The Major Works (English Library) (13 page)

There be many excellent straines in that Poet, wherewith his Stoicall Genius hath liberally supplyed him; and truely there are singular pieces in the Philosophy of
Zeno
, and doctrine of the Stoickes, which I perceive, delivered in a Pulpit, passe for currant Divinity: yet herein are they in extreames, that can allow a man to be his owne
Assassine
, and so highly extoll the end and suicide of
Cato
; this is indeed not to feare death, but yet to bee afraid of life. It is a brave act of valour to contemne death, but where life is more terrible than death, it is then the truest valour to dare to live, and herein Religion hath taught us a noble example: For all the valiant acts of
Curtius, Scevola
or
Codrus
, do not parallel or match that one of
Job
;
²⁶⁶
and sure there is no torture to
²⁶⁷
the racke of a disease, nor any Poynyards in death it selfe like those in the way or prologue unto it.
Emori nolo, sed me esse mortuum nihil curo
, I would not die, but care not to be dead.
²⁶⁸
Were I of
Cæsars
Religion I should be of his desires, and wish rather to goe off at one blow, then to be sawed in
peeces by the grating torture of a disease.
²⁶⁹
Men that looke no further than their outsides thinke health an appertinance unto life, and quarrell with their constitutions for being sick; but I that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that Fabrick hangs, doe wonder that we are not alwayes so; and considering the thousand dores that lead to death doe thanke my God that we can die but once. ’Tis not onely the mischiefe of diseases, and the villanie of poysons that make an end of us, we vainly accuse the fury of Gunnes, and the new inventions of death; ’tis in the power of every hand to destroy us, and wee are beholding unto every one wee meete hee doth not kill us. There is therefore but one comfort left, that though it be in the power of the weakest arme to take away life, it is not in the strongest to deprive us of death: God would not exempt himselfe from that,
²⁷⁰
the misery of immortality in the flesh, he undertooke not that was in it immortall. Certainly there
is no happinesse within this circle of flesh, nor is it in the Opticks of these eyes to behold felicity; the first day of our Jubilee is death; the devill hath therefore fail’d of his desires; wee are happier with death than we should have beene without it: there is no misery but in himselfe where there is no end of misery; and so indeed in his own sense, the Stoick
²⁷¹
is in the right. Hee forgets that hee can die who complaines of misery, wee are in the power of no calamitie while death is in our owne.

45. Now besides this literall and positive kinde of death, there are others whereof Divines make mention, and those I thinke, not meerely Metaphoricall, as Mortification, dying unto sin and the world; therefore, I say, every man hath a double Horoscope, one of his humanity, his birth; another of his Christianity, his baptisme, and from this doe I compute or calculate my Nativitie, not reckoning those
Horæ combustæ
,
²⁷²
and odde dayes, or esteeming my selfe any thing, before I was my Saviours, and inrolled in the Register of Christ: Whosoever enjoyes not this life, I count him but an apparition, though he weare about him the sensible affections of flesh. In these morall acceptions,
²⁷³
the way to be immortall is to die daily, nor can I thinke I have the true Theory of death, when I contemplate a skull, or behold a Skeleton with those vulgar imaginations it casts upon us; I have therefore enlarged that common
Memento mori
,
²⁷⁴
into a more Christian memorandum,
Memento quatuor novissima
,
²⁷⁵
those foure inevitable points of us all, Death, Judgement, Heaven, and Hell. Neither did the contemplations of the Heathens rest in their graves, without a further thought of
Radamanth
or some judiciall proceeding after death, though in another way, and upon suggestion of their naturall reasons. I
cannot but marvaile from what
Sibyll
or Oracle they stole the prophesy of the worlds destruction by fire, or whence
Lucan
learned to say,

I beleeve the world growes neare its end, yet is neither old nor decayed, nor will ever perish upon the ruines of its owne principles.
²⁷⁷
As the worke of Creation was above nature, so is its adversary, annihilation; without which the world hath not its end, but its mutation. Now what force should bee able to consume it thus farre, without the breath of God, which is the truest consuming flame, my Philosophy cannot informe me. Some
²⁷⁸
beleeve there went not a minute to the worlds creation, nor shal there go to its destruction; those six dayes so punctually described, make not to them one moment, but rather seem to manifest the method and Idea of the great worke of the intellect of God,
²⁷⁹
than the manner how hee proceeded in its operation. I cannot dreame that there should be at the last day any such Judiciall proceeding, or calling to the Barre, as indeed the Scripture seemes to imply,
²⁸⁰
and the literall commentators doe conceive: for unspeakable mysteries in the Scriptures are often delivered in a vulgar and illustrative way, and being written unto man, are delivered, not as they truely are, but as they may bee understood;
²⁸¹
wherein notwithstanding the different interpretations according to different capacities may stand
firme with our devotion, nor bee any way prejudiciall to each single edification.

