A search after souls and spiritual operations in man

1. Paragraph, Concerned only the intent or meaning of Paul in his term of Nature, whether intended absolutely in puris Naturalibus, or cultivated by Education, Rule or Example.

2. Paragraph, Was concerning my Expression of mak∣ing Men trust in a Lye.

3. Paragraph, I Reply to it: You seem to think that God can make Matter Cogitative, and will not deny that to be in his Power, and we are agreed in that; but you think God hath not done so: I think he hath done so; and this it seems need not be determined, but remain a Dissen∣tion without making it a Difference, the Proof on either side appearing a very great difficulty.

4. Paragraph, Desiring to shew, that there is a Know∣ledge of what is Morally good or bad, Grounded in Nature, Unassisted by Rules, Education, or Institution. You Cite an Instance in Cain, who (you think) knew he had sinned in killing his Brother; and that before his Nature was assist∣ed by Rules, or positive Institution. Here I say, are Two Assertions: First that he knew the Fact to be wicked;

next he knew this by simple Nature, unassisted by any Rule or Institution whatsoever. To the First I Answer, It doth not appear in the Text, that he knew that his Fact to be a Crime. You say, it appears upon the Margent: The Text says, My Punishment is greater than I can bear: The Mar∣gent says, Mine Iniquity is greater than can be forgiven. Evi∣dent it is, that the Complaint succeeds immediately to the Sentence pronounced after that Fact; which induces me to believe it applicable to the Punishment, rather than to the Sin; and that therefore the Reading put into the Text by our Translators, is more likely to be the true and proper Reading, than that upon the Margent: But if that which you pretend should be admitted, and the Marginal Read∣ing should be accepted. Yet it seems the State of Cain at that time, was not a State of bare and simple Nature, un∣assisted by Institution or Rules: For Adam was Divinely Instructed, and probably brought up his Children under Discipline, or a directive Education: They were Taught the use of Sacrificing; and vers. 7. God himself gave Cain Directions for his Instruction in Morality and Piety. Hence, to me it seems your instance of Cain doth not enough prove, that Conscience (without Rules or Instruction) is a Natu∣ral Guide to direct Men in their Actions; able to make a true Distinction betwixt evil and good. Rom. 5.13. For until the Law, Sin was in the World: but Sin is not imputed when there is no Law. And Chap. 7.7. I had not known Sin, but by the Law: Vers. 13. Sin by the Command∣ment became exceeding sinful, viz. until, or before the Law, bad Actions were Sins, but not imputed, because not known to be Sins; but when Institution, and Laws have detected, or discovered to Mankind the Sin of such Actions, viz. that they are Sins against God and his Laws: This knowledge makes that which before was a Sin, though not imputed, to become by such Revelation exceeding sinful: First a Sin in it self, and next as made known to the

acter by the Law, or some other Institution that it is a Sin. You give no farther, or other Answer to what I had large∣ly spoken, concerning the Nature and Operation of Con∣science in Man: I desired to know your Apprehensions con∣cerning the same, and your silence therein seems to admit of my Conceptions thereupon as firm, or probable.

5. Paragraph, You say, I desire to know of you, whence Humane Affections and their Powers grow? You Answer, They grow from the Corruption of Mans Nature, by the Fall of Adam, and the Curse attending it; to evince which, it seems you should shew what Mans Nature was before the fall, and wherein, and how far the same became Corrupt∣ed upon that Occasion: But that is a thing which I think you neither know, nor have means to discover, and that therefore we are driven to consider Humane Nature, as we now find it so considered: It is found, and you grant, that Affections and Passions have a very great Power in dispo∣sing of Humane Actions, and the Applications, and Practi∣ces of the same; that they do very often and most com∣monly over-power and mislead the National Faculty, and its Dependencies, and drive, or draw the Person, Soul and Body, into very impure and wicked Practices, even reclamante Ratione, and maugre all the Spiritual Powers which ordinarily they meet with in Mankind: And these Affections, Ambition, Covetousness, Lust, and the Passi∣ons, Wrath and Fear, are as natural to Man, as his Vital and Rational Faculties are: All Men have them, and one who hath them not, is not perfect in his Nature: The Beasts have them, viz. Lust, Wrath and Fear, and they act with as much Violence and Power in the Beasts as in the Men: And our First Parents had them before the Fall: The Wo∣man saw the Tree was good for Food, and pleasant to the Taste; hereby was her Lust tempted: And a Fruit desira∣ble to make one Wise; here was her Ambition tempted,

and by these Affections Satan prevailed (as amongst Men of our times he daily doth) to draw our First Parents into the ruinous Accomplishments of Sin and Wickedness. I say then, The Affections and Passions appear to grow, not as an effect of Adam's Fall, but as a Fruit of Natural Production; and from the same Principles and Originals that his Nutri∣tive, Generative, and other Vital Powers do grow; that his other Sensitive, and his Rational Faculties do also grow: They seem to have one same Original, and that they are as Natural to Man; as any of the other are; and that they have received no more Detriment or Vitiated Quality from the Fall, than the other Humane Powers and Faculties have done: I say, they are all acted alike, viz. by the Natural Contexture of Soul and Body: And I thence infer, that if the Humane Soul were Intelligent, she would not act these Affections and Passions with the Force and Violence, with which, oft-times we find them to be acted; but would ra∣ther chuse to act them moderately, and no farther than might stand with Terms of Discretion; and so as to restrain and keep them ever under Power of her own Government and Regality: And because she doth not, and I think can∣not do this, I conclude, she seems to me not Intelligent, but Material.

