(called Love) and Displacencie, &c. will be the fame. How Plotin. ubi fupr. p. 391.feat.26. fheweth, far the foul here doth act, without any idea or inftrument, at Memory is more I have spoken before. And the manner of our acting here- pertinent to the foul after, no man doth now fully underftand: But that which than th: body, and oft is effentially an intellectual volitive power, will not be idle in without the body. Et its active effence, for want of a body to be its inftrument. fe&t.29,&c Et c. 31, If we may fo far afcribe to God himself fuch Affections or tween the fenfitive and Paffions, as the ingenious Mr. Samuel Parker, in his Teutam. rational memo 1. Ec Phil. l. 2. c. 8. p. 333, &c. hath notably opened, we have no 1. 2. he fheweth, that r.afon to think that scientia præteritorum is not to be ascribed to a foul, when it is feparated from the corporeal fpirits.

Or if the foul cut of the body were as liable, as it is by difeafcs of the body while it is in it, to the lofs of memory, yet all thofe arguments which prove the Life of Retribution hereafter, do fully prove that God will provide it a way of exercise, and prevent all thofe hinderances of memory, which may make his Judgment and Retribution void. Again, therefore I fay, To argue ab ignotis against clear evidence, in matters that our own everlafting joy or forrow is concerned in fo decply, is a folly, that no tongue can exprefs with its due aggravations.

OBJECTION XX.

the foul in heaven forgetteth these trifles, not through ignorance, but contemps.

He belief of the immortality of fouls doth fill men with Sic ille (Strato) DeT fears, and draw them to fuperstition, and trouble the um opere magno lipeace of Kingdoms by unavoidable fects, in the profecution of berat, & me timore: thofe things which are of fuch transcendent weight, otherwise men might live in quietneß to themselves and others, fe curari, non & dies and in promoting of the publick good.

when

Quis enim poteft cum exiftimet à Deo

& no&tes div num

Anfw. This is the maddeft objection of all the reft; but in numen horrere? & fiquid adverfi acciour days there are men found that are no wifer than to derit, (quod cui non make it. I have answered it fully in divers popular Trea- accidit) extimefcere ne id jure evenerit. tifes, as that called, A Saint, or a Bruit, &c.

1. The greatest and best things are liable to the worst Cic. Acad. quæft. l. 4. abuses. Thus you may argue against Reason, that it doth but P. 44.

fill mens brains with knavifh craft, and enable them to do mischief, and to trouble the world, and to live themselves

Dddd 2

in

in cares and fears, &c. Upon many fuch reasons, Cotta,in Cic. de Nat. Deor. doth chide God for making man a rational creature, and faith, he had been happier without it. And were it not for this wit and reafon, we fhould have none of the fe evils which you have here now mentioned. Why then is not reafon as well as Religion on that account to be rejected?

On the fame reafon, Philofophy and Learning may be accused, (as it is with the Turks and Mofcovites.) What abundance of fects, and voluminous contentions, and tired confuming ftudies have they caufed? witnefs all the volumes of Philofophers and School-men.

On the fame account you may cry down Kings, and Civil Government, and Riches, and all that is valued in the world: for what wars and bloudfhed hath there been in the world for Crowns and Kingdoms? what hatred and contention for honour and wealth? If you could make all men fwine, they would not ftir for gold or pear's; or if they were dogs, they would not fight for Kingdoms: and if they be blind and impious worldlings, they will not be zealous about Religion, unless to dis-fpirit it, and to reduce it to the service of their fleshly intereft, (which is the hypocrites zeal.) No man will contend for that which he valueth not.

But, 2. Confider, that though dogs will not fight for Crowns, they will fight for bones, and fome times need men of reason to ftave them off. And though fwine fight not for gold, they will fight for draff, and burst their bellics if they be not governed. And though unbelievers and Atheists trouble not the world to promote Religion, they fet Fam:hes, Towns, and Countries, and Kingdoms together by the ears for their worldly pelf, and flefhly intereft. Enquire whether the wars of the world be not moft for carnalintereft, (even where Religion hath been pretended :) and hearken in Weftminster-ball, and at the Affizes, whether moft of the contendings there are fuch as are caufed by Religion, or by the love of the world and of the flesh. And where Religion feemeth to be a part of the caufe, it is the Atheists and ungodly that are commonly the chief contenders; who think it not enough to hope for no life to come themselves,

but

but they cannot endure other men that do it, because they feem wifer, and better, and happier than they, and by their holinefs gall their confciences and condemn them.

