same solid body, wherein I was crucified by the Jews, by miraculous Divine power, raised out of the sepulchre, and now to be found no more there. Agreeable to which of our Saviour Christ is that of Apollonius in Philostratus;" λαβοῦ μοι, ἔφη, καν μὲν διαφύγω σε, εἴδωλόν εἰμι· εἰ δὲ ὑπομείναιμι απτόμενος, πεῖθε καὶ ζῆν τέ με, καὶ μὴ ἀποβεβληκέναι τὸ σῶμα· Touch me and handle me, and if you find me to avoid the touch, then may you conclude me to be a spirit or ghost (that is, a soul departed); but if I firmly resist the same, then believe me really to live, and not yet to have cast off the body.—And, indeed, though spirits or ghosts had certain subtile bodies, which they could so far condense, as to make them sometimes visible to men; yet is it reasonable enough to think, that they could not constipate or fix them into such a firmness, grossness, and solidity, as that of flesh and bone is, to continue therein; or at least, not without such difficulty and pain, as would hinder them from attempting the same. Notwithstanding which, it is not denied, but that they may possibly sometimes make use of other solid bodies, moving and acting them, as in that famous story of Phlegon's," where the body vanished not, as other ghosts use to do, but was left a dead carcass behind. Now, as for our Saviour Christ's body, after his resurrection, and before his ascension; which notwithstanding its solidity in handling, yet sometimes vanished also out of his disciples' sight: this probably, as Origen conceived, was purposely conserved for a time, in a certain middle state, betwixt the crassities of a

a In Vita Apollonii Tyanci, lib. ix. cap. xii. p. 355.

In Libello de Rebus Mirabilibus, cap. i. in Jac. Gronovii Thesauro Antiq. Græcar. tom. viii. p. 2694.

mortal body, and the spirituality of a perfectly glorified, heavenly, and ethereal body.

But there is a place of Scripture, which, as it hath been interpreted by the generality of the ancient fathers, would naturally imply, even the soul of our Saviour Christ himself, after his death, and before his resurrection, not to have been quite naked from all body, but to have had a certain subtile or spirituous clothing, and it is this of St. Peter ; θανατωθεὶς μὲν σαρκὶ, ζωοποιηθεὶς δὲ τῷ 1 Pet. ii. 18, πνεύματι, ἐν ᾧ καὶ τοῖς ἐν φυλακῇ πνεύμασι που

to

19.

tin, in his 12th

ad Lit. c. 33.

venisse usque

quibus pecca

tur, ut eos sol

culta nobis sua

bat, nonimme

ρευθεὶς ἐκήρυξε Which being understood by those ancients of our Saviour Christ's descending into Hades or hell, is accordingly thus rendered in the vulgar Latin," Put to death in the flesh, of this St.Ausbut quickened in the spirit: in which book, De Gen. (spirit) also, he went and preached those Et Christi quispirits that were in prison," &c. So dem animam that the word veμarı, or spirit here, ad ea loca, in according to this interpretation, is to be tores craciantaken for a spirituous body; the sense vere, quos esse being this, That when our Saviour Christ solvendos ocwas put to death in the flesh, or the justitia jndicafleshly body, he was quickened in the rito creditur. spirit, or a spirituous body: in which (spirituous body) also, he went and preached to those spirits that were in prison, &c.-And doubtless it would be said, by the assertors of this interpretation, that the word spirit could not here be taken for the soul of our Saviour Christ, because this being naturally immortal, could not properly be said to be quickened and made alive. Nor could he, that is, our Saviour Christ's soul, be so well said to go, in this spirit neither, that is, in itself, the soul in the soul, to preach to the spirits in prison. They

