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This institution reserves the right to refuse to accept a copy order if, in its judgement, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of the copyright law. A UTHOR: CULVERWEL, NATHANAEL TITLE: OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE ... PLACE: EDINBURGH DATE: 1857 COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES PRESERVATION DEPARTMENT BIBLIOGRAPHU iRM TARGET Master Negative # Original Material as Filmed - Existing Bibliographic Record r- • discourse, ed. b/^Tohn Brov/r. ,, v/ Edm. 1857. -/0..-/_S5fa98p. -1651? Willi ! J , :._; o' Restrictions on Use: TECHNICAL MICROFORM DATA REDUCTION RATIO: FILM SIZE: ^ 5 .wVlA IMAGE PLACEMENT: lA/ (©) IB IIB DATE FILMED: 7 ITthZ- FILMED BY: RESEARCH FUBUCATIONS. INC WOODBRIDGE. CT INITIALS ^M. !M t*^^'*\t'amtammMmimw>m*-'" . • BIBLIOGRAPHIC IRREGULARITIES MAIN Bibliographic Irregularities in the Original Document List volumes and pages affected; include name of institution if filming borrowed text. Page(s) missing/ not available: yolumes(s) missing/not available:. Illegible and/or damaged page(s): (iv \\/ Page(s) or volumes(s) misnumbered:. Bound out of sequence: .Page(s) or illustration(s) filmed from copy borrowed from: BNIMUB." — BoTOn. HENRY ROGERS, Esq.. IN TOKEN OF THE EDITOR'S GRATITUDE ■DIHBUReB : T. COII0TABLB. PftlHTim TO MBB MAJKSTT. FOR THE INSTRUCTION AND DELIGHT DERIVED FROM HIS WRITINGS. CONTENTS. The Editob's Preface, Critical Essay on • The Di8fr»uiisE of the Original Dedication, Db. Dilunoham to the Reader, . Richard Culverwel to the Reader, Discourse of the Light of Nature, Light of Natuke,' PAGB ix xxxi 3 5 9 17 NOTES. A. — Culverwel and Rogers reconciled, . B. — Reference by Howe, , , C. — Selden, Grotius, and Salmasiusi, D. — The three Durands, . E. — SUAREZ, .... F.— Eternal Law — Suabez, Hallam, Hooker, G. — Maimonides, .... H. — The two Vasquez, 1. — Arbor Invebsa, J. — Sextus Empiricus, K. — Cardako, .... L.--The four Zabarellas, 281 283 283 283 284 284 285 285 285 286 286 286 v^ii CONTENTS. » rAoi M. — CHARACTEW8TIC8 OP NaTIOOT, . . . • • 287 N. — NKMESirs, ..••••■ 287 1 0. — ^EUGUBtNE, • • • 287 P. — P8ELLU8, ...♦•• 289 Q. — ZANCH1U8, ...•••' 289 R.— The two Pici or Mirandola, . . • • 289 S. — AVERROES, ....•• 289 T Pbospeb, ...••• 289 Additional Note Armwianism— Aktisomianism, 290 INDEX. I.— Op Names akd Things, II.— Of Texts of Scripture referred to, 291 297 THE PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. During the latter half of the sixteenth century, under the wise but arbitrary civil sway of the Maiden Queen, and the not less arbitrary, but much less wise ecclesiastical rule of Parker, and Grindal, and Whitgift, metropolitans of England, there lived in London a w^ealthy merchant citizen, Nicolas Culverwel, or, as it is sometimes written, Culverel, who, if we may judge from the history of his family, was, like many of his compeers, a devoted adherent to Puritanism ; a circumstance which, when we consider how much that form of religion was discountenanced both by royal and episcopal authority, and how serious were the dangers and sacrifices to which its rich professors were especially ex- posed, must be allowed to be a presumption, at least, that Nicolas was a sincere, earnest man.^ Two of his daughters were married to distinguished Puritan ministers ; one to Dr. Lawrence Chadderton, who was chosen by Sir Walter Mildmay, the founder of Ema- nuel College, Cambridge, to be the first master of that * Clark's Lives at the end of his Martyrclogy, a X PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. institution, which, under his care, soon took so high u place among its academical sisters. From his modesty, which equalled his learning, Dr. Chadderton was extremely reluctant to accept a situation so high and responsible, and complied only on Sir Walter saying, ' If you will not be the master, sir, I will not be the founder of the college/^ Another daughter became the wife of a still more cele- brated man, Dr. William Whitaker, the nephew of Nowel, Dean of St. PauVs, and, in succession, Regius Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge, and Master of St. John's College, in that University, whom Cardinal Bellar- mine is said to have pronounced * the most learned heretic he had ever read ;' and of whom Bishop Hall says, * Who ever saw him without reverence, or heard him without wonder ?'^ A third daughter, the spouse of ' Mr. Thomas Gouge, a pious gentleman,' was the mother of Dr. William Gouge, for nearly half a century the venerated minister of Black- friars, in London, author of a Commentary on the Epistk to the Hebrews, in a folio volume of immense size, a member of the Westminster Assembly, and the father of Thomas Gouge, the nonconformist and philanthropist, the memory of whose rare excellence Archbishop Tillotson, so much to his own honour, has embalmed in a funeral sermon, describ- ing him as ' having left far behind him all he ever knew in cheerful, unwearied diligence in acts of pious charity ; ' Brook's Lives of the Puritans, ii. 446 ; Fuller's HiH. of Cambridge, 147. a Churton's Life of Nowel, p. 64 ; Clark's Ecc Hist., p. 816, and pp. 15-17 ; WootVs Ath. Ox., vol. i. p. 303 ; Leigh on Beligion and Learning, p. 363. PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. XI having a singular sagacity and prudence in devising the most effectual ways of doing good, and in managing his charity to the best purposes, and to the greatest extent.'^ Two of his sons, Ezekiel and Samuel, devoted themselves to the Christian ministry. Of Samuel we know nothing, but what Clark tells us, that he was ' a famous preacher.' Of Ezekiel we know a little more, but still we have but scanty information respecting him. He was educated under the care of his brother-in-law. Dr. Chadderton, at Emanuel's, Cambridge. That College was then commonly called ' the Puritan College.' It owed its name, it is said, to a remarkable conversation between Queen Elizabeth and its founder. ' Sir Walter,' said the Queen, with cha- racteristic haughtiness, ' I hear you have erected a Puritan foundation at Cambridge.' * Madam,' said Sir Walter, * far be it from me to countenance anything contrary to your Majesty's established laws; but I have set an acorn, which, when it becomes an oak, God alone knows what will be the fruit thereof.' Its growth was rapid, and its produce rich ; for the quaint Fuller says, ^ Sure I am, it has overshadowed all the University ; more than a moiety of the present masters of colleges having been bred therein.' After finishing his university studies, Ezekiel became in succession Rector of Stambridge and Vicar of Felsted, in the hundreds of Essex, of which Sympson says, ' In regard of air unhealthful ; yet that air was so sweetened with the savoury breath of the Gospel, that they were termed " the holy land." ' During his last incumbency, we learn that * Middleton's Biog. Evang, iii. 267 ; Clark's Lives; Tillotson's Sermons^' Ser. xxiii. I! Xll PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. he was honoured to be the instrument of the conversion of his nephew William Gouge, then at the free school of Felsted ;^ and that, in 1583, he was prosecuted for noncon- formity, and suspended for some time, by Bishop Aylmer, for not wearing the surplice.^ Dr. William Gouge, in an address to the Christian reader, prefixed to the seventh edition of the Treatise on FaitJi, says of his uncle, that ^ God sent Ezekiel Culverwel, as of old he sent Ezekiel Buzi, to set forth the promises of God more plentifully and pertinently than ever before ; and that to breed faith where it is not, to strengthen it where it is weak, to settle it where it wavereth, to repair it where it decayeth, to apply it aright to every need, to extend it to sanctification as well as to justification, and to point out the singular use of it in matters temporal, spiritual, and eternal.' * What I say of him, I know of him ; for from mine infancy have I known him, and under his ministry was I trained up in my younger years, he being at least two-and-twenty years older than myself.' * Among other evidences of the power of God's word among them (Mr. CulverweVs people), I will record one, a very remarkable one, and worthy to be had in more frequent use. It was this : In time of great dearth of corn and other food, there was order taken by public authority, that every family should forbear one meal in the week, and upon the Lord's day bring the value of it to the collectors for the poor. This being faithfully performed by them all, therewith they did provide good com, which cost eighty-nioe shillings the bushel, and sold it to the poor at twelvepence the peck. ' Clark ; Middleton, ul aup. * Brook, vt »up. PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. XUl and yet reserved a good stock to set the poor on with.' * He was many years,' says Dr. Sibbs, ^ God's prisoner under the gout and stone ; such diseases as will allow but little liberty to them that are arrested and tortured by them. So fruitful an expense of time in so weak and worn-out a body, is seldom seen. Scarce any one came to him but went away better than they came. God gave him much strength of spirit to uphold his spirit from sinking under the strength of such diseases.'^ The time of his death is not exactly known. His book, entitled A Treatise on Faith, was printed 1623 ; and he lived to publish a defence of it against the charge of Armi- nianism, in a small pamphlet, 1626. He was certainly dead when Dr. Sibbs published his Time toell spent in Sacred Meditations ; Divine Observations and Heavenly Exhor- taiions, 1635 ; and he must have been an old man when he died, as Dr. Sibbs says of that little book, that it was ' begun about forty years ago.' His only other writings are entitled, A Ready Way to remember the Scriptures, said by Brook to have been printed 1637; and a small tract of twenty pages, entitled. The Way to a Blessed State in this Life, His Treatise on Faith seems to have been popular, for it reeiched a seventh edition in 1633. It was highly esteemed by Mr. Kobert Blair, who in his memoirs ^ says, that *he was thereby much confirmed,' and is still worthy of perusal. Dr. Sibbs describes him as * a man very well experienced in all the ways of God ;' and Fuller classes him among ' the learned writers of Emanuel College,' but * no fellow/ * Dedication of I^me Well SperU. * Life of Robert Blair, Wodrow Soc., Edinburgh, p. 32. a 2 XIV PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. • ' One generation goeth and another cometL* There appears now a second race of Culverwels on the stage, but in what relation they stood to those who preceded them is doubtful. There is Nathanael, the author of The Dis- course of the Light of Nature; there is Richard, his brother, who subscribes a short address * to the Courteous Reader,' prefixed to that discourse ; and there is a William, of whom we know only, that about the time Nathanael was a Fellow of Emanuel College, Cambridge, he was a Fellow of Trinity College in that University, and tutor to a Mr. Robert Blunt, who was ejected from a living in Northumberland, for nonconformity, in 1662.^ The name is uncommon, and he might be a cousin, if not a brother, of Nathanael and Richard. These seem to have been sons either of Samuel or of Ezekiel, probably of the latter. We know that Nathanael died in 1650 or 1651, and that he died young, but we have no means of fixing the time of his birth. It is plain, however, from what has been stated, that he had ^ an honourable descent, and came of a stock of eminent preachers.' From information kindly obtained from the College books by a member of the University, it appears that he entered Emanuel College, Cambi-idge, as a pensioner in 1633, when he probably did not exceed eighteen years of age.^ He took his degree of B.A. in 1636, and of M.A. in 1640. He was chosen a Fellow, but when we know not ; and for some time before his death he had been a regular preacher in the chapel of his college. > Palmer, iii. 75 ; Calamy, iii. 504. 2 Howe was only seventeen when he was admitted as a sizar of Christ Church College, Cambridge.— Rogers's Life of Howe, p. 23. PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. XV The master of the college, for some time previous to Culverwel's death, was Dr. Anthony Tuckney, who * had a considerable hand in the preparation of the Westminster Confession and Catechisms,'^ and whose candour and learn- ing, as well as zeal for orthodoxy, are strikingly manifested in his correspondence vdth Dr. Whichcote. Dr. Whichcote was a Fellow of Emanuel when Culverwel entered it, and continued so till 1644, when he became Provost of ' King's College, so that he may have been CulverweVs tutor. Henry More became a student in Christ Church College two years before ; and John Smith, who had Whichcote for his tutor, joined Emanuel College two years after Cul- verwel. Smith died two years after him ; so that con- sidering their congeniality of mind, they could scarcely miss being intimate. Dr. Ralph Cudworth was his con- temporary for seven or eight years at Emanuel's. Jere- miah Burroughs, and Dr. Wallis, afterwards Professor of Mathematics, were also fellow-students. From Mount Ehal (p. 89), it is obvious that Nathanael was a decided Parliament-man, and a friend of the Solemn League and Covenant. He calls on his audience to ^ bless •God for men of public spirit, Zerubbabels and Jehoshuas —smh as are building God a temple ;' puts them in mind of their sacramental vows to maintain the cause of God ; and adds, * You cannot but remember a late vow you have made too, the very sum of which was this, to stand for the public good/ > Palmer, i. 266. It deserves notice, that, notwithstanding this, the Doctor voted against imposing subscription to the Confession as the term of ministerial communion. — Letters between Dr. Tuckney and Dr. Whichcote, published by Slater at the end of Whichcote's Aphorisms. y \^ I XVi PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. Some dark hints in his brother's address ' To the Reader/ seem to indicate that he had been characterized by something in his manner, which was misconstrued by some into haughtiness, and which is traced apparently to mental aberration, or some rather severe and uncommon bodily affliction, from which he did not recover. The pas- sage referred to is as follows : ' I must say of him dvOpoy -rnvop Ti eiraOev. And as it is hard for men to be under Lukexiii.2.4. affliction, but they are liable to censures, so it fared with him, who was looked upon by some, as one whose eyes were lofty, and whose eyelids lifted up, who bare himself too high upon a conceit of his parts ; although they that knew him intimately, are most willing to be his compur- gators in this particular. Thus prone are we to think the staff under the water crooked, though we know it to be straight. However, turn thine eyes inward, and censure not thine own fault so severely in others. Cast not the first stone, except thou find thyself without this fault ; dare not to search too curiously into the dve^L^yuitrrov^ ohov^ of God ; but rather learn that lesson of the Apostle's Rom. xii 3. in that elegant paronomasy, M^ \rjr€ppoveiv Trap o ^el ^povelvt oKKa pov€iv eU to aaxfypopelp, Dillingham, in the dedication to Tuckney, acknowledges his kindness to the author, * especially when he lay under the discipline of so sad a providence ;' and in his address ' To the Reader/ speaks of God ' having chastised him somewhat sharply.' Such are all the notices, few and fragmentary as they are, which I have been able to glean from numerous quarters, respecting one who plainly held a high place as a man of genius, learning, eloquence, and piety, in the PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. xvu estimation of those who knew him best, and whose ' noble and gallant abilities' will not readily be questioned by any who, with the necessary information, have perused with due attention the little volume in which is enshrined all of his mind and heart which has been left among mortals. Of Richard Culverwel, the sum of what we know is, that he obtained the living of Grundisburgh, in Suffolk, during the Protectorate ; that he conformed in 1662, and continued there till his death in the year of the Revolu- tion, 1688.1 Soon after Nathanael Culverwel's death. Dr. William Dillingham (of whom I know nothing, but that he suc- ceeded to the Mastership of Emanuel's when Dr. Tuckney was made Master of St. John's, and that he is said to have been the author of a translation into Latin of the West- minster Confession and Catechisms, published in 1655, and reprinted in 1659 f from his not appearing either in Brook's list of Puritans, or Palmer's of Nonconformists, I conjec- ture him to have been a Conformist in 1662) published * This iDformation I owe to the kindness of the Rev. Henry More of Ix)we8toft, Suffolk, the author of a very just and elegant estimate of Culver- wel and his work in the Evangelist^ vol. i. pp. 375-377. The Rev. G. E. Webster, present Rector of Grundisburgh, has kindly furnished a copy of Richard Culverwel's epitaph. It is inscribed on a black marble slab, within the rails of the communion-table, on the north side, and is surmounted by a coat-of-arms : * Here resteth the body of Richard Culverwel, who was minister of this parish for 40 years. He dyed the 4th of April 1688. Aged 67.' • A Mr. Thomas Dillingham, of Dean, is among the ministers summoned for the Westminster Assembly; but he is marked by Neal among those who 'did not appear at aU.'—HUt. of the Pur. vol. ii. p. 47. Lond. 1822. As the* name is not a common one, he was probably a relation of Dr. William. I XVIU PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. XIX ^ ^ in 1651, a discourse of Mr. Ciilverwers on Ist Corinthians xiii. 12, entitled Sacred Optics, which, being unfinished, seems to have been the last sermon he delivered in the College Chapel. The concluding words are, when the circumstances are taken into account, strikingly impres- sive : ' Thus have we shown you the several glasses through which "we see but darkly." There remains the visio recta, a sight of God " face to face," to " know as we are known." But of this hereafter.' The editor adds this distich, — 'What this "to know as we are known" should he, The author could not tell, hut's gone to see.* The intention of this publication was, as the editor says, 'only for a taste, and to bear the mace into the world before that learned and elegant treatise, which the ingeni- ous author has left behind him, concerning the light of nature.' The reception of this little treatise was so favour- able, that within the course of less than a year, Culverwel's Eemains were published under the same editorship, with the title of * An Elegant and Learned Discourse of the Light of Nature, with several other Treatises : viz., The Schism, The Act of Oblivion, The Child's Return, The Panting Soul, Mount Ebal, The White Stone, Spiritual Optics, The Worth of Souls. By Nathanael Culverwel, Master of Arts, and lately Fellow of Emanuel College, in ^Cambridge. Imprimatur, Edm. Calamy. 4to, 1652.' The Discourse of the Light of Nature fills 215 pages. There are three other editions — one in 1654, another in 1661, and another printed at Oxford in 1669. The first of these has been supposed to be surreptitious. The paper and print are greatly inferior to the edition of 1652, and it is ridiculously inaccurate. In the title-page, fo is printed for of and imrimatur for imprimatur ; and in the short dedication, ^^Aer for farther, and tvroih for tvorth. Ex pede disce — The fact that four editions, even though they should not have been large ones, were required in seven- teen years, and one of these it may be a pirated one,^ dis- tinctly indicates that the work at its appearance had a considerable measure of popularity. Since 1669, 1 am not aware that the volume has been reprinted. An edition of the White Stone was printed some years ago. The book can scarcely be called rare in the bibliogra- phers' sense, for it frequently appears in booksellers' * On comparing carefully the second, and third, and fourth editions, I think the probahility is that they are all genuine. In the second edition, not- withstanding its press blunders, some more important oversights of editing in the first are corrected. Both the second and third editions are printed with the same letter, not however page for page ; the paper of the third and fourth is even inferior to that of the second. Some, only some of the archa- isms of the spelling are corrected ; while in other cases a worse spelling is adopted, as Camhridg for Cambridge, The imprint of the second edition is, * London, printed by T. B. and E. M. for John Hothtcel, at the Fountain and Bear in Cheap-side, in Gold-smiths-row. 1654 :' of the third edition, ' London, printed by Tho. Roycroft for Mary JRothwell, at the Bear and Fountain, in Goldsmithsrotc, in Cheapside, 1661 :' of the fourth edition, ' Oxford, printed for Tho. Williams, and are to be sold by Henry Dymock, Bookseller in Oxford. Anno Dom. 1669.' In the second edition, the dis- course extends to 183 pages ; in the third, it only reaches 175. The pagina- tion of the fourth edition corresponds with that of the third. There is no substantial difference in the four editions, though the first is incomparably superior in appearance to the other three. From there being a change made in the close of Richard Culverwel's address * To the Eeader,' in the third edition, such as would have occurred to none but an author, I think it likely that that edition was printed under his care. The four editions have been carefully compared in preparing the present edition for the press. ^' XX PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. catalogues; but it has been little noticed, and is ver>' generally unknown. I have an indistinct recollection of meeting with a commendatory mention of the book in some writer of a period not long subsequent to that of the author ; but after tasking my faculty of reminiscence to the uttermost, I cannot call up the name. I am not aware of hsLYing seen it quoted but by myself,^ though it abounds in passages well worthy of being quoted, and singularly fit for quotation ; nor of seeing it referred to in later writ- ings, except in one instance, where the name of the author is not given, by one who, with a wider and yet more dis- tinct view of the whole subject of Culverwel's principal work, has given so powerful a delineation of * The Claims and Conflicts of Reason and Faith/^ The only bibliogra- phical sketch of the work is that excellent one in The Evangelist, by the Rev. Henry More, already referred to. Many of the minor articles in the volume are of high merit. In every one of them are to be found passages of great beauty and power ; but there can be no doubt, that the Discourse of the Light of Nature, which now, after an interval of nearly two hundred years, we reproduce, as it is the longest, is, both as to thought aud composition, by far the best of Culverwel's works. That this work should have, on its first appearance, ex- cited the degree of interest, which three editions in ten years, four in less than twenty, indicate, is not at all won- derful. It may seem more difficult to account for its having so soon simk into comparative oblivion, and so long continued so. Evidence that it has so sunk is abun- » Expos, of Ut Peter, i. 368. ' Rogers's Essays, iii. 174. PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. XXI dant. It is not referred to by Baxter in his Life and Times. Doddridge does not mention it in his list of books on Christian Ethics, nor Kippis his editor. It does not appear in the ample list appended to Dr. Edward Williams's Christian Preacher. It is not noticed by either Dugald Stewart or Sir James Mackintosh, in their dissertations. And Hallam, who has seen and read so many books, does not seem to have met with this, else he could hardly have said, that ^ Cumberland,' whose work De Legibus was not published till 1672, was 'the first Christian writer who sought to establish systematically the principles of moral right independent of revelation.'^ What is perhaps still more remarkable, Nathanael Cul- verwel's name does not appear in Fuller's History in the list of ' the learned writers' of Emanuel College, whether * Fellows ' or ' no Fellows,' though, as we have remarked, that of Ezekiel, an immeasurably inferior man, does. I have not found his name in any biographical dictionary ; nor is he mentioned by Brook or Calamy, or Palmer or Bogue and Bennet. D3^er and Granger, and Noble and Brydges, have been examined in vain. His posthumous work is noticed by Watt and Darling, and that is all. The causes why a book so instinct with literary life — a book which, if the world were but aware of its worth, they certainly would * not willingly let die ' — should have run so obvious a risk of being forgotten, are not however far to seek. There was but little taste for such disquisitions among the body of theologians with whom Culverwel's Calvinism, Puritanism, and deep spiritual religion con- > Hallam, iii. 400. . h xxu PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. nected him. Among the great men of that party, I do not know of more than Howe, and perhaps Bates, who could completely sympathize with him. Among their Dii Minorum Gentium^ I can think only of Tnieraan, and still more of Shaw^ (whose Immanuel breathes a spirit very like John Smith's, only more thoroughly baptized into the name of Christ), as men who would have found in Cul- verwel's peculiarities a recommendation of his writings. It is not indistinctly intimated, both by Dr. Dillingham and Mr. Eichard Culverwel, that Nathanael was an object of suspicion with some of his party ; and I think there are symptoms of this feeling in Dr. Tuckney's letters to Whichcote, though the name of Culverwel, who was just dead when these letters were written, is not mentioned. On the other hand, those who, from their literary tastes and philosophical leanings, were most likely to take an interest in The Discfyurse, and were capable of appreciat- ing and relishing its rare excellences, were divided from the author by a great gulf of difference in religious and l)olitical opinion, widened by prejudices, of the strength of which we, whose lot has been cast in better times, can form but an inadequate estimate. The book, besides, from the strangely mosaic appear- ance it exhibits, in consequence of the innumerable Greek and Latin citations, to say nothing of Hebrew, with which the text is inlaid, was singularly unattractive. The * Trueman, Shaw, and Bates, were till Cambridge men ; the first of Clare- hall, and the second of St. John's Collefje ; Dr. Bates's college is not men- tioned. They entered the University between 1640 and 1650, so that they probably might be among Culverwcl's hearers, and imbibe in some measure his spirit. PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. XXIU familiarity the author discovers equally with the classics, the fathers, and the schoolmen, is marvellous : * He knew each lane, and every alley green, Dingle, or bushy dell, of this wide wood ; And every bosky bourne from side to side, His daily walks, and ancient neighbourhood/ As but few of these citations are translated, to the ordinary English reader The Discourse 'was a sealed book ;' while so recondite are many of them, especially as separated from their context, that even a scholar, in perus- ing the book, would require such frequent recourse to his lexicon, as to make it anything but light and pleasant reading. Add to all this, the work bears proof that it is posthu- mous, and obviously has owed but little to editorial care. Perhaps the proper duty of an editor was at that time not 60 well understood as it now is. But assuredly Dr. Dil- lingham appears to have taken his work very easily. With the exception of the Latin and the Greek, which, generally speaking, are accurately printed, little attention appears to have been paid to the correction of the press. Sentences and paragraphs are often divided from, or run into, one another, in a way which at once injures the beauty of the composition, and obscures the course and connexion of thought. The design of the treatise is well enough described by the original editor thus : * The design of the Discourse of y the Light of Nature was, on the one hand, to vindicate the use of reason, in matters of religion, from the aspersions and prejudices of some weaker ones in those times, who, XXIV PREFACE OF THE EDITOR. having entertained erroneous opinions, which they were no way able to defend, were taught by their more cunning seducers to wink hard, and except against all offensive weapons ; so, on the other hand, to chastise the sauciness of Socinus and his followers, who dare set Hagar above her mistress, and make faith wait at the elbow of corrupt and distorted reason— to " take off the head of that uncir- cumcised Philistine with his own sword," but better sharp- ened, and then to lay it up behind the ephod in the sanc- tuary. An enterprise, I confess, of no small import ; which yet, he hoped, with God's assistance to have effected, by giving unto reason the things that are reason's, and unto faith the things that are faith's. And had the world been favoured with his longer life, the height of his parts, and the earnest he gave, had bespoken very ample expectations in those who knew and heard him. But it pleased God, having first melted him with His love, and then chastised him, though somewhat sharply, to take him to Himself; from the contemplation of the light of nature, to the enjoy- ment of one supernatural, that B€L<;f a\dyi^^ ft ll^ fS JSL. -^*-V->6^'**OLC ^ -""^-V^ ^^ ^< >" ;W f fe^^v^ By Nathanael Culverwel, Mafter of Arts, and lately Fellow of Emanuel Colledge m Cambridge. Imprimatur^ Edm. Calamy. TO THE REVEREND AND LEARNED ANTHONY TUCKNEY, D.D., MASTIB OF BMANUBL COLLBOB IK CAMBRIDGE, AND TO THE FELLOWS OF THAT RELIGIOUS AND HAPPY FOUNDATION. Honoured Sibs, — The many testimonies of yom* real aflPection towards this pious and learned author, especially while he lay under the discipline of so sad a providence, deserve all thankful acknowledgment and grateful comme- moration ; which I doubt not but himself would have made in most ample manner, had it pleased God to have granted him longer life and farther opportunity. But since Divine Providence hath otherwise disposed, I thought it no solecism in friendship to undertake the executorship of his desires, and so far to own his debt of gratitude, as to endeavour some public acknowledgment of it, though the greatness of your benefits admits not of just recompense and satisfaction. Having therefore the disposal of his papers committed to me by his nearest and dearest friends, and finding them to be of such worth and excellency as ought not to be smothered in obscurity, I interpreted this a fit opportunity to let both yourselves and others understand 4 ORIGINAL DEDICATION. how deep an impression your kindness to him hath left in the apprehensions and memories of those his friends to whom God and nature had given the advantage of being more peculiarly interested in his welfare. Upon which account I do here present you with this elegant issue of his noble and gallant abilities, which, besides the relation it hath to you by the father's side, would gladly entitle itself unto your acceptance and protection, as having been conceived in your college, and delivered in your chapel ; and, therefore, hope that you, who with much delight were sometimes ear-witnesses of it, will now become its sus- ceptors. And thus having lodged it in its mother's arms, I leave it to her embraces. On whose behalf I shall only oflfer up this serious and hearty wish, that as, by the blessing of Heaven upon her fruitful womb, she hath been made a mother of many profitable instruments both in church and commonwealth, so God would be pleased to make good her name unto her, and delight still to use her as the handmaid-instrument of His glory ; that He would lay her top-stone in His blessing, as her foundation was laid in His fear. So prays the meanest of her sons, and your humble servant, William Dillingham, Aug. 10, 1652. TO THE READER. Courteous Reader, — Not many montlis have passed, since I sent abroad into the world a little treatise, which knew itself by the name of Spiritual Optics^ with intention only to make some discovery of the minds and affections of men towards pieces of that nature; wliich having met somewhere, it seems, with kind entertainment and acceptance beyond its expectation, hath now persuaded all its fellows into a resolu- tion to take wing, and adventure themselves upon thy can- dour and ingenuity. I intend not here to hang out ivy, nor with my canvas to preface this cloth of gold. The work is weaved of sunbeams ; to hang anything before it were but to obscure it : yet something here must needs be said for mine own discharge, and thy better satisfaction. Know, therefore, gentle reader, that these pieces were first intended as scholastic exercises in a college chapel, and therefore more properly suited to such an auditory ; yet I make no question but some of them, the White Stone especially, may be read with much profit by those who are of meaner capacities and less refined intellectuals. The g TO THE READER. Discourse of the Light of Nature, which, thoiigh here it bear the torch before the rest, is younger brother to them V aU, was written above six years ago. The design of it was, on the one hand, to vindicate the use of reason, in matters of religion, from the aspersions and prejudices of some weaker ones in those times, who, having entertained erroneous opinions, which they were no way able to defend, were taught by their more cunning seducers to wink hard, and except against all offensive weapons ; so, on the other hand, to chastise the sauciness of Socinus and his followers, who dare set Hagar above her mistress, and make faith wait at the elbow of corrupt and distorted reason ; to take off the head of that uncircumcised Philistine^ with his own Bword, but better sharpened, and then to lay it up behind the ephod in the sanctuary. An enterprise, I confess, of \ no small import ; which yet, he hoped, with God's assist- ance, to have effected, by giving unto reason the things that are reason's, and unto faith the things that are faith's. And had the world been favoured with his longer life, the height of his parts, and the earnest he gave, had bespoken very ample expectations in those who knew and heard him. But it pleased God, having first melted him with His love, and then chastised him, though somewhat sharply, to take him to Himself ; from the contemplation of the light 1 An unacknowledged reference to a passage in * the Discourse,' (p. 23.) It is remarkable that Dr. Whichcote, in his second letter to Dr. Tuckney, written in 1651 or 1652, usea the allusion also. ' I deserv-e as little to be called a Socinian, as David for extorting Goliath's sword out of his hand, and cutting the master's head oflf with it, did deserve to be esteemed a FhWistme.'