6. Paragraph, In the Matter of the Fathers Opinions concerning the going of Souls to Heaven, upon Death of their Bodies, I undertake not to speak upon my own pe∣rusal of the Fathers; but as I find them Cited by other Writers. I have from Peter Martyr, quoted to you Irenae∣us, denying Souls passing to God or Heaven before the Resurrection; and there Tertullian is quoted to the same purpose, viz. that Heaven shall not be opened till the Re∣surrection. Dr. Willet in his Synopsis Papismi, Fol. 402. He says, We confess most part of the Fathers, especially the later sort of them, to have been in this error. Fol. 403. He says,

Bellarmine Cites 14 Fathers to this purpose: Nay, and Our Lord, Joh. 14.2, 3. says, I go to prepare a place for you; and I will come again, and receive you unto my self, that where I am, there ye may be also: Seeming to infer a Rest till Christ's Se∣cond Coming: As Revel. 14.13. Blessed are the Dead which die in the Lord, that they may rest from their Labours, and their Works do follow them. 1 Pet. 4.13. Rejoyce, as being Partakers of Christ's Sufferings, that when his Glory shall be revealed, ye may be also glad with exceeding joy: So 2 Pet. 3.11. Seeing all the Earth, and the Heaven about it shall be Burnt up, what Holy Persons ought ye to be; looking for, and hasting to the day of God. 1 Cor. 4.5. Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to Light the hidden things of Darkness, and then shall every [deserving] Man have Praise of God. 1 Cor. 1. Vers. 7, 8. Waiting for the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Joh. 2.28. Abide in him, that when he ap∣pears you may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his Coming. Chap. 3.2. We know not yet what we shall be; but we know, that when he shall appear, we shall be like him. Joh. 6. Our Lord promises four times over to raise his Servants up at the last Day: And he tells Martha, her Brother shall rise again. She Answers: I know he shall rise again at the Resurrection of the last day. All these places refer to, and rest upon the Judgment of the last day, or Christ's Second Coming, without taking notice of any Inter∣mediate State: Nor do I meet with any Scripture asserting any Intermediate State, Place, or Judgment, between Death and the Resurrection of the last day: True it is, That those who believed the Subsistence of Souls in a State of Separa∣tion from their Bodies, were forced to invent some places and modes of that Subsistence: Whence Heathen Divines, or Poets, framed their Elisiums, and Fortunate Islands; their Habitations of Dis, and Tartarums: And so have the

Mahometans done, and so a great part of Christians main∣tain their Limbus's patrum & puerorum, Purgatory, & si∣num Abrahae, from the Parable of Lazarus, and places of other Tortures for wicked Souls; but without being able to make out, or prove such places, or such things, ei∣ther from Reason, Scripture, or other solid, and credible, or faithful Ocular Testimony, or Relations whatsoever: And if you know of any such Proofs of those, or the like places, I shall be very glad to receive the Communication thereof from you.

You say, The Fathers did not think that Souls go not to Heaven before the Resurrection: You avoid saying, They did think Souls went to Heaven before that time. I have named to you Irenaeus and Tertullian, who thought they went not to Heaven before the Resurrection. And your own Second Paper, Parag. 7. say, The Fathers owned a middle State, which was neither Heaven nor Hell, and that good Souls were in a State of Rest and Happiness, but not in Heaven, or the full Fruition of it: The Fathers owned an Intermediate State for good Souls, between Death and Hea∣ven. Our Church, or the greatest part of it, say, They go presently upon Death to Heaven: I desire to know a Reason of this Difference in Opinion, viz. why we differ from the Fathers in it: To this you Answer, These Opini∣ons agree well enough: This gives me little Satisfaction in the Point, viz. your telling me they agree well enough, because I see plainly there is a wide Difference between them, and still I want a Reason of that Difference.

