, by this perverse Medi­cine, to Consopite, and stifle all the checks and remorses of busy Con­science concerning their particular heinous sins; so it is a more pecu­liar Antidote (and yet never any venom more dangerous then such a formenting remedy, Angelus Politian. Quis nescit plus esse in Pharmaco, quam in Morbo Periculi?) to cast into a dead sleep the Schooling conscience of him, who, without this Opinue can­not but have his eyes open, to see, and condemn his deserv'd but ungroun­ded Atheism.

57. Now consider this, all ye who, Ps. 50.22: in any your several sins, forget God; Consider that every sin, even in the most upright person, is a partial, but loath'd Atheism, and every lov'd sin, is a lov'd Atheism too; Con­sider, that one Devil tempts you to Chambering and wantonness, to re­velling [Page 104]in Beer and Ale and Wine, that these are another Devil, a Tri­nity of Devils to make you renounce God, Mat. 3.9. and fall down and worship them; These are in some the con­sequents, and followers, in others, the signs and fore-runners of Be­stial, of Diabolical Atheism.

58. The abundance of those Houses, that trade in this, that sell Iniquity by the Quart, are at least a suspicion and scandal to any Pa­rish, and that quarterd iniquity is much more, not only a sin and un­holiness (if I speak not too Favou­rably, for—Ebriet as quid non desig­nat? it is never a single sin but a Volume, and Catalogue, and com­bination of unholiness) and the Factor for that sin of sins, that unholiness, that will not suffer any thing at all to be holy, no not God himself.

59. And yet, as it is oft times the Receiver, that makes the Theef, so, it is not they, that sell, but we, who buy, that make the Alchouses; our frequenting them (I speak in the name of all England, by imita­tion [Page 105]of all Holland, who, though they break the word into two pie­ces, and leave out the house, yet they powr in the Ale) is the License that sets them up; I excuse not the poor, any where, who mis-think they have need to do ill, and then, make that need, their Justice and Magistrate, not to punish but to allow the ill; but I am much more offended at the wealthier, amongst us, and every where, (in that their, and my God is offended) whose countenance does fill those Vessels, and whose unsatiableness does emp­ty them, till we are ready to change conditions with the poor sinners, and, if not inrich them (for this is such a moth-eaten gain, in quo vix gaudet Tertius Haeres) yet impo­verish our selves, and when that is done, learn of the other poor ones, and begin where they did, to do ill because we have need to do so; It cannot be helpt, we must do it, and do it without Control, till our proud sin be above the power of Church or State, Pulpit or Bench, to Preach or to Vote it down.

60. This is the practice of him that is a beginner, and this will be the practice of him that is a Profi­cient in Atheism, to this end, that he may be so contrary to those, who fear where no fear is, Ps. 53.5. as to do no­thing else, but sensually rejoyce, where there is nothing else but fear; Prov. 19.13. they courage themselves in mischief, they rejoyce to do evill, and delight in the frowardness of their ways.

61. But, then, as I have nam'd a giddy sickness in this floating Bri­tish ile, and told you the danger of that sickness, that it is in some a temptation, and, in others, a temp­ting the temptation to deny the Lord that bought them, 2 Pet. 2.1. and therefore, reprehended the love and delight in that sickness, which makes the Disease a death too, 'tis as true of the Ale-pot, as of any else, Mors in Olla, 2 Kings 3.30. (for, what St. Paul says of pleasure, and delicacy at large, is more emphatically true of this Swinish pleasure, this Miry Cauis im­mundus vel Amica Lu­tosis. Hor. Serm. l. 3. Ep. 2. de­licacy, this Dog-like Vomiting, He and She, that liveth in this frail [Page 107]Glassy pleasure, 1 Tim. 5.6 in this Intoxica­ting, Murthering Delicacy, is dead whilst he, and she seemed to live, Dead and Bury'd too—Somno Vino­que Sepulti, Virg. their Bodies are not hu­mane Bodies, but Graves, [...], and [...], and their Souls are not at all reasonable (unless pas­sively) but rottennesses within them) so, I would not name the sickness, but that Beasts might re­cover into Men, uncharm'd from the transforming draughts of Circe; nor tell the danger, but that Men might escape it, as a Lord have mercy is set upon some Doors, to forbid Man an entrance there; nor reprove their love of it, but that they might learn to loath the sin as much as the Surfet, this Disgraceful, and Be­witching, this un-manly and un-Godly sin, as the Spartans taught their Children Sobriety, by shewing them the follies of their drunken servants.

62. Consider therefore, that, as St. Paul says, your Bodies are, in reference to a Corporal Resurrection, from the Grave, so your Souls also [Page 108]are in reference to a Spiritual Re­surrection from sin, like a Grain of Corn; that Grain of Corn has seed in it self, and may live and multiply, live, Ps. 65.13. and live happily, Laugh and sing too, and even shout for joy, if it be sow'd in the Earth, in the Ma­nur'd Earth, Plow'd and Harrow'd; but, if you Sow it in the Water, it does not only not multiply, but it pe­rishes, it does not only not laugh and sing, but it weeps, and dyes, and comes to nothing, to nothing but that, which is most like to nothing, to putrefaction; every Soul in this Nation has seed in it self, and may live, if it will indure, and be the better for, such Harrowings, and Plowings as these, which dig a­bout it, and cut up the Weeds, and open the soars of it, and tell that swimming Soul, that it does not yet live, though it be in a capacity to live, that it may live, and thrive, if it will it self be the good ground to receive this word of exhortation with joy, Mat. 13.23. and to let it take root, that it be not washt away at the next rainy meeting, to receive it into an [Page 109] honest and good heart, and to keep it there, and let it never more be washt away; for the watry, the melting soul, the liquid, the fluid Soul, will as the water it self, take no Impression, no not from the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ; the very word of God will not fru­ctify there; 'tis true, without mode­rate drinking, life it self will not indure, as the earth it self will not bring forth, Job. 2.23. Ps. 65.11. Prov. 3.20 unless God give it the former rain moderately, which falls down in drops; only this way, will the Clouds drop fatness, when them­selves drop down like Dew, but a Deluge, an Inundation of either, will ruin both; when our Saviour Christ was mercifully minded to forgive a sinful Woman, John 8.6. 'twas the dry Earth he wrote upon; he quickly found the tractableness of that, he stooped down, V. 8. and wrote on the GROUND agen, but he never grac'd the unsta­ble waters, (which David hath branded with that comparison, that they reel to and fro, Ps. 107.20and stagger like a drunken Man) with one word from one of his Fingers; and in the [Page 110]whole Gospel, we read but of one Man that had the Dropsy, when he was before our Saviour, as the Ob­ject of his compassionate cure, he does not presently heal him, but Questions first, and disputes the Case, [...] is it possible, or, if it be possible, Luke 14.3 Is it lawful to do it.

63. Fear, I told you, sends the Atheist to the Sign-Priest; Ps. 10.4. He goes not thither because God is not in all his thoughts, but that God may not be in any of them; the fear of the superstitious Heathen, that scrupled at every thing, Fecit Deos, This it was, that made Gods for him; if he feared a Disease, he would worship even that, that that might not afflict him; rather then have no God at all, the Ambulatory Gout should be one God, and the Sedentary stone another, and the sudden fear, the mind-startles, the Soul-Agues of prophane Atheist, do themselves prove the true God to be; How can such a desperate irreligious Man fear, but at the apprehensions of an eternal, and implacable, and irresi­stible power of him, who though he [Page 111]is a Galilaean, is a Conquerour too, Vicisti Ga­lilac. Ju­lian. whom his Irreligion does Offend, and Desperateness Provoke, and Im­becillity Arm? and how can such a Desperately Irreligious Man, such a Vaunting Worm, Apprehend a God at any time, but that he cannot tell how to tear the Impression of that Deity out of his Soul, which will be acknowledg'd by the very Heart of the most Resolv'd Gainsayer? He may wash, as long as he will, in Abana and Pharphar, 2 King. 5.12.Rivers of Da­mascus (for the Rivers of Israel, the Waters of Jordan, are not for his turn) and sooner wash his Soul out of his Body, than such a Sculpture as that, out of his Soul.

64. That he does fear so, and that because of his Sin, because of this gigantine, and mountainous Sin of his, which involves within it, and is made up of all other and lesser Sins (as, when you break into its several pieces those Giants scaling Fabrick. you may say, This is Pe­lion, and that Ossa, and then, break one of these, you may discover a World of little Hillocks) that he is [Page 112]afraid of that God, in the Night, and Alone (a Tumult, and Throng, being the Scene of his Mirth, and solitude of another Tumult and Throng of Disquietness within himself) whom he defies in the Day, and in the Face of the whole World, of the Sun and of Men, I stand not in need of the Te­stimony of Minutius Felix, Per Quietem, Deos Agnoscimus, quos Impiè, per Diem Negamus; I re­quire not the witness-bearing of that Man, who, to avenge the Cause of his God, hath try'd him in the Dark, with a hollow and terrifying Voyce, till he hath Confest that very Un-known Man, to be his Un-known God; I ask him not to satisfie Me, but I leave him to decide this Que­stion within his own Soul, to an­swer himself, when he is alone, and, in the Emblem of his Future Hell, wrapt about with a Thick Naturalis Tenebrarum metus, in quas adda­ctura Mors creditur, sed cum per­suaseris Ista Fabu­las esse, su­bit Altus Metus; aequè enim Timent, ne apud Infe­ros sint, quam an Nusquam. Senec. Ep. 72. Dark­ness; Let him then hear the Roef crack, like the Gnashing of the Teeth there; let him see the Flakes of Lightning ready to scorch out his Eyes, and to Anticipate to him the Blindness there; Let him hear the [Page 113] Winds, and the Rain, the Hail, and the Thunder roar, like the Howling and Weeping, Storm and Tempest, Fire and Brimstone there; Let him then ask himself, Is there not, now, a God, which Builds up, Job 38.35.and Puls down? Is it not a God, that sends Lightnings, and makes them Go? Canst thou do this? and make them say unto thee, Here we are? nay, Canst thou Un-do this? and make them say unto thee, Here we will be no more? Is it not a God, that Bringeth the Winds out of his Trea­suries? Ps. 135.7. or canst thou, when they are ready to whirl thee away, send them back thither? Hath the Rain a Fa­ther? and is not God he? or who hath Begotten the Drops of the Dew be­sides the Lord? Job 38.28. The Rain is the Du­tifull Child of God; he hath com­manded it, and it does assault thee; Canst thou command it back, that it should leave off to storm thy Room? to shatter thy Windows? to shake and Astonish thy very Soul? Is it any Less than the Lord God, can say, And ye, O great Hail-stones, Exek. 13.1 [...].shall fall? Or, art thou more Lofty, [Page 114]and God-denying, than Pharaoh was, Exod. 9.28. who intreated Moses and Aaron to intreat the Lord, that there might be no more mighty Hail? Credidi­mus Jovem Regnare. Hor.—Coelo To­nante—Will not the rattling Thun­der that tears the Skyes, rip open thy Breast, and tear this Confession out of it, as it did out of thy Fellow-Heathens, that there is a God which reigns in Heaven? and art thou not afraid of these Tokens of the Lord, when he thus visiteth the Earth? Ps. 65.8, 9. Tell all, or any of these, that there is No God; tell them, if thou dare, that they are not sent upon God's Errand to thee, to make thee Confess it is God that sent them; nay, tell thy self, if thou dare, so much as in thy most recluse and undiscoverable thought, that these Insensible Mini­sters of God do not powerfully, and beyond the resisted efficacy of his own Verbal Ordinance, preach the Divinity it self unto thee; Hold out, now, at this Battery, if thou canst; and, if thou canst not, be faithfull to thy own Soul, and inform thy next gain-saying self, how much thou wast, now, even now, taught the [Page 115] Fear of the Lord? how little thou didst dare to deny God now, lest his last Executioner, the Devil himself, should immediatly appear, and prove him to thee by an Argument as ever­lasting as the Active and Passive Torment of the Devil himself, as un-deniable, as it is, now, wretched­ly un-deniable, that thou didst, be­fore, deny God, in Tongue, and in Hand, in Profane Voyce, and in Godless Life.