—Eight Letters of Dr. A. Tuckney and Dr. B. Whichcote, appended to Whichcote' s Moral and Rdigioui Maxima. TO THE READER. of Nature, to the enjoyment of one supernatural, that <^ft>9 awpoacTov — light inaccessible, which none can see and live i '^^ ^> le and to translate him from snuffing a candle here to be made partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light. So that all he finished towards that undertaking was this Discourse of the Light of Nature in general, not descending so low as to show how the moral law was founded in it, or that Gospel revelation doth not extinguish it. Wherein, if standing in the midst between two adversaries of extreme persuasions, while he opposes the one, he seems to favour the other more than is meet ; when thou shalt observe him, at another time, to declare as much against the other, thou wilt then be of another mind. Judge candidly, and take his opinion as thou wouldst do his picture, sitting ; not from a luxuriant expression, wherein he always allowed for the shrinking, but from his declared judgment, when he speaks professedly of such a subject. For instance, if any expression seem to lift reason up too high, you may, if you please, otherwise hear it confess and bewail its own weak- ness, (chap, xii.) ; you may see it bow the head and wor- ship, and then lay itself down quietly at the feet of faith, (chap, xviii.) So that if thou read but the whole discourse, thou wilt easily perceive, as himself would often affirm, that he abhorred the very thought of advancing the power of Nature into the throne of free grace, or by the light of Nature in the least measure to eclipse that of faith. I would not willingly by any prolepsis forestall thy reading, yet if thou shouldst desire a foretaste of the author's style, I would turn thee to the beginning of the seventeenth chapter ; never was light so bespangled, never 8 TO THE READER. did it triumph in greater bravery of expression. But I detain thee too long. Let this suffice thee as a coarse list to a finer web, or as waste paper to defend this book from the injury of its covers. — Farewell. Cambr., Aug. 10, 1652. 1 RICHARD CDLVERWEL TO THE READER. Courteous Keader, — This discourse, which had ray brother for the author, might justly have expected me to have been the publisher. And I should think myself in- excusable, in this particular, did not the remote distance of my present abode, and the frequent avocations from study, by attendance upon my ministry, together with the ruins of a crazy body, somewhat apologize in my behalf. That is obvious and 'notorious'^ in every man's mouth, that the brother should raise up seed to the brother : but Pt^t xxt here, lo ! a friend that is nearer than a brother, who rears up this living monument to the memory of his deceased friend. In this treatise we may perceive how the Gentiles' candle outwent us with our sunbeams : how they, guided only by the glimmering twilight of Nature, outstripped us who are surrounded with the rays of supernatural light, of revealed truth. Thou may est here find Plato to be a Moses 'speaking Attic Greek,' ^ and Aratus, Menander, and Epimenides called into the court, to bring in their sufirages to St. Paul's doctrine. Here we may find reason, like a Gibeonite, hewing wood lIoXvOp^WrjToy. • Atticissans. / 10 TO THE READER. Josh. ix. 23. and drawing water for the sanctuary ; Jethro giving coun- Exod. xTiii. g^i ^^ ]Moses. God draws us with the cords of a man ; He drew professed star-gazers with a star to Christ. Oalen, a physician, was wrought upon, by some anatomical obser- vations, to tune a hymn to the praise of his Creator, though otherwise atheist enough. Ssw Keason, though not permitted, with an over-daring i Pompey, to rush into the Holy of holies, yet may be al- lowed to be a proselyte of the gate, and, with those devoted Greeks, to worship in the court of the Gentiles. Natural light, or the law written in the heart, improved Rom. i. 19. by that ' knowledge of God '^ which is written in the book of the creature in capital letters, so that he that runs may read, is that which this treatise bears witness to ; where these * heavenly twins,' -^ those heaven-born lights are set up in the soul of man ; like those twin flames on the mariner's shroud, they presage a happy voyage to 'the fair havens.' As for the bosom-secrets of God — gospel mysteries, the mercy-seat itself, into which the angels desire 'to bend 1 Pet i. 12. down and look,'^ reason's plumb-line will prove too short to fathom them ; here we must cry with the Apostle, * Rom. xi. 33. thc depth !'* Reason may not come into these seas, ex- cept she strike her topsail ; here we may say with Aris- totle at the brink of Euripus, not being able to give an account of the ebbs and flows, 'If I cannot comprehend thee, thou shalt me !' It is storied of Democritus, that he put out his eyes that * Tb ypuarbv tov 0€oO. * AioffKOvpoi — Castor and Pollux. ' Ilapa/ct/^at. TO THE READER. 11 he might contemplate the better. I do not counsel you to do so ; but if you would wink with one, the eye of reason — captivate every thought to the obedience of Christ — you might, with that other of faith, take the better aim at the mark, to obtain * the prize of the high calling of God in Jesus Christ.' p^" '" '^' Possibly an expression or two, more there are not, may seem to speak too much in reason's behalf, but, if well examined, will prove nothing to the prejudice of free grace: the whole scope of the book endeavouring to fix those land-marks and just bounds between religion and reason, which some, too superciliously brow-beating the handmaid, and others too much magnifying her, have removed. These exercises suit well with the place where, and the auditors to whom they were delivered ; but, like Aristotle's * physical lectures,'^ these are not for vulgar ears. These lucubrations are so elaborate, that they smell of the lamp, * the candle of the Lord.' As concerning the author of this treatise, how great his parts were, and how well improved, as it may appear by this work, so they were fully known, and the loss of them sufficiently bewailed by those among whom he lived and conversed ; and yet I must say of him, ' he suffered a mis- i cur. x. 13. fortune incident to man.'^ And as it is hard for men to be under affliction, but they are liable to censures, so it Luke xm 2. 4. fared with him, who was looked upon by some, as one whose eyes were lofty, and whose eyelids lifted up, who Prov. xxx 13. bare himself too high upon a conceit of his parts ; although 12 TO THE READER. they that knew him intimately, are most willing to be his compurgators in this particular. Thus prone are we to think the staff under the water crooked, though we know it to be straight. However, turn thine eyes inward, and censure not thine own fault so severely in others. Cast not the first stone, except thou find thyself without this fault ; dare not to search too curiously into * the untrace- Rom. xi33. able ways'^ of God; but rather learn that lesson of the Apostle's in that elegant paronomasy, * not to think of thyself more highly than thou oughtest to think, but to think soberly.'* Thus not willing longer to detain thee from the perusal of this discourse, I commend both thee and it to the bless- ing of God, and rest Rom. xiL 3. OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE Thine to serve thee in any spiritual work or labour of love,^ From my study at Grundisburg, in the county of Suffolk, August 18, 1652. Rich. Culverwel. A DISCOURSE. ' ' Av€^iXVidaTovs 65ovs. ' Mil vTcppovu¥. ^ * Thine to serve thee in all Christian offices ' — (third edition). PROVERBS XX. 27. DIK DDtri mn'» ly—Text, ffeb. 4>«s Kvpiov, TTfOTj dv^pwvdip. — Sepiuttg. AiJxi'os Kvpiov vvoTTi avBpuyiruv. — Aqu. Sijmm. Tlieod. ap. Origenis Hexapla. Aa/xjrT7j/) Kvplov ■KV€vp.a dvdpibTTWv. — Alius, ap. Origenis Hcxapla. Lucerna Domini, spiraculum Iiominis. — Vulg. Mens hominis lucenia Domini. — Versio Auctoris. The lantern of the Lord is the breath of man. — Coverdale. The light of the Lord is the breath of man. — Oenev. The lamp of our Lord, the breath of a man. — Douay. The understanding of a man is the caudle of the Lord. — Author' $ Translation. The spirit of a man is the candle of the Lord.— TA^ Authorized Version. CONTENTS. CHAPTER L The Pobch or Istroductiok, CHAPTER IL The Explication of the Words, . CHAPTER in. What Nature is, CHAPTER IV. The Nature of a Law in general, CHAPTER V. Of the Eternal LaWi rxGK 17 CHAPTER VTI. The Extent of the Law of Nature, .... CHAPTER VIIL How the Light op Nature is discovered ; not by Tradition nor ' AN Acting Intellect,' ..... 26 32 40 50 CHAPTER VI. Of the Law of Nature in general, its Subject and Nature, . 67 81 90 16 CONTENTS. CHAPTER IX. The Light op Reason, PAOI 96 CHAPTER X. Of the Coxsent of Nations, . . . . .109 CHAPTER XI. The Light of Reason is a Derivative Lioht, . . .121 CHAPTER XII. The Light of Reason is a Diminutive Light^ . . .164 CHAPTER XIII. The Light of Reason discovers Present, not Future Things, . 17(> CHAPTER XIV. The Light op Reason is a Certain Light, . 190 CHAPTER XV. The liiGHT OF Reason is Directive, .... 205 CHAPTER XVI. The Light OF Reason IS Caijh AND Peaceable, . . .219 CHAPTER XVIL The I^ght of Reason is a Pleasant Light, . . . 237 CHAPTER XVIII. The Light of Reason is am Ascendant Light, . . . 258 I OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. CHAPTER I. THE PORCH OR INTRODUCTION. It is a work that requires our choicest thoughts, the exactest discussion that can be — a thing very material and desirable, to give unto reason the things that are reason's, and unto faith the things that are faith's ; to give faith her full scope and latitude, and to give reason also her just bounds and limits. This is the first-bom, but the other has the blessing '} and yet there is not such a vast hiatus neither, such a 'great gulf ^ between them, as some would imagine. There is no such implacable antipathy, no such irreconcilable jarring between them, as some do fancy to themselves. They may very well salute one another * with a holy kiss,' * the kiss of peace/^ Reason R^m xvi le. and faith may embrace each other. There is a twin-light 2CorxULi2; springing from both, and they both spring from the same i Pef^T. 14. * fountain of light, and they both sweetly conspire in the same end, — the glory of that being from which they shine, and the welfare and happiness of that being upon which they shine. So that to blaspheme reason, is to reproach * Note A. * Mfya x«to-M«- • < Aylif) r was wont ; must it therefore be extinguished presently ? ^ Is it not better to enjoy the faint and languishing light of this ' candle of the Lord,' rather than to be in palpable and disconsolate darkness ? There are, indeed, but a few Bom. Till. iO-22. L^ ^ 20 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. ? seminal sparks left in the ashes, and must there be whole floods of water cast on them to quench them ? It is but an old imperfect manuscript, with some broken periods, some letters worn out ; must they, therefore, with an un- merciful indignation, rend it and tear it asunder ? It is granted that the picture has lost its gloss and beauty, the oriency of its colours, the elegancy of its lineaments, the comeliness of its proportion ; must it, therefore, be totally defaced ? must it be made one great blot ? and must the very frame of it be broken in pieces ? Would you per- suade the lutanist to cut all his strings in sunder because they are out of tune ? and will you break the bow upon no other account but because it is unbended ? Because men have not so much of reason as they should, will they therefore resolve to have none at all ? Will you throw away your gold because it is mixed with dross? Thy very being, that is imperfect too ; thy graces, they are im- perfect, — wilt thou refuse these also ? And then consider, that the very apprehending the weakness of reason, even this in some measure comes from reason. Keason, when awakened, feels her own wounds, hears her own jarrings, sees the dimness of her own sight. It is a glass that discovers its own spots, and must it therefore be broken in pieces ? Reason herself has made many sad complaints unto you ; she has told you often, and that with tears in her eyes, what a great shipwreck she has suffered, what goods she has lost, how hardly she escaped with a poor decayed being ; she has shown you often some broken relics as the sad remem- brancers of her former ruins. She told you, how that when she swam for her life, she had nothing but two or three jewels about her, two or three common notions ;^ and would you rob her of them also ? Is this all your » Note B. INTRODUCTION. 21 tenderness and compassion ? Is this your kindness to your friend ? will you trample upon her now she is so low ? Is this a suflScient cause to give her a bill of divorcement, because she has lost her former beauty and fruitfulness ? Or is reason thus offensive to them, because she cannot grasp and comprehend the things of God ? Vain men ! will they pluck out their eyes because they cannot look upon the sun in his brightness and glory ? What though reason cannot reach to the depths, to the bottoms of the ocean, may it not therefore swim and hold up the head as well as it can ? What though it cannot enter into the * holy of holies,'^ and pierce within the veil ; may it not, notwithstanding, lie in the porch, at the gate of the temple called Beautiful, and be a door-keeper in the house Acts m. 2. of its God ? Its wings are clipped indeed ; it cannot fly Ps.ixxxiv.io. so high as it might have done ; it cannot fly so swiftly, so strongly as once it could ; will they not, therefore, allow it to move, to stir, to flutter up and down as well as it can ? The turrets and pinnacles of the stately structure ai'e fallen ; will they therefore demolish the whole fabric, and shake the very foundations of it, and down with it to the ground ? Though it be not a Jacob's ladder to ^ I limb up to heaven by, yet may they not use it as a staff ^_ to walk upon earth withal ? And then reason itself knows , ihis also, and acknowledges that it is dazzled with the majesty and glory of God ; that it cannot pierce into His mysterious and unsearchable ways. It never was so vain — ( as to go about to measure immensity by its own finite compass, or to span out absolute eternity by its own more imperfect duration. True reason did never go about to comprise the Bible in its own nutshell. And if reason be content with its own sphere, why should it not have the liberty of its proper motion ? * Sanctum sanctorum. A2 L- 22 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Is it because it opposes the things of God, and wrangles against the mysteries of salvation ? Is it therefore ex- cluded ? A heinous and frequent accusation indeed, but nothing more false and injurious. And if it had been an open enemy that had done her this wrong, why, then she could have borne it ; but it is thou, her friend and com- panion. Ye have taken sweet counsel together, and have Ps It. 12 14. entered into the house of God as friends. It is you that have your dependence upon her ; that cannot speak one word to purpose against her, without her help and assist- ance. What mean you thus to revile your most intimate and inseparable self ? Why do you thus slander your own beings ? Would you have all this to be true which ^ you say ? Name but the time, if you can, when right reason did oppose one jot or tittle^ of the Word of God. Certainly these men speak of distorted reason all this while. Surely they do not speak of * the candle of the ^^ Lord,' but of some shadow and appearance of it. But if they tell us that all reason is distorted, whether, then, is theirs so in telling us so ? If they say that they do not know this by reason, but by the word of God ; whether, then, is reason, when it acknowledges the word of God, distorted or no ? Besides, if there were no right reason in the world, what difference between sobriety and madness, between these men and wiser ones ? How, then, were the j.i. 20 heathen left * without excuse,' who had nothing to see by but this * candle of the Lord ?' And how does this thrust men below sensitive creatures ! for better have no reason at all than such as does perpetually deceive and delude them. Or does reason thus displease them, because the blackest errors sometimes come under the fair disguise of so beau- tiful a name, and have some tincture of reason in them ? But truly, this is so far from being a disparagement to * Apex. INTRODUCTION. 23 reason, as that it is no small commendation of it, for ' it is becoming to put a good face on things.'^ Men love to put a plausible title, a winning frontispiece upon the foulest errors. Thus, licentiousness would fain be called by the name of liberty, and all dissoluteness would fain be countenanced and secured under the patronage and pro- tection of free grace. Thus wickedness would willingly forget its own name, and adopt itself into the family of goodness. Thus Arminianism pleads for itself under the specious notion of God's love to mankind. Thus, that silly error of Antinomianisni will needs style itself an * evangelical honeycomb.' Thus all irregularities and anomalies in Church afifairs, must pride themselves in those glittering titles of * a new light,' * a gospel way,' ' a heaven upon earth.' No wonder, then, that some also pretend to reason, who yet run out of it, and beyond it, and beside it. But must none, therefore, come near it ? Because Socinus has burnt his wings at this ' candle of the Lord,' must none, therefore, make use of it ? May he not be conquered with his own weapons, and beat out of his own strongholds ? and may not the head of an uncir- cumcised Philistine be cut off with his own sword ? Or, lastly, are they thus afraid of reason, because by virtue of this men of wit and subtlety will presently argue and dispute them into an error, so as that they shall not be able to disentangle a truth, though in itself it be never so plain and unquestionable ? But, first, reason itself tells them that it may be thus, and so prepares and forti- fies them against such a trial ; and then this only shows that some men's reason is not so well advanced and im- proved either as it might be, or as others' is. A sharper edge would quickly cut such difficulties asunder. Some have more refined and clarified intellectuals, more vigorous y 24 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. and sparkling eyes than others, and one soul diflfers from another in glory ; and that reason which can make some shift to maintain error, might, with a great deal less sweat and pains, maintain a truth. There is no question but that Bellarmine, and the rest of the learned Papists, could have, if they had pleased, far more easily defended the Protestant religion than their own. Besides, the vigour and triumph of reason is prin- cipally to be seen in those first-born beams, those pure and unspotted irradiations, that shine from it; I mean those first bubblings up of common principles that are owned and acknowledged by all, and those evident and kindly derivations that flow from them. Keason shows her face more amiably and pleasantly in a pure and clear stream, than in those muddied and troubled waters in which the schoolmen that have leisure enough are always fishing. Nay, some of their works are like so many raging seas, full of perpetual tossings and disquietings and foam- ings, and sometimes ' casting up mire and dirt ;' and yet these vast and voluminous leviathans love to sport therein : and that which is most intolerable, these grand ^ sages,'* that seemed so zealous for reason, at length in express terms disclaim it ; and, in a most blindfold and confused manner, cry up their great Diana, their idol of transub- stantiation. The Lutherans are very fierce against reason too, much upon the same account, because it would never allow of that other monstrous and misshapen lump of consubstantiation. But why have I all this while beaten the air, and spilt words upon the ground ? why do I speak to such as are incurable and incapable ? for if we speak reason to them, that is that which they so much disclaim : if we do not speak reason to them, that were to disclaim it too. But I 1 ^<46Qv irp6T€pa hv efiy. » ToO vov yew^fiara. • Nous and \6yos. ^ » Ai7fuov;ry6$— opifex rerum.— Plato, Dial. Sophista. Opera, vol. ii. part ii. p. 234. Berolin. 1816-23. w Dei SjifnovpyovvTos, famula et ministra. flourishing and rhetorical sense :'^ that God is the foun- tain of being, and nature but the channel ; that he is the kernel of being, and nature but the shell Yet herein Plato was defective, that he did not correct and reform the abuse of this word Nature ; that he did not screw it up to a higher and more spiritual notion. For it is very agreeable to the choicest and supremest being ; and the Apostle tells us of ' the divine nature.'^ So that it is time 2 Pet 1 4. at length to draw the veil from nature's face, and to look upon her beauty. And first, it is the usual language of many, both philo- sophers and others, to put nature for God himself, or at least for the general providence of God ; and this, in the schoolmen's rough and unpolished Latin, is styled natura naturans;^ thus nature is taken for that constant and catholic Providence, that spreads its wings over all created beings, and shrouds them under its warm and happy pro- tection. Thus that elegant moralist, Plutarch, speaks more like to himself than in his former description: * Nature is in all things accurate and punctual ; it is not defective nor parsimonious, nor yet sprouting and luxu- riant ;'* and consonant to this is that sure axiom, ^ Nature^ / makes nothing in vain.'^ Thus God set up the world as ^^ a fair and goodly clock, to strike in time, and to move in an orderly manner, not by its own weights (as Durandus would have it), but by fresh influence from himself, by that inward and intimate spring of immediate concourse, that should supply it in a most uniform and proportionable manner. * In sensu florido. « 'H Oeta 6vai.(afUva, — Aristot. Categ. viii. 3. * A On; ij ipiLfffis. ■r 40 OP THE LIGHT OF NATURE. THE NATURE OF A LAW. 41 . CHAPTER IV. THE NATUKE OF A LAW IN GENERAL. Before we can represent unto you the law of nature, you must first frame and fashion in your minds the just notion of a law in general. And Aquinas gives us this shadowy representation of it : ^ A law is a certain rule and measure, according to which any agent is led to act, or re- strained from acting.'^ But Suarez is offended with the latitude of this definition, and esteems it too spreading and comprehensive, as that which extends to all naturals, ay, and to artificials too, for they have ' rules and mea- sures of their operations.' ^ Thus God has set a law to the waves, and a law to the winds ; nay, thus clocks have their laws, and lutes have their laws, and whatsoever has the least appearance of motion, has some rule proportion- able to it. Whereas these workings were always reckoned to be at the most but ' tendencies and gravitations,'^ and not the fruits of a legislative power. But yet the Apostle Paul, to stain the pride of them that gloried in the law, calls such things by the name of law as were most odious and anomalous. Thus he tells us of * a law of death,'* * Lex est qusBilam regula et mensura, secundum quam inducitur aliquM ad agendum, vel ab agendo retrabitur. * Regulas et mensuras operationum. * Inclinationes et pondera. * N6ftoj Ba»6.7w. and * a law of sin'^ though sin be properly ' lawlessness.' ^ Rom. nii 2. Thus he mentions 'the law of our members,'^ the same uom. tu. 23. which the schoolmen call 'the law of excitement.'^ And yet this is sure, that a rational creature only is capable of a law, which is a moral restraint, and so cannot reach to those things that are necessitated to act ' to the utmost stretch of their powers.'^ And, therefore, Suarez*^ gives us a more refined description, when he tells us, that ' a law is a certain measure of moral acts, of such a kind, that by conformity to it, they are morally right ; by dis^ cordance with it, morally wrong.'^ A law is such a just and regular tuning of actions, as that by virtue of this they may conspire into a moral music, and become very pleasant and harmonious. Thus Plato speaks much of that 'melody and harmony '« that is in laws ; and in his second book Be Legihus, he does altogether discourse of harmony, and does infinitely prefer mental and intellectual music, those powerful and practical strains of goodness, that spring from a well-com- posed spirit, before those delicious blandishments, those soft and transient touches that comply with sense, and salute it in a more flattering manner; and he tells you of a spiritual dancing chat is answerable to so sweet a music, to these * most divine flutings.'^ While the laws play in concert, there is a chorus of well-ordered affections that are raised and elevated by them. And thus, as Aristotle well observes, some laws were * N6moj afiapriat. i 'Apofiid. ^ N6/toj iv TMs fU\€(Tiv — Legem niembronim. * Legem fomitis— apud Rabbinn. JTIH "12^. ' Ad cxtremum virium. • Note E. ' Lex est mensura quiedam actuum moralium, ita ut per conformitatcni ad illam rectitudinem moralem habeant, et, si ab ilia discordent, obliqui sint. • EipvSfxla Kal . Bckker. Berol. 1831. * Lex est ordinatio rationis ad bonum commune, ab co, qui curam liabvt communitatis, promulgata. * Lex est commune praceptum, justnm ac stabile, sufficienter proniul- gatura. « Pruesupponere actum intellectus. ' In actu voluntatis. • In actu rationis. ' In actu voluntatis. C 2 A 46 OF THE LIGHT OF NATUEE. ^ at all depend upon the will of man, but upon the power and will of the Lawgiver. NoWj in the framing of every law there is to be (1.) 'An aiming at the common good;'^ and thus that speech of / Carneades, ' utility may almost be called the mother of what is just and fair/^ if it be taken in this sense, is very commendable, whereas, in that other sense (in which it is thought he meant it), it is not so much as tolerable. Law- givers should send out laws with olive-branches in their mouths ; they should be fruitful and peaceable ; they should drop sweetness and fatness upon a land. Let not then brambles make laws for trees, lest they scratch them judg. ix. and tear them, and write their laws in blood. But law- givers are to send out laws, as the sun shoots forth his :kiai. iT. 2. beams, * with healing in his wings/ And thus that elegant moralist Plutarch speaks, " God," says he, " is angry with them that counterfeit his thunder and lightniug, ' His sceptre, and His thunderbolt, and His trident,'^ He will not let them meddle with these." He does not love they should imitate Him io his absolute dominion and sove- reignty, but loves to see them darting out those warm, and amiable, and cherishing * rays,'* those * beamings out' of justice, and goodness, and clemency. And as for laws, they should be like so many green and pleasant pastures, into which these ' shepherds of nations'* are to lead their flocks, where they may feed sweetly and securely by those refreshing streams of justice that roll down like water, Amos T. 24. ' and of righteousness like a mighty torrent.' And this consideration would sweep down many cobweb laws, that argue only the venom and subtlety of them that spin them i this would sweep down many an Ahithophel's ' Intentio boni commnnis. • Utilitas justi prope mater ct a^qui. • 0^ CKiprrpov, ov Kcpawbu, ov rpiatvav. * 'AKTivo^oXlai. ' riot/x^yej Xowy. THE NATURE OF A LAW. 47 web, many a Haman's web, many a Herod's web ; every spider's web that spreads laws only for the catching and entangling of the weaker ones. Such lawgivers are fit to he Domitian's playfellows, that made it his royal sport and pastime to catch flies, and insult over them when he had done. Whereas a law should be a staff" for a common- wealth to lean on, and not a reed to pierce it through. Laws should be cords of love, not nets and snares. Hence it is that those laws are most radical and fundamental, that principally tend to the conservation of the vitals and essentials of a kingdom ; and those come nearest the law of God himself, and are participations of that eternal law, which is the spring and original of all inferior and deriva- tive laws. ' All laws are made for the sake of advantage,''^ as Plato speaks; and there is no such public benefit as that which comes by laws ; for all have an equal interest in them, and privilege by them. And, therefore, as Aris- totle speaks most excellently, Maw is intellect without propension.'