46. Now to determine the day and yeare of this inevitable time, is not onely convincible
²⁸²
and statute madnesse, but also manifest impiety; How shall we interpret
Elias
6000. yeares, or imagine the secret communicated to a Rabbi, which God hath denyed unto his Angels?
²⁸³
It had beene an excellent quære, to have posed the devill of
Delphos
,
²⁸⁴
and must needs have forced him to some strange amphibology; it hath not onely mocked the predictions of sundry Astrologers in ages past, but the prophecies of many melancholy heads in these present, who neither understanding reasonably things past or present, pretend a knowledge of things to come, heads ordained onely to manifest the incredible effects of melancholy, and to fulfill old prophesies,
²⁸⁵
rather than be the authors of new. ‘In those dayes there shall come warres and rumours of warres’,
²⁸⁶
to me seemes no prophesie, but a constant truth, in all times verified since it was pronounced: There shall bee signes in the Moone and Starres, how comes he then like a theefe in the night,
²⁸⁷
when he gives an item of his comming? That common signe drawne from the revelation of Antichrist
²⁸⁸
is as obscure as any; in our common compute he hath beene come these many yeares,
²⁸⁹
but for my owne part to speake freely, I am halfe of opinion that Antichrist is the Philosophers stone in Divinity, for the discovery and invention whereof, though there be prescribed
rules, and probable inductions, yet hath hardly any man attained the perfect discovery thereof. That generall opinion that the world growes neere its end, hath possessed all ages past as neerely as ours; I am afraid that the Soules that now depart, cannot escape that lingring expostulation of the Saints under the Altar,
Quousque Domine
?
How long, O Lord
?
²⁹⁰
and groane in the expectation of the great Jubile.
²⁹¹

47. This is the day that must make good that great attribute of God, his Justice, that must reconcile those unanswerable doubts that torment the wisest understandings, and reduce those seeming inequalities, and respective
²⁹²
distributions in this world, to an equality and recompensive Justice in the next. This is that one day, that shall include and comprehend all that went before it, wherein as in the last scene, all the Actors must enter to compleate and make up the Catastrophe of this great peece. This is the day whose memory hath onely power to make us honest in the darke, and to bee vertuous without a witnesse.
Ipsa sui pretium virtus sibi
, that vertue is her owne reward,
²⁹³
is but a cold principle, and not able to maintaine our variable resolutions in a constant and setled way of goodnesse. I have practised that honest artifice of
Seneca
, and in my retired and solitary imaginations, to detaine me from the foulenesse of vice, have fancyed to my selfe the presence of my deare and worthiest friends,
²⁹⁴
before whom I should lose my head, rather than be vitious, yet herein I found that there was nought but morall honesty, and this was not to be vertuous for his sake who must reward us at the last. I have tryed if I could reach that great resolution of his,
²⁹⁵
to be honest without a thought of Heaven or Hell; and indeed I found upon a naturall inclination, an inbred loyalty unto vertue, that I could serve her without a livery, yet not in that resolved and venerable way, but that the
frailty of my nature, upon an easie temptation, might be induced to forget her. The life therefore and spirit of all our actions, is the resurrection, and stable apprehension, that our ashes shall enjoy the fruit of our pious endeavours; without this, all Religion is a Fallacy, and those impieties of
Lucian, Euripedes
,
²⁹⁶
and
Julian
are no blasphemies, but subtile verities, and Atheists have beene the onely Philosophers.
²⁹⁷