66. Dost thou not, now, begin to feel that Principle which thou hadst hitherto inslav'd, to stir and fetch about, to breath and gasp for Life, that there Is a God? Ps. 145.9. Joh. 1.3. a God that is Good to all? a God that made all things? and a God that hateth no­thing which he hath made? Dost thou not, now, confess him? and confess him to have been good to thee, in sparing such an Enemy so long, that he might reconcile thee? to have been good to thee, whom he might justly hate, in that thou hadst un-made thy self from all that, which God had made thee? in that thou wert a Rebel, instead of a Creature; [Page 116]and a Foe, instead of a Child; and a Bastard, instead of a Son? Is not he, now, all the Desire and Hope thou hast, who, but a little before, was Nothing at all? As soon as thou beginn'st to know him, though thou tremblest at thy former Denial, and with Peter, Mat. 26.75weep'st bitterly, Esto, ego Flagitiosus sum, saltem mecum age paenitenti­am. Hie­ron. Lib. 2. Ep. 3.Agens Paenitentians with him, with whom thou hadst been Flagitiosus, dost thou not admire the inexpressibleness of his Mercy? thou hast derided him, in his Minister; thou hast mockt him in his other Servants, and in his own Service; thou hast vilify'd him, in forbearing his House; and vilify'd him more, in despising him, in setting light by him in his very House, as if thou thy self wert all the God that wert present there; and what greater In­dignity can be offer'd to the Divine Majestie? what Sin can be imagin'd more than this? could'st thou ima­gine it, thou would'st surely act it too; and yet, how hath God con­triv'd it, (and what but a God could contrive this?) that there should yet be probational hopes of Mercy to such a Hellish Sinner? and that [Page 117]Mercy it self should be Argument and Conviction for it self? Past Mercy, for Future Mercy? To bring thee down upon the knees of thy Soul, to humble thee at his Foot­stool, and to make thy universal, absolute, entire submission and pro­stration, acceptable in his sight, and comfortable in thy own, at the same instant, when he sets before thy Eyes so much horrour of Iniquity, that thy Eyes loath to see it, and the very Order, in which they are set, does confound thee the more; He sets before thy Eyes too, so much Mi­racle of Mercy, that thy Eyes are dazled with it, that, notwithstanding all that horrour of Sin, he hath hi­therto Repriev'd thee; Confess, and adore, and reverence him now, with Person, and Life, and Livelyhood, with Soul, and Body, and Estate, and will he not do more, and more spiritual good, for Confessing, and Adoring, and Reverencing—Thee, who hath already done so much good, in so marvelous a forbearance, to thee that denyd'st, and scorn'dst, and revil'dst thy God? thou hadst begun [Page 118]to neglect him, and he conniv'd at that; thou wentst on, to despise him, and he still held his peace; thou wert perfect in sin, and didst even abjure him, and then he held out his Bow in the Skye, but there was no Arrow in it, nay his very Bow was a Testimony of his Love—Ponam Arcum was the Word of a God at Peace with Man; Gen. 9.13. do but begin to serve, and love, and fear him, and see if some good Gabriel does not tell thee, that at the Beginning of thy Conversion, Dan. 9.23.and Supplication, the Commandment went forth, and that he is sent to shew thee that thou art Greatly Beloved, to Encourage thy Better Beginning, to Reward thy Wiser Progress, and to Crown thy Holier Perfection.

66. Let me here confess and de­plore the sins, the their sins of Priest and People throughout this Nation, in imitation of That Daniel's Piety, to whom This Message was sent, whiles he was confessing his sin, V. 20 and the sin of his People Israel. Let me pursue and magnifie the Mercy of God, notwithstanding our unrelen­ted [Page 119]perversness, and multiply'd pro­vocations, Day by Day; and, O, let that Mercy be, what God designs it should be, an Invitatory Means to recall us from our Obstinacy and Customariness in sin; & let who will call this Extravagancy and Digressi­on, it matters not, I am sure his (for he confesses himself soar, and guilty, in that he is so unwilling to be toucht) and mine, and all our di­gressions, and Extravagancies, com­pell me to it.

67. What sins are there, that are not our sins? and yet for all that, what Mercies are there to the Na­tions round about us, which we do not partake of? are not we onely a Sodom, and an Egypt here, whil'st there is somewhat More, though not Enough, of Goshen and Israel, upon our Right and Left Hand? and yet, have we not still the Light of Goshen, though thrust under a Bushell, as if we, either were, or, if we would, might be, the very Israel of God? What though we are not profest Atheists? are we not practical Atheists neither? do we not all of us do as [Page 120]they do? Drink a Health to the Devil (though we do not Comple­ment him so much as to say we do it) when in over-much and useless favour, to the Health of Another, and Another Man, we In Potâ est nulla Salute Sa­lus. Ovid. Nulla, neu Stomachi, neu Mentu. drink away our own Health, both of House and Guest, Tabernacle and Inmate, Body and Soul? where is there more Sur­fetting and Drunkenness? a Man need not cross the Seas, and hazard his Life that way, to become a Bad Good-fellow, he may be Pleasantly-Mad at home, the Canaries, the Whites and Reds will cross the Seas for his sake, and, without the Expence of a Voyage, drown him upon the Shore; And is not this, to deny that God, which is All Spi­rit, whil'st we make our own Flesh, and the noysomest part of it (that which is it self One Draught-house, and fils Another) our Belly our God? Phil. 3.19. Where is there more Swearing? He is not Gentleman enough, who, though he Low'rs upon his Tenants, and Charge below him, those under his Roof, and under his Command, does not Low'r upwards too, and [Page 121]against Heaven it self, and, this very way, challenged Obeisance from men, in that he is to Great, as not to have a very God above him; and does not his Retinue begin to be Rude with God, and to count it a piece of Ci­vility and Service, to swear a Little, because he, that payes them wages, does Much, to whom yet they yield a Prerogative in some great Oath, and will no more dare to meddle with that, than with the Meat upon his Trencher? and is not this to Deny God? do we not, when we take his Name in Vain, make himself also to be a Vain, a No-God? Wh [...]re is there less of Marriage, and more of Uncleanness? and is not this, to De­ny God, whil'st God himself, when he would declare his Detestation of this sin, cals the Forsaking of God by this Name? He does so, in the Mouth of David, 78.27.They go a Whoring from thee; he does so in his own Mouth too, Hos. 4.12. My People ask Counsel at their Stocks—for—the Spirit of Whoredome hath caused them to erre, and they have gone a Whoring from [...]nder their God; Where is there more Covetous­ness? [Page 122]how many, at this day, sit under Vines, not of their own, and under Figtrees, of other Men, whil'st the Owners of them sit sub Dio, and rest their Cold Heads upon Jacob's Pillows of stone? and does not the Covetous Man Deny God by Dis­trusting his Providence? does he not worship another, and not the true God? St. Paul saies, he does, when he tels him he is an Idolater; Col. 3.5. and the True God himself tels him, who it is he Does worship, and who it is he Can Not worship; 'tis his own Mammon which he Loves and Holds to, and therefore He cannot Love, but [...]. Epictet. c. 18.Hate, he cannot Hold to, but Despise his Dis-own'd God; Let him not Deceive himself, (for, his Un­deceiving God he cannot Deceive, [...], Plato, in Fine 2. Polit.) to think Christ will be God in the Breast, when Silver is God in the Bag? was it so with Judas think ye? it was not, it cannot be, Ye cannot serve God and Mammon. Mat. 6.24. Where is there more Un-blushing Theft, when one Takes, and will not humble himself [Page 123]to Borrow? Another Borrows, and will not honest himself to Pay? un­less it be with a Text of our Saviours, and a Gloss of his own—Lend, Luk. 6.35.Ho­ping for Nothing again? when a third would take pains, and pay, and is himself more put by from Emolu­mental Labour, than another pre­ferr'd to it? when one Parent would with-hold his Child, and cannot, and another Parent breeds up the Child to it, makes it the Child's Trade, and Occupation, and Ap­prenticeship, and the Parents Live­lyhood, and Meat, and Income, to Steal? when the Trades-man sels his Ware at an Over-price, and his Soul, and his God, at an Under? when some of the People will sooner take away two Coats, than give one? Luk. 3.11. when some of the Publicans will rather exact more than is Appointed them, V. 13. than Mitigate the Taxes? when some of the Souldiers will be readier to do Violence, than to be Content with their Wages? V. 14. when some of the Di­vines will be more Vehement to Preach away Tithes from their Bre­thren-Divines, than to Preach Sal­vation, [Page 124]and Baptism, and Eucharist, to their Flock? Some of all sorts do Steal, either with an Oppressing Tongue, or with an Envious Eye, with a Ravening Hand, or a De­vouring Heart, and some of all sorts, do give, either an Alms, or a Pity; and though these do, in their Bounty, worship their God (for, Right Cha­rity is a Service of his; 'twas known so to be in Warmer Daies—Knowing, Q. Eliza­beths In­junct. 25.that to Relieve the Poor, is a True Worshipping of God—Alms, and De­vorion of the People—their very Alms were part of their Devotion, and with such Sacrifices, Heb. 13.16God is well pleased) yet, do not those Others, by their several kinds of Theft, Deny God? this Sin is in the Head of those, a­gainst all which God himself in this manner complains—Will ye steal?— and walk after other Gods, Jer. 7. v. 9, 10, 11.whom ye know not? and yet come and stand before me, in this House, which is called by my Name? Is the House, which is called by my Name, become a Den of Robbers in your Eves? Where is there more of Blood-shed, when some Fields in London, after [Page 125]Night has spread her Curtains over them, cannot be walkt through, safe and dry, notwithstanding the Law dwels at the next Door to them? and the High-waies to it are sprink­led Redder with Blood, than with Sand? and is not this to Deny God, whose very Image they cannot en­dure to see alive?