^ A law is a pure intellect, not only without a sensitive appetite, but without a will. A law is impar- tial, and makes no factions : and a law cannot be bribed, though a judge may. And that great philosopher does very well prosecute this ; ' If you were to take physic,' says he, ' then indeed it is ill being determined by a book ; it is dangerous taking a printed receipt ; you had better leave it to the breast of the physician, to his skill and advice, who minds your health and welfare, as being most for his gain and credit. But in point of justice the case is very differ- ent ; you had better here depend upon a rule, than leave it to the arbitrary power of a judge, who is usually to decide a controversy between two, and, if left to himself, were apt to be swayed and biassed by several interests and * ToC dploTov fvfKa irdvra tA pSpn/xa. — Plato, De Legibvs, i. sect. 4. * ^6fios icrl vws dP€v dp^^ews Aristot., Eth. Nic. L 2. 1. 48 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. engagements, which might incline him to one more than another. Nay, now that there is a fixed rule, an immov- able law, yet there is too much partiality in the application of It ; how much more would there be if there were no rule at all ?' But the truth is, the judge should only follow the ' last and practical dictate of the law ;'i his will, like a ' blind power/2 is to follow the ' last light of intellect'^ of this 'reason '4 that is to rule and guide him ; and therefore Justice was painted blind, though ' the law itself ^^ be ' pos- sessed of eyes;' ^for the mind sees, the mind hears '^ and the will IS to follow ' the last decision of the head/^ the meaning of the law in all circumstances. (2.) In a lawgiver, there is to be 'judgment and con- structive wisdom for making laws/» The Egyptian hiero- glyphic for legislative power was 'an eye in a sceptre ;''•» and it had need be such an eye that can see both ' before and behind/" It had need have a full and open prospect into public affairs, and to put all advantages into one scale, and all inconveniences into another. To be sure, the laws of God flow from a fountain of wisdom, and the laws of men are to be lighted at this 'candle of the Lord,' whicli He has set up in them, and those laws are most potent and prevalent that are founded m light; 'the guidance of reason is golden and holy '^-^ Other laws are 'hard, and of iron ;'^3 they may have an iron and adamantine necessity, but the others have a soft and downy persuasion going along with them, and there- " Ultimum ct practicum dictamon legis ^ Noviasimum lumen intellectus. * Ipsa lex. ^ NoCs 6p^, vovs d/coi/et. Judicium et pnider.tia architectonica ad ferendas leees '" Oculus in sceptro. ii n,j^J' \ i , H rov Xcyiafiov ayuryi, ^pvarj Kal Upd. " 2^^,^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^^ • Caeca potent ia. • Oculata. • Ultimum nutuni capitis. THE KATITIE OF A LAW. 49 V^ fore as he goes on, * reason is so beautiful, that it wins and allures, and thus constrains to obedience/^ -^ (3.) There is to be ' the seal of a law,' ^ I mean ' the approving and passing of the law/^ After a sincere aim at public good, and a clear discovery of the best means to promote it, there comes then a fixed and sacred resolution, ' we will and decree ;' * this speaks the will of the lawgiver, and breathes life into the law, it adds vigour and efficacy to it. But yet notwithstanding, (4.) There must be ' the voice of the trumpet,' * that is, ' the promulgation and recommendation of the law.'^ The law is for a public good, and it is to be made known in a public manner ; for as none can desire an unknown good, so none can obey an unknown law, and therefore invincible ignorance does excuse, for else men should be bound to absolute impossibilities. But whether it be required to the publishing of a law that it should be in the way of writing, which is more fixed and durable, or whether the manifesta- tion of it in a vocal and oral manner will suffice (which yet is more transient and uncertain), I leave the lawyers and schoolmen to dispute. Of this I am sure, that all the laws of God are proclaimed in a most sufficient and em- phatical manner. / * Top \oyiafiov KaXoO fi^v 6vtos, irpdov 5^ Kal ov /Stai'oi/. * Sigillum legis. ^ Electio et determinatio Icgis. * Volumns et statuimus. ' Vox tubaj. * Promulgatio et insinuatio legis. 50 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. CHAPTER V. OF THE ETERNAL LAW. Having thus looked upon the being of a law in general, we now come to the spring and original of all laws, to the Eternal Law, that fountain of law, out of which you may see the Law of Nature bubbling and flowing forth to the sons of men. For, as Aquinas does very well tell us, the law of nature is nothing but 4he copying out of the eternal law, and the imprinting of it upon the breast of a rational being/ ^ That Eternal Law was in a manner in- carnated in the law of nature. Now this eternal law is not really distinguished from God himself. For ' nothing exists from eternity but God himself.' 2 So that it is much of the same nature with those decrees of His, and that Providence which was awake from everlasting. For as God from all eternity, by the hand of infinite wisdom, did draw the several faces and lineaments of being, which He meant to show in time: so He did then also contrive their several frames with such limits and compass as He meant to set them ; and said to everything, * Hither shalt thou go, and no farther.' This the Platonists would call 'the ideal of laws,'^ and ^ Participatio legis aeternae in rationali creatura. "^ 'Nil est ab eeterno nisi ipse Deus. • *IS4(Uf tQv vhfuav. THE ETERNAL LAW. 51 would willingly heap such honourable titles as these upon it, *the guiding, originating, abstractly just, abstractly lovely, abstractly good, self-existent, germinating law.'i And the greatest happiness the other laws can arrive unto is this, that they be * ministering and subservient laws,' * waiting upon this their Eoyal Law ;'2 or, as they would choose to style them, some * shadows and appearances of this bright and glorious law,'^ or at the best they would be esteemed by them but ' the noble offspring and progeny of laws ;'* blessing this womb that bare them, and this breast that gave them suck. And thus the law of nature would have a double portion as being ' the first-born of this eternal law,'^ and ' the beginning of its strength.' Now as God himself shows somewhat of His face in the glass of creatures, so the beauty of this law gives some representations of itself in those pure derivations of inferior laws that stream from it. And as we ascend to the first and Supreme Being by the steps of second causes, we may climb up to a sight of this eternal law, by those fruitful branches of secondary laws, which seem to have their root in earth, when as indeed it is in heaven ; and that I may vary a little that of the Apostle to the Romans, ' The invisible law of God, long before the creation of the world, is now clearly seen, being understood by those laws which do appear ;' so that ' the knowledge of the law'^ is manifested in them, God having shown it to them. Thus, as the schoolmen say very well, * every derivative law supposes a self-existent law ;'^ every Luke xi. 27. GfcD. xlix. 3. X Rom. i. 20. 1 'O vbfJLOt ipxvy^^ irpbyTovpybi, a&rodiKaios, ivrdKokos, airrodyados, 6 6yTU}s vbfio^y 6 t ypairrSf. CHAPTER VL OF THE LAW OF NATURE IN GENEUAL, ITS SUBJECT AND NATURE. The Law of Nature^ is that law which is intrinsical and essential to a rational creature ; and such a law is as "necessary as such a creature ; for such a creature as a creature has a Superior, to whose providence and disposing it must be subject ; and then as an intellectual creature it 18 capable of a moral government, so that it is very suit- able and co-natural to it to be regulated by a law, to be guided and commanded by One that is infinitely more wise and intelligent than itself is, and that minds its welfare more than itself can. Insomuch that the most bright and eminent creatures, even angelical beings, and glorified souls, are subject to a law, though with such a happy privilege, as that they cannot violate and transgress it ; whereas the very dregs of entity, the rnost ignoble beings are most incapable of a law ; for you know inanimate beings are carried on only with the velieinency and neces- sity of natural inclinations ; nay, sensitive beings cannot reach or aspire to so great a perfection as to be wrought upon in such an illuminative way as a law is ; they are » •EUTov. — Plato, ' the pliilosopher ;' vide preceding page. ^ De Legibus, lib. ii. of Divine worship in sensitive beings ? What do they more than the heavens, which ' declare the glory of God ; or the firmament, which shows his handiwork ?' Unless Psai xix. i. perhaps the lawyers can find not only a commonwealth, but a church also among the bees ; some canonical obedi- ence, some laudable ceremonies, some decency and con- formity amongst them. We will only set some of the poets to laugh the lawyers out of this opinion ; old Hesiod tells them his mind very freely : — * Never by brutal violence be swayed, But be the law of Jove in thee obeyed ; In these the brute creation, men exceed, They void of reason by each other bleed ; While man by justice should be kept in awe, Justice, of nature well ordained the law.'' — Cook's Translation. What are those laws that are observed by a rending and tearing lion, by a devouring leviathan ? Does the wolf oppress the lamb by a law ? Can birds of prey show any commission for their plundering and violence ? That amorous poet, Ovid, shows that these sensitive creatures, in respect of lust, are absolute Antinomians. And what though you meet with some ^ single cases,'^ some rare patterns of sensitive temperance ? A few scat- tered and uncertain stories will never evince that the whole heap and generality of brutes act according to a law. You have heard, it may be, of a chaste turtle,— and did you never hear of a wanton sparrow ? It may be you have read some I* ' T6v 8^ ydip i,v6p(i)Troi.€pofUvyi. • In utilitatem ejus, contra quern peccatum est. • In emendationem. " In utilitatem peccantis. " *larpiK^v ToyripLas.— Com. in Aur. Carm. Pyth., 27-29. E 66 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. THE LAW OF NATURE. 67 Deut zxxi. 12. example, for the advantage of others/^ as the Greek orator speaks, ' That others may exercise foresight and fear/ 2 the same which God speaks by Moses, * That Israel may hear and fear ;' and thus punishment does ^ serve as a public example/^ But now none of these ends are appliable to sensitive creatures, for there is no more satisfaction to justice in inflicting an evil upon them, than there is in the ruining of inanimate beings, in demolishing of cities or temples for idolatry, which is only for the good of tliem that can take notice of it ; for otherwise, as that grave moralist, Seneca, has it, ' How foolish is it to be angry with objects that neither have deserved our anger, nor feel it V^ No satis- faction is to be had from such things as are not apprehen- sive of punishment ; and therefore annihilation, though a great evil, yet wants this sting and aggravation of a punish- ment, for a [brute] creature is not sensible of it. Much less can you think that a punishment has any power to mend or meliorate sensitive beings, or to give example to others amongst them. By all this you see, that amongst all irrational beings there is no * lawlessness,'^ and therefore no * offence,'^ and therefore no 'punishment;'^ from whence it also flows, that the law of nature is built upon reason. There is some good so proportionable and nutrimental to the being of man, and some evil so venomous and destructive to his nature, as that the God of nature does sufiiciently antidote and fortify him against the one, and does maintain and sweeten his essence with the other. * In exemplum, in utilitatera aliorum. ^ '\va dX\vvaii Kal 6 v6^s Oorgias, Opera, torn. iii. p. 244. Lond. 1826. * Hominum infirmiorum commenta. * T6 XaixTrphrarov t^$ 0{^ N6A101 Kord Td ^Tf. " N6;«>s koip6s. 72 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. laws'^ are 'more lordly,' ^ laws of the first magnitude, of a nobler sphere, of a vaster and purer influence. Where you see also that he calls the law of nature, the moral Rom.ii.i5. law, and the same which the Apostle calls * written law,'^ he with the rest of the heathen calls it ' laws unwritten,'* couching the same sense in a seeming contradiction. The orator has it expressly, * A law not written, but innate/^ And amongst all the heathen, I can meet with none that draws such a lively portraiture of the law of nature, as that noble orator does. You may hear him thus pleading for it, * Grant,' says he, * that Kome were not for the present furnished with a positive law, able to check the lust and violence of a Tarquin, yet there was a virgin law of nature, which he had also ravished and deflowered ; there was the beaming out of an eternal law, enough to revive a modest Lucretia, and to strike terror into the heart of so licentious a prince :' for, as he goes on, (his meaning is not much different from this,) — * Right reason is a beautiful law ; a law of a pure com- plexion, of a natural colour, of a vast extent and diffusion : its colour never fades, never dies. It encourages men in obedience with a smile, it chides them and frowns them out of wickedness. Good men hear the least whispering of its pleasant voice, they observe the least glance of its lovely eye ; but wicked men sometimes will not hear it, though it come to them in thunder ; nor take the least notice of it, though it should flash out in lightning. None must enlarge the phylacteries of this law, nor must any dare to prune off the least branch of it. Nay, the malice of man cannot totally deface so indelible a beauty. No pope, nor prince, nor parliament, nor people, nor angel, -» NVo* Kar^ Td 1^. * KvpiiSnepoi. 3 Mfioi ypavToi. * 'Aypaipa vhfufia. * Non scripta, sed nata lex.— Cicero, OrcU, pro Milone, sect. 4. THE LAW OF NATURE. 73 nor creature, can absolve you from it. This law never paints its face, it never changes its colour ; it does not put on one aspect at Athens, and another face at Rome, but looks upon all nations and persons with an impartial eye: it shines upon all ages, and times, and conditions, with a perpetual light : " It is yesterday, and to-day, the same for ever." There is but one Lawgiver, one Lord and Supreme Judge of this law, " God blessed for evermore." He was the Contriver of it, the Commander of it, the Publisher of it ; and none can be exempted from it, unless he will be banished from his own essence, and be excommunicated from human nature. This punishment would have sting enough, if he should avoid a thousand more that are due to so foul a transgression.'^ Thus you see that the heathen not only had this 'written law'^ upon them, but also they themselves took special notice of it ; and the more refined sort amongst them could discourse very admirably about it, which must needs leave them the more inexcusable for the viola- Eomi. 20. tion of it. We come now to see where the strength of the law of nature lies, where its nerves are, where it has such an efficacious influence, such a binding virtue. » Est quidera vera lex recta ratio, natur» congniens, diffusa in omnes, constans, sempitema ; quae vocet ad officiura jubendo ; vetando a fraude de- terreat: quae tamen probos neque frustra jubet aut vetat, nee improbos jubendo aut vetando movet. Huic legi nee propagari fas est, neque derogari ex hac aliquid licet ; neque tota abrogari potest. Nee vero aut per senatum, aut per populum solvi hac lege possumus ; neque est quaerendus explanator, aut interpres ejus alius. Non erat alia Romae, alia Athenis; alia nunc, alia posthac ; sed et omnes gentes, omni tempore, una lex, et sempiterna, et immutabilis continebit, unusque erit quasi communis magister et legislator omnium Deus: Hie legis hiyus inventor, disceptator, lator; Cui qui non parebit ipse se fugiet, et naturam hominis aspernabitur ; Hoc ipso luet maximas pcenas, etiamsi csetera supplicia, quae putantur, effugerit.— 2?e Repub., lib. iii. Frag, in Lactant. vi. 8. * N6mo5 ypairrds. 74 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. And I find Vasquez^ somewhat singular, and withal erroneous in his opinion, whilst he goes about to show that the formality of this law consists only in that harmony and proportion, or else that discord and disconvenience, which such and such an object, and such and such an action has with a rational nature ; for, says he, every essence is *a measure of good and evil,'^ in respect of itself. Which, as he thinks, is plainly manifested and discovered also in corporeal beings, which use to fly only from such things as are destructive to their own forms, and to embrace all such neighbourly and friendly beings as will close and comply with them. But he might easily have known, that as these material beings were never yet so honoured, as to be judged capable of a law, so neither can any naked essence, though never so pure and noble, lay a moral engagement upon itself^ or bind its own being ; for this would make the very same being superior to itself, as it gives a law, and inferior to itself, as it must obey it. So that the most High and Sove- reign Being, even God himself, does not subject Himself to any law ; though there be some actions also most agreeable to His nature, and others plainly inconsistent with it, yet they cannot amount to such a power, as to lay any obliga- tion upon Him, which should in the least notion differ from the liberty of His own essence. Thus also, in the commonwealth of human nature, that proportion which actions bear to reason, is indeed a sufficient foundation for a law to build upon, but it is not the law itself, nor a formal obligation. Yet some of the schoolmen are extremely bold and vain in their suppositions ; so bold, as that I am ready to question whether it be best to repent them ; yet thus they say, ' If there were no God, or if He did not enjoy or make ' Note H. > Mensura boni et mali. THE LAW OF NATURE. 75 use of reason, or if He did not judge rightly regarding matters ; if, nevertheless, there were in man the same clear direction of right reason, which he has at present, he would have also the same system of law which he has at present.'^ But what are the goodly spoils that these men expect, if they could break through such a crowd of repugnancies and impossibilities ? The whole result and product of it will prove but a mere cypher ; for reason, as it is now, does not bind in its own name, but in the name of its Supreme Lord and Sovereign, by whom reason ' lives, and moves, and has its being.' For if only a creature should bind itself to the observation of this law, it must also inflict upon itself such a punishment as is answerable to the violation of it ; but no such being would be willing or able to punish itself in so high a measure, as such a transgres- sion would meritoriously require, so that it must be accountable to some other legislative power, which will vindicate its own commands, and will by this means engage a creature to be more mindful of its own happiness than otherwise it would be. For though some of the gallanter heathen can brave it out sometimes in an expression, that the very turpitude of such an action is punishment enough, and the very beauty of goodness is an abundant reward and compensation ; yet we see that all this, and more than this, did not effica- ciously prevail with them for their due conformity and full obedience to nature's law ; such a single cord as this will be easily broken. Yet there is some truth in what they say ; for thus much is visible and apparent, that there is such a mag- netical power in some good, as must needs allure and * Si Deu8 non esset, vel si non uteretur ratione, vel si non recte judicaret de rebus, 8i tamen in homine idem csset dictamen rectse rationis, quod nunc est, haberet etiam eandem rationem legis quam nunc habet. 76 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. THE LAW OF NATURE. 77 attract a rational being ; there is such a native fairness, such an intrinsical loveliness in some objects, as does not depend upon an external command, but by its own worth must needs win upon the soul ; and there is such an in- separable deformity and malignity in some evil, as that reason must needs loathe it and abominate it. Insomuch, as that if there were no law or command, yet a rational being of its own accord, out of mere love, would espouse itself to such an amiable good, it would clasp and twine about such a precious object ; and if there were not the least check or prohibition, yet in order to its own welfare, it would abhor and fly from some black evils, that spit out 80 much venom against its nature. This is that which the schoolmen mean, when they tell us, 'some things are wrong because they are forbidden, but others are forbidden because they are wrong ;'^ that is, in positive laws, whether Divine or human, acts are to be esteemed evil upon this account, because they are for- bidden; but in the law of nature such an evil was in- timately and inevitably an evil, though it should not be forbidden. Now that there are such ' things good in themselves,'^ and 'things evil in themselves,'^ as the schools speak, I shall thus demonstrate : ' What is not evil in itself, might have not been forbidden ;'* for there is no reason imagin- able why there should not be a possibility of not prohibit- ing that which is not absolutely evil, which is in its own nature indifferent But now there are some evils so excessively evil, so intolerably bad, as that they cannot but be forbidden. I * Qmedam stmt mala, quia proliibentur ; sed alia prohibentur, quia sunt mala. « Bona per se. • Mala per se. * Quod non est malum per se, potuit non prohiberi. shall only name this one, ' hatred of God.'^ For a being to hate the Creator and cause of its being, if it were possible for this not to be forbidden, it were possible for it to be lawful ; for ' where there is no law, there is no trans- Rom. w l5. gression ;'^ where there is no rule, there is no anomaly f if i J^hniii 4. there were no prohibition of this, it would not be sin to do it But that to hate God should not be sin, does involve a whole heap of contradictions ; so that this evil is so full of evil, as that it cannot but be forbidden ; and therefore is an evil in order of nature, before the prohibition of it. Besides, as the philosophers love to speak, ' The essences of things are unchangeable.'^ Essences neither ebb nor flow, but have in themselves a perpetual unity and identity ; and all such properties as flow and bubble up from beings, are constant and invariable ; but if they could be stopped in their motion, yet that state would be violent, and not at all co-natural to such a subject. So that grant only the being of man, and you cannot but grant this also, that there is such a constant conveni- ency and analogy which some objects have with its essence, as that it cannot but incline to them, and that there is such an irreconcilable disconvenience, such an eternal antipathy, between it and other objects, as that it must cease to be what it is before it can come near them. This Suarez terms a natural obligation, and a just foundation for a law ; but now, before all this can rise up to the height and perfection of a law, there must come a command from some superior Power, from whence will spring a moral obligation also, and make up the formality of a law. ' Odium Dei. « O^yiip otK i(m vSfiot, ovtk ira/)(£/3a(rtj-Ubi nulla lex, ibi nulla prae- varicatio. s *Xyofda. * Essentiae rerum sunt inmiutabiles. F 78 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Therefore God himself, for the brightening of His own glory, for the better regulating and tuning of the world, for the maintaining of such a choice piece of his work- manship as man is, has published this His royal command, and proclaimed it by that principle of reason, which ^ He has planted in the being of man ; which does fully convince him of the righteousness, and goodness, and necessity of this law, for the materials of it ; and of the validity and authority of this law, as it comes from the mind and will of his Creator. Neither is it any eclipse or diminution of the liberty of that first being, to say that there is some evil so foul and ill-favoured, as that it cannot but be for- bidden by him ; and that there is some good so fair and eminent, as that he cannot but command it. For, as the schoolmen observe, ' Though the will of God be completely free in respect of all His looks and glances towards the creature, yet notwithstanding, upon the voluntary and free precedency of one act, we may justly conceive him neces- sitated to another,'^ by virtue of that indissoluble con- nexion and concatenation between these two acts, which does in a manner knit and unite them into one. Thus God has an absolute liberty and choice, whether He will make a promise or no, but if He has made it, He cannot but fulfil it. Thus He is perfectly free, whether He will reveal His mind or not ; but if He will reveal it, He cannot but speak truth, and manifest it as it is. God had the very same liberty whether He would create a world or not, but if He will create it, and keep it in its comeliness and proportion. He must then have a vigilant and providential eye over it ; and if He will provide for it, He cannot but have a perfect and indefective providence, agreeable to His own wisdom, and goodness, and being ; * Divina voluntas, licet simpliciter libera sit ad extra, ex suppositiune tamen unius actus liberi, potest uecessitari ad aliuiu. THE LAW OF NATURE. 79 80 that if He will create such a being as man, such a rational creature, furnished with sufficient knowledge to discern between some good and evil, and if He will supply it with a proportionate concourse in its operations. He cannot then but prohibit such acts as are intrinsically pre- judicial and detrimental to the being of it ; neither can He but command such acts as are necessary to its pre- servation and welfare. ^ Vs God, therefore, when from all eternity in His own glorious thoughts He contrived the being of man, did also with His piercing eye see into all conveniences and disconveniences, which would be in reference to such a being ; and by His eternal law did restrain and determine it to such acts as should be advantageous to it, which, in His wise economv and dispensation, He published to man by the voice of reason, by the mediation of this natural law Whence it is, that every violation of this law is not only an injury to man's being, but, ' in addition to the wicked- ness of the thing itself,'^ as the schools speak, is also a virtual and interpretative contempt of that supreme Lavy- giver, who, out of so much wisdom, love, and goodness, did thus bind man to his own happiness. So much then as man does start aside and apostatize from this law, to so much misery and punishment does he expose himself; though it be not necessary that the candle of nature should discover the full extent and mea- sure of that punishment, which is due to the breakers of this law, for to the nature of punishment ' it is not neces- sary that the punishment should be foreknown, but that an act should be committed worthy of such punishment. » Ultra nativam rei malitiam. . j- „ * .i: « Non requiritur ut pr^cognita sit pcena, sed ut fiat actus dignus tal. poena. iX 11 80 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. The lawyers and the schoolmen both will acknowledge this principle. For as Suarez has it, ' Responsibility for crime follows from its very nature ; so that even if pun- ishment be not fixed by a law, yet a crime may be pun- ished according to the decision of a competent judge.' ^ Yet the light of nature will reveal and disclose thus much, that a being totally dependent upon another, essentially subordinate and subject to it, must also be accountable to it for every provocation and rebellion ; and for the viola- tion of so good a law, which He has set it, and for the sinning against such admirable providence and justice as shines out upon it, must be liable to such a punishment, as that glorious Lawgiver shall judge fit for such an offence ; who is so full of justice, as that He cannot, and so great in goodness, as that He will not, punish a creature above its desert. * Sequitur reatus ex intrinseca conditione culpie ; ita ut licet pcena per legem non sit determinata, arbitrio tamen conipetentis judicis puniri possit. EXTENT OF THE LAW OF NATURE. 81 CHAPTER VII. THE EXTENT OF THE LAW OF NATURE. There are stamped and printed upon the being of man some clear and indelible principles, some first and alphabet- ical notions, by putting together of which it can spell out the law of nature. There are scattered in the soul of man some seeds of light, which fill it with a vigorous pregnancy, with a multiplying fruitfulness, so that it brings forth a numerous and sparkling posterity of secondary notions, which make for the crowning and encompassing of the soul with happiness. All the fresh springs of common and fountain notions are in the soul of man, for the water- ing of his essence, for the refreshing of this heavenly plant, this arbor inversa^ this enclosed being, this garden of God. And though the wickednesses of man may stop the pleasant motion, the clear and crystalline progress of the fountain, yet they cannot hinder the first risings, the bubbling endeavours of it. They may pull off nature's leaves, and pluck off her fruit, and chop off her branches, but yet the root of it is eternal, the foundation of it is inviolable. Now these first and radical principles are wound up in some such short bottoms as these : * We must seek good, and avoid evil \'^ * we must seek happiness ;'^ * do not do to > Note I. • Bonum est appctendum, malum est fugieiidum. 3 Beatitude est qiuerenda. F2 •» •_ 82 Matt Tu Matt. T OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. 