3. The extremity of this objections impudency appeareth in this above all; that it is most notorious, that there is no effctual cure for all the villanics of the world but true Religion; and fhall the cure be made the cause of that disease? 1. Read and judge in Nature and Scripture, whether the while matter of Religion be not perfectly contrary to the vices of the world. Will it trouble Kingdoms, or difquiet fouls, to love God above all, and to honour and obey him, and be thankful for his mercies, and to truft his promifes, and to rejoice in hope of endless glory and to love our neighbours as our felves, and to do no injuftice or wrong to any to forbear wrath and malice, luft, adultery, theft and lying, and all the reft expreffed in this treatife. 2. Is it not for want of Religion that all the vices and contentions of the world are? Would not men be better fubjects, and better fervants, and better neighbours, if they had more Religion? Would not they lie, and deceive, and fteal, and wrong others lefs? Do you think he that believeth a life to come, or he that believeth it not, is liker to cut your purse, or rob you by the high way, or bear talfe witnefs against you, or be perjured, or take that which is not his own, or any fuch unrighteous thing? Is he liker to live as a good fubject or fervant, who looketh for a reward in heaven for it, or he that looketh to die as a beaft doth? Is he liker to do well and avoid evil, who is moved by the eff.ctual hopes and tears of another life, or he that hath no fuch hopes and fears, but thinketh that if he can efcape the Gallows there is no further danger? Had you rather your servant, that is trufted with your cftate, did believe that there is a life to come, or that there is none? Nay, why doth not your objection militate as ftrongly against the thief's believing, that there will be an Affize? For if the belief of an Aflize did not trouble him, he might quietly take that which he hath a mind to, and do what he lift: but this fills his heart with fears and troubles. 3. Compare thofe parts of the world (Brafil and Soldania, &c.) which believe not a life to come, (if any fuch there be) with those that do, and fee which

belief hath the better effects. 4. What is there of any cffectual power, to reftrain that man from any villany which he hath power to carry out, or policy to cover, who doth not believe a hfe to come. 5. And if you believe it not, what will you do with Reason, or any of your faculties, or your time? How will you live in the world, to any better purpofe, than if you had flep: out all your life? What talk you of the publick goed, when the denying of our final true felicity, denyeth all that is truely Good, both publick an f private.

But fo fottifh and malignant an objection deferveth pity more than confutation. Whatever Religious perfons did ever offend thefe men with any reall Crimes, I can affure them, that the Cure had been to have made them more Religious and not lefs; And that the true Belief of a Life to come, is the end, the motive, the poife of all wife and regular actions, and of Love and Peace, of right Government and obedience, and of justice, mercy, and all that is lovely in the world.

Vid. Paul Cartes: in a fent.d.1.p.30,31,

An OBJECTION about the Worlds Eternity.

H

Aving faid thus much about the point which I thought moft confiderable, I fhall anfwer an Objection about the Worlds Eternity, because I perceive that it fticks with fome.

Obj. We finde it the harder to believe the Scripture, and the Chriftian Derine, because it offerteth a thing which Ariftotle bath evinced to be fo improbable, as is the Creation of the World within less than 6c00 years. When no natural renfox can be brought to prove that the World is not eternall.

Anfw. 1. It is you that are the affirmers, and therefore on whom the natural proof is incumbent. Prove if you can that the World is eternal. Were it not tedious, I fhould by examining your reafons fhew that they have no convincing force at all.

2. There is so much written of it, that I am loth to trouble the Reader with more. I now only again referre

the

the Reader to Raymundus Lullius, defiring him not to reject his arguments if fome of them feem not cogent, feeing if any one of all his multitude prove fuch, it is enough.

mun

3. I now only defire that the Controverfie between the Christian and the Infidel may be but rightly flated. And to some think, because that end do not charge Christianity with any School-mans or they read much in Plathe world, that his other confident perfons private opinions, nor fuppofe Chrift to of the making of or Scripture to determine any thing, which they do not de- opinion was not for its termine. 1. Christianity and Scripture do not at all deter- eternity; but I doubt mine, whether the whole Univerle was created at the fame they are quite mistaken. Alcinous in li,de doc. time when this our Heaven and Earth was: But only that Plat. faith too truely, the Syfteme or World, which we belong to, the Sun, and [Cum vero Moon, and Starrs, and Earth were then created. Nay, a dum Plato genitum great part of the ancient Doctors, and of the moft learned inquir, haudquaquam dendum eft, ut alilate Expofitors on Gen. 1. do expound the Heavens which fic eum fenfiffe cre God is faid to create as being only the vifible Heavens, and quod olim tempus not including the Angels at all. And others fay, that by ante mundum præIn the beginning] is meant ab initio rerum, and that the cefferit; Verum quiHeavens there meant being the Angelical Habitations, and femper in generatione perdurat, indicatq; fubftantiæ fuæ the Earth as without form, were both ab initio rerum before the fix dayes Creation, which began with the making caufam præftantioof Light out of the pre-exiftent Heavens or Chaos. I think rem. Animam prænot this opinion true; but this liberty Chriftian Doctors have rerea mundi, que femper extitit, haud taken of differing from one another in this difficult point. efficit Deus; fed orBut they utterly differ about the time of the creation of Angels (on Gen. 1. and on Job 1.) and confequently whether there were not a World exiftent, when this World was created.

2. Or if

any

a

nat: câq; ratione eam facere nonnunquam afferitur, quod

excitat cam, & ad feipfum ejus mentem

that feeth more than I, can prove the con- velut ex profunde trary, yet it is certainly a thing undetermined by Scripture quodam fomno conand in the Chriftian Faith, whether there were any Worlds vertit, &c. that had begun and ended before this was made: That God is the maker of Heaven and Earth, and of all things visible and invifible, is moft certain: But whether this Heaven and Earth, which now is, was the firft which he hath made, is a thing that our Religion doth not at all meddle with. They that with Origen affirm, that there were antecedent worlds, are justly blamed on one fide, not for fpeaking things falfe, but things uncertain and unrevealed, and for corrupting Christianity by a mixture of things alien and doubtfull. And

thofe