68. These Things are so; and though so they are, what Blessings are we to seek for, besides the Bles­sings of Holiness and Obedience? of Peace and Love? we are Blessed in our Basket and in our Store (though my self have so Little Store, that I have scarce a Basket to put it in, and am almost in the Condition of those, whom our Saviour sent abroad, Mat. 10.10 V. 9. Eph. 4.25. With­out Scrip, as well as without Gold, and Silver, and Brass, yet, in that we are Members One of Another, I put my self into the Number, be­cause I see others, of whom my self, in a Spiritual Alliance, am part, to be Rich, and Full, though they reign as Kings without me) as Blessed, as if we had done all that to which Performances these Blessings are [Page 126]promisd, Deut. 28.1. Hearkned diligently to the voyce of the Lord, to Observe and Do All His Commandements; And, Therefore are we thus Blessed Tem­porally, that, by these we might be wrought upon, to hearken to the voice of the Lord our God in All things, and by that, be blessed Eternally.

69. But, if any of those severall sinners (all of whom I [...]rive to re­claim as well as that Atheist, who himself is all of them) who shall read how heinous and Atheistick their sins are, would forsake them, because of—I cannot say more then—the Un­godliness of them, and yet fear they can not forsake them, God will not for­give them, because they are so estran­ged from God, by them; not to tell any such, that Niniveh (as sinfull as the most sinfull of those, who will stoop to read this) did repent at the first voice of Jonah, I shall conclude this (which by this time, is digression enough) with setting before them the Great Mercies of God against the sim of Paul, and Gods recove­ring him out of those sins, into which he was plung'd all over; but [Page 127]the ears of him, which, by hearing Christs voice, taught the whole man to worship Him. Act. 9.1.—When Saul was yet Breathing out threatnings & slaught­ters against the Disciples of the Lord,

We have amongst us, too many of those evill qualities which S. Paul feard to be amongst his Corinth: 2.12, 20.De­bates, Envyings, Wraths, Strifes, Back­bitings, Whispers, Swellings, Tumults, Slaughter,—but, God be thanked, None of these are intended against the Disciples of the Lord, at least not Quatenus Ipsum, As they are the Disciples of the Lord, not Therefore and because of that very Reason, but rather, because, Though they are so, they are either suspected not to be so, or, if they are suspicion-proofe, for some Temporal & Collateral reason, which, either the Religion of That Man does not allow, or else the Man of That Religion does Thwart; this, though it be an Atheism, is not a direct and an Irrecoverable one; for, sure it is a much easier task, to per­suade This Man to be content with His Estate, and to serve God with that little He hath, to persuad [...]hat Man to lay dow the vain The [...]hts [Page 128]of Honour, and to esteem the True Worship of His God, to be the Best, Greatest, and most Durable Honour, then to assail, and Unwind Him, who strikes the First Blow against God Himself, and wounds Him, not as Ignorant Saul did, through the sides of His Saints, but through the very substance of Himself; And yet, let me tell every Threatning soul a­mongst us, that, whether They whom He Threatens, Are, or are Not Dis­ciples of Christ, Himself, who does thus Debate, and Envy, who is thus Wrathfull, and Strisefull, who does thus Backbite and Whisper, who is thus swelling and tumultuous, during these pestilent and outragious Hu­mours, Matth. 11.29. Is. 9.6. 2 Cor. 12.11. 1 John 4.16. is no Disciple at all of the Meek Jesus, the lowly in Heart Jesus, the Prince of Peace Jesus, the God of Love Jesus, and the God Jesus, who is love it self;—When Saul desired Letters—(Authority and Commissi­on from the Heathen and Unchri­stian states) that if he found Any— (He had made them to hide them­selves for fear of his further persecu­tions, that it was difficult even for Him, who was perniciously zealous [Page 129]in the Cruell Inquest, and for all those Promoters he would imploy in the service of the Unbaptized State, to Find them out)—of this Way (pro­fessing Christ and his unacceptable Truth)—Whether they were Men or Women—(He would neither show Mercy to his Fellow Men, nor com­passion to that weaker Sexe, which is unable to Bear, to that Tender Sex, which is apt to Compassionate)— He might bring them Bound—(they must be brought, for he would so Binde them, that they could not Come)—to Hierusalem, Verse 2.—However we persecute One Another, the most of us do it but in a private Malice; we seek not to Unchristian, unbaptize the State (and, O! may none of us ever seek to do it!) by ingaging the Power of That, to be as malicious as our selves; we do but Threaten, and (what ever in past yeares we have done) we Wound not Men, we do but slander, we Binde nor women; and yet, do we These? and am I not too Courtly to say we do—But these? And yet, in the very Act and Fury of doing All These, in the very care [Page 130]and Industry (Toiling himself, that he might be Toilsome to Others) when he Journey'd to execute All These, Verse 3 yet, for all this, and the pre­sentness and impetuousness of All this, does Christ Call Saul, and Con­vert Saul, Blind him, and Cast him down, From ver. 4. to ver. 31. Recover him, and Lift him up, make him Confess Christ, and preach Christ, and protect him for doing This against the hate of Men, who laid wait for him, because he did This.

O Lord, our God, we are as great Objects of Thy wonderfull Mercy, as Saul was, Pardon us, Inlighten us, Strengthen us, that we who have liv'd the Life of Saul against Thee, may live and dy, the life and death of Paul for thee, to the honour of that Name of Thine which we have hitherto caus'd to be evill spoken of among all the People.

70. As there is sin in every Man, and that sin is a disobedience to the Commands of God in His Jus Naturale as well as in His Jus Po­sitivum, so that the very wayward­ness of Man, does Prove that God [Page 131]who is the Law-giver; Jam. 4.12. As there is in Man Power to Discriminate, and Di­stinguish, sinfull, and evill, and un­just, from Holy, and Good, and Righteous, so that this Innate Facul­ty of separating the One from the Other, of Discerning betwixt Light and Darkness, betwixt Foul and Upright, by reason of which Horace does highly complement Him, and from the very Foundation and first Aristotle in Ethic. says, Man cannot be Prais'd for any thing but vertue, because strength, and beau­ty, &c. Na­turall per­fections, are not, as This, in his own power; and he has no Power to this, but by his discer­ning fa­culty. Principle of Praise, of whom He sayes—Qui Turpi secernis Hone­stum, Is, and is us'd by some for an Argument of the Deity; As This sin, which Man is Guilty of, and which Man Knows Himself to be Guilty of, does hinder Him from That great and Last happyness, which he naturally desires, and which he Naturally Desires of God, so it is God only, which can give to Man that Final, that uninterrupted, that eternal happyness; which happyness, as Man cannot Understand, as well as not Injoy, without the gift of God, so, because the Scriptures do Teach both these, both what that Blessedness Is, so far forth as the [Page 132]shallowness of the Prosoundest Man is able to Conceive and how Man may attain to this Throughout-un­conceivable Blessedness, and nothing else, but Scripture does teach both these. Let this it self be one Argu­ment whereby to prove to the Hi­therto doubting man that God Him­self Is, not only in Himself, but is too the Authour of those very Scriptures.

71. That [...]. Ari­stot. Ethic. l. 1. c. 1. happyness, the greatest, the chiefest, beyond which there is nothing more, not only to be pos­sest, but to be Imagin'd (for, the greatest, the chiefest happyness is much More than so) is the Desire of All those, who have so much of Man, as to be capable of a Desire, is Confest by All; Aske the very A­theist, who Denys God, if He would not This? and, how much soever He Robs God, not only of his ho­nour, his Bene esse, but of his Esse too, He will not be so ungratefull to the Calls and yearnings of his own Appetite, to say that this is not the Desire of his Heart and Soul, to be as Happy as the Nature of Man is Capable to be; And then take Ad­vantage [Page 133]of This Partiall, and intere­sted, and self-Concession, and ask Him, if He be not willing, for that very Happyness sake, to grant such a God, who may Grant Him This.