12. others what you do not wish to have done to yourselfjl^ And reason, thus, by wanning and brooding upon these first and oval principles of her own laying, it being itself quickened with a heavenly vigoi "^ does -^us ' hatch the law of nature/^ For you must not, nor cannot think that nature's law is confined and contracted within the compass of two or three common notions, but reason, as with one foot it fixes a centre, so with the other it measures and spreads oiit a circumference ; it draws several conclusions, which do all meet and crowd into these first and central principles. 'As in those noble mathematical sciences there are not onjy some first * postulates,'^ which are granted as soon as they are asked, if not before ; but there are also whole heaps of firm and immovable demonstrations that are built upon them. In the very same manner, nature has some pos- tulaia, some ^assumptions,'* which Seneca renders prce- sumptiones,^ which others call anlicipationea animij which she knows a rational being will presently and willingly yield unto ; and therefore by virtue of these it does engage and oblige it to all such commands, as shall by just result, by genuine production, by kindly and evident derivation, flow from these. For men must not only look upon the capital letters of this ^ written law,'^ but they must read the whole context and coherence of it ; they must look to every iota and apex of it, for heaven and earth shall sooner pass away, than 18. ' one jot or tittle' of this law shall vanish. They must not only gaze upon two or three principles of the first magni- tude, but they must take notice of the lesser celestial * Quod tibi fieri non vis, alteri ne fcceris. * 'QordK-riae t6v ydfiw — Incubaudu super ha?c ova. ' Atr^/Aara. * llpo\ifi\l/€is. * Epist. 117. * liifics ypawTos. EXTENT OF THE LAW OF NATURE. 83 Sporades^ for these also have their light and influence. They must not only skim off the cream of first principles, but whatsoever sweetness comes streaming from the dug of nature, they must feed upon it, that they may be nourished with it. Keason does not only crop off the tops of first notions, but does so gather all the flowers in nature's garden, as that it can bind them together in a pleasant posy, for the refreshment of itself and others. Thus, as a noble author ^ of our own does well observe, * All morality is nothing but a collection and bundling up "^ of natural precepts.'^ The moralists did but * enlarge the Mat fringes of nature's garment ;'* they are so many commen- tators and expositors upon nature's law. Tbis was his meaning, that styled moral philosophy Hhat philosophy which is for the maintaining and edifying of human nature.'^ Thus nature's law is frequently called the moral law. But the schoolmen, in their rougher language, make these several ranks and distributions of ' natural precepts.'^ First there come in the front ' general principles,' as some call them, * known instinctively ; as. We must do what is honourable, and avoid what is wicked.'^ Then follow next, ' particular and more defined principles ; as. We must practise justice, we must worship God, we must live tem- perately.'* At length come up in the rear, 'conclusions clearly following from the foregoing, but which cannot be • Small bodies like islets.— Pomp. Mela., lib. ii. ch. 7. • Bacon. • Tota fere ethica est notitia communis. • YiXarvvilv v\aKTiqpia. ' *H ircpl rd di^/>a>irtva la. — Socrates. • Td Tpiora Karh. 6 Signaculum quoddam et impressio increatse lucis in anima. 2 *E was rb CJs tov vpocuitrov aov. 8 "T^xapw. * 'EirL4 vpo^pipovca v Species. HOW THE LAW OF NATURE IS DISCOVERED. 95 kindling. He will but set his reminiscence a work, and will visit his old acquaintance, recall many ancient truths that are now slipped out of liis memory, and have been too long absent. And surely Aristotle never thought that his ' sheet of blank paper'^ could have nothing printed upon it, till a Jew gave it an imprimatur ; he little imagined that the motion of his soul depended upon these Oriental intelligences. Therefore, if they please, they may spare that pretty story of theirs — which that learned author, whom I have so often commended, does acquaint us with, but yet withal esteems it fabulous — of Simeon the Just, the high-priest, reading of lectures to Aristotle a little before his death, of the immortality of the soul, and the reward and punish- ment which are reserved for another life, and that so powerfully, as that he convinced him, and converted him. But certainly, that brave philosopher could easily spy out immortality stamjjed upon his own soul, though such a monitor had been absent, and did know long before that time by the improvement of his own intellectuals, that he must give an account of his being and operations to his ' Being of beings.'^ What means, then, that voice of the oracle ? ' Wisdom the Chaldees alone have obtained, and with them the Hebrews, Chastely who worship a self-existent King as their great God.'^ Truly, the oracle here is not so obscure, but that you may easily perceive that by ^ wisdom'* it did not mean intelli- gentia, which is ' the knowledge of the first elements,'^ but only sapientia, which is ^ the knowledge of what is most * Rasa tabula. * *0v 6tn'uv. * }lovyoi XaXSaioL aop.ol- pTjffav TTJi olKfLas AXd/x^fwj, raOra ^ovXcrai A 6 ^fios oplj^ei vofioi, xal yiverai oi Gey ij xari ^c6v SiaKcifxivrf ypvxh, ^ai -wpbs rh "htiow Kal rh XafXTTpbv diro^X^irovaa irpdrrei A Av TrpdTTjj. Hit ivavrLwi 5iaK€ip,4irrf trpds rb Adeov, Kal ffKvrtivbv, cUij Kal ws trvx^ €pofJikirrj, Are rrjs fMvris ruv KaXQv (TTd^fiVS, voO Kal GeoO, dTOT€ears the name of ' ITie Bloudie Tenent yet more Lloudie, by Mr. Cotton's endevour to Wash it White in the Bloude of the Lambe,' 1652. * Caput et auctor consilionun omnium, » Pyxis nautica. ^•' THE LIGHT OF REASON. 105 the material intellect is, as it were, a liferenter or pen- sioner of it.'^ The Jews especially admire and adore the influence of an intellectus agens ; and not forgetful of their primogeni- ture and privileges, but being always a conceited and a bragging generation, they would fain persuade us that God himself is their intellectus agens^ but to the Gentiles He sends only an angel to illuminate them. The Jews indeed sometimes call every faculty an angel, as one of the best amongst them, Maimonides, tells us ; but yet here they properly mean an angelical being, dis- tinct and separate from the soul ; and just according to Averroes' determination, the lowest intelligence, * the last mover of the heavenly beings.' ^ Their own intellectus agens they call ' the presence and power of God ' ^ dwelling in the understanding ; the influence of it they term yBK', as the fore-mentioned Maimonides observes ; that is, a copious and abundant supply of light shining upon the mind. According to which they understand that place of the Psalmist, * In thy light we shall see light ;'"* which the p^^ "xvi. 9. schoolmen more truly expound of the ' light of glory,' ^ in the beatifical vision, though it may reach also to that joy and delight which saints have in communion with God here. Amongst fresher and more modern writers, Zabarella^ is very intense and zealous for this, that God himself is the intellectus agens of the soul ; but being a most humble and devoted servant of Aristotle, he can by no means quiet and content himself, unless he can show the world that his * Materialem vero intellectum esse quasi usufructuarium, et beneficiarium illius. « Ultimus motor ccelestium. • HJ^at^ and ^p7] Hn. * l^K 1K13 "pwa. » Lumen gloriee. * Note I^ H2 \ 1 106 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. master was of the same judgment. This makes him to suborn two or three testimonies, or at least to tamper with a place or two ; and then bravely to conclude, that without doubt was the mind of the philosopher, which is not only against the whole stream of other interpreters, but against the known and orthodox principles of him that was wiser than to countenance such a vanity. It should seem by that eminent writer of our own, that Friar Bacon was of the same mind too, for whose words these are quoted, amongst many others, out of an Oxford manuscript, * God, in the view of the soul, is like the sun to the eye of sense, and angels are like the stars/ ^ Now what angels they were that this Roger Bacon fixed his eye upon, whether they were not fallen stars, let others examine. I should think that Cardan's irUdlectus agens and his were botli much of the same colour. But this you may perceive in him, and the rest of the great pleaders for an intellectus agens, that they found all their argu- ments in a pretty similitude of an eye, and light, and colours, as if this were some unconquerable demonstration. Whereas the great master of subtleties,^ whom I have more than once named before, has made it appear, that the whole notion of an intellectus agens is a mere fancy and superfluity. Yet this may be granted to all the fore-mentioned authors, and this is the only spark of truth, that lies almost buried in that heap of errors, that God himself, as He does supply every being, the motion of every creature, with an intimate and immediate concourse every way answerable to the measure and degree of its entity, so He does in the same manner constantly assist the understand- * Deus respectu animae est sicut sol respectu oculi temporalis, et angeli sicut stellae. * Scaliger, De Sultilitaie, \ THE LIGHT OF REASON. 107 ing with a proportionable co-operation. But then, as for any such irradiations upon the soul in which that shall be merely patient,^ God, indeed, if He be pleased to reveal Himself in a special and extraordinary manner, may thus shine out upon it, either immediately by His own light, or else drop angelical influence upon it ; but that this should be the natural and ordinary way, necessarily required to intellectual workings, is extremely prejudicial to such a noble being as the soul of man is ; to which God gave such bright participations of Himself, and stamped His image upon it, and left it to its own workings, as much as any other created being whatsoever. Nay, as Scaliger does most confidently object it to Cardan, you will not have one argument left by which you can evince the im- mortality of the soul, if you shall resolve all the excellency of its being and operations into an intellectus agens really distinct from it. But then to make this intellectus agens^ and patiens^ only the various aspects and different relations of the same soul, is but a weak and needless device ; and if it were Aristotle's, to be sure it was none of his masterpieces ; for it is built upon I know not what phantasms and false appearances. Whereas those species and colours, those pictures and representations of being that are set before an intellectual eye, carry such a light and beauty in themselves, as may justly ingratiate them with the understanding. And though some tell us that they have too much dross and impurity, that they are too muddy and feculent, not pro- portionable to the purity of a reasonable soul, yet let them but think of those many strainers they have gone through ; those double refinings and clarifyings that they have had ; ■ Passive. * NoCt ToiijTociy. YlaOijTiKoi. 108 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. from 80 many percolations ; and withal they may know that the understanding can drink in the most pure and flowering part of the species, and can leave the dregs at the bottom. Have you not thus often seen a seal stamp- ing itself upon the wax, and yet not communicating the least particle of matter, but only leaving a form and im- pression upon it ? However, there is as much proportion between these species and an intellectus pattens, as between these and an intdlectus agens. Nay, there is more proportion between these species and the understanding, than between the soul and body, which yet are joined and married together in a most loving and conjugal union. / K THE CONSENT OF NATIONS. 109 CHAPTER X. OF THE CONSENT OF NATIONS. \ Though nature's law be principally proclaimed by the voice of reason, though it be sufficiently discovered by ' the candle of the Lord,' yet there is also a secondary and additional way, which contributes no small light to the manifestation of it : I mean the harmony and joint con- sent of nations, who, though there be * no communion, nor commerce, nor compact'^ between them, yet do tacitly and spontaneously conspire in a dutiful observation of the most radical and fundamental laws of nature. So that by this pleasant concert of theirs you may know that the same nature did tune them all. When you see the same prints and impressions upon so many several nations, you easily perceive that they were stamped ^ with the same public seal.'^ When you see the very same seeds thrown in such different soils, yet all increasing and mul- tiplying, budding and blossoming, branching out and en- larging themselves into some fruitful expressions, you know then that it was Nature's hand, her bountiful and successful hand, that scattered such seminal principles among them ; you presently know that is no enclosed way, it is a * king's highway,'^ in which you meet with so many travellers, such a concourse and confluence of people. ^ l^ * Via regia. Eodem communi sigilla 110 OF THE UGHT OF NATURE. Acts ii. 8-12. Amongst many others, the learned Grotius is full and express for searching out the law of nature in this man- ner. You shall hear his own words, which he speaks in that excellent work of his, De Jure Belli et Pacts, ' The existence of natural law is usually proved both a priori and d, posteriori^ the former being the more refined mode of proof, the latter the more suited for popular apprehension. The proof cL priori^ is by showing that something does or does not accord with our rational and social natures, and this of necessity. That d, posteriori is by gathering together and reckoning, not perhaps with absolute certainty, but at least with great probability, as parts of a system of natural law, all points which among all nations — I mean all the more civilized — are considered as such.'^ And he does annex this reason of it, ' A uni- versal effect requires a universal cause.' ^ When you see such fresh springs and streams of justice watering several kingdoms and nations, you know that they are participa- tions of some rich fountain, of a vast ocean. When you see so many rays of the same light shooting themselves into the several corners of the world, you presently look up to the sun, as the glorious original of them all. Let me, then, a little vary that place in the Acts of the Apostles : You may hear every man in his own language, in his own dialect, and idiom, speaking the same works of nature; Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, in Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, * Esse aliquid juris Daturalis, probari solet turn ab eo quod prius est, turn ab eo quod posterius; quarum probandi rationum ilia subtilior est, hsec popularior. A priori, si ostendatur rei alicujus convenientia aut disconvenien- tia necessaria cum natnra rationali ac sociali. A posteriori vcro, si non cer- tissima fide, certe probabiliter admodum juris naturalis esse colligitur id, quod apud gentes omnes aut moraliorcs omnes tale esse creditur. — PrclPfjg. ' Universalis efifectus universalem rcquirit causam. THE CONSENT OF NATIONS. Ill and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, you may hear them speak in their own tongues the wonderful works of God and nature. For whatsoever is natural and essential, is also universal / in order to such a species. The philosopher^ speaks to / this very pertinently : * Whatsoever is natural is im- moveable, and in the same manner perpetually energetical ; as fire does not put on one colour amongst the Grecians, and paint its face otherwise among the Persians ; but it has always the same ruddiness and purity, the same zeal and vehemency.*^ As nature shows choice variety and needlework in this, in that she works every individual with several flourishes, with some singular and distinguishing notes, so likewise she plainly aspires to concord and unity, whilst she knits all together in a common and specifical identity. Not only in the faces of men, but in their beings also, there is much of identity, and yet much of variety. You do not doubt but that in all nations there is an exact likeness and agreement in the fabric and composure of men's bodies in respect of integrals, excepting a few monsters and heteroclites in nature ; nor can you doubt but that there is the very same frame and constitution of men's spirits in respect of intrinsicals, unless in some pro- digious ones, that in the philosopher's language are ' mis- takes of nature.'^ As face answers face, so does the heart of one man the heart of another, even the heart of an Athenian the heart of an Indian. Wherefore the votes and suffrages of nature are no con- ProT. xxvii. 19. * Aristotle. * Td nkv va€i i.KlrqTov, koI iravraxov rr^v avrijp (x^i SOvofiw, &tJ/xt7 5* oihit Trd/JLirav diriWurat, ^vriva Xaol WoWol tprffxl^oviTi. — Hesiod, l^py. k. 'Bfi. 762. ^ Apud nos veritatis arguiuentum est aliquid omnibus videri. ' Omni autem in re, consensio omnium gentium lex naturae putanda est. * Pro certis habemus ea, in quee commuui opinione concessum est. * Kpdrurrov irduTas dvOpdixovi al}f€c$ai ffvvo/ioXoyovm-as rcis ftrjSrjco- fiivois. • '0 X670J ^vp6s. * Kpin^ptw. • Td KoivTJ atv6fi€va Turrd. • Vox populi vox Dei. '** Quod apud multos unum invenitnr, non est erratom, sed traditum. THE CONSENT OF NATIONS. 113 iU It must be a conquering and triumphant truth that can stop the mouths of gainsayers, and pass the world without contradiction. Surely that is pure gold that has been examined by so many several touchstones, and has had approbation from them all. Certainly it is some transcendent beauty, that so many nations are enamoured withal. It is some powerful music, that sets the whole world a dancing. It is some pure and delicious relish, that ,^ ' » can content and satisfy every palate. It is some accurate . ^^^ piece, that passes so many critics without any animadver- • ' ^-sions, without any * various readings.'^ It is an elegant I V t^^ picture, that neither the eye of an artist, nor yet a popular eye, can find fault withal. Think but upon the several tempers and dispositions of men, — how curious are some I how censorious are others! how envious and malicious are some ! how various and mutable are others ! how do some love to be singular, others to be contentious ! how doubtful and wavering is one, how jealous and sus- picious is another ! and then tell me whether it must not be some authentical and unquestionable truth, that can at all times have a certificate and commendamus from them all. Then look upon the diversities of nations, and there you will see a rough and barbarous Scythian, a wild American, an unpolished Indian, a superstitious Egyptian, a subtle Ethiopian, a cunning Arabian, a luxurious Pei*sian, a treacherous Carthaginian, a lying Cretian, an elegant Athenian, a wanton Corinthian, a desperate Italian, a fighting German,^ and many other heaps of nations, whose titles I shall now spare, and tell me whether it must not be some admirable and efficacious truth, that shall so over- power them all, as to pass current amongst them, and be owned and acknowledged by them. * Variae lectiones. * Note M. u 114 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Yet notwithstanding, as we told you before, that the obligation of nature's law did not spring from reason, so much less does it arise from the consent of nations. That law, indeed, which is peculiarly termed * the law of nations,'^ has its vigour and validity from those mutual and reci- procal compacts which they have made amongst them- selves ; but the meeting of several nations in the observa- tion of nature's law, has no binding or engaging virtue in it any otherwise than in an exemplary way ; but yet it has a confirming and evidencing power, that shows that they were all obliged to this by some supreme authority, which had such an ample influence upon them all. Thus you know the sweetness of honey, both by your own taste, and by the consent of palates too ; yet neither the one nor the other does drop any sweetness or lusciousness into the honeycomb. Thus you see the beauty and glory of light, and you may call most men in the world to be eye-witnesses of it, yet those several eyes add no gloss or lustre to it, but only take notice of it. Man being, as the philosopher^ styles him, * a sociable rind peaceable creature ;'^ as that sacred orator* terms him, *a congregating creature that loves to keep company ;'^ he must needs take much delight and complacency in that in which he sees the whole tribe and species of mankind agreeing with him. Why then do the Jews look upon the 'heathen peoples'^ with such a disdaining and scornful eye, as if all the nations, in comparison of them, were no more than what i8». xi 15 the Prophet says they are in respect of God, * as the drop * "SS/xifxov €0vik6v — Jns gentium. ' Aristotle. ^ ZCiOv ToXiTiKby, Kal ^Qov ^fxepov. — Jli'st. Anim., lib. i. par. i. 26, 27 ; Opera, torn, i. p. 488. Bekker, Berolin. 1831. * Chrysostom. * 'Ay€\av. • D^13. THE CONSENT OF NATIONS. 115 of a bucket, as the dust of the balance/ that cannot in- cline them one way or other ? Do but hear a while how that learned and much hon-^ oured author of our own ^ does represent their mind unto you, * The opinions, manners, constitutions, and measures of all, or at least many nations, are not at all regarded by the Hebrews, in decisions upon what they hold to be natural or universal law.'^ These are the contents of that chapter which he begins thus : ' As the Hebrews do not consider that any system of natural law is learned from, or fixed by, the acts or practice of other animated beings, so in coming to a decision regarding the natural or universal law that has reference to man, they will have no regard paid to the practice and customs of other nations, whether these be the majority, or absolutely all.'^ It seems the Jews look upon the Gentiles as if they differed specifically from them ; as they do not search for the law of nature amongst sensitive beings, so neither amongst other nations. But I had thought that the Jewish writers had promised the heathens an angel, an intelligence, to irradiate and illuminate them ; and does he shine upon them no clearer ? does he perform his ofiSce no better ? The Jews told us, that they themselves were to inform them and instruct them ; and have they taught them their lessons no better ? They mentioned a voice that came to Adam and to Noah, and have they whispered it only in one another's ears ? Why have they not proclaimed it to the rest of the world ? * Sclden, De Jure Heh. * Gentium sive omnium, sive complurium opiniones, mores, constitutiones, monsursB apud Hebraeos, in eo deceraendo quod jus esse veliut naturale, sen universale, locum habent nullum. * Quemadmodum ex aliorum animantium actibus aut usu jus aliquod naturale disci, aut designari, nolunt Ebrsei ; ita neque ex aliarum, sive om- nium sive plurimarum, gentium usu ac moribus, de jure naturali, sou hominum univei*sali, decerni vulunt. 116 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. How sad were the condition of the Gentiles, if they were to live upon the Jews' courtesy and benevolence ; that would strip them of nature, plunder them of their essences, rob them of their first principles and common notions ! But God has not left them like orphans to such unmerciful guardians. He himself has taken care of them, and has made better provision for them. Now these several nations are to be considered, either in *the common bulk and heap' of them, or else in Hhe major part' of them, or in 'the noblest and most refined sort' amongst them.^ If we take them in the fullest universality of them, then that worthy author of our own says truly, ' It neither was in former ages, nor has it been up to our time, fully dis- covered by any one, either of what character, or how numerous these are or have been.'^ Nor indeed is it at all material in respect of this, whether we know them or no ; but having the formal consent of so many, and knowing that there is 'a like reason in the others,'^ being that they have the same natural engagements and obligations upon them, we cannot justly distrust, but that if there should new nations, nay, if there should new worlds appear, that every rational nature amongst them would comply with, and embrace the several branches of this law ; and as they would not differ in those things that are so intiinsical to sense, so neither in those that are essential to the understanding. As their corporeal eye would be able to distinguish between beauty and de- formity, so their intellectual eye would as easily discern some goodness from some kind of wickedness. * 01 TdvT€i and ol xoWol, or ol evyev^arepoi anil if>povtfiurrcpoi. ^ Nee olim, nee hactenus, aut qualesnam, aut quot sint fuerintve, est ab aliquo satis exploratum. ' Par ratio reliquomm. THE CONSENT OF NATIONS. 117 But are there not many nations of them that live in the perpetual violation of nature's law ? If you speak of the more capital letters of this ' written law,'^ you find no nation so barbarous but that it can read them and observe them. I never heard of a nation apostatizing from com- mon notions, from these first principles. But if you mean the whole context and coherence of nature's law, if you speak of those demonstrations that may be built upon these fundamental principles, of those kindly derivations and conclusions that flow from these fountain-notions ; then this indeed must be granted, that it is the condemn- ing sin of the heathen, that so many of them imprison this natural light,^ and extinguish this ' candle of the Rom i is Lord.' There are many wild and anomalous 'individuals'^ amongst them; 'men quite barbarous, wild, and irra- tional,'* as Aristotle calls them ; 'men ruined,'^ as others term them ; but are there not such also even amongst Jews? nay, amongst such as call themselves Christians, that are lapsed and fallen below themselves ? Many na- tural precepts are violated even amongst them. Have you weeds, and briars, and thorns in a garden ? no wonder then that you meet with more in a wilderness. Are there some prodigies in Europe.^ you may very well look for more monsters in Africa. Do Christians blur and blot the law of nature ? no wonder then that an American seeks quite to raze it out. Does an Israelite put truth sometimes in prison ? no wonder then that an Egyptian puts it in a dungeon. Yet, notwithstanding, amongst all those that have had so much culture and morality, as to knit, and embody, and compact themselves into a commonwealth, to ' N6fu>$ ypawTdt. * Individua. * 01 8i€aylav cO^c/xij ^X^i Polit., lib. viii. p. 4 ; Opera, torn. ii. 1338. Bekker. * Evx(pC>s #x«t- * Cannibalism. * Intellectus agens. 120 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. that ever did allow the breaches of solemn compacts, the dishonouring of parents ; that ever made a law for this, that there should be no law or justice amongst them ? Till all this can appear, let the testimonies of Gentiles be esteemed somewhat more than the barking of dogs. Methinks, if they were mere cyphers, yet the Jews going before them, they might amount to somewhat. Let the prints of Nature in them be accounted sacred. A pearl in the head of a heathen, some jewels hid in tlie rubbish of nations, let them be esteemed precious. Whatsoever re- mains of God's image upon them, let it be loved and acknowledged. Their darkness and misery is great enough, let not us aggravate it, and make it more. To mix the light of their candle with that light which comes shining from the candle of a heathen, is no disparagement to Jew nor Christian. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 121 CHAPTER XL THE LIGHT OF REASON IS A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. Now the spii-it of man is the ^candle of the Lord.' First, as ' a derivative light, a light from a light.' ^ Surely there is none can think that light is primitively and originally in the candle, but they must look upon that only as a weak participation of something that is more bright and glorious. All created excellency shines with borrowed beams, so that reason is but * a spark of the Divine light ;'^ it is but * a faint breathing of the Divine breeze.'^ This was tlie veiy end why God framed intellectual creatures, that He might communicate more of Himself to them than He could to other more drossy and inferior beings, and that they might in a more complete and circular manner, as the schoolmen speak, * return into the bosom of the first and supreme cause,'* by such operations as should in some measure imitate and represent the working of God himself, who, being a most free and intellectual agent, would have some creature also, that should not only take notice of these His perfections, so as to adore and admire them, but should also partake of them, and should follow the Creator in His dispensations and workings, though still at an in- finite distance and disproportion. This moved Him to stamp upon some creatures under- ' liUmen derivatum — *u>s iK (fxarbs. * Diviiise particula aurae. 2 Scintilla divinse lucis. * Redire in principium suiim. 122 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. standing and will, which in themselves make up one simple and entire print and signature of reason, though we break the seal for the better opening of them, and part them into two several notions. To this end He filled the highest part of the world with those stars of the first magnitude, I mean those orient and angelical beings, that dwell so near the fountain of light, and continually drink in the beams of glory, that are exactly conformable to their Creator in all His motions ; for the same end He furnished and beau- tified this lower part of the world with intellectual lamps, that should shine forth to the praise and honour of His name, which totally have their dependence upon Him, both for their being, and for their perpetual continuation of them in their being. It was He that lighted up those lamps at first ; it is He that drops * the golden oil * ^ into them. Look then a while but upon the parentage and original of the soul and of reason, and you will presently perceive that it was ' the candle of the Lord.' And if you have a mind to believe Plato,- he will tell you such a feigned story as this : That there were a goodly company of lamps, a multitude of candles, a set number of souls lighted up altogether, and afterwards sent into bodies, as into so many dark lanterns. This stock and treasure of souls was reserved and cabineted in I know not what stars, perhaps that they might the better calculate their own incarnation, the time when they were to descend into bodies; and when they came there they presently sunk into ' Hyle,'^ they slipped into ' Leth^,'* which he terms ' the putting off of know- ledge'^ for a while, the clouding and burying of many sparkling and twinkling notions, till by a waking remini- scence, as by a joyful resurrection, they rise out of their » anrn. * The reference seems to be, chiefly at any rate, to the Phcedo, c. 20. , » 'TXiy— Matter. * AiJ^— Forgetfulness. » 'EirterriJ^i;? diro^oX^. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 123 graves again. Plato, it seems, looked upon the body as the blot of Nature, invented for the defacing of this ^ written law,'^ or at the best as an impertinent tedious parenthesis, that checked and interrupted the soul in her former notions, that eclipsed and obscured her ancient glory ; which sprung from his ignorance of the resurrection, for had he l)ut known what a glory the body was capable of, he would have entertained more honourable thoughts of it. Yet Origen was much taken with this Platonical notion, it being indeed a pretty piece of philosophy for him to pick allegories out of. And though he do a little vary from Plato in a circumstance or two, yet in recompense of that he gives you this addition and enlargement, that according to the carriage and behaviour of these naked spirits before they were embodied, there were prepared answerable mansions for them. That such a soul as had walked with God acceptably, was put into a fairer prison, was clothed with an amiable and elegant body ; but that soul which had displeased and provoked its Creator, was put into a darker dungeon, into a more obscure and un- comely body. That candle which had shined clearly, was honoured with a golden candlestick ; that which had soiled its light, was condemned to a dark lantern. One would think by this that Origen had scarce read Genesis, he doth in this so contradict the sacred history of the creation. Nor is this the just product of Plato's opinion, but is preg- nant with much more folly ; he returns him his own with usury, gives him this as the just ' interest '^ and improve- ment of it. Aquinas doth clash in pieces all these Platonical fictions in his two books, Contra Gentiles; yet upon this sinking and putrid foundation was built the tottering superstructure of connate species.^ For when Plato had laid down this eiTor Gen. i. ii. 'S6fios ypaiTTos. * T6kos. ^ Ideas. 124 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. for a maxim, ' That the souls of men were long extant before they were born/^ then that other fancy did presently step in, * That the soul was very speculative and contem- plative before it was immersed in the body ;'2 which made way for the next conceit, that the soul brought many of its old notions along with it into the body, many faithful attendants that would bear the soul company in her most withering condition, when other more volatile and fugitive notions took wing to themselves and flew away ; many a precious pearl sunk to the bottom of Lethe, but some relics of notions floated upon the top of the waters, and in the general deluge of notions, there was an ark prepared for some select principles, some ' precepts of the children of Noah,'^ which were to increase, and multiply, and supply the wants of an intellectual world. This makes the Platonists look upon the spint of man as * the candle of the Lord,' for illuminating and irradiat- ing of objects, and darting more life upon them than it receives from them. But Plato, as he failed in corporeal vision, whilst he thought that it was ' by the sending out of rays,'^ so he did not ' give up his error'^ in his intellec- tual optics, but in the very same manner tells us that spiritual vision also is * by the sending out of rays/ ® And truly, he might as well fancy such implanted ideas, such seeds of light in his external eye, as such seminal prin- ciples in the eye of the mind. Therefore Aristotle, who did better clarify both these kinds of visions, plucked these motes out of the sensitive eye, and those beams out of the intellectual. He did not antedate his own knowledge, nor remember the several postures of liis soul, and the ^ Uplv yeviffOat r)tias fjv rjfiuv rj ^vxh- — Phcedo. "^ 'Einov 7pa^aTe7w— Ahrasa tabula. This phrase has not been found in Aristotle, but the reference is probably to the following passage :— "Ort Svvdfiei Twj i fro^i the several workings of the understanding, that have ^ 1 sealed and printed such a truth upon the soul ; so that no ■other innate light, but only the power and principle of knowing and reasoning, is ' the candle of the Lord/ Yet there is a noble author of our own ,2 that hath both his truth and his error, as he hath also written about both, who pleads much for his * natural instincts,'^ so as that at the first dash you would think him in a Platonical strain ; but if you attend more to what he says, you will soon per- ceive that he prosecutes a far different notion, much to be preferred before the other fancy. For he doth not make these instincts any connate ideas, and representations of things, but tells us that they are powers and faculties of the soul, the first-bom faculties and beginning of the soul's strength, that are presently espoused to their virgin-objects, closing and complying with them long before discourse* can reach them ; nay, with such objects as discourse cannot reach at all in such a measure and perfection ; these instincts he styles * gifts of nature, and a universal representation and admirable type of Divine Providence/^ Some of these are to be found in the low- est animate beings, which yet have no connate ideas' ^ among them ; though they have powers and propension to * N6/io$ ypairrbs. ' Lord Herbert. The works referred to are, De Veritate, published at Paris, 1624; and what soon followed it, De jReligione Gentilium^ et Er- rarum apud eos Causis ; to which is appended, De Religione Laicu * Instinctus naturales. * Reasoning. * Natune dotes, et Providentife Divinae universalis idea et typus optimus. * Species. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 129 their own welfare, a blind tendency and inclination to their own security; for thus he speaks, 'That natural instinct, even when most imperfect, is wise for self-preser- vation ;'^ and such a noble being as man is must needs have it in a more sublime and eminent manner. Therefore he terras these instincts in man, * intellectual faculties, and powers resembling God;'^ whereas those other inferior faculties are esteemed * powers resembling the world.' '^ His words being somewhat cloudy, I shall thus paraphrase upon them : The soul is made with a \ / through light, with a double window ; at one window it looks upon corporeals, at the other it hath a fair prospect upon spirituals. When it takes notice of the material world, it looks out at the window of sense, and views ' the outward husks and shells of being ;'* but not at all pleased or contented with them, those higher powers, those purer faculties of the soul, unclasp and disclose themselves, and extend themselves for receiving some delight more precious and satisfactory, being made in as harmonious proportion, suitable to spiritual objects, as the eye is to colours, or the ear to sounds. And, as you know, a corporeal eye is so fashioned and organized, that though it have no connate * ideas'^ of the sun, yet it is pleasant to behold it ; so the eye of the soul doth willingly open itself to look upon God, *a8 an object,'^ and has all *by reception'^ from Him, fixing its eye upon so transcendent and beautiful an object, and viewing all those streamings out of light, those beanor \ ings out of eternal and universal notions, that flow from I * Instinctus ille naturalis, in quovis inarticulate licet et incauto elcmento, sapiens est ad conservationem propriam. • Facultates noetic*, et facultates Deo analogse. ' Facultates analog* mundo. * Putamina et cortices rerum. • Species. ' Per receptionem. e2 • Per modum objccti. 130 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. 1 Col. iii. 2. Him as the Fountain of lights, where they have dwelt from everlasting, which now appear to it in time with a most powerful and enamouring ray, to direct the soul to that happiness it longed for, and to guide and conduct it in all its operations. If you ask when these highest faculties did first open and display themselves, he tells you, it is when they were stiumlated and excited by outward objects ; and it may be upon this account, that when the soul can find nothing there worthy one glance, one cast of its eye, im- patient of such empty and shadowy sights, it opens itself to the * things above,' ^ and warms itself in those everlast- ing sunbeams ; but when it comes down from the mount, it puts on the veil of sense, and so converses with material objects. Yet I do not here positively lay down this for a truth in all the branches of it, but only represeiit the mind of the fore-mentioned author, who himself doth acknowledge that the rise of these first principles is crypticaP and mysterious. His words are these : ' The fact of your not knowing how those common ideas are drawn forth, ought not to prove an obstacle ; we have told you sufficiently before, that you are ignorant how taste, smell, touch, &c., begin to operate.'^ By which you cannot but perceive, that he makes the con- formity of such a faculty with such an object the spring and original of common notions. Yet this then had de- served a little clearing ; whence the difficulty of under- standing spirituals * as such '* does arise, if there be such a present and exact analogy between them ; whereas the intuitive knowledge of God, and viewing those goodly * TA Ai^u,. 2 Secret. ^ Vo8 interea non niorari debet, quod qnomodo eliciantur istae notitiae communes nesciatis. Satis superque dixirnus vos nescire quomodo fiat Jus- tus, odoratus, tactus, et cetera. * Pro boo statu. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 131 notions that are steeped in His essence, uses to be reserved as a privilege of a glorified creature. Yet this I suppose may be said, that herein is the souFs imperfection, that it cannot sufficiently attend both4» spirituals and corporeaJs; and therefoie, sense being so busy and importunate for the prosecution of her objects, no wonder that these noetical ^ faculties do faint and languish. So that if there be any whom the former discursive way will not suffice, it seems better for them to have recourse to an innate power of the soul that is fitted and fashioned for the receiving of spiri- tuals *as'2 spirituals, than to fly to I know not what connate ' ideas,' ^ of I know not how long duration, before the soul was acquainted with the body. Yet that other noble author of our own,* that has the same title of truth, not without a competent mixture of error too, doth choose to resolve all into a Platonical remembrance, which yet that acute answerer of him^ doth show to be a mere vanity ; for as for matters of fact, to be sure they have no implanted ideas. And if historical knowledge may be acquired without them, why then should discursive know- ledge have such a dependence upon them ? And I wish that the Platonists would but once determine, whether a blind man be a competent judge of colours by virtue of his connate 'ideas,'^ and whether by supply of these ideas ' Intellectual or discursive. * Quatenus. ^ Species. * Robert Greville, Lord Brooke, whom Milton so highly eulogizes in his Areojtagitica. The title of the book referred to is, * The Nature of Truth : its Union and Unity with the Soule, which is one in its Essence, Faculties, Acts: one with Truth.' Lond. 164L 12mo. — See Walpole's Noble and Jfoyal Authors. Park's edition, vol. ii. p. 341. Lond. 1806. * John Wallis, D.D., afterwards Professor of Geometry in the University of Oxford; then minister of St. Gabriel's, Fenchurch, London. The answer was entitled, ' Truth Tried ; or Animadversions on Ijord Brooke's Treatise of the Nature of Truth.' Lond. 1643. 4to. — Aikin's Gen. Biography. * Species. 132 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 133 V ^ r I V V Heb i. 3. John i 1. ProT. viii, 22-31. a deaf man may have the true notion of music and har- mony ? If not, then they must ingenuously confess, that the soul for the present wants so much of light, as it wants of the window of sense. But if they tell us that some out- ward objects must jog and waken these drowsy and slum- bering notions, then they lay the foundation in sensitives ; and withal let them show us, why the generality of men in their intellectuals are not equally improved, whereas they have the same objects to quicken and inflame them ? In the meantime, we will look upon the understanding as * a glass not prejudiced, nor prepossessed with any connate tinctures,'^ but nakedly receiving, and faithfully returning, all such colours as fall upon it. Yet the Platonists in tliis were commendable, that they looked upon the spirit of a man as ' the candle of the Lord,' though they were de- ceived in the time when it was lighted. Nor is this candle lighted out of the essence of God Himself. It were a far more tolerable error to make the light of a candle a piece of the sun's essence, than to think that this intellectual lamp is a particle of the Divine nature. There is but one ' brightness of His glory, and express image of His person,'*-^ I mean the wonderful ' Word,'^ not a candle, but a sun that shined from ever- lasting. But I find the Stoics challenged for this error, that they thought there was a real emanation and traduc- tion of the soul out of God, * out of the very essence of God •/* and the Gnostics, the Manichees, and the Priscil- lianists, are looked upon as their successors in this folly. Now, as for the Stoics, you will scarce find evidence enough to prove them guilty of this opinion. They have indeed some doting and venturing expressions, when they * Speculum non coloratum. * 'AxaiVyacr/xa t^j 56^t7$ /cal xcpafTTj/) ttjs irwoeTacfUi aiTov. * '0 A&yos. * Ex ipea Dei substantia. amplify and dignify the nobility of the soul; and will needs have some of the royal blood to run in every vein and faculty of it ; nor are the Platonists defective in this, but lift up the soul to as high a pitch of perfection as the Stoics ever did ; yet surely both of them but as a limited and dependent being infinitely remote from the fulness of a deity. Yet Simplicius, in his comment upon the grand Stoic, Epictetus, tells us, that that sect of philosophers were wont to call the soul ' a part, or limb of God ;'^ which is a gross and corporeal conceit, not at all agreeable to the indivisibility of spirituals, nor suitable with the soul's immateriality, much less consistent with the tran- scendent purity of God himself. But the learned Sal- masius, in his animadversions on both the fore-mentioned authors, though he spend paper enough in clearing some passages of the Academics, Peripatetics, and Stoics, con- cerning the nature of the soul ; yet doth not in the least measure take notice of any such heterodox tenet among the Stoics ; yet, if there had been any such, they had very well deserved animadversions ; but he doth thus represent their philosophy to you : that whereas the soul is usually looked upon as ' tripartite,'^ being branched out into the vegeta- tive, sensitive, and rational ; the Stoics chose to make it 'of eight parts,' ^ and would have 'seven parts serving,'* *one commanding,'^ which they reckoned thus : 'The per- ceptive faculties,® they were five ; then ' the vocal' ^ and 'the germinative,'* then ' the leading,'^ which was all one with ' the reasoning,' ^^ or ' the discursive,' ^^ or ' the scientific' ^^ * Mkpos fj fjLiXos Tou Geoy — Pars vel membrum Dei. — Atar/jt^. i. 9. * Tpifiepi^s. * 'OKTafiepi/is. * Septem partes ancillantes. * Imperatricem unicam. * TA aiaOriTiKd. ' T6 fi4pvroif rrevfia. *' Qepfibv Tvfvfia. w Vehiculum animse. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 135 cipal seat of the soul, which they did so much extol and deify. It is abundantly clear, that their Stoical philosophy was more refined and clarified, more sublime and extracted from matter, than to resolve the quintessence of a rational nature into I know not what muddy and feculent spirit. This they could not do, if they would be faithful and con- stant to their own principles. Nay, they were so far from thus vilifying the soul, and detracting from it, as that they were rather excessive and hyperbolical in prais- ing it above the sphere of a creature. Thus that known Stoic, Epictetus, calls the soul of man * akin to the Deity ;'^ which Seneca renders, * A free soul is akin to the gods ;'^ and Arrian, in his comment upon the fore- mentioned author, doth thus diffuse and amplify it : ' There is a connexion and coherence of souls with a deity ; there are mutual touches and embraces between them ; they are some delibations and participations of himself.'^ Thus that famous emperor, M. Antoninus, that had tasted of the Stoical philosophy, styles the soul, ' The genius that Zeus has given to each as chief and leader, — a fragment of himself: this is each ones intellect and reason.'* Where, at the first, one would think he had meant it in an Averroistical sense, but that he himself doth prevent the interpretation, by telling you that he intends nothing else but 'intellect and reason,'* which therefore he * Itiryyev^s S^ey- — ^larpi^. i. 9. ■ Liber animus est Diis cognatus. — Ep. 31, ad Jin, de Consolatione ad Helviam. xi. * Ai \f/vxo.l ofhui elaly ivBeSf/Jiivai Kal wr. « V. 62, p. 334. Lond. 1654. ' Quid aliud vocas aniraum, qnam Deam in humano corpore hospitantem ? Epist. 31. * Gc^s ip ffapxl (pavepuBels. * Ratio nil aliud est, quam in corpus humanum pars DiN-ini spiritus mersa. • Intellectus agens. ' * Air6payi8i tov GcoO. MfToxij TTJs ^eias eWd/x^ewj. Ilolrf/xa GeoO \oyiK6v. Al SvydfjLfis. Gcta SOvaput. 16 ^piQS€s. L * Ta pi^pr) TTJi ^vxv^. • T6 pi^pos TOV Oeov. » Td ^eioy. ^° Mere/A\t'«Jxwh pamphlet of The SouVa Mortality, doth more solidly and deliberately handle the question ;* yet being very vehement and intense for the soul's creation, he slips into this error, that the traduction of the soul is inconsistent with the immortality of it, » Se neque legendo, neque orando, neque ratiocinando invenire potuisse, quomodo cum creatione auimarum peccatum originale defendatur. " 'Er^Xft'- ^ S^' Kenelm Digby. ♦ Of the author and answerer of this ' brutish pamphlet/ I have discovered uo trace. — Ed. 146 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. But it may be you had rather hear the votes and suf- frages of those ancient heathen writers, that had nothing to see by but * the candle of the Lord ;' perhai)S you would willingly know what their souls thought of tliemselves. You will believe Nature, the universal mother, if she tell you who is the father of spirits. We will begin with Pythagoras, and he tells you his mind freely and fully, whilst he gives you that piece of leaf-gold in one of his verses : — *. . . . Courage! divine descent have we mortals.'* Aratus is in the very same strain, and was honoured so Acts xT.i 28. far as to be quoted by an Apostle for it, ' For we are also his offspring/*'^ But if these seem somewhat more gener- ally, not exactly pointing out at the soul, the Chaklee oracle will speak more punctually, * These things the Father devised, and from Him man received his spirit.'* The Father of spirits, by his thought and word, by his commanding breath, did kindle this lamp of the soul, for the quickening and illuminating of such a noble creature. Zoroaster pours it out more at lirge, and does thus dilate and amplify it: '0 soul,' t^ays he, 'why dost thou not aspire, and mount up to the centre and light of glory, to that fountain of beams and brightness, from whence thou wert derived, and sent down into the world, clothed and apparelled with such rich and sparkling endow- ments ?'* ' . . . . Odpcei, ^€109 yhoi iarl ^parotci. — iur. Pt/th. 63. '* Tov yap xai y^vos iap^y. ^ TatTa rarrip ^vhyjae, ^p&ros S4 ol ^^'xwro. * XpTi 8i ffTcvSeiv wpbs t6 ipdos, Kal Tpdi varpbt airyaj. "EyBev iirifjLav^i. * 'O 5^ irdvTiav xarr^p 6 vovi Cjy fwTj Kal v Eav ravrd iarir iXrjdi}, rd Tcpl ttjs ffvyyevtlas toO OeoO Kal dyOpuyiruv \ey6fJLeva xnrb tuv 4n\oa6$ elvai tj/j-Sls u)S tov ivbs Ocov, Kal ivbs 6t5our/cd\ou. * 0e6^«' fie/jLidvffTou. * Twv ^Lb)v KaXwv. • Note 0. ' Tbv voOy Tois ^cots cvyyeviffTarov. 150 OF THE LIGHT OF NATUKE. alone to enter from without, and alone to be divine.'^ He bad but a little before evinced, that the sensitive and vege- tative souls were conveyed in a seminal way ; like a couple of sparks, they were struck *from the power of matter ;'^ but, says he, the rational, that came ^ from a higher place ]^ as Seneca speaks, the window of heaven was opened, and a present light sprang in, for the completing of those former rudiments and preparations ; the misunderstanding of this * mind from without,'-* did, it may be, occasion, but it did at least corroborate the fancy of an angel's being an 'actuating intellect;'^ yet Simplicius, that known inter- preter of Aristotle, does expound it of the soul's creation, ' For the soul is said to be enlightened by God,'^ as he speaks. And this which Aristotle here calls *the mind from without,'" Psellus,^ the philosopher, styles *the mind from above ;^ Plato termed it ' a plant, not of earth but of heaven ;'^^ the Sibyl called it *a fiery mind;'" some other, 'an intelligent and incorporeal fire;'''^ still conspir- ing with this of Solomon's, 'the candle of the Lord.' Seneca, setting aside his Stoicism, has very gallant and brave apprehensions of the soul's nobility, and tells us that it was 'a draught from the Divine spring ;'^^ which Tully thus varies, ' A nosegay plucked from the Divine mind.'^* Souls, like so many flowers, were cropped and gathered out ' XelweTai 5^ rov uovv fidvov ^vpaBeu iretaiivai, Kal %€iov etvai /xSvov. '^ Ex j)otentia materia. * QvpaSev — Ex altiori sede. * 'O vovs ^vpadev. • Intellectus agens. • Ktu yhp ij ^vxn irjrb GcoO iWdfiireaOai Xkycrai. ^ O vovs ^vpaOev. • Note P. ' '0 vovs Hvtadiv. '" 4>i;t6i', ovk ^Kyetov, dW ovpdviov. *' TlCpiyov vovv. '- NofpoJ' Kal dff(l}/xaTov irvp. *' Haustus ex Divina origine. — Seneca Rhetor. Suasoria. vi. ; Opera, p. 34. Bipont. 1810. " Ex mentc Divina decerptus. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 151 of the garden of God, and were bound up ' in the bundle i S'^'" of the living/^ And if ye will but attend to the noble orator and philo- sopher, you shall hear him thus pleading for the soul's divinity : ' It is in vain to look for the soul's parentage upon earth, for there is no mixing and blending of spiri- tuals with corporeals; the earth doth not contribute for the fixing and consolidating of them ; it is no airy puff will suffice for the swiftness and nimbleness of their motion ; no drops of water will quench their thirst and longings ; they have a purer light and heat than could ever be fetched from an elementary spark. In those humble and sordid beings there is nothing fit to represent, much less to produce, the clasping and retentive power of memory, the masculine and vigorous working of the mind, the re- fined and comprehensive virtue of those thoughts that can recall and look back to things past; that can interpret and comment upon all present objects, and with a prophe- tical glance can spy out futurities and possibilities, which are works not unworthy of a deity. Nor can it ever be shown that such rare privileges should be communicated to human nature any other way, than by the immediate bounty and indulgence of Heaven ; there being such sin- gular and inimitable idioms in the mind of man, as could never be extracted from those ordinary and vulgar entities. Though a sensitive soul may creep upon the ground, though it may roll and tumble itself in the dust, yet an intellectual being scorns to look lower than heaven itself ; and though it be dated in time, yet it means to live as long as eternity.'^ * In fasciculo viventiura. ' Animorum nulla in terris origo inveniri potest ; nihil enim est in aniuio mixtum atque concretum, aut quod e terra natura atque fictura esse videatur; uihilqui; aut humidum quideni, aut stabile, aut igneum ; his enim in natnris 152 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. The poets had veiled and muffled up the same opinion in their mythology ; while they tell us that Prometheus, which is all one with Providence, did work and fashion the bodies of men out of clay, but he was fain to steal fire from heaven for the quickening and enlivening them with souls, which made the prince of poets ^ sing, — * The ethereal vigour is in all the same, And every soul is tilled with equal flame.'* — Dryden's TraHtlattoa. And Ovid supplies them with a short verse, — 'Something Divine ia in us, and from heaven.*' — Garth's Tranalation. How often do you meet with this in Homer, that God is the Father of spirits, ' the Father of angelical beings and of the souls of men ;*^ which Virgil renders, — * The sire of men and gods.'* Yet all this while, I know not whether j'ou can, I am sure I cannot, sufficiently perceive, that the generality of the heathen did think that every soul was immediately created by God himself, but only that at the first there was bestowed more than ordinary workmanship upon them, which they knew principally by those generous nihil inest, quod vim memoriae, mentis, cogitationia habeat ; quod et prae- terita teneat, et futura praevideat, et complecti possit prsesentia, quae sola divina sunt, nee evincetur unquam unde ad hominem venire possint, nisi a Deo ; singularis igitur quaedam est natura atque vis animi, scjuncta ab his usitatis notisque naturis ; ita quicquid est illud quod sentit, quod sapit, quod vult, quod viget, cceleste et divinum est ; ob earn rem aetemum sit necesse est. — Cicero, Tu$c. QiuBst. i, 27 ; v. 13. » Virgil. 2 Igneus est oUis vigor et ccelestis origo. — ^En. vi. 730. • Sedibus aethereis spiritus ille venit. — Ars Amat. iii. 550. ^ Uarrjp ivdptop re '^eQp t€ — II. A. 544, A. 68, &c. * hominum sator atque Deorum. — ^n. i. 258. Ill; 1^ t A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 153 motions which they found working in their own souls ; and partly by some relics of Mosaical history that were scattered amongst them. Thus, then, I have represented unto you, as indifferently^ as I can, the state of this great controversy ; and though I could easily tell you which part I do most easily incline to, yet I shall rather refer it to your own thoughts, with this intimation, that a modest hesitancy may be very lawful here ; for if you will believe Gregory the Great, he tells you it is a question which cannot be determined in this life. However, it is enough for us that the spirit of a man, either by virtue of its constant creation, or by virtue of its first creation, is * the candle of the Lord.' As the soul is the shadow of a deity, so reason also is a weak and faint resemblance of God himself, whom there- fore that learned emperor, M. Antoninus, calls ^ the gene- rative intelligence.' ^ It is God that plants reason ; it is He that gives it an increase, * The reason of men has sprung from the reason of God.'^ The title of *The Logos'* (word, intelligence) belongs to Christ himself, ' in whom coi. ii. 3. are hid the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.' Reason j first danced and triumphed in those eternal sunbeams, in the thoughts of God himself, who is the fountain and original of reason. And as His will is the rule of good- ness, so His understanding is the rule of reason. For God himself is a most knowing and intellectual being ; He is the first mover of entity, and does move determinately to a certain end,^ which speaks an intelligent agent ; He does ' propound most choice designs, and blessed ends to Him- self,' and b not that a work of reason ? He does contrive, ' Impartially. * X&yot cnr€pfiaTucbt. — Antonin. tA e/s iavrdv, p. 28. Glas. 1744. * *0 \6yoi iyOpiiiruv xkVK iirb ^elov \6yov. * '0 \&yos. * Determinate tendere in aliquem finem. M 2 154 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. and dispose, and order means for accomplishing of them ; and doth not that require understanding ? He makes all beings instrumental and subordinate to Him ; He moves all inferior wheels in a regular manner ; He moves all the spheres of second causes in a harmonical way. Such blind entities as want intellectual eyes, He himself doth lead them and conduct them ; and to others He gives an eye for their guidance and direction. Now, He that hath framed an intellectual eye, shall not psai. iciv. 0. He see ? He that hath clothed the soul with light as with -J a garment, shall not He much more be clothed Himself with a fuller and purer brightness ? In that which we j esteem reason amongst men, there are many clouds and blemishes, many dark spots and wrinkles, that are scattered and conquered by this more glorious light. The soul is fain to climb up and ascend to knowledge by several steps and gradations, but His understanding is all at the same height and eminency. Man's reason is fain to spend time in knitting a proposition, in spinning out a syllogism, in weaving a demonstration ; but He is infinitely beyond and above these first draughts and rudiments of knowledge ; 1 Cor. XV. 52. He sees all * in the twinkling of an eye ;'^ at the first open- ing of His eye from everlasting, with one intellectual glance. He pierceth into the whole depth of entity, into all the dimensions of being. Man's understanding is fain to borrow a 'resemblance'^ from the object which presents to the mind the picture and portraiture of itself, and strikes the intellectual eye with a colour suitable and proportion- able to it. But the divine understanding never receives the least tincture from an object, no ' likeness from with- out,'^ but views all things in the pure crystal of His own essence. He does not at all see Himself in the glass of the creatures, as we see Him, but He sees creatures in the * 'Ev piir-§ d^aXjxov. Species. * Species ab extra. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 155 glass of His own being. How else should He see them from everlasting, before they were extant, before they were visible by any species of their own ? God therefore doth primarily and principally look upon Himself, for He is 'the most illustrious of things conceivable;'^ He cannot have a more beautiful and satisfying object to look upon than His own face. * The knowledge of God'^ is an object fit to enamour all understanding ; for the more any being is abstracted from materiality, the more it is refined from material conditions, the more graceful and welcome it is to the understanding ; — for matter does cloud and darken the gloss of being ; it doth eclipse an object, and is no friend to intelligibility. So that God being a pure and immaterial spirit, must needs be ' the most excellent of conceivables,'^ and a most adequate object for His own eye to look upon. And this understanding is Himself, it being ' immanent action,'* always dwelling with Him. ' The knowledge of God is the being of God,'^ as the schoolmen speak. God is both ' all eye and all light ;'^ as suppose the bright body of the sun had a visive faculty, so as it could view and survey its own light and beams, and could by virtue of them look upon all other things, which its own light does unveil and discover, it would then give some languishing adumbration of a Deity, who is always look- ing upon His own perfections, and seeing creatures by His own light, by His own uncreated beams. For ' the idea and likeness of all things is in the being of God.'" Thus God, looking upon His own omnipotency, knows all possi- bilities ; viewing His own determinations. He sees all futu- rities; looking upon His own wisdom, He beholds all * Nobilissimum intelligibile. « Tb yvtaarbv rod Oeou. " Praestantissimum intelligibile, * Actio immanens. ' Dei scientia est Dei essentia. « "QXos dipOaXfibs, 8\ov ipws. ' Species et similitudo omuiuui est in Dei essentia. 1/ y 156 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. 