7. Paragraph, You had quoted to me Solomon's Saying, The Spirit returns to God, who gave it, as the strongest Text you could find for the Soul's Separate Subsistence. To that Text, as proving this Point, I sent you Three Objections, never propounded to you nor Answered by you before: They appear to me very Material, and such as you will,

with great difficulty be able to make a reasonable and sub∣stantial Answer unto; and therefore I desired you to be∣stow an Answer upon them: instead of which you tell me, you have said enough upon that Text before, approved by the Learned of your Town, as a true and Unanswerable Explication of that Text. To this I reply, Those Learn∣ed were Men agreeing in Judgment with your self in our disputed Point, and apt to approve what was said by you in the Confirmation of it: But now if you please to Com∣municate these Objections to those Persons, and make such Answer to them as they shall approve, it will oblige me much, and add great strength to the force of your Argu∣ment from that Text, which I think my Objections do over∣throw, so long as they stand in force and remain unanswer∣ed: And I allow you to think as the Jebusites expressed, 2 Sam. 5.6. They challenged David, conceiving as in the last clause of that Verse.

8. Paragraph, You say, You have lately had occasion to consider a Text of Scripture, which you think directly contra∣dicts and overthrows my Opinion, viz. 2 Cor. 5. Vers. 6. and 8. Knowing that whilst we are at home in the Body, we are absent from the Lord, and are willing therefore to be absent from the Body, and present with the Lord: And I grant, That these Words absent from the Body, and present with the Lord, taken singly as recited in these Two Verses, seem strongly to import, that a Man hath something, which be∣ing absent from the Body, may be present with the Lord: But it is a granted, and well tried, and approved Rule; that for the Understanding and sound Exposition of Scrip∣ture, the Context is always well, and throughly to be con∣sidered, and all the parts so be understood and construed, as may make the several Parts and Expressions of it stand and agree together, and with the true and sober Rules of com∣mon Sense and Reason: To make such an Exposition of

these two Verses, and the Words, and import of them, it seems to me, the Expounders of them should begin from the next preceding Chapter, viz. Chap. 4.8. there Paul be∣gins to recount his Sufferings: Vers. 14. But after all, He who raised the Lord Jesus, shall raise us up also by Jesus, and shall present us with you: And therefore we must look a•• things not seen and Eternal; in comparison of which, the present Affliction is but short and light: Chap. 5.1, &c. For we know, we have a Building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the Heavens; desiring to be cloathed upon with our house: if so be that being cloathed, we shall not be found naked: For we do groan, not for that we would be uncloathed but cloathed upon, that Mortality might be swallow∣ed up of Life: Therefore we knowing, that whilst we are at hone in the Body, we are absent from the Lord, and are will∣ing rather to be absent from the Body, and to be present with the Lord: therefore we labour, that whether present or ab∣sent, we may be accepted of him. For we must all appear be∣fore the Judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in his Body, according to what be hath done, whether it be good or bad. To accord the Words absent from the Body, and present with the Lord, to the rest of the Con∣text, it seems we must take Body in this place for the Na∣tural Body, as it is distinguished from the Spiritual Body, expected at the time of Christ's Second Coming: Those who are raised to Happiness, shall be raised Spiritual Bodies, as 1 Cor. 15.44. and those who are alive at that time shall be changed, viz. their Natural Bodies into Spiritual Bodies; For Flesh and Blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God: Whilst therefore we are at home in the Natural Body, we are, and must be absent from the Lord; and do wish ra∣ther to be absent from this Body, viz. have it changed in∣to a Spiritual Body; that this Mortal might put on Immor∣tality, and Death may not have Power over us, but be swallowed up in that Victory: Our Text is parallel hereun∣to,

we know we have an house eternal in the Heavens, desiring to be cloathed upon with this house, viz. the Spiritual Body, that Mortality might be swallowed up of Life: Therefore he desires not to be Uncloathed, not to Die, or put off this Tabernacle, but to be Cloathed upon; to pass to Life with∣out passing the Gates of Death, be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye; for till a Resurrection, or such a change, we are like to be absent from the Lord: There∣fore he desires to be Cloathed upon with this house from Heaven, that he may not continue in the Natural Body, and thereby absent from the Lord: He speaks as if he might live to that time, says, We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed: And of absence from the Body by this change, it seems St. Paul speaks in my Text which you have quoted, and not of any thing to be done, or expected, after Death, or betwixt that and the Resurrection. The whole Tract recited, seems to me, intended for Comfort in times of Worldly Afflictions, founded upon the Resurrection, Chap. 4.14. and terminated in it, Chap. 5.10. desiring whether absent in the Natural Body, or present in the Spiritual, to be accepted by Christ, that we may come to that great Au∣dit with Confidence, as 1 Joh. 2.28. and not be ashamed before him at his coming, but may rejoyce at it, with joy un∣speakable and full of Glory; that the wicked rising, or found alive at Christ's Coming, shall be so changed, or have Spiritual Bodies, I do not find Written, and it seems as likely that they may still remain in their former state of Nature, sensible of what they suffer, as in their first Life: The difficulty thereupon will be, how they should be able to dwell in Everlasting Burnings, without being consumed: But I pretend not to solve all Difficulties, but shall leave this to farther Consideration, and conclude my self,

Your obliged humble Servant.

10. Nov. 93.