72. But then, though happyness be the Desire of all, even meere Na­turall Men, yet, Varro, in Philosophia, apud Au­gust. de Ci. Dei l. 19. c. 1. since those Naturall Men are so Divided amongst them­selves, that they know not, by what Qualities to Describe it, or by what Name to call it (who, amongst the two hundred threescore and eight severall Opinions Concerning it, and Names of it, have not hit upon the Right) and are so far from De­fining it (and indeed, it is One part of the Christian Mans Happiness that He cannot define it, unless, as many Philosophers do the soul of man, Negatively, not only because it is More than He can Define, but be­cause he knows it so to be) that they cannot so much as give you the right [...] of it; They define it, only Identically, the ignorant result of All, the Ablest of them say Concerning it, is but This, that Praemium, Finem (que) virtutis, optimum, Divinum (que) quoddam, at (que) Bea­tum esse constat. A­rist. Ethic. l. 1. c. 9. Happyness is Happyness—Nothing els, is True, and certain, from them, and there­fore [Page 134]such a very Truth, and certain­ty as This, thus Limited, and Iden­tifi'd, is a part of their ignorance; since amongst the Wise ones of them, One calls that Fortune, which is always Assistant to Good Counsells, happyness; Fortuna Consiliorum Bonorum Adjutrix, Felicitas.Cicero does so; and though He does well, to make Counsells, and Deliberations, and the Goodness of them, to be One Part of Happyness, yet he does Ill, to account of these, as if they were The Happyness of Happynesses, and not the After-Re­ward of These (even of that earthly Happynesse it self) to be It; and He does worse, (to do, as the Poet reprehends the unwiser men to do—Te Facimus, Fortuna, deam) to make Fortune the Goddess, Juven. which succeeds Good Counsells, and Dis­creet Deliberations; what has such a Fickle thing as she, and Her Up­down wheel, to do with the Certi­tude and Stability of these? She, that has much less of Pow'r, and Jurisdi­ction, and soveraignty, than the stars? and the Sapiens Dominabi­tur Astris. Wise man (such as Cicero was, till he Bow'd the knee to For­tune) who, in some sense is well said to Govern them, should govern her [Page 135]much more; or else, Tully himself; as Politique a Statist as he was, as Governing a Head-piece as he had, if That Fortune which is wont to Fa­vour Fortuna Favet Fa­tuis. Fools, more than Wise Men, if that Deaf Fortune, whom the most Passionate of his Orations could not so much Inflect and perswade, as the Attentive Multitude, does but look awry & Frown, leaves off to be hap­py, and a Prosperous Catiline, all whose Counsells are evill, and Delibe­rations Treasonable, will have as much claim to Happiness as a Defeated Tul­ly, notwithstanding the Sobriety of His Counsells, and Loyalty of His De­liberations, since they do ex aequo di­vide his definition betwixt them, in that the one Counsells, well, and For­tune Assists the other. Since Another calls That man Bonus qui Rotâ Tor­quetur, & Malis con­flictatur, Felix. Happy, who Indures the wrack and wheel, and unyieldingly Conflicts with a World of Miseries;—Seneca does so; And he does, in Part, Well, to Call him Happy, whom Adversity and wretchedness does not make Lesse Good; and in Part, Amiss, for, who will be Incourag'd to be Faithfull and Perseverant in that [Page 136]Goodness whose only Happyness is, to be Miserably-Good? Quis Virtu­tem amplectitur Ipsam, Praemia si tollas? if you take away the Future Reward, who will Court a Penuri­ous Vertue? nay, if, insted of the Re­ward, you give Him Sisiphus's stone, and Ixtons wheel, who will Court an Ingratefull, an Undoing, a Plaguing Vertue? Since Another cals Plea­sure happiness; Epicurus did so; and Xerxes Xerxes, Rex Persa­rum, Nova Voluptatis Repertori praemium Constituit. Nihil aliud putans esse vitam nisi vescendi & Potandi Li­centiam, Firmicus de err. part. Relig. did so; and the first did, in part, Well, if you Apply to That Word. His sober and Inward sence, if you do, as Seneca would have you do, Propiùs Introspicere, and Con­fine it to a Mentall Gust; if you suf­fer not the Curiosity of the Palate, and the Insatiableness of the Machome­tus credidit Beatudinem consistere, in cibo, potu, & delecta­tionibus corporati­bus. Joan­nes Galen­sis Anglus. l. de Orig. Mach. c. 5. Belly to be the Seat, and Determinatour of that Pleasure, and thereby, make not the Word, which was more In­nocent; and Refin'd, and subtle, in his purpose, obnoxious to the Miscon­struction of him, who wisht that he had a Cranes Neck, that he might be a great while a Feeling and Tasting, the Delicacy, and sapidness of His Old wines, and Sybaritique Feasts; [Page 137]for certainly, Xerxes the Persian King, did much mis-understand Epi­curus, and the Choiceness, and Inti­macy of His Delectation, when he constituted a Reward to him, who should so much vex and trouble him­self, even with pleasure, as to take paines to Invent a New one; And yet when you have purg'd, and still'd and Fin'd this delight from all its drossiness, Is This Delight it self the Happyness? what then will become of that Good Man who has this Tryal put upon his Goodness, to have the Pre­sent joy and contentment withheld, and separated from it? must he then, leave off to be Good? & seek out hap­pyness in Another, more Rosy, and less Thorny Road? Since a fourth de­fines Regnum res est inter Deos Homi­nes (que) pul­cherrima. Happyness to Consist in honour, and power, soveraignty, and principa­bility; Livy does so; But then is none happy without that Omnis sae­c [...]li, Honor, Diabolo est nego­tium. Hilarii, can. 3. in Matt. honour, which is the Traffique and Merchandize of the Devill? and is it in the power of that Satan, who offer'd the King­doms of this world, and all the Glo­ryes of them, to that Christ, whose they alwayes were, though without [Page 138]a Contract, and unbargain'd for, to make a Blessed Man? Is none happy, unless he be a King? None indeed, no not one; but then He must be Rex sui, Himself, and His Passions (and, amongst the rost, this it self, by which he desires to Reign) all the People over whom he Reigns; Is any Other Rule, the only Heaven? and the way to that (Per Fas, per Nefas) the only way to Happyness? Few in­deed there are that find this strait Gate, Matth. 7.14. that walk in this Narrow way; nor was it the Well-taught Judg­ment, but the ungovern'd Ambition of Caesar, who said, he would rather be the First at a siege, than the second at Rome; it savours, sure, of more Na­turall and Rational, aswell as Chri­stian and Gospell Divinity, to de­sire to be the Least in the Kingdom of Heaven, Matth. 11.11. rather than the greatest in any Kingdom upon earth; if it be so, that it must be, aut Caesar, aut Nullus, how Many of the Nones will there be? if it be so, that it must be-. Only a Prince is happy, into how close a Room is Felicity Pent? how does it Thwart, and Contradict, [Page 139]imprison, and even inslave its own self, in that it is become thus un-dif­fusive, and incommunicable? and is, Therefore, neither good, nor happy? for, what is Good is Sui Diffusivum, the more Good, the further it reaches, as the Bright and Apparent Sun, is a greater blessing, than when That Sun weares a cloud upon his Face, and goes to Bed in darkness, Hid from our eyes; and what is Hap­py, is so far from being like a Crown, that it is, Impatiens Non-Consortis, the less happy, Lucan. Erasm. in Mor. En­com. the less others are happy with it; Nulla boni viri (and none, but the Good Man, is the Bles­sed Man) Jucunda Possessio sine socio. Since therefore a fift makes Wisdom to be This happyness, and the Wise Man This King; Sapiens, uno Minor est Jove, Dives, Li­ber, Honora­tus, pulcher, Rex deni (que) Regum.Horace does so; and he does well in doing so, had he Rightly known what the True Wisedom is; but, by reason of This Errour, He makes That, which he calls happyness, to be Nothing at all, because the Wisest of meere Natu­rurall men, Hoc tan­tum scio me nihil scire. has so much of Socrates in him, to know, and understand, and Confess, † This is All his wisdom [Page 140]to Arrogate to himself None of this; he has much of Wisedom, but he is Wise enough to apprehend, that there is much more of Wisedom which he cannot comprehend, and therefore, he will not indure to be denominated Wise Omnis de­nominatie sumiturà Majori. from the lesser part; he knows much, but, that much is little to what he knows not; He Rules himself well, by that Talent, and Portion of Wisedom which he has, but he does More Mis-Rule himself for vvant of More of that Wisedom; Since a sixt does de­fine Happyness to Consist in Operation, in Well-doing. Aristotle, in One place, does so; in the Contentment, and satisfaction, and Delight, which follows that Operation, that Well­doing; Aristotle, in another place, does so; But, since happyness, cannot be vvithout a Rest from Labours, for, a Toilsom happiness vvho can avvay vvith? since that delight does not alvvayes follow Well-doing here, or, if it does, since That is not the Supreme happiness; From the uncer­tainty in all These, the vvisest of Na­turall men, what Happiness is; from [Page 141]the certainty in all these, and in all mankind besides, that happiness is, and is to be desir'd, Let the Na­tural Man, upon this very ground, search the Scriptures to find that happiness.

73. Happiness is, in very deed, the desire of all; and yet, it cannot behad upon this earth, if it could, a King, who has the most command of this Earth, is most like to have had it; And yet, that such a one, a very King, who was a meer na­tural Man, could not have it here, but in Heaven, nor there neither, but in his Summum Bonum A­nimorum est, Deo Frui. Tris­megist. Pimand. Dial. 1. God and the God of Heaven; for, story has told us, that, when Egyptian Priests told any of their Egyptian Kings, his God would have him leave his Kingdom, and come to him, he presently, and chear­fully, Kill'd himself, as he thought, up to Happiness, and God and Hea­ven.

74. Since all the writing of Hea­thens will not help us to it, though severally they agree in telling us, that there is such a thing, and yet, severally contradict each other in [Page 142]what that things is, let me go on, as I long since promis'd, to the ho­nour of God, and his Scriptures, to propose the Scriptures of God, by a Natural reason, even to him, who is, yet, but a Natural Man, out of which he may truly learn, what that happiness is, and how he may reach up to, and be involved in that true happiness.

75. Nemo Malus, Fe­lix. Juven. Certainly, it is not for no­thing, that Man knows, his Sin, if unremedy'd, will unhappy; it is, sure, to a good end this; and more, certainly, Man does not desire a vain and impossible thing, when he would be happy; for, † Nature has given an appetite to nothing, Sat. 4. Natura ni­hil Frustra. but the God of nature has provided some­thing to fill up that appetite; Let me therefore propose to a modest scrutiny, and sober examination, such inquiries as these.

76. Is it not of necessity, of the very essence of God, that the same God, who is a just God, should be a merciful God too? Is it not ex­ceeding probable, Psal. 5.21. that, as the Ju­stice of God does set our sins in or­der [Page 143]before our eyes, and, thereby, Naturally make us to fear that pu­nishment, which belongs, and is due, to the disorderliness of our sin, so the mercy of God would set in or­der before our eyes too, some infal­lible method of reclaiming us from that sin, and Indow us with a ho­liness contrary to that sin, and in­state us in a happiness contrary to the punishment of that sin? What would better prescribe this holiness, and hold forth this hap­piness, than the written Law of our teaching God, and the written pro­mises of our gracious God? since, if there were no directing Law, we could not learn to be holy, if there were no incouraging Promises, we could not claim to be happy, and, if neither of them were written, by the corruption of man, and the de­ceiveableness of Tradition, they might both of them be chang'd, and interpos'd, and expurg'd, till they agree with the humour and wilful­ness, and exchequer of man, who, insted of the establish'd universal Re­ligion of God, might obtrude upon [Page 144]us the mutable Doctrines of a Sect and partee.

If it be probable, that such a Law be written (and, upon so indubitate a ground, as to have the choicest attribute of God, that, which God most loves, and man most loves, his very mercy, to attest the Proba­bility of it) that such a Law is writ­ten, and we find it not in all the vo­lumes, the most Apophthegmatical discourses of the wisest, the most learned, and most devout of Hea­thens, whose Books are as dark to any such purpose, as the Ink they wrote with, or the Black Ball we Print with; and if there be such a Book of Books (not only in that, That one Book is made up of several Books, but in that, All the Books in the world together are not com­parable to that one-several, that one-every Book) whose design it is, to instruct us in such a Piety, and to Crown us with such a Reward, Is it not highly worth the while to turn over that Book? that we may be sincerely and solidly Religious by it, and truly and eternally blessed [Page 145]by the Author of it? and what Book has such contents in it? can do all this? besides that, which we call the Scripture?