157 N varieties, all degrees and differences of being, wliich yet put not the least shadow of difference in Him ; because the excellencies of all beings are treasured up in Him only by way of transcendency, not ' by collection, but by perfec- tion,'^ as the schools have it. So that when God beholds all created beings by virtue of His own essence, yet you must not imagine that the formality of a creature is contained in an uncreated being, but only that there is enough of being there to give a i-epresentation of all being whatsoever. As when a glass reflects a face, there is not the least mutation in the glass, much less is the face any part of the glass's essence, though the glass give a sufficient resemblance of it ; yet herein there is this disparity, that the glass of God's essence did represent a creature, before any created face could look into it ; for God, looking upon Himself from eternity, did then know ^ in what and how many ways anything could be made like to His own being ;'=^ and did know how far such a being would imitate His essence, and how far it would fall short of it. He saw that this being would come nearer, that that being would be more distant and remote from Him ; this picture would be liker Him, that would show very little of Him. Now the actuality and existence of such an object is not requisite to the understanding of it, for how then could we conceive of a privation or of nonentity ? How can we otherwise apprehend this, than by framing the notion of something positive in our minds, and supposing a total deficiency from it ? Thus, as they used to speak, ' Right is the index of itself and of wrong, and in every kind of thing the most illustrious is the measure and pattern of the rest ;'^ that * Per modum compositionis, sed per modum perfectionis. * Quot modis aliquid assioiilari posset Ipsius essentiae. » Rectum est index sai et obliqui, et nobilissimum in unoquoque genere est mensura et exemplar reliquonim. Fii st and Supreme Being, by the great example and pattern of Himself, can judge of all inferior and imperfect beings. Nor could He see them * from eternity'^ any otherwise than in Himself, there being nothing else eternal but Him- self ; and in Himself He could clearly see them as we see effects in their cause. All created beings were eminently contained in the centre of one indivisible essence, who by His infinite virtue was to produce them all ; who being an intelligent centre, did see those several lines that might be drawn from Him ; and withal, being a free and a voluntary centre, did know how many lines He meant to draw from Himself Now you know, amongst men, a demonstration d priori is esteemed most certain and scientifical : * Science is know- ledge of things in their causes.'^ God thus knew creatures, perfectly knowing Himself, who was the first cause of them all. This doth much speak the immutability of the ' eternal reason and wisdom in the mind of God, and doth remove all imperfections from it. For you see He did not move in an axiomatical way, ^ by composition and divi- sion,' or ' by synthesis and analysis ;'^ for He saw things by His own uncompounded and indivisible essence ; much less did His knowledge improve itself in a syllogistical way,, deducing and collecting one thing out of another. This is the schoolmen's meaning, when they tell us, ' God's know- ledge is not ratiocinative,'* that is, *is not discursive.'^ They that will light a candle may strike such sparks, but the sun and stars want no such light. Angels are above syllogisms, how much more is God himself ? Nay, even amongst men, first principles are above disputings, above demonstrations. Now all things are more naked in respect of * Ab eetemo. ^ Per compositionem et divisionera. * Cognitio Dei non est ratiocinativa. * Scire est per causas cognoscere. "I * Non est discursiva. 158 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. \ 'N* God himself, than common notions are to the sight of men. It is a ' tortoise-like motion/^ ^ a tardy and tedious work/ a fetching a compass, to gather one thing out of another. It is the slow pace of a limited understanding ; but there is no succession in God, nor in the knowledge of God. There are no ^ premises or conclusions,'^ no * passing from one thing to another,'^ and no 'external medium Z"* for He does not ' know by a mediation distinct from Himself/* There is a complete simultaneity in all His knowledge. His essence is altogether, and so is His knowledge. Plurality of objects will confound a finite understand- ing, for they must be presented by different ^ ideas ;'® and a created eye cannot exactly view such different faces at once, such several pictures at once. The understanding sometimes loses itself in a crowd of objects ; and when such a multitude comes thronging upon it, it can scarce attend to any of them. But God seeing them all * through one kind of idea, and one kind of operation,'^ takes notice of them all with an infinite delight and facility. For He loves to attend to His own essence, which doth so admirably represent them all; hence His knowledge is always in act, because His essence is a pure act. Human understandings have much of their knowledge stored up in habits, but there are no habits in a Deity ; for knowledge is dormant in a habit, but His understand- ing never slumbers nor sleeps. There is no potentiality in Him, but He is always * in a state of the highest l)erfection ;'^ He is ' always in the act of understand- ' Motus testudineus. » Prius el posterius. ^ Transitus ab uno ad aliud. * Externum medium. • Cognoficere per aliud medium a seipso distinctum. • Species. ' Per unicam speciem, per uuicam operationem. • In ultima perfectione. A DERIVATR^ LIGHT. 159 ing,' 1 as ' the sun ' ^ is « always in the act of shin- ing.'3 Human understandings are fain to unbend themselves sometimes, as if they were faint and weary ; but Divinity is always vigorous, and eternity can never languish. The understanding of God thus being filled with light. His will also must needs be rational, ^His knowledge l^eing not blind, but possessed of eyes.'* This makes the schoolmen very well determine, that though there cannot l)e ' a cause of the Divine will,'^ yet there may be assigned *a reason of the Divine will.'® There can be no cause of His will, for then there would be a cause of His essence, His will being all one with His essence ; but there cannot be ' a cause prior to the First Cause/^ Yet this account may be given of His will, that ' a good understood is the foundation of its being willed;'^ so that as God does primarily ^ understand Himself,'^ so He does understand other things, only ^through Himself ;'^*^ so likewise He does principally and necessarily * will Himself,'" and does will other things secondarily, and out of choice, ' on account of Himself.'^*-^ And as God hath set all other beings a long- ing after the perfection and conservation of their own beings, and has in a special manner stamped upon a rational nature an intellectual appetite of its own welfare and happiness, so as that it cannot but propound an ulti- mate scope and end to itself, and bend and direct all its desires for the hitting and attaining of it ; so He himself also sets up Himself, as the most adequate and amiable • Semper in acta iutelligendi. ' Sol. s Semper in actu lucendi. • Non caeca, »cd oculata notitia. » Causa Divinae voluntatis. • Ratio Divinae voluntatis. » Causa prior prima. • I^num intellectum est fundamentum voliti. • Intelligere seipsum. « Per seipsnm. " Velle seipsum. " Propter seipsum. 160 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. end of all His workings and motions, and does bend (he whole creation, does suit every being, and order it, to His own glory. Now, how rational is that will of His, that does chiefly fix itself upon the fairest good, and wills other things only as they are subservient to it ? * God wills His own good- ness as an end, and all other things as means to that end/^ Out of the intense and vehement willing of Himself, He wills also some prints and resemblances of Himself. The beauty of His own face, of His own goodness, is so great, as that He loves the very picture of it. And because one picture cannot sufiiciently express it, therefore He gives such various and numerous representations of it. As when men cannot express their mind in one word, they are will- ing to rhetoricate and enlarge themselves into more. God doth give many similitudes of Himself, for the greater ex- l)lication of His own essence. His essence in itself not being capable of augmentation or multiplication, He loves to see some imitations and manifestations, to make known His own power and perfection in a way of causality. Now the understanding of God being so vast and in- finite, and His will being so commensurate and propor- tioned to it, nay, all one with it, all those decrees of His, that are the eternal product and results of His mind and will, must needs be rational also ; for in them His under- standing and will meet together, His truth and goodness p».ixxxT 10. kiss each other. And though these decrees of God must be resolved into His absolute supremacy and dominion, yet that very sovereignty of His is founded upon so much reason, and does act so wisely and intelligently, as that no created understanding can justly question it, but is bound obediently to adore it. * Deus vult l>oiiitatcm suam taoquam fincm, tt vult omnia alia tanqnain media ad finem. A DERIVATIVE LIGHT. ^gj The prosecution and application of these decrees is accompanied with the very same wisdom and reason • for what 18 Providence but 'an eye in the sceptre,'^ a rational guiding and ruling all affairs in the world ;— it is ' Divine reason in the Ruler ;'2 it is 4he system of regulating things to a particular end.'^ That which in man is called prudence, m God is called Providence ; the right tunind\a\yUt, 2 *0vov. " Futurum quateous futuruni. 13 Objectum improportionatum iatellectui angelico. DISCOVERS PRESENT, NOT FUTURE THINGS. 179 'an eternity of intuition/^ which should 'remove all suc- cession, all " priority and posteriority,"^ and make a com- plete simultaneity;'^ nor yet have they 'a fulness of re- presentative reason.'* They have no such boundless and infinite species, as the Divine essence is, by which God beholds all things. Angels have neither light enough of their own to manifest a future object, nor an eye strong enough to pierce into it. They cannot infallibly foretell their own motions, because God can alter them and over- power them ; much less can they know the determinations of God himself, or any operations that depend upon a free agent, till they bud and blossom in some actual discoveries and appearances. Nor are they so well acquainted with the whole context and coherence of natural agents, with all those secret twinings and complications as to spy out beforehand those events which are brought forth in a casual, and uimsual, and very unlikely manner. When- soever, then, they have any prescience of future contin- gencies, it is only by revelation from God himself They may see the face of a future object ' in God's mirror,'^ but yet that is ' a mirror acting according to its own will/^ and shows only what it pleaseth, and when, and to whom it pleaseth. The wicked angels know this well enough, that they for their parts have no knowledge of future uncertainties, though they desire to have it as much as any ; and they pretend to it as much as any ; yet you know how cautelous they were in their oracular responsals, as that elegant moralist, Plutarch, does most excellently show in several places. They always drew a curtain before their predic- ' ^ternitatem iutuitus. * Prius et posterius. • Ambire in objecto suo omnes differentias temporis. ♦ Plenitudinem rationis representativae. » In speculo Divino. • Speculum voluntarium. 180 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. tions, and wrapt them up in obscurity, which plainly argued a consciousness of their own ignorance in respect of future events. The good angels are so filled with their present happi- ness, they are so quieted with the enjoyment of God him- self, as that they are not at all solicitous or inquisitive about future events, but they cheerfully entertain and drink in all those beams that come flowing from the face of their God, and they desire no more than He is pleased to com- municate to them ; nay, indeed, they can desire no more, for He gives them as much as they are capable of. Now, if angelical understandings are not so wide and comprehensive as to grasp and take in such objects, what mean, then, the sons of men to aspire and reach after the knowledge of them ? If those tall and eminent beings, standing upon the mount of God, cannot see them, how shall the sons of men, that are of a lower stature, hid in a valley, how shall they behold them ? Yet there was always, in the generality of mankind, a prurient desire and hankering after the knowledge of future events. Men still stretch out the hand to the forbidden tree, they long for the fruit of it, and would fain be plucking some apples from it. Nay, men long for the greenest apples, for the precocious knowledge of events, before they come to their just ripeness and maturity. The desire of this sets the astrologer a lighting his candle at the stars. Oh, how does he flatter himself in his own imaginary twinklings, and how does he persuade the more simple and credulous part of the world, that he can discover every future atom, that he can put those capital stars, those golden letters together, and spell out all the fates of kingdoms and persons ? It makes the Augur ^ the * raven-prophet,*^ as the Greeks call him, chatter with * Ko/)a/co/xd*Tt5. ► DISCOVERS PRESENT, NOT FUTURE THINGS. 181 the birds in their own dialect ; and, as if he were their scholiast, he writes comments and expositions upon their language. Oh, how devoutly will he listen to a prophetical crow ! how will he criticize upon the harsh accents of the screech-owl ! upon the dismal and melancholy notes of the night-raven ! It makes the Auspex watch the birds in their several postures, and to be as diligent and judicious a spectator of thetn as the other was an auditor. He can interpret every fluttering, he can tell you all their journeys, where they lodged, where they baited last, what tree they visited, what bough they stayed longest upon; and at length he will pluck some pens out of their sacred wings, for the writing of all his learned predictions. It moved the Exspex to consult with the inwards, to search into the bowels of things ; he will but look upon a liver, and will presently tell you the colour and complexion of all affairs. It caused the Aruspex to behold the behaviour of the dying sacrifice, and from the quietness or struggling of those sensitive creatures, to foretell the reluctancies or facilities in higher matters. It set the Chiromancer a studying to read those lines that seem to be scribbled upon his hand, and to explain them with his own interlineary glosses, and to look upon them as Nature's manuscripts, as an enchiridion^ of Nature's penning, in which she gave him a brief synopsis of all such passages of his life as should come into being afterwards. It moved the inter- preter of dreams to set up his seat of judicature in those gates of fancy— the ' gate of hom,'^ I mean, and the *gateof ivory'3— and as if the night were to enlighten the day, he will regulate all his waking motions by those slumbering intimations ; yet usually the interpretation of the dream is the more nonsensical dream of the two. ' Manual or hand-book. » Porta eburnea.— Virg. JEn. vi. 893-5. * Porta cornea. 182 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Some others will needs cast lots for their fortunes, and thinking that the judgment of a die is infallible, will under- take no matters of moment till they be predetermined by it ' The die is cast, and by the present lot they judge of the future/^ A rare device, to find out one contingency by another ; to lose one arrow, and to shoot another after it I These are some of those many methods and contrivances which the sons of men have contrived to themselves for the finding out of future events. What should I tell you of the rest of the geomancy (^ earth prophecy'^, and the pyromancy ('fire prophecy'^), of the hydromancy (Svater prophecy '^) and the necromancy (* prophecy bv consulting the dead'^), and belomancy (* javelin-prophecy '^), of the libanomancy ('incense-prophecy'^), of the coscinomancy ('sieve-prophecy'^), which are all but the various expres- sions of the same madness ? What should I tell you of those several nations that have been enamoured with these follies ? The Assjrrians, the Chaldeans, the Persians, the Grecians, the Romans, have had always amongst them several professors of these vanities. You see how fain the sons of men would have some key or other to unlock and open these secret and reserved passages, which Providence hath wisely shut up, and hid from the eyes of men. But Aquinas passes this censure upon them all, * Arts of this kind do not enjoy the patronage of an intellect virtuously disposed.'^ And that sacred author is much of the same mind : ' In vain you seek that on earth, which God alone knows in heaven. '^^ * Jacta est alea, et per prascntem sortcm jadicant de futura. 2 Teufiavria. 3 Uvpo/xavria. * "tSpo/xatrria. * ^(Kpofiavrla. • BtXo/xayrla. ' Ai^avofiayria. ^ KoffKivofiatrria. * Hujiismodi artes non utuntur patrocinio intellectus bene dispositi secun- dum virtutem. ^^ Frustra illud qureris in terns, quod solus Deus novit in codHs. D1SC0\T:RS present, not future things. 183 Yet this tree of knowledge is fair to the eye, and pleasant to the taste ; the soul doth relish all notional dainties with delight ; and these prenotions and anticipations of things are the more sweet and delicious to the palates and tastes of men, because most of their being is treasured up in their future condition. They have no satisfaction, no Sab- bath, nor quiet in their present state, and therefore they would fain know what the next day, and what the next year, and what the next age will bring forth. The desires, the prayers, the hopes, the endeavours, the counsels of men, they all look towards the future. For, as Mirandola^ the younger doth well observe, the soul of man is * par- taker of tlu-ee times. Time past, answers to memory ; time present, to understanding ; time future, to will.'^ God, therefore, that He may keep such a creature as man is, in a waiting and obedient posture — in a posture of dependence and expectation, doth choose gradually and leisurely to discover to him, * at sundry times and divers manners,' ^ those thoughts which He hath concern- ing him. God will have man, in this sense, ' to live for the day;** 'to entertain fortune by the day,' as the noble Verulam saith that Prince ^ did, whose life he writes and commemorates. * I care for to-day ; who knows the morrow ? • is a speech that may be taken in a better sense than Anacreon meant it. And so may that of the Latin lyric : — * Note R. Gian-Francesco Pico, Prince of Mirandola. * Trium temporum particeps. Tempus praBteritum memori®, praesens in- tellectui, futurura voluntati congruit et respondet. ' HoXv/xepwi Kal rdXvTpdiruf. * In diem vivere. » Henry VII. — . • T6 ai^fxepov p/Xei fioi, T6 6* axipiov tLx oZ5c. — Anacreon, Ode xv. neb i. 1. -\} 184 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. • To-morrow with its cares despise, And make the present hour your own.' ' — Creech's Translation. And the heroical poet shows them the necessity of this Bohriety and temperance in knowledge, for, saith he, ' man, to fate and future fortune blind !'• — Strahan's Translation. For men's knowledge naturally enters in at the gate of sense, but a future object can have no admission there. And as the mind cannot recall 'an object totally gone/* when there is no remaining * idea,'* neither the least print or * trace '^ of it, so neither can it present an object that is altogether future, and hath no such colour as can move and strike the intellectual eye. Such efifects, indeed, as are stored up in pregnant and eminent and necessary causes, may be easily and certainly foreknown by visible and unquestionable demonstrations. The foreteUing of an eclipse may be done without an oracle, and may be believed, though there be no miracle to seal and confirm it. Such effects as lurk in probable causes, that seem to promise very fairly, may be known also in an answerable and proportionable manner, by strong and shrewd conjectures ; hence springs all the ' fore- knowledge of physicians, sailors, shepherds,'^ as the fore- mentioned Mirandola tells us. Yet the great pretenders of the antedating knowledge do very frequently, *and ac- cording to their custom/^ deceive both themselves and others in these more ordinary and easy scrutinies. This might clothe your almanacs in more red, and put them to ' Quid sit futurum eras, fuge quierere. — Hor. Cann. i. ix. 13. ' Nescia mens horainum fati sortisque futurse. — ^Virgil, jEn, x. 601. •'* Objectum totaliter prateritum. * Species. ' Vestigium. ' Prsenotiones medicorum, nautarum, pastorum. ' £t pro more. DISCOVERS PRESENT, NOT FUTURE THINGS. 185 the blush for guessing at the weather no better. You may write upon them, ' No day without a blunder/^ Did they never threaten you with thunder and lightning enough to make a Caligula prepare new laurels, when yet the heavens proved very pacate and propitious ? Did they never tell you of a sad discontented day which would weep its eyes out, which yet, when it was born, proved a Democritus, and did nothing but laugh at their ignorance and folly ? Did they never flatter you with fine, pleasant, temperate weather, * and the rain descended, the winds blew,'^ the hail Matt tu. 27. beat ? The prediction fell, because it was built upon so weak a foundation. So that Aquinas, for his part, thinks that the sensitive creatures, the crows, and the cranes, and the swallows, those flying almanacs, that know their appointed times, are more happy and successful in their predictions, and are better directed by their feeling the impression of some heavenly bodies than men are by their seeing of them. Now, if these ^ mirrors of the year '^ be cracked and broken, and give such unequal representations of things most obvious, how then will they be ever able to show you objects far more imperceptible and immaterial, that depend upon the will and decrees of God himself, and upon the motions of most free and indifferent agents ? This makes the great * scourge of astrologers,'^ I mean the most noble and eminent Mirandola, with indignation to conclude, that this blazing art of theirs — that is, astrology abused f for so either he means, or ought to mean — is at the best but ^ the mistress and queen of superstitions ;'^ and he breaks out into such words as these, * Vanity of vanities is astro- logy ; all superstition is vanity.'^ » Nulla dies sine errato. * Kai Karipr) i) ^poxh, ^rvevaav oi iveiioi. 8 Anni specula. * Astrologo-niastix. * Astrology in some of our older writers includes astronomy. • Domini et regina superstitionum. ' Vanitas vanitatum astrologia, ct omnis 8up< rstitio vanitas. r 2 Pet i. 10. 2P« i 21. ReT. i. 8. 186 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Yet, notwithstanding, God hath provided some that shall give some faint resemblances of Himself, in the knowledge of future things, by a participation of light from Him : ' We have a more sure word of prophecy, whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place,' ^ that I may borrow these words of the Apostle. This ' prophetic light '^ is * a supernatural light'^ Prophetical springings come not from the will of man, but from the breathings of the Holy Ghost ; they are ' impres- sions and signatures of Divine knowledge.''* As God him- self is ^ He which is, and which was, and which is to come,'^ so He will have a prophet to be a shadow of Himself, "Os T -fjSrj rd r* i6vra rd r icffSficva irpb r ibvra. — II. i. 70. Which Virgil well translates, ' Novit namque omnia vatcs, Quie sint, quie fueiint, quae mox ventura trahantur.'* Qewg. iv. 392, 3. God thus revealing and communicating His mind to His prophets, doth clearly manifest that He himself hath an exact knowledge of future events, He doth expressly show that He doth * care for the affairs of men ;'^ that He is the manager and arranger of the future ;'® that His pro- vidence doth overrule the greatest contingencies. He doth, therefore, upbraid the idols of the heathen with their * "ExoMf " P(^ai6T€pop t6v TrpoifyrjrtKhv \hrfOv, (p icaXw; xouht Tpoc^xo^^^f ^ Lumen propheticimi. • Lumen snpematuralc. * Impressiones ct signature Divinae scientiw. "^ '0 uv, Kal 6 fiv, Koi 6 ipx^P-eyos. • • The seer, To whom all nature, and all times are known. All past, all present, and all future shown.' — Sotheby. ' Curare res humanas. • Actor et ordinator futurorum. DISCOVERS PRESENT, NOT FUTURE THINGS. 187 ignorance of these things : ' Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods.'^ !«*• '^"^s. Prophetical language is * a mark of Divine communica- tion,' ^ and doth necessarily require ^superhuman know- ledge ;'^ which makes me wonder at the great doctor Ben Maimon, that resolves the power of prophesying into nothing else than a healthful temper, a lively complexion of body, and a vigorous mind advanced with study and industry; — an opinion which smells too strongly of the garlic and onions of that country, the Egyptian supersti- tion I mean, with which he was sufficiently acquainted. Yet he tells us that it is the public tenet of the Jews, ' the sentiment of our law,'* for so he entitles it; and withal adds, that the art of prophesying— for though he does not style it so, yet he makes it so— is ' the highest position of man, and the greatest perfection of the race.'^ The quali- fications which he requires are these : men must be ^ fit for prophecy from their birth ;'^ there must be 'a natural skill ;'^ there must be * an admirable genius.'^ The pro- phet must be ' excellent in intellect, and perfect in mora- lity.'® But his principal condition is, that there must be ' the highest perfection of the imaginative faculty ;'^^ for, saith he, if the influence of an ' actuating intellect,'" such a one as he falsely and vainly supposes, be poured out only upon the rational part of the soul, and either by reason of the scarcity of oil, or the incapacity of the fancy, doth not * nriK D^nijK '•a nv^^^ ninxij nvnxn in*>:n—Avayy€i\aT€ r)p.iv to, ix€px6fJi€va f Tr' ^(rxoirou, Kal yvuffd/JieOa 6ti '^eoi iare. * Divini semionis character. 3 Superhumanam cognitionem. * Sententia Icgis nostrie. * Supremus gradus hominis, et summa perfectio speciei. * Idonei ad prophetiara ab ipsa conceptiqne et nativitate. » Dispositio et dexteritas naturalis. * Optimus humor ct^rebri. » Optimus vir intellectualibus, et moribus suis perfectus. i*^ Summa facultatis imaginatricis perfectio. " Intellectus agens. 188 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. drop upon the fancy, there will be only * a sect of wise speculators/^ Such men may be eminent for deep con- templation, but they will never be famous for prophesying. If the fancy be only quickened or heightened, then there will be * a sect of statesmen, lawyers, jugglers, magicians."^ But if the understanding and fancy be both heightened to their due ' elevation,'^ ^ suddenly prophets emerge.'* Only this I had almost forgot, which yet he thinks very con- venient, that they should have good diet for the time of their prophesying ; for, as he tells you, according to the mind of the Jews, ' prophecy dwells not 'mid sorrow and sloth.'^ So that the * sons of clay,'** the vulgar sort of people, are no more fit to prophesy 'than an ass or a frog.'^ These are his own words.^ But surely this doctor him- self did not prophesy, but dream all this while ? How else did he think that such a noble and spiritual employ- ment, such a great and glorious privilege as this is, could be raised by the power of man out of the strength of nature, that nature that is so fallen and degenerated ? ps ixxTiu.4]. And what means he to * limit the Holy One of Israel, and , to restraui the Spirit of the Almighty ?' Grant that Isaiah was a courtier, yet was not Amos an herdsman ? and was not he also among the prophets ? Did he never Judg. IT. 4. jhear of the weaker sex sometimes prophesying ? which yet iwas never famous for intellectuals. Does not this prophe- tical spirit breathe when it pleaseth, and where it pleaseth, and how it pleaseth ? Methinks this second Moses should * Secta sapientum apeculatorum. "^ Secta politicorum, jurisperitorum, praestigiatorum, incantatoruni. ^ Apex. * Repente fiunt prophetaB. ^ Prophetia neque habitat inter tristitiam nequc pigritiam. * Terrse tilii— 'JTIK Dy. ' Quam vel asinus vel raiia. * The similarity between MaimoniJes's theory of inspiration, and that lately revived, is striking : ' There is no new thing under the sun.' — Ed. 2 Chrou. xxxiv. 22. l!«a. Tiii. 3. DISCOVERS PRESENT, NOT FUTURE THINGS. 189 I not be oflfended, though some of the ordinary people be prophets. Or if natural endowments, or artificial prepara- tions must be had, and if they of themselves be so potent and energetical, how then comes vision to fail, and how does prophecy cease ? Are there none that have their imagination strong enough, that have their understandings raised enough ? that are of unquestionable integrity, and are not wanting in study and industry, and yet are no pro- phets, nor prophet's sons ? Let, then, this ' candle of the Lord ' content itself with its proper object. It finds work enough, and difficulty enough, in the discovery of present things, and has not such a copious light as can search out future events. p2 190 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. CHAPTER XIV. TUE LIGHT OF REASON iS A CERTAIN LIGHT. X II The light of reason is *a certain light.'^ Lamp-light, as it is not glorious, so it is not deceitful, though it be but a faint and languishing light. Though it be but a limited and restrained light, yet it will discover such objects as are within its own sphere with a sufiScient certainty. The letters of Nature's law are so fairly printed, they are so visible and capital, as that you may read them by this candle-light ; yet some weak and perverse beings, not fit to be honoured with the name of men, slight all the work- ings and motions of reason upon this account, that they are rolling and fluctuating, that they are treacherous and inconstant. And they look upon logic, which is nothing else but the just advancement of reason, an art of ripening and mellowing reason, an art of clarifying and refining of the mind; they look upon it as an intellectual kind of juggling, an artificial kind of cheating and cozening their understanding. — Nor were it a wonder if only the dregs of people, the rude lump of the multitude, if they only were sunk and degenerated into this folly. But I meet with a famous and ancient sect of philosophers that delight in the name of sceptics, who, by a strange kind of hypocrisy, and in an * Lumen certum. A CERTAm LIGHT. 