48. How shall the dead arise, is no question of my faith; to beleeve onely possibilities, is not faith, but meere Philosophy; many things are true in Divinity, which are neither inducible by reason, nor confirmable by sense, and many things in Philosophy confirmable by sense, yet not inducible by reason. Thus it is impossible by any solid or demonstrative reasons to perswade a man to beleeve the conversion of the Needle to the North; though this be possible, and true, and easily credible, upon a single experiment unto the sense. I beleeve that our estranged and divided ashes shall unite againe, that our
separated dust after so many pilgrimages and transformations into the parts of mineralls, Plants, Animals, Elements, shall at the voyce of God returne into their primitive shapes; and joyne againe to make up their primary and predestinate formes. As at the Creation, there was a separation of that confused masse
²⁹⁸
into its species, so at the destruction thereof there shall bee a separation into its distinct individuals. As at the Creation of the world, all the distinct species that wee behold, lay involved in one masse, till the fruitfull voyce of God separated this united multitude into its severall species: so at the last day, when these corrupted reliques shall be scattered in the wildernesse of formes, and seeme to have forgot their proper habits, God by a powerfull voyce shall command them backe into their proper shapes, and call them out by their single individuals: Then shall appeare the fertilitie of
Adam
, and the magicke of that sperme that hath dilated into so many millions.
²⁹⁹
I have often beheld
as a miracle, that artificiall resurrection and revivification of
Mercury
, how being mortified
³⁰⁰
into thousand shapes, it assumes againe its owne, and returns into its numericall selfe. Let us speake naturally, and like Philosophers, the formes of alterable bodies in these sensible corruptions perish not; nor, as wee imagine, wholly quit their mansions, but retire and contract themselves into their secret and unaccessible parts, where they may best protect themselves from the action of their Antagonist. A plant or vegetable consumed to ashes, to a contemplative and schoole
³⁰¹
Philosopher seemes utterly destroyed, and the forme to have taken his leave for ever: But to a sensible Artist
³⁰²
the formes are not perished, but withdrawne into their incombustible part, where they lie secure from the action of that devouring element. This is made good by experience, which can from
the ashes of a plant revive the plant, and from its cinders recall it into its stalk and leaves again.
³⁰³
What the Art of man can doe in these inferiour pieces, what blasphemy is it to affirme the finger of God cannot doe in these more perfect and sensible structures? This is that mysticall Philosophy, from whence no true Scholler becomes an Atheist, but from the visible effects of nature, growes up a reall Divine, and beholds not in a dreame, as
Ezekiel
,
³⁰⁴
but in an ocular and visible object the types of his resurrection.

49. Now, the necessary Mansions of our restored selves are those two contrary and incompatible places wee call Heaven
and Hell; to define them, or strictly to determine what and where these are, surpasseth my Divinity. That elegant Apostle
³⁰⁵
which seemed to have a glimpse of Heaven, hath left but a negative description thereof; Which neither eye hath seen, nor eare hath heard, nor can enter into the heart of man: he was translated out of himself to behold it, but being returned into himselfe could not expresse it. Saint
Johns
description by Emeralds, Chrysolites, and pretious stones,
³⁰⁶
is too weake to expresse the materiall Heaven we behold. Briefely therefore, where the soule hath the full measure, and complement of happinesse, where the boundlesse appetite of that spirit remaines compleatly satisfied, that it can neither desire addition nor alteration, that I thinke is truely Heaven: and this can onely be in the enjoyment of that essence, whose infinite goodnesse is able to terminate the desires of it selfe, and the unsatiable wishes of ours; whereever God will thus manifest himselfe, there is Heaven, though within the circle of this sensible world. Thus the soule of man may bee in Heaven any where,
even within the limits of his owne proper body, and when it ceaseth to live in the body, it may remaine in its owne soule, that is its Creator. And thus wee may say that Saint
Paul
, whether in the body, or out of the body, was yet in Heaven.
³⁰⁷
To place it in the Empyreall, or beyond the tenth Spheare,
³⁰⁸
is to forget the worlds destruction; for when this sensible world shall bee destroyed, all shall then be here as it is now there, an Empyreall Heaven, a
quasi
vacuitie, when to aske where Heaven is, is to demand where the presence of God is, or where wee have the glory of that happy vision.
Moses
that was bred up in all the learning of the
Egyptians
, committed a grosse absurdity in Philosophy, when with these eyes of flesh he desired to see God,
³⁰⁹
and petitioned his Maker, that is truth it selfe, to a contradiction. Those that imagine Heaven and Hell
neighbours, and conceive a vicinity between those two extreames, upon consequence of the Parable, where
Dives
discoursed with
Lazarus
³¹⁰
in
Abrahams
bosome, do too grossely conceive of those glorified creatures, whose eyes shall easily out-see the Sunne, and behold without a Perspective,
³¹¹
the extremest distances: for if there shall be in our glorified eyes, the faculty of sight & reception of objects I could thinke the visible species
³¹²
there to be in as unlimitable a way as now the intellectuall. I grant that two bodies placed beyond the tenth Spheare, or in a vacuity, according to
Aristotle
Philosophy,
³¹³
could not behold each other, because there wants a body or Medium to hand and transport the visible rayes of the object unto the sense; but when there shall be a generall defect of either Medium to convey, or light to prepare & dispose that Medium, and yet a perfect vision, wee must suspend the rules of our Philosophy, and make all good by a more absolute piece of Opticks.