77. Bring hither, into a com­parison, I say not all the choicest writings, of all those, who were the holiest, and hope-fullest of Men, in a Natural Religion (for such a low comparison would be a scan­dal to this Holy word; and, indeed, any, though less unmannerly, and more approaching comparison, would be so too; but, the Nature of this present discourse do's make it somewhat tolerable, if not require it) but bring hither the Ex­tractions of all their holinesses, and hopes, amass into one Treatise, only the Excellencies and Quin­tessence of all, that all have said, as to an integrity, Here, and a Heaven hereafter, and see, if they are not, all, those halt, and blind, and maim'd Religions, which only this Jesus, whom we Preach, è suggesto, and è Praelo, can heal! and that, as he made the world, with a word only, with this very word of God, which [Page 146]we call upon you, to search, and to ask Counsel of! See, how the Gospel of Jesus Christ is, throughout, clean and sanctify'd! 1 Tim. 5.23. how, though it allows Wine for the Stomack sake, yet it charges a sobriety, even in Wine too! Prov. 23.31. Look not thou upon the Wine, when it is red—lest it make thee look as red as it when it gi­veth its colour in the Cup—lest it make thee give thine in thy Face,—when it moveth it self aright—lest it and make thee move wrong, and un­towardly, and reelingly, thy Legs carry thee whither thou wouldst not; John 21.18. and it tells you what a mocker it is, and that he that is deceived there­by is not wise, Prov. 20.1. no not Seneca's self, though he says it sparingly, and with an Aliquando—Bibendum est ad e­brietatem usque—no Aliquando at all here, unless such a time, which is neither Day, nor Night, nor a dubious mixture, and instantane­ous compound of both; find out such a time, and sin thou mayst, Gospel it self, and the God of it, will not be angry; but, till then, (i. e. for ever) cease from sin; See, [Page 147]how there is nothing, here (as in all other the most pious writings, which are not founded upon this) to be read and heard, cum veniâ & favore! not only a Cato may, without a blush, but a Saint in Heaven dos, with an unspotted reverence, look upon these mysteries! how there is much of it consonant to right reason! for otherwise, man could not appre­hend it much of it (for, if we stay there; Possibly Man might have compil'd it) above the quickest, most exact reason, of the sharpest most piercing Man! and yet (for other­wise, it were not God neither, that made it) nothing at all contrarient to reason! What other Book is there, can tell us, how God without a violation of his Justice against the sins of Man, can, yet, mercifully save sinful, because penitent, Man? No way, was ever yet heard of, be­sides this way, which could rational­ly deliver Man from the one Thral­dom and captivity of his sin, and the other Thraldom and Captivity of Hell, into which his sin would hurl him; No way, but this, can lead [Page 148]him into that happiness, of which, his sin ought to defraud him; other Books can tell you, that there is a Styx and a Charon, and a Rhada­manth; that there are Virgines Furiae, which are uncapable to be vitiated and corrupted with any Bribes; and they tell you true; and they charge you to believe that they tell you true,—Tu vera Puta; but, no Book, besides this, (unless it borrows its Narrative Traditionally from this, and makes it somewhat the worse, because the less plain, for wearing) can, by an infiniteness of the mercy of God, and an assent of the reason of man, 1 Pet. 5.8. Rom. 5.5. tell you, of one roaring Lion ready to devour you, and, of another Lion, that of the tribe of Judah, which can challenge you (you who resist not, (for, though the Debt be paid, if a wilful Man, that is in Love with bonds, reject and tear the acquittance, He must pay it agen, to the utmost Farthing) you, who take hold by the hand of Faith, of what he hath done for you) as his lawful purchase; which can, and will, deliver you from the Jaws of that [Page 149] Lion, and make him roar agen, be­cause the prey has escapt from be­twixt his teeth; which can rescue you from the Conveiance of that Charon, and the judgement of that Rhadamanth, and the torture of that Styx, and preserve you from the loss of your blood, by the inestimable price of his incorruptible own; O, that all those Heathen-(far abroad, Ps. 2.8. in the uttermost parts of the earth, and at home, and amongst us too of this Natron, which calls upon his Name, and is call'd by it-which God hath given to this JESUS (who is the Authour, and subject of the Book)-for his inheritance (which he was Born to, and had not at all been Born in this world, but for that inheritance sake)-for his possession (which he hath bought with the voluntary laying down of that Life, John 10.18.and powerful taking it a­gen, to which he was Born from the womb, and Re-Born, from the Grave) O, that all those Heathens (the profest ones, beyond Christen­dom, and the secret ones, Acts 17.11. in the Bowels of it) would do as the Be­reans did (who are honoured with [Page 150]the stile of Noble for doing it) Diligently and Daily search the Scriptures (the Evangelical Scri­ptures) whether these things are so!

77. And I may be excus'd, even amongst such People as we are, to Honour and Defend the Authority of holy Scriptures, even by such an Argument as this, because of the more than Exact, and Supereminent Holiness of them, L. de Ve­ritate Rel. Christ. in that, not onely the Learned and Indefatigable Gro­tius hath us'd the like Argument a­gainst the Heathens, but the Con­sciencious Balduin too hath done the same, Casus Conscien­tiae. whereby to Confirm the Faith, and Settle the Consciences, even of Christians themselves, who might, Possibly, Scruple at the Authority of holy Writ.

78. Excuse me therefore, my Bre­thren of the Christian Confession, and give me leave to go on, since such a Method as this, as it may be Instrumental to the Begetting of Faith in him, who, as yet, dis-be­lieves that Book to be the Work, as well as the Gift of God, so it cannot choose but re-mind you, and cherish, [Page 151]and encourage that Faith which you already have, and stir up, and awa­ken that Love, and Honour, and Reverence, both to God, and the Word of God, which your Hearts bear to Both, when you consider, that by the Stile and Method, the Man­ner, and Matter of it, it can be no less than God, that spoke and made it.

79. Nay, hath not God himself given way to such a manner of Ar­guing as this, when (as, Christ, the Son, abridges the Gospel into two Commandments, so God, his Father, Mat. 22.40. Contracts the Law, into a Command, and a Promise, upon Obedience to it, and a Threat, upon Rebelling a­gainst it, Isa. 1.18. and makes his Entrance upon it with such a Preface—Come now, and let us reason together—and as an Inference out of the whole—For the Mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. Which intimates to us, V. 20. that, as we must Believe, because God hath said it, so, we may Argue, and Reason, that God hath said it, be­cause, what is Deliver'd there, is above the Power and Capacity of any Crea­ture. I shall for a little while Respite [Page 152]the Promises & Threats of Scripture, which is Isaiah's Argument, that Scripture is the Word of God, be­cause, in right order, I ought to be­gin with the beginning, and to con­sider, first, the Stile and Method of God, from the very first Word, and so on, throughout his Book.

80. The Stile and Method in which the Word of God begins, does continue to the end; it speaks, as from One having Authority, Mat. 7.29.and not as the Humane Scribes, and Writers, whose occasional sudden Voyce, and Considerate, Purposing Pen too, are subject to Errour; In the Doctrines of Man, the Method is, to Prove, unless it be onely in Re Factâ, that he, who speaks, brings his Eyes with him, as the Witnesses which saw such a thing done; In all else, it is his Reason which sways us, and works upon our Belief, and not his Name; But in holy Scriptures the Case is al­ter'd; Moses, in the beginning of them, does onely say, that, In the Beginning, Gen. 1.1.God created the Heavens and the Earth: He does not Prove God, nor, that Great Work of God, [Page 153]the Creation; and, in this, the Au­thority of Moses, nay, of All Mankind, nay, of the very First of them All, is altogether Invalid, and Un-concluding; and, that one Ex­ception, of being an Eye-witness, is, in this case, wholly taken off: For, though the Invisible things of God are clearly seen by the Creation of the World, though Every man may know, Rom. 1.20. by Every thing he sees, that there is a God that made it, and there was a time when it was made; yet Moses was no Eye-witness of the making of the World, for himself was made long after, and himself tels us so; neither could he receive, by the Te­stimony of Man, in what Order the World was made, because Man was the last thing that was made in the World; not onely Scripture tels us, he was the last, but Reason it self tels us, he could not be the first, his Ʋbi must have been made before himself could be plac'd in it. He that wrote that Book, and the whole Penta­teuch, does every where discover a great measure of Wisdome in himself, and therefore could not possibly be [Page 154]guilty of so much gross and absurd Folly, to think his own Testimony Valid, when, out of himself there are Irrefragable Reasons against the Va­lidity of his single Testimony, or the Joynt Concurrency of the whole Ra­tional Creation; and, therefore too, it cannot be, but that he would have the Eternal Creatour, qui nec Fallere potest, nec Falli, to be understood the sole Author, and himself onely to have been as the Pen in the Hand of God, whil'st God himself was the Ready Writer. Psal. 45.1. In Man, Reason is the Authority, but, in God, Au­thority is the Reason; and therefore Man proves, and God onely saies; nay, let me say, that this it self is the most powerfull proof that can be either urg'd, or imagin'd, that God hath said it; t [...]e very Method, in­communicable, and un-applicable to Creature does signifie, that it is that God which spake these words, who hath acquainted us, that this is his peculiar Stile, Psal. 82.6.Dixi—I have said that ye are Gods, Deputed Gods by me, to stand in my Room, to Distri­bute my Justice, to Execute my [Page 155]Vengeance, 1 Tim. 6.15. Psal. 97.9. who my self am the King of Kings, and the Lord of Lords, Exalted far above all Gods, so that we may, not onely Pardon, as Hy­perbolical, but Approve, as Literally true, that Vehement Expression of Raimundus de Sabunde, Dum Mi­nùs Probat, Magìs Probat; In Natu­rali Theo­logia. God does prove all he saies, the more, in that he does not Prove at all, but Say, because, did he Prove, it would administer Doubt, that the Words were Mans, who, though perhaps he be in Many Things, [...], is, in Nothing, [...]; but, to Say, by way of Authority—Non Vox Homi­nem sonat, This is, indeed, Act 12.22. not the Voyce of Man, but of God; and, since so it is, he that would have a Richer Pawn, a firmer Obligation, than the Bare Word of God (and yet I do not well to call it his Bare Word, for, his—Dixit, & Factum est, Psal. 33.9. go to­gether, what he saies, is never Bare, but alwaies apparel'd with Perfor­mance) I know not what to com­pare him to, but to our Covetous Pur­chasers, who think their Lease Im­perfect, and their Bargain lost, if [Page 156]they have it not For Ever, and, for One Day at least, more than for ever, For Ever and a Day; Thus the Stile and Method proves God to be the Author of them.