191 unusual way of affectation, pretend to more ignorance than they have, nay, than they are capable of. They quarrel with all arts and sciences, and do as much as they can to annihilate all knowledge and certainty ; and profess nothing but a philosophical kind of neutrality and lukewarmness. Socrates did not please them ; for he showed himself but a semisceptic, one that was too confident in saying that he did ^know this only, that he knew nothing ;'^ for they will not allow so much knowledge as that comes to ; this they tell you, that they do not know this, whether they know anything or not. There was one sort of Academics, that came Very near them ; their motto was, ^ I do not comprehend ;'2 their meaning was, that they could not grasp or comprehend any object. Lucian, that unhappy wit, makes himself very merry with them, and laughs at one of them that had a servant that proved a fugitive and ran away from him. His master, says he, is very unfit ^ to run after him ;'3 for he will always cry, ' I cannot reach him, I cannot come near him.'* Yet if these Academics, by their ^ want of comprehension,'* meant no more than this, that the whole intelligibility of any entity could not be exhausted by them, that they could not so perfectly and powerfully pierce into any object as to discover all that was knowable in it ; their opinion then was not only tolerable, but very commendable and undeniable ; for only God himself doth thus ' comprehend.'^ There is not enough in any created lamp to give such a bright displaying of an object. Nor is there vigour enough in any created eye so to pierce into the pith and marrow, the depth and secrecy of being. But if their mind was this, as it is generally thought to be, * Hoc tantum scire, se nihil scire. < Oi5 KaraXafi^dvu, ov KaraXafi^dvu. « •! don't catch'— Oj) KaraXa^^dvu}. £> 'A/caraXi/f/a. » ApaT^TTjv fi€TaSiu}K€iu. * KaraXafi^dveiy. U 192 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. that there was nothing in being so visible, as that their understanding could pierce it with certainty and satisfac- tion ; such an error as this was very derogatory to the plenitude and exuberancy of beings that streams out in a clear cognoscibility ; and it was very injurious to their own rational capacities, which were not made so strait and narrow-mouthed as not to receive those notions that con- tinually drop from being ; but were contrived and propor- tioned for the welcoming and entertaining of truths that love to spin and thread themselves into a fine continuity, as if they meant to pour themselves into the soul without spilling. But the sceptics will bid you * rein up,'^ and will desire you not to believe one word of this. They have no less than ten several bridles ' for restraining assent/ ^ Sextus Empiricus, that grand sceptic, will give you a sight of them all, from whence they were styled 'men that did check and constrain '^ knowledge ; that whereas 'the dog- matic philosophers,'^ their adversaries 'diametrically,'^ did lay down their determinations in a more positive and decretorious manner, these ' sceptics '^ would take time to consider, and no less than all their lifetime. They chose to be so many perpetual questionists that would pose them- selves, and rub themselves, and stay themselves finally, and would by no means be persuaded to commence or to take any degree in knowledge. 'All things are indefinite;'^ that was the sum of all their philosophy. Their most radical and fundamental principle, if they may be said to have had any such, was this, ' that all propositions were in cequiUbrio ;' ^ that there was nothing could incline the 1 ^Ewix^iv. * Fx diametro. 2 Ad compescendum ct cohibendum assensum. • IkcttikoI. » Oi i€KTiKoL ^ Udirra iffrlv Upiara. 4 ^oynariKoL * T(p Tavrl X67V rbv \6yov Icov ivriKCiffdai. A CERTAIN LIGHT. 193 balance this way or that ; that there was an ' exact equality of reason for the affirmation or negation of any proposi- tion.'^ Lucian brings in one of them with a pair of balances in his hand, crowding three or four arguments for the affirmative into one scale, and just as many for the negative into the other, and then telling them his meaning in these words : ' I have taken a great deal of pains in weighing of controversies, and yet find in them such an undistinguishable equipoise, as that there is not in me the least inclination to one side more than the other.' ^ This they term an ' indifierence,'^ an 'equilibrium,'* a specula- tive kind of ' impartiality,'^ in respect of all things. In morals they call it ' carelessness ;'^ for as they would not acknowledge any ' true '^ or ' false,' ^ so neither would they trouble themselves about ' the base '^ or ' the honour- able ;'^^ ' there is no rather this way than that, or than neither way*^^ They had no better ethics than that speech would amount to ; yet they had some laws amongst them, some customs and rules of life, but they did not observe them as 'things that were fixed and fit to be established ;'^^ they were far from being irreversible, like those of the Medes and Persians, but they put them under the head of ' things that appear ,'^^ laws pro tempore ; such shadows and appearances as they would for the present please tliemselves in. And, after all debates, after all their * 'Iopia. ' Turpe. * 'A/ipei^la. ^^ Honestum. '' ' A7rpoau}Vo\r}\f/ia. ^' Ov fidWov ovtws ij (Ktivus if ovder^pus. ° *Airpay/j.offvvrj. ^- Ta /3e/3a/a)s yvwara. ' Verum. '■' Td liUivdas vTOTVTaLveTai wpdyfiara, Toiavra Kal etvai. * Verum quod ad to periinet. • Vcrura quod ad ilium pertinct. 198 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. A CERTAIN LIGHT. m r \ opinion true. For as the will cannot embrace an object unless it be presented 'under the shadow of good/^ so neither can the understanding close and comply with any opinion unless it be disguised 'under the appearance of truth/ ^ But to make appearance the very essence of truth, is to make a shadow the essence of the sun ; it is to make a picture the essence of a man. I shall say no more to Protagoras than this, that if any opinion be false, his cannot be true, but must needs be the falsest of all the rest;^ r^Yet the end that these sceptics propound to themselves 'was, if you will believe him, * a freedom from jars and dis- cords,'^ from heresy and obstinacy, to have a mind unpre- judiced, unprepossessed ; the avoiding of perturbations, a milky whiteness and serenity of soul— a fair mark indeed ; but how a roving sceptic should ever hit it, is not easily imaginable ; for what philosophy more wavering and voluble ? Was there ever a more reeling and staggering company ? Was there ever a more tumbling and tossing generation ? ''"-'"IVhat shall I say to these old seekers, to this wanton and lascivious sect, that will espouse themselves to no one opinion, that they may the more securely go a whoring after all ? If they be resolved to deny all things, as they can do it very easily, and have seemed to do it very com- pendiously, truly then they have taken a very sure way to prevent all such arguments as can be brought against them ; yet because they seem to grant appearances, we will at least present them with a few ' appearances,'* and we will see how they will move them and affect them. It Avere well, then, if PyiTho, the forementioned painter, would but tell us, whether a picture would be all one with a ' Sub umbra boni. •'' Wrapa^ia Kal nirptoirdBeia. • Sub apparent ia veri. face ; whether an appearance be all one with a reality ; whether he can paint a nonentity or not ; whether there can be an appearance where there is no foundation for it ; whether all pictures do equally represent the face ; whether none can paint a little better than he used to do ; whether all appearances do equally represent being ; whether there are not some false and counterfeit appearances of things. If so, then his ' indifference'^ must needs be taken away ; or, if there be always true and certain appearances of things, then his doubting and 'uncertainty'^ must needs vanish. When he is thirsty, and chooses rather to drink than abstain, what then becomes of his ' indifference ?'^ if he be sure that he is athirst, and if he be sure that he seems to be athirst, what then becomes of his ' uncer- tainty ?'* When the dog was ready to bite him, if he was indifferent, why did he run away ? If it were an appear- ance, why did he flee from a shadow ? Why was the painter afraid of colours ? If his sense was only affected, not his understanding, how then did he differ from the sensitive creature, from the creature that was ready to bite him ? If he tells us that he was the handsomer picture of the two, who was it then that drew him so fairly ? was it an appearance also ? Doth one picture use to draw another ? When he persuades men to incline to his scepticism, what then becomes of his ' indifference ?'^ When he makes no doubt nor scruple of denying certainty, what then becomes of his ' uncertainty ?'** But, not to disquiet this ' same Pyrrho any longer, I shall choose more really to scatter those empty fancies by discovering the true original and foundation, the right progress and method of all ' certainty. Now God himself, that eternal and immutable Being, ' 'ASiaopia. " * Ahiacpopia. • 'ATTopia. L^ 200 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Hhat fixed and unshaken Entity/* must needs be the fountain of certainty, as of all other perfections ; and if other things be compared to Him, they may in this sense, without any injury to them, be styled * appearances/^ in respect of the infinite reality, and weighty and massy so- lidity that is in His most glorious being, by virtue of which, as Himself hath everlastingly the same invariable know- ledge of all things, so He is also the most knowable and intelligible object, a sun that sees all things, and is in itself most visible. An atheist must needs be a sceptic; for God himself is the only immovable verity upon which the soul must fix and anchor. Created beings show their face awhile, then hide it again ; their colour goes and comes, they are ' in motion and flow/^ God is the only durable object of the soul. Now that the soul may have a satis- factory enjoyment of its God, and that it may be accu- rately made according to His image, God stamps and prints, as resemblances of His other perfections, so this also of certainty upon it. How else should it know the mind of its God ? how should it know to please Him, to believe Him, to obey Him ? With what confidence could it approach unto Him, if it had only weak and wavering conjectures ? Now God lets the soul have some certain acquaintance with other beings for His own sake, and in order to His own glory. Nor is it a small expression of His wisdom and power to lay the beginnings of man's certainty so low, even as low as sense ; for by means of such an humble foundation, the structure proves the surer and the taller. It is true there is a purer and nobler certainty in such beings as are above sense, as appears by the certainty of angelical knowledge, and the knowledge of God himself; ^ In motu et fluxu. Td atf6iJ.eva. A CERTAIN LIGHT. 201 yet so much certainty as is requisite for such a rational nature as man's is, may well have its risings and springings out of sense, though it may have more refinings and puri- fyings from the understanding. This is the right propor- tioning of his certainty to his being ; for as his being results out of the mysterious union of matter to immate- riality, so likewise his knowledge, and the certainty of his knowledge, (I speak of natural knowledge,) first peeps out in sense, and shines more brightly in the understanding. The first dawniugs of certainty are in the sense, the noon- day glory of it is in the intellectuals. There are indeed frequent errors in this first edition of knowledge, set out by sense ; but it is then only when the due conditions are wanting, and the understanding (as some printers use to do) corrects the old errata of the first edition, and makes some new errors in its own. And I need not tell you that it is the same soul that moves both in the sense and in the understanding ; for * it is the mind that sees, the mind that hears /^ and as it is not privileged from failings in the motions of the sense, so neither is it in all its intellec- tual operations, though it have an unquestionable certainty of some in both. The certainty of sense is so great, as that an oath, that high expression of certainty, is usually, and may very safely, be built upon it. Mathematical demonstrations choose to present themselves to the sense, and thus become ocular and visible. The sceptics, that were the known enemies of ceiiainty, yet would grant more shadow and appearance of it- in sense than anywhere else, though erroneously. But sense — that racked them sometimes, and extorted some confessions from them which speculative principles could never do. Away, then, with that humour of Heraclitus, that tells us * men's eyes are but weak and deceitful witnesses.'^ Surely / ' NoOt 6pa, Kal vwt dKovci. * Kafcoi fiapTvpes dvOpuwoKriv 6paaia. % ' * KopnTTia. 204 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. name of Truth ; ^ yet let none be so vain as to imagine, that this is in the least measure spoken to the disesteem of that noble Lord, who was well known to be of bright and sparkling intellectuals, and of such singular and incom- parable ingenuity, as that, if he had lived till this time, we cannot doubt but he would have retracted it, or at least better explained it before this time. However, I could not but take notice of so black an error, that did crush and break all these first principles, and had an irreconcilable antipathy against reason and certainty, though it hid itself under the protection of so good and so great a name. Certainty is so precious and desirable, as, where God hath given it, it is to be kept sacred and untouched ; and men are to be thankful for these candles of the Lord, for this * certain light '- set up not to mock and delude them, but to deal truly and faithfully with them. Lord Brooke. * Lumen c»;rtuni. A DIRECTIVE LIGHT. 205 CHAPTER XV. THE LIGHT OF REASON IS DIRECTIVE. The light of reason is *a directive light.' ^ This ' law wj'itten'^ is a light for the feet, and a lantern for the paths ; for the understanding is ' the leading and guiding power '^ of the soul. The will looks upon that, as Leander in Musaeus looked up to the tower for Hero's candle, and calls it, as he doth there, — * Lamp, which to me, on my way through this life, is a brilliant director.'* Reason ^carries a torch before'^ the will, nay, more than 80, it is an eye to the blind ; for otherwise it were in vain to light up a candle for a 'blind power '^ to see withal. Intellectuals are first in motion. These 'gates of light '^ must first be set open, before any glorious and beautiful object can enter in for the will to court and embrace. The will doth but echo to the understanding, and doth practi- cally repeat the last syllable of the ' final decision ;'* which makes the moralist well determine, that 'moral virtues cannot exist without intellectual powers ;'^ for to the presence of moral virtues there are necessarily pre-required * Lumen dirigens. * N6/io$ ypaTrrb^. ^ T6 ijyefioviKdv. * AiLfxi'Ov ifioQ ^idTOio a€ff and confident of, that it is against the mind and meaning of antiquity to stop the progress of religion and reason. ^^ But I know there are some will tell us of a visible tri- bunal, of an infallible head of the Church, born to deter- mine all controversies, to regulate all men — it is a wonder * Ob defectum luniinis. - GeiiTri^i/crrot. R2 214 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. they do not say angels too. Others more prudently and equally resolve the final judgment of controversies into a general and oecumenical council ; but I shall speak to them all in the language of the philosopher, ' The law must rule all -y^ and I shall explain it according to the mind of the learned Davenant,^ in his discourse * On the arbiter and rule of Christian faith and conduct/^ God only is to rule His own Church * by a determining and legislative power/* Men that are fitted by God himself, are to guide and dbect it, ^ in way of subserviency to Him, by an explication of His mind,'* yet so as that every one may judge of this * by acts of their own understanding,'^ illuminated by the Spirit of God ; for there are no representatives in intellectuals and spirituals. Men may represent the bodies of others, in civil and temporal affairs, in the acts of a kingdom, and thus a bodily obedience is always due to just authority ; but there is none can always represent the mind and judg- ment of another in the vitals and inwards of religion ; for I speak not of representations in outward order and dis- cipline. A general council does and may produce 'a public judgment,'^ but still there is reserved to every single individual ' rational judgment ;'« for can you think that God will excuse any one from error upon such an account as this : * Such a doctor told me this, such a piece of antiquity informed me so, such a general council determined me to this' ? Where was thine own lamp all this while ? * Act t6v v6hov Apx^*-^ ird.vr(av. « Perhaps the most judicious theologian the Church of England has pro- duced. — Ed. » De judice ac norma fidei et cultus Christiani. * AiroKparopiKus Kal vofioderiKws — Judicio auctoritativo. * 'TTT-nperiKuiS Kal ^p/iT/i'cvri/ctDs^udicio ministeriali. * 'UiurriKus Kal dicpoar ikws— Judicio privato et practic8B discretionis. ' Judicium forense. * Judicium rationale. !(' A DIRECTIVE LIGHT. 215 Where was thy ^ reason illuminated and directed according to the rules of good and necessary logic impressed on a rational creature ?'^ Yet this must be gratefully acknowledged, that these general councils have been of public influence, of most admirable use and advantage to the Church of God, though they are not of the very essence of it ; for it is well known that there was none of them till the days of Constantino. But herein is the benefit of councils, that they are, or ought to be, a comparing and collecting of many lights, a unit- ing and concentrating of the judgments of many holy, learned, wise Christians, with the Holy Ghost breathing among them, though not always so fully and powerfully as that they shall be sure to be privileged from every error ; but being all of them subject to frailty and fallibility, and sometimes the major part of them proving the pejor part, there is none bound to give an extemporary assent to their votes and suff'rages, unless his mind also concur with theirs.^ That worthy divine of our own, whom I mentioned l)efore,^ speaks very fully and clearly to this : ^ There is no one who can believe at the simple dictate of another, without the exercise of private judgment, even if he were most anxious/* The most eminent Mirandola will give you the reason of it ; for, says he, * Nobody believes a thing to be true, simply because he wishes to do so ; for it is not in the power of a man to make a thing appear true to his * Ratio illuminata et gubemata secundum normas bonae et necessarije consequentiae, rationali creaturse impressas. * Andrew Marvel does not think quite so well of councils as our author. See his Short Historical Essay touching General Councils, Works, 4to, vol. iii. p. 106. — Ed. * Davenant. * Ad nudam prsescriptionem aut detemiinationem alterius, sine lumine privati judicii, nemo est qui credere potest, etiamsi cupiat maxime. 216 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. intellect when he pleases/^ But before there can be faith in any soul, there must be ' a knowledge of the proposition to be believed ;'^ and there must be / a tendency of the reason to give assent to this proposition when laid bare * and known/ ^ Before you understand the terms of any proposition, you can no more believe it than if it came to you in an unknown tongue. A parrot may repeat the creed : thus ^ you might imagine ravens as poets, and magpies as poetesses, to sing a song worthy of one who had drunk of Hippocrene/* Though such at length may very safely conclude, as that talkative bird is reported to have done by a happy and extemporary contingency, ' I've lost my labour and my oil !'^ This is the misery of those implicit believers amongst the Papists, and it is well if not among some Protestants too, that do * go with their feet, rather than their hearts, into the opinions of others;'*' dancing in a circular kind of faith : they believing as the Church believes, and the Church believing as they believe, Eccies xu 13. &c. ; and this is with them DlKn ^^ — ^ the whole of man,' the whole perfection of a Roman Catholic' Yet let none be so foolish or wicked as to think that this strikes at anything that is truly or really a matter of faith, whereas it doth only detect the wretched vanity and deceit of a Popish and implicit credulity, which commands men to put out their lamps, to pluck out their eyes, and * Nemo credit aliqniJ venim prsecise quia vult credere illud esse verum, noil est enim in potentia liomiiiis fucere aliquid apparere intellectui suo verum, quando ipse voluerit. * Cognitio propositionis credendie. ^ Inclinatio intellectus ad asscntiendum liuic propositioni revelatw et cogiiitae. * Corvos poetas et poetridas picas, Cantare credas Pegaseium melos. — Pers. Prolog. 13, 14. * Operam et oleum perdidi. ° In aliorum sententius pedibns potins quam cordibus ire. i A DIRECTIVE LIGHT. 217 « yet to follow their leaders, though they rush upon the mouth of hell and destruction ; whereas it is better to be an Argus in obedience, than a Cyclops, 'A monstrous bulk deformed, deprived of sight.'*— Dr>'den. An eye open is more acceptable to God than an eye shut. Why do they not as well command men to renounce their sense, as to disclaim their understandings ? Were it not as easy a tyranny to make you to believe that to be wliite which you see to be black, as to command you to believe that to be true which you know to be false ? Neither are they at all wanting in experiments of both ; for transub- stantiation, that heap and crowd of contradictions, doth very compendiously put out the eyes of sense and reason both at once. Yet that prodigious error was established in the Lateran Council under Innocent the Third, which, as some contend, was a general and oecumenical council. And if the Pope, whom they make equivalent to all coun- cils, nay, transcendent, if he, in ccUhedra, shall think fit to determine that the right hand is the left, they must all immediately believe him, under pain of damnation. So that first principles, common notions, with the products and improvement of them, must needs be looked upon as of bad consequence, of pernicious influence at Rome. What ! to say that two and two make four, that 'the whole is greater than its part,"^ especially if the Church shall deter- mine against it, — Oh, dangerous point of Socinianism! Oh, unpardonable heresy of the first magnitude! Re- bellion against the Catholic Church ; a proud jostling against the chair of infallibility 1 Away with them to the Inquisition presently; deliver them up to the secular * Monstnim horrendum, informc, ingens ; cui lumen ademptum. Virg. ^n. iii. 658. * Totum majus parte est. u- 218 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. powers ; bring fire and fagot immediately ; Bonner's learned demonstrations, and the bloody discipline of the scarlet and purple whore. No wonder that she puts out John iii. 19. the candle, * and loves darkness rather than light, seeing Rev xTii. 4. lier deeds are evil/ She holds a cup in her hand, and will not let the world sip and taste, and see how they like it, but they must swallow down the whole philtrum and potion without any delay at all. Thus you may see the weak reeds that Babylon leans upon, which now are break- ing and piercing her through. But religion, framed according to the gospel, did always scorn and refuse such carnal supports as these are. That truth that must look the sun in the face for ever, can you think that it will fear a candle ? Must it stand in the presence of God, and will it not endure the trial of men ? Or can you imagine that the spouse of Christ can be so unmerciful as to pull out her children's eyes, though she may very well restrain their tongues sometimes, and their pens, if they be too immodest and unruly ? I shall need to say no more than this, that true religion never was, nor will be, nor need be, shy of sound reason, which is thus far * a directive light,'^ as that it is obliged, by the will and command of God himself, not to entertain any false religion, nor anything under pretence of religion, that is formally and irreconcilably against reason ; reason being above human testimony and tradition, and being only subordinate to God himself, and those revelations that come from God. Now it is express blasphemy to say that either God, or the Word of God, ever did, or ever will, oppose right reason. ' Lmiien Jirigens. ^ \ A CALM AND PEACEABLE LIGHT. 219 V r CHAPTER XVL THE LIGHT OF REASON IS CALM AND PEACEABLE. The light of reason is *a calm and friendly light ;'^ it is a candle, not a comet ; a quiet and peaceable light. And though this ' candle of the Lord ' may be too hot for some, yet the lamp is maintained only with soft and peaceable oil. There is no jarring in pure intellectuals ; if men were tuned and regulated by reason more, there would be more concord and harmony in the world. As man himself is a sociable creature, so his reason also is a sociable light. This candle would shine more clearly and equally, if the winds of passion were not injurious to it. It were a commendable piece of stoicism, if men could always hush and still those waves that dash and beat against reason. If they could scatter all those clouds that soil and discolour the face and brightness of it ; would there be such fractions and com- motions in the State, such schisms and ruptures in the Church, such hot and fiery prosecutions of some trifling opinions ? If the soft and sober voice of reason were more attended to, reason would make some differences kiss and be friends ; it would sheath up many a sword ; it would quench many a flame ; it would bind up many a wound. This ' candle of the Lord ' would scatter many a dark sus- picion, many a sullen jealousy. Men may fall out in the dark sometimes, they cannot tell for what. If the ^candle ' Lumen tranquillum et aiiiicum. u 220 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. of the Lord' were but amoDgst them, they would chide one another for nothing then but their former breaches. ' Knowledge establishes the soul ;'^ it calms and composes it ; whereas passion, as the grand Stoic Zeno paints it, is ' an abounding and over-boiling impetus, a preternatural agitation of a soul;'^ 'a commotion of the mind opposed to right reason, and contrary to nature,'^ as the orator styles it. The soul is tossed with passion, but it anchors upon reason. This gentleness and quietness of reason doth never com- \ mend itself more than in its agreeing and complying with faith, in not opposing those high and transcendent mys- teries that are above its own reach and capacity. Nay, it had always so much humility and modesty waiting and attending upon it, that it would always submit and subor- dinate itself to all such Divine revelations as were above its own sphere. Though it could not grasp them, though it could not pierce into them, yet it ever resolved with all gratitude to admire them, to bow its head, and to adore them. One light does not oppose another; *the lights of faith and reason'* may shine both together, though with ! far different brightness ; ' the candle of the Lord ' is not i impatient of a superior light ; it would both ' bear an equal and a superior.'^ The light of the sun, that indeed is * monarchical light,'* a supreme and sovereign light ; that with its golden sceptre rules all created sparkles, and makes them subject and obedient to the Lord and rule of all light. Created intellectuals depend upon the brightness of God's beams, ' 'H irim I welcome thou firstborn of corporeal beings, thou lady and queen of sensitive beauties, thou clarifier and re- finer of the chaos, thou unspotted beauty of the universe.-* * Lumen jucundum. * This calls up to the mind Milton's beautiful adJress to light— Par. Lost, book iii. 1-12 ; which, however, was written nearly twenty years later— i^rf. T 2 238 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. EecL li. 7. \ Mutt. vi. 29. Let him be condemned to a perpetual night, to a fatal dis- consolate grave, that is not enamoured with thy brightness. Is it not 'a pleasant thing to behold the sun ?' nay, to behold but a candle, a deputed light, a vicarious light, the ape of a sunbeam ? Yea, there are some superstitious ones who are ready to adore it ; how de^'outly do they compli- ment with a candle at the first approach I how do they put off the hat to it, as if with the satyr they meant to kiss it! You see how pleasant the light is to them. Nay, that learned knight,^ in his discourse of bodies, tells us of one totally blind, who yet knew when a candle came into the room, only by the quickening and reviving of his spirits. Yet this corporeal light is but a shadow ; it is but a black spot to set off the fairness of intellectual brightness. How pleasant is it to behold an intellectual sun ! nay, to behold but ' the candle of the Lord !' How pleasant is this lamp of reason ! -Everything that is natural is pleasant.' ^ 'All the motions and operations of nature are mixed and seasoned with sweetness/ Every entity is sugared with some de- light ; every being is rolled up in some pleasure. How does the inanimate being clasp and embrace its centre, and rest there as in the bosom of delight ! How flourishing is the pleasure of vegetatives ! Look but upon the beauty and pleasure of a flower. Behold the lilies of the valleys, and the roses of Sharon ; Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. Go then to sensitive creatures, and there you meet with pleasures in a greater height and exaltation. How are all the individuals amongst them maintained by acts of plea- sure ! How are they all propagated by acts of pleasure ! Some of them are more merry and cheerful than the rest Sir Kenelm Digby. * rial' tpvffiKoy ijSu. A PLEASANT LIGHT. 239 How pleasant and jocund is the bird ! How musical is it ! How does it sing for joy ! Did you never see the fish playing in its element ? Did you never see it caught with a bait of pleasure ? Does not leviathan sport in the sea, and dally with the waves ? If you look up higher, to rational beings, to the sons of men, you will find there a more singular and peculiar kind of pleasure, while they have both a taste of sensitive de- light, and a participation of intellectual. The soul and body enjoying a chaste and conjugal love, the pleasure of the soul is more vigorous and masculine, that of the body more soft and effeminate. The nobler any being is, the purer pleasure it hath proportioned to it. Sensitive pleasure hath more of dregs; intellectual pleasure hath more of quintessence. If pleasure were to be measured by corporeal senses, the brutes, that are more exquisite in sense than men are, would by virtue of that have a choicer portion of happi- ness than men can arrive to, and would make a better sect of Epicureans than men are ever like to do. But there- fore Nature hath very wisely provided that the pleasure of reason should be above any pleasure of sense ; as much as, and far more than, the pleasure of a bee is above the plea- sure of the swine. Have you not seen a bee make a trade of pleasure, and hke a little epicure * faring deliciously every day,' while it lies at the breast of a flower, drawing and sucking out the purest sweetness ? And because it will have variety of dishes and dainties, it goes from flower to flower, and feasts upon them all with a pure and spot- less pleasure ; whereas the swine in the meantime tumbles and wallows in the mire, rolling itself in dirt and filthi- ness. An intellectual bee, that deflowers most elegant authors ; a learned ei>icure, that sups up more orient pearls than ever Cleopatra did ; one that delights in the embraces U Luke xri. 19. 