would add also, that spirit here could not be taken for the Divine Spirit neither, which was the efficient cause of the vivification of our Saviour's -body at his resurrection; because then there would be no direct opposition betwixt being put to death in the flesh, and quickened in the spirit; unless they be taken both alike materially. As also the following verse is thus to be understood; that our Saviour Christ went in that spirit, wherein he was quickened, when he was put to death in the flesh, and therein preached to the spirits in prison. By which spirits in prison also would be meant, not pure incorporeal substances, or naked souls, but souls clothed with subtile spirituous bodies; as that word may be often understood elsewhere in Scripture. But thus much we are unquestionably certain of from the Scripture, that not only Elias, whose terrestrial body seems to have been, in part at least, spiritualized, in his ascent in that fiery chariot, but also Moses appeared visibly to our Saviour Christ and his disciples upon the mount, and therefore (since piety will not permit us to think this a mere prestigious thing) in real bodies; which bodies also seem to have been 'Avyoan, luciform or lucid, like to our Saviour's then transfigured body.

Again, there are sundry places of Scripture, which affirm, that the regenerate and renewed have here in this life a certain earnest of their future inheritance; which is their spiritual or heavenly body; as also the quickening of their mortal bodies is therein attributed to the efficiency of the spirit dwelling in them. Which is a thing that hath been taken notice of by some of the ancients, as Irenæus: "Nunc autem partem aliquam spiritus

sueti.]

ejus sumimus, ad perfectionem et præpa- 1. v. c. viii. [p. rationem incorruptelæ, paulatim assue- 301. edit. Masscentes capere et portare Deum. Quod et pignus dixit apostolus; hoc est, partem ejus honoris, qui a Deo nobis promissus est. Si ergo pignus hoc habitans in nobis jam spirituales effecit, et absorbetur mortale ab immortalitate."Now have we a part of that spirit for the preparation and perfection of incorruption; we being accustomed by little and little to receive and bear God. Which also the apostle hath called an earnest; that is, a part of that honour which is promised to us from God. If therefore this earnest (or pledge), dwelling in us hath made us already spiritual, the mortal is also swallowed up by immortality. And Novatian," "Spiritus Sanctus id agit in nobis, ut ad æternitatem et ad resurrectionem immortalitatis corpora nostra perducat, dum illa in se assuefacit cum cœlesti virtute misceri." This is that which the Holy Spirit doth in us, namely, to bring and lead on our bodies to eternity, and the resurrection of immortality; whilst in itself it accustometh us to be mingled with the heavenly virtue. Moreover, there are some places, also, which seem to imply, that good men shall, after death, have a further inchoation of their heavenly body, the full completion whereof is not to be expected before the resurrection or day of judgment. We know, that "if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan earnestly." And, verse 5. "He that hath wrought

b

a De Trinitate, cap. xxix. p. 450, ad calcem Operum Tertulliani, b 2 Cor. v. 1.

us for the self-same thing is God, who also hath given us the earnest of the Spirit." Now how these preludiums and prelibations of an immortal body can consist with the soul's continuance after death, in a perfect separation from all manner of body, till the day of judgment, is not so easily conceivable.

Lastly, It is not at all to be doubted, but that Irenæus, Origen, and those other ancients, who entertained that opinion of souls being clothed after death with a certain thin and subtile body, suspected it not in the least to be inconsistent with that of the future resurrection; as it is no way inconsistent for one, who hath only a shirt or waistcoat on, to put on a suit of clothes, or exterior upper-garment. Which will also seem the less strange, if it be considered, that even here in this life, our body is, as it were, two-fold, exterior and interior; we having, besides the grossly tangible bulk of our outward body, another interior spirituous body, the soul's immediate instrument, both of sense and motion; which latter is not put into the grave with the other, nor imprisoned under the cold sods. Notwithstanding all which that hath been here suggested by us, we shall not ourselves venture to determine any thing in so great a point, but sceptically leave it undecided.

The third and last thing in the forementioned philosophic or Pythagoric cabala is concerning those beings superior to men, commonly called by the Greeks demons, which Philo tells us are the same with angels amongst the Jews, and accordingly are those words, demons and angels,

* De Insomniis, p. 586.

a