The Manner, and Matter does so too.

The Manner does so, in another manner of Stile and Method.

It finds fault in the whole Crea­tion, Gal. 2.17. though it makes not Fault in any part of it; It is Objurgatory, and Rebuking, to those on Earth, and to those in Heaven too; and what Creature Amongst Us will be so Bold, to Stile and Manner it so Loftily, and Majestically, and All-Knowingly? it tels us, not onely that All Men are Sinners, Jam. 3.2. but it uses the Hands of those very Sinfull Men, to self-acknowledge their par­ticular most grievous and hainous Sins, and makes those Men hold up their Hands at the Bar of Heaven, and not onely cry Guilty, in the Mass, as Heathens do, but thus, and thus, thus and thus hainously and specifically Guilty; and what Crea­ture will be so Injurious to his own [Page 157]Fame, to leave his Shame, and Scan­dal, and Dis-repute, upon Record? not onely, as he is one of Mankind, but too, as he is this Individual Man? A Seneca, In Vita Beatâ, c. 18. In Al­to omn. though he cryes out—In Profundo Omnium Vitiorum sum, would never cry out against his own Covetousness, though he did against the Avarice of other Men; in his own Behalf he is more sparing, and saies, Sapiens (for himself did Opine himself to be that Wise Man) non optat Divitias, sed Mavult, and he leaves others to tell us more Loudly, not onely of Senecae Praedivitis Hor­tos, Martial. but of his-Amor Sceleratus Ha­bendi; and, not onely this, Job 4.18. but God in Scripture Charges his Angels too with Folly; and Heathen Man will rather Dispute, whether there Be an Angel, whom he never saw, than charge that Invisible Angel to have sinn'd with him.

91. Would St. Paul, trow ye, have told us, that he had once been so far from Saint, as to have been a Blasphemer, and Persecuter, 1 Tim. 1.13. but that he was Over-rul'd by a Divine Power, which draws Good out of [Page 158]Evil? and makes the Penitence of St. Paul, V. 16. and the Mercy of God upon it, an Example and Encourage­ment to Atheistical Blasphemers, and Un-Christian Persecuters, to re­turn from their Evil Waies, and not to Kick out their own Blood against the Pricks? Act. 9.5. to be more Upright, and Just, both to God and Man? VVould holy David have told us, that he had been so Un-holy, Title of Ps. 51. as to go in to Bathsheba, but that the Adulterer should, with him, detest and forsake that Impure and Unclean Sin? should come Home, and return to his First Love, be constant to his Spouse Jesus, Rev. 2.4. 2 Cor. 11.2. and not make his Members the Members of an Har­lot? VVould Moses have told us, that his Anger waxed hot? that he cast the Tables (which were the work of God, Exod. 32.19. V. 16.and the Writing within them was the Writing of God, of God's own Commands) out of his hands, and broke them, Et Manus & Duplices Manibus Ce­cidere Tabellae. Ovid. de Remed. Am. l. 2. But that we should not Fret (as he did) lest we should be mov'd to do Psal. 37.8.[Page 159]Evil, as he did? and to break all the Commandments of God, in a much worse sense than he did? but that we should imitate him in his Sorrow, in his better Anger against his worse Anger, and in his other more pre­dominant, and denominating Qua­lity, his Meekness, Num. 12.3 and his Zealous Keeping all the Commandments of his God? It makes, and offers Pro­mises to All Men, it Pours out, and Denounces Threats upon All Men, even Kings, and Judges, and Magi­strates; and what One meer Man will take such a Universal Power to himself, and will not suffer his Em­pire to be Bounded by any part of that Vast Ocean, all of which has it self a Ne Ʋltra,Ps. 104.9.Thus far thou shalt go, and no further; were it possible that such a One Man should be King of all the VVorld, yet the Promises, and the Threats, are to That One Man too; and it is as Ridiculous and Absurd, for a Man to make a Promise to, and to Threaten Himself, as if he should have an Action at Law against himself for breach of Promise, or sue himself to be Bound [Page 160]to the Behaviour and Peace, for Threatning himself; there is but one Allowable, nay more, Commendable (and Pity it is, that it is so un-imi­tated, for want of Pity) way that I know of, for a Man to sue him­self; The Lord Viscount Scudamore, and Mr. Farrar of Hunting­don shire. some, whose Predecessours have Impropriated, have had such Berean-Nobility, and high Primitive Christianity in them, as to cause their own Names to be Prosecuted in Chancery, and there have Re­sign'd, and by Law Confirm'd Tithet to the Church; and, for their sakes, I could wish this Book might Live, that their Names might give Fame to the Book, and the Gratefull Book Perpetuate their Names.

82. Thus, from the Latitude, and Unlimitedness of Jurisdiction, in both Branches of it, Punitive and Remunerative, Vindictive and Pre­miative, Ps. 145.9. in doing Good to all, high and low, rich and poor; in calling all Men to Account, even those Cedars, and the Tallest of those, whose Office it is to call Inferiour Men to Account here, It must be that Absolute, Uni­versal Monarch, the Maker, the [Page 161]Owner, the Possessour, the Ruler of the VVorld, whose words these are.

Thus, the Stile, and Method, and Manner, Proves God to be the Au­thor of them.

The Matter does so too.

83. The Promises are, Mat. 5.8. of Eternal Happiness in Heaven, in the Sight and Enjoyment of the Eternal God; The Threatnings are, of Pains in Hell, Mat. 25.41. with the Devil and his Angels for ever; Neither of these can be Apprehended, but by him, who has the faculty of Discourse and Ra­tiocination; and no Reasonable Crea­ture can Promise or Threaten these; The Good, neither Angel, nor Man, will usurpe so much False Power to himself, as to Bestow Heaven, or to Inflict Hell; since Nothing can, Nihil dat, quod in se non habet. of its own Power, give, or cast, that upon another, which it hath not in it self, by its own Power; and no Angel, much less, Man, how good soever, can Possess, and Enjoy God, whether God will, or no; He may as soon be God, and what God is, [...], as, so, Enjoy him; and, [Page 162]whether he be Man, or Angel, if he be Good, he hath not Hell at all; The Bad cannot lift up Another to that Heaven, which himself has Not, nor sentence Another to that Hell, which has himself; All, that go thi­ther, go the same way, and, cer­tainly, the First of All was not so Ill a Lover of himself, as that he would Sciens & Prudens, Damn himself thither; 'tis-Nullum Numen ('tis not Nullus Daemon) Abest, Juven. Sat. 1.si sit Pru­dentia Tecum.

84. It makes Promises of things, which, had they not been Reveal'd by God, could never have entred into the Heart of Man to conceive; that there should be, Col. 2.9. in the same Person, Perfect God, and Perfect Man; Is. 7.14. that a Virgin should have a Son, and be a Virgin, when she bears him, Mat. 1.23. and ever after, and so much the more, and more evidently a Virgin, because she had such, and so holy a Son; Luk. 1.35. All Promises, that any Crea­ture makes, must (like the Child that any Creature bears) be Con­ceiv'd before they are Made; and, since no Creature could ever, by any [Page 163]the most lightsome faculty of its own, Conceive such mysterious Depths as these, therefore, that in which these Promises are made, must needs be the Word of an All-know­ing, as well as an All-powerfull God, of that God, who saw his Own, as well as his Father and Servant Da­vid's Substance, and, in whose other Book all his Members were writ­ten,Ps. 139.16when as yet there was none of them.

85. Mar. 12.33 It Commands a Universal Ho­liness to God; the Good are so Good, that they will not Command this, in their Own, but onely in the Name of their God; and the Bad are so Bad, that they will not Command this at all, no, nor Perswade it, no, nor Suffer it; Since therefore the Scri­pture is, as Nazianzen saies of it, Omni Rationabili facultate Validior, Oratio 7. above the Capacity of any Rational Creature to Compose, it must needs be, it cannot possibly be otherwise than, the Work of that God, who alone is above all Rational Creatures; not onely Above them, but with that Reverend Addition of St. Paul—Far [Page 164]above all Principality,Eph. 1.21.and Power, and Might, and Dominion, and Every Name, that is Named, not Onely in this World, but Also in that which is to come.

86. Hitherto I have shew'd you, how the Stile and Method, the Man­ner and Matter, of Holy, and Ma­king-Holy, Scriptures, does Prove a God, and propos'd to the Hitherto-Atheist, the Diligent Search of these, in that they are, not only Holy, and Sanctifying Scriptures, but, because they are so, Blessed and Happifying Scriptures too; the search of these, upon this Ground, I propos'd to him, that he might find out, by these, what that True Happiness is (and Confess GOD, not onely Essen­tially to Be, but Mercifully to be the Author, and Fountain, and Giver, both of the Scriptures, and of the Happiness Taught and Repos'd in them) which All Men desire, and, concering the Declaring and De­fining of which, all Un-Scriptur'd Men are as Wavering and Un­constant, as the Citizens of Jerusalem were, in telling what was the No-Fault, [Page 165]of Un-guilty, and Saint, Paul, that some cry out One thing, Act. 21.34some Another; some a Prosperous Good­ness, and some, an Innocency, though Afflicted; some, Pleasure, and some, Honour; some, Wisdome, and some, Contentfull Goodness; so that we can no more know the Cer­tainty, than the Chief Captain of the Band could, who came to Paul's Rescue, because of the Philosophical Tumult; Of which Happiness, let me shew you, in one word more, a Glimpse and Tast out of holy Scri­ptures, how it is much More, and much Better, not onely than any One, but than All of those Names, by which they call it; and so I shall, though slowly, Descend to, yet spee­dily pass through, the Second Trea­tise, or Second part of the First.