1 240 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. of truth and goodness, hath he not a more refined and clarified pleasure than a wanton Corinthian that courts Lais, than a soft Sardanapalus spinning amongst his cour- tezans, than a plump Anacreon, in singing, and dancing, and quaffing, and lascivious playing ? ' In any one who exults in the greatness and superiority of the soul, the active and emulative pleasures put out of sight, and ex- tinguish those of sense,' ^ as the elegant moralist hath it ; and it is as if he had said, the delights of a studious and contemplative Athenian, or of a courageous and active Lacedemonian, are infinitely to be preferred before the pleasure of a delicate Sybarite, or a dissolute Persian. The delight of a philosopher does infinitely surpass the pleasure of a courtier. The choicest pleasure is nothing but the * flowering of the true and the good.'^ There can be no greater pleasure than of an understanding em- bracing a most clear truth, and of a will complying with its fairest good ; this is ' to rejoice in spirit,'^ as the Greeks call it ; or, as the Latins, * to be glad in the bosom.*^ All pleasure consisting in that harmonious conformity and correspondency that a faculty hath with its object, it will necessarily flow from this, that the better and nobler any object is, the purer and stronger any faculty is, the nearer and sweeter the union is between them — the choicer must be the pleasure that ariseth from thence. Now intellectual beings have the bravest object, the highest and most generous faculties, the strictest love-knot and union, and so cannot want a pleasure answerable to all this. Epicurus himself, as that known writer of the philo- ' TCop rjdovuiv ret; ffUfiartKiis al irpaKTiKai xal yhp iyiiryf fx^ ''"'■ ^^<^ dya$6v, daipiav /xiv rhs 5td x^^^" V^ovht, Ktd rds 6i* ' Apo8ipovrjaiv. ^ OvK icTiv ijS^iai ^rjv Hyfv tov povL/xojs Kai KaXws. * Xaipeiv. ' EC TpdrTeip. 242 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. Epicurus -/^ where he shows that this jolly philosopher makes the body only the proper centre of pleasure ; and /when he tells you that the mind huth a more rari6ed de- light, he means no more than this, that the mind perceives the pleasure of sense better than the sense does ; which [ makes the fore-mentioned author pass this witty censure upon them, ' They pour no pleasure upon the soul, but that which comes out of the impure and musty vessel of > the body/^ The whole sum of Epicurus's ethics, which he styles his canonical philosophy, is this, ' that pleasure was the " Alpha "^ and " Omega "* of all happiness/* To this purpose he wrote a multitude of books, and scattered them like so many of his atoms ; and the greedy appetite of his licentious followers was easily caught with these baits of pleasure, which made his opinions to be styled ' meretricious doctrines,'^ that curled their locks, painted their faces, opened their naked breasts, and clothed them- selves in soft and silken apparel, to see if they could thus entice the world. They were ' doctrinal Sirens,'^ that with a melting and delicate voice, did endeavour to soften and win upon the hearts of men as much as they could. The quintessence of all his doctrine was this, ' Pleasure, that guide of life, and mistress too,'"— (Creech.) as Lucretius, the Epicurean poet, sings. The practice of that frolic^ professor of pleasure, did suflSciently explain » OvK iffTiv rjS^wt Ijjv (car* *EirlKovpop^'Son potest suaviter >'ivere secun- dum Epicuri decreta Plutarch. * T^v riSotnjv Kaddxep olvov U rod wovripov dyyeiov iiax^otnei. 3 A. * 0. ^ ^ Tt;!' -^Sotnjv apx'?" '^<*^ rlXos \iyofi€¥ tov fiaKoplus ^rjv. « Meretricia dogmata. ' AoyfMTiKal Set/)^^?. • Dux vitae dia voluptas.— De Berum Naiura, ii. 172. » Frolic, as an adjective, is nearly out of use. ' We fairies are now frolic' — Shakspere, Mid. Dream. ' The frolic wind.'— Milton, V Allegro. * Frolic play.' — Collins, Ode to the Fassiont. A PLEASANT LIGHT. 243 and comment upon his mind. His dwelling was in a garden, a lit place to crown with rosebuds, * to crop the tops '^ of pleasure, to let no flower of the spring pass un- touched of him. Here be was furnished with all his wisd ii. 8. voluptuous accommodations, and he might spread like a green and flourishing bay-tree. But amongst all his plea- sure, methinks none should envy that — which yet the writer of his life is pleased to observe — that ^ he was wont ' to vomit twice a day constantly after meals,' ^ by virtue of his excessive luxury. Oh, rare philosopher I that head of a vomiting sect, that licked up his and their own filthiness. Is this the work of an Athenian ? Is this his mixing of virtue with pleasure ? Will he call this living happily ;'^ sure he will not call this ^ living according to reason ?''^ Yet his death was very conformable to his life, for he ex- pired with a cup of wine at his mouth ; which puts me in mind of the end of the other carousing epicure, that merry Greek, Anacreon, who, by a most emphatical tautopathy, was choked with the husk and kernel of a grape. So soon does the pleasure of an epicure wither, so soon are his resolves blasted ; he eats, and drinks, and dies before to-morrow. ' Pleasures are like breezes ;'^ they seem to refresh and fan the soul w4th a gentle breath, but they are not certain, not durable. Those corporeal delights, as that florid moralist, Plutarch, tells us, like so many sparks 'they make a crack and vanish ;'^ like some extemporary meteors, they give a bright and sudden coruscation, and disappear immediately. The pleasures of taste are but * on the end ' ApdxeiP Kopv^xis. * Ais T^t TJjxkpa^ ipiclv dird rpo^i. ' Zifv "^Sius. * Z^v (ppovi/jius. * A{ i^Soval KaOdirep aOpai. * 'E^a^ii' &:ia Kai a^^aiv iv capKl Xafipdvovatv. 244 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. of the palate/^ as that famous epicure, Lucretius, tells us : — ' The savours please within the mouth alone ; For when the food's descended farther down. We taste no more, and all the pleasure's gone.'* Creech. Whereas intellectual joy shines with a fixed and un- decaying brightness ; and though these * outward pic- tures of pleasure,'^ as llato calls them elegantly, lose their gloss and colour, yet the inward face of delight maintains its original and primitive beauty. Sensitive pleasure is limited and contracted to the narrow point of a * now ;'* for sense hath no delight but by the en- joyment of a present object, whereas intellectual plea- sure is not at all restrained by any temporal conditions, but can suck sweetness out of time past, present, and to come ; the mind does not only drink pleasure out of pre- . sent fountains, but it can taste those streams of delight that are run away long ago, and can quench its thirst with | those streams which as yet run under ground. For does not memory, which therefore Plato calls * the preserving of ^ sensations,'^ does it not reprint and repeat former pleasure ? And what is hope but pleasure in the bud ? Does it not antedate and prepossess future delight ? Nay, by virtue of nn intellectual percolation, the waters of Marah and xiS^T^''' ^^' Meribah will become sweet and delicious. The mind can extract honey out of the bitterest object when it is past ; how else can you construe the poet's words ? * In fine palati. * Deinde voluptas est e succo in fine palati. 2>c Rerum Natura, iv. 63 1 . 3 'BSoval K^la. U 246 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. A \ \ Did you never hear of the soft Sybarite, who complained in the morning of his weariness, and of his pimples, when he had lain all night only upon a bed of roses ? But who ever was tired with intellectual pleasure ? Who ever '^' was weary of an inward complacency ? Who ever surfeited of rational joy ? Other pleasures 'ingratiate thomselves by intermission/^ whereas all intellectuals heighten and advance themselves by frequent and constant operations. Other pleasures do but emasculate and dispirit the soul, they do not at all fill and satisfy it. Epicurus may fill his with one of his atoms, as well as with one of his pleasures ; whereas rational pleasure fills the soul to the brim ; it oils the very members of the body, making them more free and cheerful. Nay, speculative delight will make abundant compensa- tion for the want of sensitive ; it will turn a wilderness into a paradise. It is like you have read of the philoso- pher that put out his eyes, that he might be the more intent upon his study; he shuts his windows that the candle might shine more clearly within ; and though lie be rather to be wondered at than to be followed or com- mended, yet he did proclaim thus much by this act of his, that he preferred one beam of intellectual light before the whole glory of this corporeal world. How have some been enamoured with the pleasure of mathematics ! When, says Plutarch, did any epicure cry out *I Ve dined '^ with so much joy as Archimedes did * IVe made the discovery ?'^ How have some astronomers built their nests in the stars, and scorned to let any sublunary pleasures rend their thoughts from such goodly speculations? The worst of men in the meantime, glut themselves with sensitive plea- > Volnptatea comnienJat rarior uaus. A PLEASANT LIGHT. 247 / sure — 'fools and knaves are merry,' ^ as he in Plato speaks. Apollo laughs but once in a year, whereas a fool laughs all the year long. And it is a great deal more consonant to sound philosophy, that rationality should be the spring of inward pleasure than of outward risibility. Amongst all mental operations, reflex acts taste pleasure best, for without some self-reflection men cannot tell whether they rejoice or not ; now these acts are the most distant and remote from sense, and are the highest ad- vancements of reason. True pleasure is * a serious matter,'^ as the grave moralist Seneca speaks ; and it is ^ in the depth '^ where truth and goodness, those twin-fountains of pleasure, are. Sensitive pleasure makes more noise and crackling, whereas mental and noetical delights, like the touches of the lute, make the sweetest and yet the stillest and softest music of all. Intellectual vexations have most sting in them, why then should not intellectual delights have most honey in them ? Sensitive pleasure is very costly ; there must be ' much preparation and attendance/* much plenty and variety : — * I hate all the slaves that are sparing of labour ; Give us roses abundant '*' — Francis. It is too dear for every one to be an epicure — it is a very chargeable philosophy to put in practice ; whereas rational delight freely and equally diffuses itself, you need not pay anything for fountain-pleasure ; the mind itself proves a Canaan that flows with milk and honey. Other pleasure a sick man cannot relish, an old man cannot embrace. Barzillai says he is too old to taste the * "S-optfyla iroXi/reXTj's. * Xalpovaiv ol &ovrcs ffpovs. • ^opfpbv Ti ffKv6pu)Tr6v. • *A\V oitK oipov x\-^$oi o^W 6TTr]ats rOtv Kp€Co¥ rb €Cpaiuop €v rais ioprais. • 'AXXA Kal iXxls d7a^^ xai S6^a toO Tapuvcu rbv ^^bv evfieyij, /cat b^x^a^ai rd yivbfieva KcxoLpiCfUvta^. • Trjv evSo^lat' ijSv tfyoOtrrai. • Kard rifv KounavLav iv reus vbovaii. 254 OF THE LIGHT OF NATURE. A PLEASANT LIGHT. 255 I excess of riot Have not sensitive creatures as much friendship as this amounts to ? They tell us they love the continuation of pleasure ; why then do they deny the im- mortality of the soul ? It is the voice of Epicurus and his swinish sect, ^ There must be no eternity.'^ What! are they afraid their pleasure should last too long ? or are they conscious, as they may very well be, that such impure pleasure is not at all durable ? It is the voice of the same impure mouth, ' There is no repetition of life/^ What I is he afraid of having his pleasures reiterated ? Does he not expect a crown of rosebuds the next spring ? or is he so weary, as well he may be, of his pleasure, as that he will prefer a nonentity before it ? This sure was the mind and the desire of that Epicurean poet Lucretius, though a Roman of very eminent parts, which yet were much abated by a philtrum that was given him — a just punishment for him who put so much of his pleasure in a cup ; and this desperate slighter of Providence at length laid violent hands upon himself. Are any of you enamoured with such pleasure as this ? You see what is at the bottom of an epicure's cup ; you see how impatient a rational being is of such unworthy delights, and how soon it is cloyed with them. You see the misery of an epicure, whose pleasure was only in this life, and yet would not last out this life neither. But all rational pleasure is not of a span long, but reaches to perpetuity. That moralist, whom I have so often mentioned, reckons up whole heaps of pleasure which spring from the continuation of the soul. * There,' says he, * shall I have the pleasure of seeing all my friends again '/^ there I shall have the pleasure of more ennobled * A« rby alwva fi^ eXvai. * A2s 7d/) ovK iffTi yipeadai. ' Aurd/) ^7€\€v aWipios Zeifs 'EwiJxw*' H€T itOXov Ayeiv is Ofiiffyvpiy iffrpuv. Musfleus, ^ i for the soul ; that is, such a supernatural disposition in an I intellectual eye, by which it is clarified and fortified, and ' rightly prepared for beholding the Divine essence ; which makes Dionysius, the falsely-supposed Areopagite, very fitly describe happiness by this, ' The souFs sunning of itself in the light of glory/* Some will have that of the 1 Imperfectissima operatio ex parte inteUectus. licet sit perfectio ex parte objecti. . . « Effectus adwquantes virtutem causa. Lumen gionse. * ^rdffis iy ^e^v aivs etpai, ' The image ' is said to be ' inge- nious, and the antithesis striking ;' but, it is added, ' nevertheless, the sentiment is far from just* I demur to this finding. I insert the evidence on which it rests, both because I am glad of the opportunity of enriching these pages with a fine specimen of thought and composition, and also that I may set two clear thinkers and elegant writers at one with each other, which, if I mistake not, may be easily done. ' It is hardly right to represent faith as younger than reason ; the fact undoubtedly being, that human creatures trust and believe long before they reason or know. Tlie truth is, that both reason and faith are coeval with the nature of man, and were designed to dwell in his heart together. They are, and ever were, and in such creatures as ourselves, must be, reciprocally com- plementary ; neither can exclude the other. It is as impossible to exercise an acceptable faith without reason for so exercising it — that is, without exer- cising reason while we exercise faith — as it is to apprehend by our reason, exclusive of faith, all the truths on which we are daily compelled to act, whether in relation to this worid or the next. Neither is it right to repre- sent either of them as failing of the promised heritage, except as both mav fail alike, by perversion from their true end, and depravation of their genuine Z 282 NOTES. nature ; for if to the faith, of which the New Testament speaks so much, a peculiar blessing is promised, it is evident, from that same volume, that it is not a faith without reason, any more than a faith without works, which is commended by the Author of Christianity. And this is sufficiently proved by the injunction, " to be ready to give a reason for the hope," and, therefore, for the faith, " which is in us." ' If, therefore, we were to imitate the qnaintncss of the old divine on whose dictum we have been commenting, we should rather compare reason and faith to the two trusty spies, " faithful among the faithless," who con- . firmed each other's report of " that good land tvhich flowed with milk and honey," and to both of whom the promise of a rich inheritance there was given,' and in due time amply redeemed. Or rather, if we might be permitted to pursue the same vein a little farther, and throw over our shoulders that mantle of allegory which none but Bunyan could wear long, and wear grace- fully, we should represent reason and faith as twin-bom ; the one, in form and features, the image of manly beauty, the other, of feminine grace and gentleness ; but to each of whom, alas ! is allotted a sad privation : while the bright eyes of reason are full of piercing and restless intelligence, his ear is closed to sound ; and while faith has an ear of exquisite delicacy, on her sightless orbs, as she lifts them towards heaven, the sunbeam plays in vain. Hand in hand the brother and sister, in all mutual love, pursue their way through a worid on which, like ours, day breaks and night falls alternate ; by day, the eyes of reason are the guides of faith, and by night, the ear of faith is the guide of reason. As is wont with those who labour under these privations respectively, reason is apt to be eager, impetuous, impatient of that instruction which his infirmity will not permit him readily to apprehend ; while faith, gentle and docile, is ever willing to listen to the voice by which alone truth and wisdom can reach her.'* Nothing can be more true and beautiful than all this ; and had Nathanael Culverwel lived in our times, no man, I am persuaded, would have more readily acknowledged the truth, or more intensely admired the beauty ; but I do not think he would have found anything really antagonistic to his dictum. The two knights are looking at opposite sides of the shield. And what Mr. Rogers says of reason and faith as coeval principles in human nature, is not more true than what Mr. Culverwel says of them, as channels through which truth about God, and the unseen and eternal, enter the mind. Generally, truth on these subjects, as exhibited in the works of God, comes, to some extent or other, through the channel of reason into the mind, before the fuller revelation of the truth in the Scriptures finds its way there through the channel of faith. Truth, as embodied in Nature and Providence, is presented to all men, and is apprehended by reason. Truth, in the Bible, is presented 1 Rogers's it-'cww and Faith ; their Claims and their Conjlicls. tributionsto the Edinburgh tienew. Vol. iii p 174. Essays selected from con- NOTES. 283 only to those ' to whom the word of salvation comes,' and is apprehended by faith. Surely, in this sense, ' reason is the first-bom,' and surely too, * the blessing,' by way of eminence, is not promised any more to him who reasons than to him who works, but 'to him who believes.' Reason in the individual, to allude to Mr. Rogers's fine allegory, sees God in His works, before faith hears Him in His word. And he in whom God is listened to by faith, is blessed in another guise from him in whom He is only known by the reason. Note B. — Rufeaence by Howe. P. 20, 1. 2 from the foot. — Howe seems to have had this passage in his eye when, in his matchless description of the ruined temple of God in the soul of man, he says, ' Look upon the fragments of that curious sculpture which once adorned the palace of the great King : the reliquea of common notions, the lively prints of some undefaced truth.' — Living Temple^ part ii. § 8. Note C— Selden, Grotius, and Salmasius. P. 33, 1. 7. — For the character of Selden, as an ethical writer, the reader may consult Hallam's Literature of Europe, p. iii. chap. iv. § 28, vol. iii. p. 110. The following is not too high an eulogium on that not very read- able, and now very little read author: — 'Selden for scholarship, only not universal, and for his indefatigable researches into the original constitution of the State, must be consulted and venerated as a sage, to whom learning and the liberties of England are alike and largely indebted.* The merits of Grotius, as a writer on morals, have been most judiciously and candidly estimated by Dugald Stewart, Dissertation, g iii. p. 84, etc. ; by Sir James Mackintosh, Dissertation, § iv. pp. 315, 316 ; and especially by Hallam, Literature of Europe, part iii. ch. iv. sect. iii. § 80, vol. iii. p. 543, etc. Had it not been for the transcendent fame of scholarship which then be- longed to Salmasius, he would scarcely have been mentioned, we think, by Culverwel. A just estimate of his powers and attainments may be found in Hallam, part iii. chap. i. g 16. Note D. — The three Durands. P. 38, 1. 4. — ^WiLLLAM DuRAND was an eminent jurist of the thirteenth century. He was bora 1237, and died 1296. His principal work is entitle Speculum Juris, from which he derived the name of ' Speculator.' He 284 NOTES. wrote also Bationale Divinarum Officiorum. He died Bishop of Mende. He must not be confounded with his nephew of the same name, celebrated in his own time for a work On the Manner of Holding a Oeneral Council. Culverwel probably refers to a third William Durand, surnanied Db St. PoURCAiN. He was in succession Bishop of Puy and Meaux. Among the schoolmen he has the appellation, The Resolute Doctor. He was first a Thomist, and then a Scotist. His apostasy so offended the sect he deserted, that one of them wrote this epitaph for him, — * Durus Dunndos jacet hie sub marmore doro ; An sit salranduB, ego nescio, nee quoque euro * He died in 1332. The best edition of his great work, Commentarii super Lib. IV. Sententiarum, is that in folio, 1572. For fuller information, Tir»- boschi, Moreri, and Aikin may be consulted. Note E. — Suarez. P. 41, 1. 7. — Francis Sdarez of Grenada (born, 1548 ; died, 1617) was, as Hallam {Lit p. iii. chap. iv. § 15) says, ' by far the greatest man, in the department of moral philosophy, whom the order of Loyola produced in that age.' His great work is entitled, Tractatus de Legihus ac Deo Legislatore. Sir James Mackintosh (Dissertation, sect. vi. p. 315) remarks, ' Grotius, who, though he was the most upright and candid of men, could not have praised a Spanish Jesuit beyond his deserts, calls Suarez " the most acute of philoso* phers and of divines." ' Note F. — Eternal Law — Suarez, Hallam, Hooker. P. 54, 1. 30. — The following is Suarez 's definition or description of eternal law : — ' Lex aetema est decretum liberum voluntatis Dei statuentis ordinem servandum, aut generaliter ab omnibus partibus universi, in ordine ad com- mune bonum, vel immediate illi conveniens ratione totius universi, vel saltern ratione singularum specierum ejus ; aut specialiter, servandum a creaturis intellectualibus, quoad liberas operationes eorum.' — De Legihus, cap. ii. § 6. This, certainly, not very perspicuous statement is thus translated by Hallam : ' — ' Eternal law is the free determination of the will of God, ordaining a rule to be observed either, first, generally, by all parts of the universe, as a means of a common good, whether immediately belonging to it in respect of the entire universe, or, at least, in respect of the singular parts thereof; or, secondly, to be specially observed by intellectual creatures, in respect of their free operations.' It is justly remarked by him, that * this crabbed piece of NOTES. 28r* scholasticism is nothing else in substance than the celebrated sentence on law , which concludes the first book of Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity.^ — Hallam, ii. 505. The sentence referred to is certainly one of the most magnificent in the English language. ' Of law, there can be no less acknowledged than that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world ; all things in heaven and earth do her homage ; the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power ; both angels and men, and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent, admiring her as the mother of mercy, peace and joy.' Note G. — Maimonides. P. 64, 1. 7. — Moses Maimonides, or Ben Maimon, often termed, from the initials of his office and names, Rambam, is called by the Jews ' the Eagle of the Doctors,' or * the Doctor,' and is certainly one of the most ingenious and enlightened of Jewish writers. It is a proverb among the learned Jews, ' A Mose ad Mosem par Mosi non fuit uUus.' He was bom at Cordova in 1131, and died in Egypt in 1204 or 1205. His most important works are, Moreh Nevochim — the Guide to the Perplexed ; and his Sepher Hamitzoth, or the Book of the Commandments. — Wolfii Bib. Ileb., Buxtorf, Pref. to his trans, of Mor. Nev. Basnage. Note H The two Vasquez. P. 74, 1. 1, — There are two Spanish theologians of this name, Dennis, an Augustinian monk ; and Gabriel, a Jesuit. It is to the last of these Culver- wel refers. He died 1604. His works fill ten folio volumes. — Moreri. Note I. — Arbor Inveusa. P. 81, 1. 12. — A learned friend has suggested that the reference may be to the Arbor metallorum of the alchemists, of which Hofmann, in the Lexicon Universale, so justly praised by Gibbon, says, * Ludit mirifice ars in reruin natura, conterit et ad minima redigit qtifievis metalla, quae mira fermenta- tione foeta, ac vitreo vasi indusa paulatim fermentationis incrementum percipiunt, atque in gratam arborem se hinc inde in vitreo vase dilatantem excrescentemque extendunt.' This tree grows downward — inversa. Here we have an ' enclosed being,' nourished by the liquid in the midst of which it resides. I have no doubt this is the reference. A piece of zinc is sus- pended in a solution of lead in a phial, and in a short while the lead re- Z 2 286 NOTES. appears in a metallic form, attaching itself to the zinc, and exhibiting the appearance of a shrub growing downwards. ^^ The following passage occurs in Bacon's Nov. Org. lib. in.. Works, vol. i. p 343, folio : ' Si quis enim accipiat ramum tenerum et vegetum arbons, Lue ilium reflectat in aliquam terr« particulam, hcet non cohaereat ipsi loco, gignet statim non ramum, sed radicem. Atque vice versa si terra pon^tur superius, atque ita obstniatur lapide aut ahqua dura substantia, ut planta cohibeatur, nee possit frondescere sursum ; edet ramos m aerem deor- sum.' This also is an 'arbor inversa.' There is no enclosure here, how- ever, and otherwise it aflfords no illustration of Culverwel s idea. Note J.— Sextus Empikicus. P 101 119 -Sextus Empimcus was a Greek philosopher, and is supposed to have flourished under the Emperor Commodus. His works, which have come down to our times, are \n^ Pyrrhoniana^ Hypotyposeisxn three books; and Adversv, Mathematicos, in ten books. They are full of erudite discus- sions on the Greek philosophies, and contain a summary of the pnn^iples ot the sceptics. The best edition of his works is that by Fabncius in 1718, m folio. Brucker in Hist PhU., and Haller in his Bibl Med., may be con- suited for further details. Note K. — Cardawo. P 103 1 26 -^EROM Cardano, one of the most extraordinary characters of his age. (Bom, 1501 ; died, 1576.) His autobiography is somewhat like the confessions of Rousseau. It exhibits a very strange picture of high, varied, misguided intellectual and moral power. The works referred to by Culver- wel are his De ^*i6«i7ita' vfiiv, 261. Tate, 62. Taylor, Jeremy, xxv, xxxii. TertuUian, 68, 112, 133, 143. Thales, 149. The Holy Spirit the interpreter of Scripture, 227. Themistius, 103. Theory of conscience, Culverwel's view of, xxxix. Theory of knowledge, Culverwel's view of, xxxiv. Tiberius, 265. Tillotson, Archbishop, x, xi. Tiraboschi, 284, 289. Traduction of the soul, 142 ; not in- compatible with its immortality, 143. Trismegistus, 137, 147. Trueman, xxii. Truths proper to faith undiscoverable by reason, xlvi. Tuckney, Dr. Anthony, xv; corres- pondence with Dr. Whichcote, ib.; Dedication to, 4. Turretine, Francis, 167. Td 6y, 43. •TXt;, 34. Ilpian, 58. Universality of moral distinctions stated and enforced by Culverwel, xl. Valla, 59. Vasquez, 74. Vasquez, the two, 285. ' Velleity,' meaning of the word, 269. Virgil, 152, 181, 184, 186, 217, 245, 273. Vossius, 263. "Waldenses referred to, 231. Wallis, Dr. John, xv, 131. Walpole, Lord Orford, 131. Watt, xxi. Webster, Rev. G., xvii. Westminster Assembly, x. Whitaker, Dr. William, x. Whitgift, Archbishop, ix. Williams, Dr. Edward, xxi. Will of God, free, yet regulated by His wisdom and holiness, 78. Wood, X. Zabarclla, 103 ; Note L, 286. Zabarellas, the four, notice of, 286. 2^chius, notice of, 289. Zeno, 134, 172, 220. Zoroaster, 146. H.-OF TEXTS OF SCRIPTURE REFERRED TO. fAOB PAGE Gen. i. 27, . 149 Psal. Ixxxiv. 10, . 21 Gen. ii. 7, . 29 Psal. Ixxxv. 10, . 236 Gen. iii. 22, . . . 164 Psal xciv. 9, 154 Gen. xxii. 1-19, . 226 Psal. cxxiii. 2, . . 36 Gen. xlix. 3, . . . 51 Pbov. iii. 17, . 28 ExoD. ix. 27, . 68 Prov. XX. 27, 16 Exod. XV. 23 ; xvii. 7, Exod. xviii. 17, . 244 12 Prov. XX. 27, . .^'^ . Prov. xxvii. 19, . ** -^ « 25 111 Exod. XX. 13, 15, 68 Prov. XXX. 13, . ••* . 13 m Exod. xxi. 28, . 64 M ECCLES. i. 11, 27 1 Deut. iv. 22, 273 Eccles. xii. 13, . 28 fl Deut. xxv. 5-10, . 11 1 Deut. xxxi. 12, . 66 Cant. ii. 9, 233 ' JoBH. ix. 23, . . . 12 IsA. ii. 10, 11, 17; xxiii. 9, 236 Isa. V. 11, . 260 Judges iv. 4, 188 Isa. viii. 3, 188 ^K Judges viii.. 2 Isa. xl. 5, . 114 H Judges ix. 14, 15, 46 Isa. xii. 23, . . . 187 H Isa. ix. 19, . . . 275 H 1 Sam. X. 23, 26 .H 1 Sam. xxv. 29, . 151 Dan. vii. 13, 63 ■ 2 Sam. xix. 34, 35, 248 Hos. ii. 4, . 58 H 1 Kjnqs viii. 66, . 240 Amos v. 24, 46 S 1 Kings x,^ 27 S 1 Kings xii. 11, . 265 Mal. iii. 17, 92 ;H Mai. iv. 2, . 46 fl 2 Chron. xxxiv. 22, 188 , fl Matt. v. 18, 82 H Job XX viii. 14, . 261 Matt. vi. 28, 29, . 235 fl Matt, vil 27, 185 H Psal. ii. 4; xi. 7, 251 Matt. xi. 25, 26, . 235 ■ Psal. iv. 6, 90 Matt, xxiii. 5, 83 ■ Psal. xix. 1, 61 Matt. xxv. 23, . 267 ■ Psal. xix. 4, 259 ■ Psal. xxxvi. 9, . 105 Luke i. 3, . 102 1 Psal. xxxvi. 9, 275 Luke ii. 27, 51 ■ Psal. xlv. 7, 53 Luke xiii. .3, 4, . 13 ■ Psal. xlix. 12, . 170 ■ Psal. Iv. 12-14, . 22 John i. . . . . 14 I Psal. Ixxviii. 41, . 188 John i. 27, . 236 298 INDEX OF TEXTS OF SCRIPTURE REFERRED TO. FAOB FAOB John iii. 19, 218 2 Cor. xiii. 12, . 17 John xii. 37-42, . 228 Gal. i. 8, . 206 Acts ii. 8-12, . 110 Col. ii. 2, . 102 Acts iii. 2, . 21 Col. ii. 3, . 15 Acts vii. 26, 221 Col. iii. 2, . 130 Acts xvii. 11, 208 Col. iii. 11, 97 Acts xvii. 22, 23, 25 Acts xvii. 25, 29 1 TiM. iii. 15, . . . 69 Acts xvii. 28, 146 1 Thess. i. 5, 102 Rom. i. 12, . 12 1 Thess. V. 26, . 17 Rom. i. 18, 117 Rom. i. 20, . 2 2,51,73, 127 Phil. iii. 14, 18 Rom. ii. 14, 15 Rom. ii. 15, . 56, 72 Hkb. i. 8, . 148 Rom. iii. 1, 2, 92 Heb. xii. 1, 260 Rom. iii 29, 97 Heb. xii. 9, 141 Rom. viii. 20-22, 19 Rom. ix. 21, 139 James i. 17, . 26, 56, 142 Rom. xi. 33, . 12, 14 James ii. 18, 43 Rom. xii. 2, 13 Rom. xvi. 16, 17 1 Pet. i. 12, . 12,236 1 Cob. i. 20-28, . 235 1 Pet. ii. 2, 207 1 Cor. i. 29, 236 1 Pet. ii. 9, 92 1 Cor. ix. 9, 64 1 Pet. V. 14, 17 1 Cor. X. 13, 13 1 Cor. xi. 14, 14 2 Pet. i. 4, 37 1 Cor. xii. 31, . 257 2 Pet. i. 19, 186 1 Cor. XV. 41, . 221 2 Pet. ii. 6, 68 1 Cor. XV. 44, 45, 29 1 Cor. 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