14.

them eternal life, and they shall never perifh." And John iv. "Whofoever drinketh of the water that I fhall give him, "shall never thirst; but the water that I fhall give him, shall "be in him a well of water, fpringing up into everlasting life." And again, John xi. 26. "Whofoever liveth and believeth in me, fhall never die." And once more, Rom. ii. 7. "them who by patient continuance in well-doing, feek for glory "and honour, and immortality, eternal life;" with multitudes more of like nature.

"To

Now if these be no vain and delufory promifes, (as to be fure they are not, being the words of the true and faithful God) then thofe fouls to whom they are made, muft live for ever: for if the fubject of the promises fail, confequently the performance of the promises muft fail too. For how fhall they be made good, when thofe to whom they are made, are perifhed?

Let it not be objected here, That the bodies of believers are concerned in the promifes as well as their fouls, and yet their bodies perish notwithstanding.

For we fay, though their bodies die, yet they fhall live again, and enjoy the fruit of the promises in eternal glory; and whilft their bodies lie in the grave, their fouls are with God, enjoying the covenanted bleffednefs in heaven, Rom. viii. 10, 11. and fo the covenant-bond is not loofed betwixt them and God, by death, which it must needs be, in cafe the foul perifh when the body doth. And upon this hypothefis, that argument of Chrift is built, Matth. xxii. 32. proving the refurrection from the covenant God made with Abraham, Ifaac and Jacob; "I am the "God of Abraham, and the God of Ifaac, and the God of Ja"cob: God is not the God of the dead, but of the living," q. d. If Abraham, Ifaac and Jacob, be perished in foul as well as in body, how then is God their God; what is become of the promife and covenant-relation? for if one correlate fail, the relation neceffarily fails with it. If God be their God, then certainly they are in being; "for God is not the God of the dead," i. e. of those that are utterly perished. Therefore it muft needs be, that though their bodies be naturally dead, yet their fouls ftill live; and their bodies muft live again at the refurrection by vir tue of the fame promise.

On the contrary, many threatnings of eternal mifery, after this life, are found in the fcriptures of truth, against ungodly and wicked perfons. Such is that in 2 Theff. i. 7, 8, 9. "The "Lord Jefus fhall be revealed from heaven in flaming fire, to render vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey

"not the gofpel of our Lord Jefus Chrift, who shall be punished "with everlafting deftruction, from the prefence of the Lord, "and the glory of his power." And speaking of the torments of the damned, Chrift thus expreffeth the mifery of fuch wretched fouls in hell, Mark ix. 44. "Where their worm dieth not, and "the fire is not quenched." But how fhall the wicked be punished with everlasting deftruction, if their fouls have not an everlasting duration? or how can it be faid, Their worm (viz. the remorse and anguifh of their confcience) dieth not, if their fouls die? Punishment can endure no longer than its subject endureth. If the being of the foul cease, its pains and punishments must have an end.

You fee then, there are everlasting promises, and threatenings to be fulfilled, both upon the godly and ungodly, "He that "believeth on the Son, hath everlafting life, and he that believ "eth not the Son, fhall not fee life, but the wrath of God abid"eth on him," John iii. 36. The believer shall never see spiritual death, viz. the feparation of his foul from God; and the un' believer shall never fee life, viz. the bleffed fruition of God; but the wrath of God fhall abide on him. If wrath must abide on him, he must abide also as the wretched subject thereof, which is another argument of the immortality of fouls.

ARGUMENT III.

The immortality of the foul is a truth afferted and attested by the univerfal confent of all nations and ages of the world. "We give much (faid || Seneca) to the prefumption of all men,” and that juftly; for it would be hard to think that an error fhould obtain the general confent of mankind, or that God would fuffer all the world, in all ages of it, to bow down under an univerfal deception.

This doctrine ticks clofe to the nature of man; it fprings up eafily, and without force from his confcience. It hath been allowed as an unquestionable thing, not only among Chriftians, who have the oracles of God to teach and confirm this doctrine, but among Heathens alfo, who had no other light, but that of pature, to guide them into the knowledge and belief of it. Learned Zanchius cites out of Cicero an excellent paffage to

Multum dare folemus præfumptioni omnium hominum cum de anima aternitate differimus, non leve momentum apud nos habet confenfus hominum aut timentium inferos, aut colentium. Ep. 17.

Senec.

* In omni re confenfio omnium gentium lex naturæ putenda eft eoque inftar milte demonftrationum calis confenfio apud bonos effe debet, Zanchius de immortalitate animarum, p. 644.

this purpose. "In every thing, faith he, the confent of all na"tions is to be accounted the law of nature; and therefore, "with all good men, it should be inflead of a thousand demon

itrations; and to refift it, (as he there adds), what is it, but to refift the voice of God?" and how much more, when, with his confent, the word of God doth alfo confent? As for the confent of nations, in this point, the learned author last mentioned, hath induftriously gathered many great and famous teftimonies from the ancient Chaldeans, Grecians, Pythagoreans, Stoics, Platonists, &c. which evidently shew they made no doubt of the immortality of their fouls. How plain is that of Phocylides ? ψυχη δε αθάνατος και αγηρος ζη δια παντος. Speaking of the foul, in oppofition to the body, which must be refolved into duft, he faith, "But for the foul, that is immortal, and "never grows old, but lives for ever." And Trifmegiftus, the famous and celebrated philofopher t, gives this account of man, "That he confifts of two parts, being mortal in respect of his "body, but immortal in refpect of his foul, which is his best "and principal part." Plato not only afferts the immortality of the fouls of men, but difputes for it; and, among other arguments, he urges this: That if it were not fo, "wicked men would certainly have the advantage of righteous "and good men, who, after they have committed all manner "of evils, fhould fuffer none." But what speak I of philofophers the moft barbarous nations in the world conftantly believe it. The Turks acknowledge it in their Alcoran; and though they grofly mistake the nature of heaven, in fancying it to be a paradife of fenfual pleasures, as well as the way thither, by their impoftor Mahomet; yet it is plain they believe the foul's immortality, and that it lives in pain or pleafure after this life.