87. That Happiness is a Pro­sperous Goodness, for it Consists in Enjoying that God, who, first, Mat. 5.8. made Man Good, and then Happy; and the Security of that Happiness, is beyond the Power of such a Giddy thing as Fortune, either to Bestow, 1 Thess. 4.17. or to Deprive Man of; for it is for [Page 166]ever; And that Happiness is much more than all the Successes of this World, and more than that Much More too; for he that has been the most Successfull Man here, can yet imagine Happinesses beyond all that Actual Success; but, there, he shall Possess More, than he can Covet here; not onely the Excellency of all that God hath Created, and which, in his Infinite and Mercifull Wisdome and Goodness, he shall appoint to endure in Heaven, when he Annihilates those unworthier Creatures, which, here, we Enjoy'd too much, and Lov'd too well, be­cause not well enough; and, yet, who can Imagine the Entire, though Inferiour, Happiness of the Created All in this World? and, much more, the Things which are in Heaven, Wisd. 9.16who hath searched out? those things which the Prophet Isaiah, Isa. 64.4. and the Apostle St. 1 Cor. 2.9. Paul, have told us, the Heart of Man, though it can Enjoy, cannot conceive: and, yet, it shall not onely Enjoy All These, in That God, 1 Cor. 15.28. who is All in All, but there­fore Much More than All these, be­cause [Page 167]that God also; There shall be Tranquill Happiness of the Mind, without the Vexation of the happiest Mind here, which Plots, and Con­trives, Studies, and Beats, to be more Happy still; That Happiness shall consist, if not In, yet with, Virtue, and Love, and Knowledge; we shall Love our own Glory, and Love the Glory of God above that, and Love his, even in that he hath Glorify'd us also; We shall stand up compleat in Virtue, 1 Cor. 10.12. without bare thinking that we stand (though some, here, will not be contented with a Modest Thinking, but will arrogantly Pro­claim too, that they stand, even whil'st they lye flat along in that Ditch into which their Blind Guide hath thrown them) and without an­xious Taking heed, lest we fall, for, Mat. 15.14 our God will take that heed for us, and hold up our Arm with his; we shall be Wise, not in any perplex'd Speculation of the Divinity in Things Created, but in the Open Vision of the Essence of God, in the streaming Rayes, though not in the whole Sun of that Essence; we shall be like [Page 168]him, in Un-sinfull, Un-dangerous Knowledge, 1 Joh. 3.2. because we shall see him as he is.

88. There shall be all the Hap­piness of the Body too; Beauty, and Health, and Strength; the Body shall shine as the Sun; Mat. 13.43 1 Cor. 15.54. that shall be its Beauty; It shall be Immortal as the Soul (when Man shall be, as it were, Re-made, not of Body and Soul, but of Soul and Soul) that shall be its Health, it shall be Im­passible, Un-suffering, as the Angels of God, it shall have an eye, which they have not, and yet, no more Tears than they which never had Eyes to weep; Rev. 7.17. nay, the Eyes of it shall be, like those of Christ, as a Flame of Fire, Rev. 19.12. Un-wet, and as Dry as that; Sooner may Contradicti­ons be Verisimilitudes, and Fire weep here, than a Saint there; and that shall be its Strength.

And, not onely the Mind shall be Happy, in that which Peculiarly ap­pertains to It, Virtue, and Love, and Wisdome; not only shall be added to the Happiness of the Mind, that of the Body, in that which Peculiarly [Page 169]appertains to It, Beauty, and Health, and Strength; but, to both these Distinct Happinesses, of the Body, and of the Mind, will be added a third, which will, once again, make both of them joyntly Happy, That, which we, here, miscall the Goods of For [...]une, and shall, there, rightly un­derstand to be the Wealth of God, for, both Body and Mind shall be (I will not say Fortunate) Happy in the perpetual possession of all manner of Riches; for, as the Body and Mind make the Man ('twas in some re­fin'd and limited sense, well said of Pythagoras, [...], and of Pla­to, Animus Cujus (que) Is est Quis (que) yet, when Pythagoras, and Plato, were dead, his Soul, and his Mind, still were; but that Soul was not Pythagoras, nor that Maxd, Plato; else, Pythagoras was Alive, with­out any [...], even after he was Dead, and Plato was Return'd be­fore his own Great Year) and God makes the Man a Saint, so, the same God will make that Saint a Joseph, Gen. 41.43. who shall be Ruler over all his Land, Ruler over all his Goods, over the [Page 170]whole Kingdome of Heaven, for, that it self is, both the Field, and the Treasure, Mat. 24.47 Mat. 13.44.46. and the Pearl in it, for which we should Sell All we have here, and Purchase those, by Selling, by Despising, by Counting All we have here, Phil. 3.8. but Dung, that we might win Christ; Such an un-doting e­steem of these Under, and Deceitfull Happinesses, will make them to be Dung indeed, such Dung, as will Enrich and Fructifie that Field, and make it bring forth that Treasure, and that Pearl for us; Let us, there­fore, with a Comparative Contempt of these, cry out, as St. Austin did, Whatever else the Lord our God hath given to us, In Psal. 26.let him (what he hath been, a long time doing) take it all away, and give us these. For

89. With these, as he will give us an Establish'd, and Persevering, so he will also give us an Un-affli­cted Goodness; Sin and Misery go together, and neither of them can enter into Heaven; Sin is a Moth, which will eat a hole into our Hap­piness, Mat. 6.20. and Misery is a Thief, which will steal it all away, and there is no [Page 171]room for such Guests as these; There was, sometime, a kind of Hell in the Lower Heavens, Gen. 19.24. but all the Fire and Brimstone of them will be rain'd down upon the Sodoms and Go­morrahs here; nay, those very Hea­vens themselves, will endure the Plague, which they did Inflict, they will Melt away with forvent heat, 2 Pet. 3.12 and onely that Heaven shall endure for ever, in which there is, and will be, nothing else, but God, and An­gels, Saints, and Joy.

90. The Pleasures there, are much more (and much more Pleasures) than Man can either Desire or Ap­prehend; for, they are not onely Pleasures for evermore, Ps. 16.11. but they are too, a whole River of them. Psal. 36.8.

91. There is Honour; and that more multiply'd in the Nature of it, than in all those words of St. Peter, 1.1.7.Praise, and Honour, and Glory, and more Magnify'd still, in that the Fa­ther of Jesus Christ will honour those there, Joh. 12.26 who serve Jesus Christ here.

92. The Wisdome there is in­finitely [Page 172]beyond all the Wisdome in this World; not onely beyond all the Wisdome of the Children of this World (who are so Wise in their Ge­nerations, one would scarce think they were ever Children) but of the Children of Life and Light too, whil'st they are in this World; The Best, the Chiefest Wisdome of the Children In this World, though not of the Children Of this World, is, to be Wise to Another, a Greater, a Better World; 'tis true, Nemini sa­pit, qui sibi non sapit, and 'tis as true, as that—Nec sibi sapit, qui sibi non in Aeternum sapit, Ps. 111.10.The Beginning of that Wisdome, is the Fear of GOD, and the Instructers in that Wisdome are the holy Scriptures; 'tis the great Eulogie, that St. Paul gives of them to Timothy, 2.3.15. that they are Able to make him wise unto Salvation; and in the verse after, All of them are given by Inspiration from GOD; so that this one Link in the Chain of Happiness, is sufficient to both those ends, for which I insist upon it, both that Scriptures might be search'd, as the onely Certain Foun­dation [Page 173]of Future Bliss, and that that God might be acknowledg'd, whose Gift that Happiness is, and whose Fear does begin to make us Wise un­to it; And, if there be so much VVis­dome, in the very Way to Salvation, how much more in the Enjoyment of it? As certainly as much More, as that First Principle, which is e­qually agreed upon by all Mankind, has Certainty in it, Totum est majus suis Partibus, for, Here we know, but it is but in Part, we Prophecy, but, in the most Studious, or most Enlightned of us, it is but in Part; 1 Cor. 13.9, 10. but, hereafter, When that, which is Perfect, is come, then that, which is in Part, shall be done away; VVe are Children, so long as we are here, we speak, we understand, we think, V. 11 as Children; Then onely, when we are grown up to a Perfect Man, Eph. 4: 13.unto the Measure of the Stature of the Fulness of Christ (and that is only, when we enter into Happiness) shall we cast away Childish Things; for, though in that place, St. Paul was become a Man even below Stairs, and out of Heaven, by a special and [Page 174]bountifull Illumination and Sancti­fication, yet, how many of us to­gether, in respect of Knowledge and Holiness, cannot make up one St. Paul? And yet the Knowledge which the Man St. Paul had here, was but VVeak, and Childish, and that onely, Manly and Perfect, which he Now has Above; The Evangelical Knowledge, which he had, and we have here, was indeed, Perfect, if Compar'd to a Legal Knowledge, but very Lame, and Heavy, Dull, and Ignorant, if set in Competition with that in Heaven; so Theodoret interprets that place; [...]. and so St. Paul too, when, in the verse after, he does so far Un-Man himself, as to wrap up himself, and us, in the same Thick Cloud, for, Now, We see through a Glass Darkly (We, not a very Paul excepted) but, Then, Face to Face; and (lest that might be suspected for a meer piece of Civility, humbly to involve himself in that Ignorance, which is the Lot of All) he speaks more home yet, and to his own Door, Now I know in Part, but, then, shall I know, [Page 175]even as I also am known; and, what VVisdome, what Knowledge, Grea­ter, and more Sublime, than to Know, even as God himself Knows, (sure, if there be a Prius and Posteri­us in the Knowledge of God, the first thing that he ever knew, was, that himself Alwaies Is from Everlasting) and to be VVise (in some granted Proportion, Psal. 93.2. even by the Testimony of God himself) as he is VVise?

93: There, is also a Contentfull Goodness, a Filling, a Satisfying Happiness—Lord shew us the Father, Ioh. 14.8.and it sufficeth; nay, not onely the Father, but the Son, and the Holy Ghost too, are shew'd sufficiently to all the Saints of God here, in their Exile, and will be shew'd sufficingly to them all Above, in their Coun­trey.

94. The End why I propose to my Atheist-Reader all these several Branches of our Future Happiness, (which will hereafter be bestow'd by the Father of Spirits, and are, Heb. 12. [...] in the mean while, attested by the Spirit of the Father) is, that he may (by that Lov'd Argument of Self-Preservation, [Page 176]and, for his very own sake) be in love with those Scriptures of God, which so much Out-Promise, and Out-Give, all that All Natural Men have written, or can desire, that, by these, he might Know, and Acknow­ledge, Love with Reverence, and Serve with Fear, that God, who is, even by Natural Reason (which, to the Atheist, is instead of God) con­vinc'd to be the Bountifull Author, both of these Scriptures, and of all other Bounties.

95. May such Reasons as these be effectual upon him, to seek all his Happiness at the hands of that God, who is Rerum omnium Pleroma, Irenaeus, l. 2. c. 1. the One, Onely Fulness, and Satis­faction, Center and Rest of All things, without whose Blessing in a Contentment here, and in making that Contentment an Earnest of a Heaven, our Souls are Empty, when our Chests are Throng'd, and our Appetite, even when it is Sated, Hungers after we know not what.

96. In Enchi­ridio Or­thodoxo­graph. 'Tis good Counsel of Pisanus, that, since no Creature, without God, can do Enough for himself, [Page 177]and be Satisfactory to himself, he, that would have sufficient, and e­nough, should seek to enjoy his God; should Study, and Pray, and Live, after that manner, whereby he might have a Title and Interest in that Fundamental Universal Blessing, (without which, Nothing else, not all the Pomp and Prosperity, the Gilded Hooks, and Candid Venoms of this World, is Blessed; and, with which, Nothing, not all the Con­tempt, and Visible, naked-fac'd Scorpions of this World, can make Wretched) I will be their God, Frequenter, in utroque Codice.and they shall be my People; Who suffer'd more than the Apostles of Christ Je­sus? and yet, 2 Cor. 3.4. because such Trust they had, through Christ, to God-ward, who suffer'd Less than they? Did they suffer, to whom it was given to suffer? Who ever complain'd of Li­berality, as of Stripes? of Kindnesses done to him, as of a Load and Pres­sure? What Liberality greater? What more Abundant Kindness, than such a Bounty, which, in St. Paul's ac­count (who had often experimented the Sweetness of that, which Per­secuting [Page 178]Man meant Gall and VVormwood) is made Equal, even with Faith in God; His Zealous Di­sciples would have Envy'd him, if they might not Partake with him in the Honour of Enduring Affli­ctions; and therefore he does, not onely Comfort his Philippians in these, but these themselves are the very Comforts which he speaks, and God Administers to them—For unto you it is given, C. 1. v. 29, 30.in the behalf of Christ, not onely to Believe in him, but also to Suffer for his sake, having the same Conflict which ye saw in me, and now hear to be in me; He does not, and he would not have any of those, to grieve, for any of these; nay, he does, and would have those do so too, thank his and their God for them; how weak, and despis'd, and un­wealthy soever they were in this VVorld, yet this was his, and all his Disciples, 2 Cor. 3.5. great Support, that—Their Sufficiency was of God; Have God, and you have Sufficient, for—He is All; Have not God, and you have Nothing, for he is All: Paul had Conflicts, and the Philippians had [Page 179]Conflicts; and, these were to them, Signs, and Marks, and Testimonies of true Disciples; nay, they were more, Mercies, and Donations, and Gifts to Beloved Disciples; Not onely these, but Christ himself had Conflicts too, and, in the Eye of the VVorld (till the Eye of the VVorld, the Sun, was asham'd to see All of it, and hid both his own Face, and the Face of the whole Earth, in Darkness) Nothing else but Con­flicts; and yet in the midst of all these Conflicts, these had All, be­cause they had God; and Christ had All, because He Was, and Is God, and Is to Come, to Reward those, who Patiently Endure these.

97. By this time, I hope he, to whom I now write, has left off to be he, to whom I Began to write, that he is Austin'd into—Ego non sum ego, and Paulin'd into—I live, Gal. 2.20.yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; that he is not onely a Deist, but a Christian too; and therefore I shall take my leave of him with two pieces of Sober Counsel; One, from the General Doctrine of God, that [Page 180]he would depend wholly upon him; Another from the Particular Do­ctrine of Happiness, that he would go on in being a Saint, Psal. 85.8.and not turn again to Folly, in prizing Glass above Pearl.

98. From the First, Learn he not to gape after the Inferiour All, but to attend on that God, who, even now, Ps. 81.10. hath brought him out of Egypt, and hath promis'd, though he open his Mouth never so wide, to Fill it; to labour for a Title, and not to doubt of Sufficiency in him, who is Above Ali, Eph. 4.6.and Through All, and All in All; Let him be Above all, by his Proselytical, and our Renew'd Obedience to his holy Precepts; Let him be Through All, by his, and our Resigning all the several Powers he hath given us, back to himself, by imploying them in a Subordination to Just and Mercifull Power; Let him be All in All; Desire we no­thing else but him, Nothing but from him, Nothing but for him. Are we his Children? who is so wise as he, to know what we stand in need of? Mat. 6.8. & 32. VVho is so Good as he to supply to [Page 181]all our wants? VVho is so Fatherly as he, to Chastise us, and yet to Love us too? Are we not his, but Belial's Children? who is so Gracious as he, to afflict us, that we may be his? who is so Holy and True, Just and Potent as he, to controul all our Inordinate and Sinfull Desires of Having?

99. From the Second. Learn we to return that Answer to all the gaudy Temptations, and fond Al­lurements of this Inchanting VVorld, which Agesilaus did to him, who besought him to hearken to the Voyce and Song of one, who well imitated the Various and Plea­sant Notes of the warbling Nigh­tingale; No, saies he, Ipsam Lusci­niam audivi, I have heard the Nigh­tingale her self, and all Imitation I know, comes short of her; Say to any Tully, who bids you ask for Happiness from Humane Plots, and Counsels, and Contrivances, and the Aids and Assistances of For­tune upon these, I will none of that, since I have heard of a Firmer Hap­piness, which Fortune has Nothing [Page 182]to do with, a Happiness from A­bove, and to Above, from that God, from whom Every Good Gift does come, Jam. 1.17. and from whom too All Good Counsels do proceed; If it be not Good, Common-Prayer-Book. 'tis no Gift, and I will not re­ceive it; If it be Good, 'tis none of hers, and I will not be Accessory to her Theft, nor purchase a Halter, be it never so Silken a one; I remem­ber that of Seneca (whom I once took for Divine too much, and now wish he were more Divine) For­tunae de me Potestatem, non do, and I am Christian'd into a new Philosophy, which saies, Non datur Fortuna. Say to any Seneca, who cals the Conscience of Well­doing, Happiness, even then, when the Body is in Torture, I am con­tented with the Yoke now, but I look for a Release anon, Ps. 34.19. since I have heard that though Many are the Afflictions of the Righteous, yet the Lord not onely Delivereth them out of all, Gen. 15.1. but is, himself, their Ex­ceeding great Reward;Ps. 58.11.Verily there is a Reward for the Righteous, Verily he is a God that judgeth in the [Page 183]Earth; I believe it enough, be­cause David hath said it, and yet I have learnt to put both the Ve­rilies together, Amen, A­men, dic [...] vobis. and believe it the more, for David's Sons, and my God's sake, whose Stile That Is; though I suffer Many things, 2 Tim. 1.12.ne­vertheless I will not be ashamed, for I know whom I have Belie­ved; What is a little Blood-shed? I have empty'd a Vein to Re­cover from a Sickness, and was well again; Shall I not empty them All, for Christ and Heaven? Say to any Epicure, to any He, that would be more Crane than he is Philosopher, that bids you, to be Happy, to become a Dog, and a Sow, to wallow in your own Myrie Vomit, to allow of nothing but Sensual Pleasure, I will none of that; since I have heard, not onely that a Friar, Erasmus in his Eccle­siastes. to Torment a Drunkard, bade him be Drunk again, as Conceiving no Torture to be equal to an Over-charg'd Stomach, nor the Rope it self more Cruelly to stretch a Throat, [Page 184]than a Loathsome Yawning, but that at God's Right Hand there are Pleasures for Evermore, Ps. 16.11. In­nocent, and Un-satiating Plea­sures, a whole and a clear Ri­ver of them; not onely a River, but the Spring-head too, All my Springs are in thee O God, Psal. 87.7. Say to any Livy, who calls VVorldly Honour, and Earthly Soveraignty, Happiness, I will none of that, since I have heard, There is no Honour like to that, L. Hatton's Preface to the Psalms.of serving God in a Great Capacity; that this is the onely Lawfull VVay, by which to set up a Royal Priesthood, 1 Pet. 2.9. Exod. 19.6a Kingdome of Priests, even amongst the Laity also, when God shall make them, indeed to be, what in both those Scriptures they are call'd, a holy Nation. Say to any Horace, who, to be Hap­py, bids you be VVordly-wise, and Wise in your Generation, I will none of that, since I have heard of Another, a Heavenly VVisdome, a VVisdome to all Eternity, and to Salvation in it; [Page 185]This, if compar'd to the Worlds, is not Another, but an Onely Wisdome; the Worlds, if com­par'd to this, is not Another Wisdome, but an Onely Folly, Madness, Desperation; VVhat is my Generation, but a Point, a Nothing, to God's Eternity? My Daies are but a Hands Breadth, Psal. 39.5.(Diogenes's [...], in re­spect of some Longer Liver in the first of Ages) and mine Age is as nothing before thee O God; Might I be as Happy, Latum Unguem, and one Day of my Life, as all this World could make me, and wretched the whole hand-breadth, and all the Life besides, I would not make so Indiscreet and Un­politique a Choyce; All this Life, to all Eternity, is infinitely less than a Day, to all this Life, and shall I choose the Greater Evil; and forfeit the Greater Good, when I have skill enough to re­fuse the Lesser Good, because of a Lesser Evil? Say to any Aristotle, who comes nearest the [Page 186]Mark, when he bids you be Hap­py in Well-Doing, and in the Satisfaction which arises from thence, I will more than that, since I have heard, that though a Good Conscience, Prov. 15.15. and a Merry Heart, because of That, is a Con­tinual Feast, yet the Reward of that Good Conscience is a much Better, and Merrier Feast, and that therefore I look up to that Jesus, Heb. 12.2. who, as he is the Author, has appointed unto me a Kingdome, and, when he is the Finisher of my Faith, will Crown me in it, that I may Eat and Drink at his Table, Luk. 22.29, 30.in his Kingdome.

100. And yet, though this Je­sus be Another Notion, Examina­tio Portu­galli A­theis. 1617 or rather Another Person (for there was a Portugal Atheist, who being ask'd what he thought of the Trinity, an­swerd, Examina­tio 3. quaest. 6. Se adorare Trinitatem, sed per al [...]as Notiones, non sub Nomi­nibus Patris, & Filii, & Spiritus Sancti) yet it is but One, and the Same God, who makes this Feast of Happiness, and fils the [Page 187]Table with all these, and ma­ny more, Several and Precious Messes, and who by his Ʋnity with the Father, and the Holy Ghost (to which Unity in Trinity be all Prayer and Praise for ever) calls upon me for my Promis'd Disquisition, and Determinati­on, That there is One (already Argu'd) and But One God, to which I proceed, [...].