The very favage and illiterate Indians are fo fully perfuaded of the foul's immortality, that wives caft themselves chearfully

† Ανθρωπος δίπλες, δια το σωμα θνητος, αθανατος ἢ δια ψυχην, τον σιωδη άνθρωπον.

+ E por yap, &c. Si enim mors diffolutio effet utriufque (corporis fe. et anima) lucrum foret malis cum moriuntur. Plato in Epift.

Why do I fpeak of the Turks, Tartars, Mufcovites, Indians, Perfians, and all other nations which are at this day barbarous ? None is fo barbarous and wicked, but he is convinced, that, after death, there are places in which fouls are either punished for their bad actions, or rewarded and bleft with delights for their good actions. Zaneh.

into the flames to attend the fouls of their husbands; and subjects, to attend the fouls of their kings into the other world. Two things are objected against this argument.

1. That fome particular perfons have denied this doctrine, as Epicurus, &c. and by argument maintained the contrary,

To which I antwer, That though they have done fo, yet, (1.) This no way thakes the argument from the confent of nations, because fome few perfons have denied it: we truly fay, the earth is fpherical, though there be many hills and rifings in it. If Democritus put out his own eyes, must we therefore fay all the world is blind?

(2.) It is worth thinking on, whether they that have questioned the immortality of the foul, have not rather made it the matter of their option and defire, than of their faith and perfuafion. We distinguish Atheists into three claffes, fuch as are fo in practice, in defire, or in judgment; but of the former forts there may be found multitudes, to one that is fo in his fettled judgment. If you think it strange that any man fhould with his foul to be mortal, Hierocles * gives us the true reafon of it: "A wicked man (faith he) is afraid of his Judge; and there"fore wishes his foul and body may perish together by death, ❝ rather than that it should come to God's tribunal.”

Object. 2. Nor can the strength of the argument be eluded by faying, "All this may be but an univerfal tradition," one na. tion receiving it from another.

Sol. For as this is neither true in itself, nor poffible to be made good, fo if it were, it would not invalidate the argument: for if it were not a truth agreeable to the light of nature, and fo eafily received by all men upon the propofal of it, it were impoffible that all the nations in the world fhould embrace it fo readily, and hold it so tenaciously as they do.

ARGUMENT IV.

The immortality of the foul may be evinced from the everlafting habits which are fubjected, and inherent in it. If these habits abide for ever, certainly fo must the fouls in which they are planted.

The fouls of good men are the good ground, in which the feed of grace is fown by the Spirit, Mat. xiii. 23. i. e. the fubjects in which gracious properties and affections do inhere and dwell, (which is the formal notion of a substance) and these implanted graces are everlasting things. So John iv. 14. "It fhall

Ο κακός αθάνατον είναι την αυτό ψυχήν ένα μη υπομένη τιμωρεμενος, και φθάνετον έχει δικασην. Hieroc

be in him a well of water, fpringing up into everlasting life," i. e. the graces of the Spirit shall be in believers, permanent habits, fixed principles, which shall never decay. And therefore that feed of grace, which is caft into their fouls at their regeneration, is in Pet. i. 23. called "incorruptible feed, which liv"eth and abideth for ever:" and it is incorruptible, not only confidered abstractly, in its own fimple nature, but concretely, as it is in the fanctified foul, its fubject: for it is faid, 1 Joha lii. "The feed of God remaineth in him." It abideth for ever in the foul. If then thefe two things be clear to us, viz. 1. That the habits of grace be everlasting;

9.

2. That they are infeparable from fanétified fouls;

It must needs follow, That the foul, their subject, is fo too, an everlasting and immortal foul. And how plainly do both thefe propofitions lie before us in the fcriptures? As for the immortal and indeterminable nature of faving grace, it is plain to him that confiders, not only what the fore-cited scriptures speak about it, calling it incorruptible feed, a well of water Springing up into everlasting life; but add to thefe, what is faid of thefe divine qualities, in 2 Pet. i. 4. where they are called the divine nature; and Eph. iv. 18. the life of God, noting the perpetuity of thefe principles in believers, as well as their refemblance of God in holiness, who are endowed with them.

I know it is a great question among divines, An gratia in renatis fit natura et effentia fua interminabilis? Whether thefe principles of grace in the regenerate, be everlafting and interminable, in their own nature and effence? For my own part, I think that God only is naturally, effentially, and abfolutely interminable and immortal. But thefe gracious habits, planted by him in the foul, are so by virtue of God's appointment, promife, and covenant. And fure it is, that by reafon hereof shey are interminate, which is enough for my purpofe, if they be not effentially interminable. Though grace be but a creature, and therefore hath a poffe meri, yet it is a creature begotten by the Word, and Spirit of God, which live and abide for ever, and a creature within the promise and covenant of God, by reafon whereof it can never actually die.

And then as for the infeparableness of these graces from the fouls in whom they are planted, how clear is this from John ii. 27. where fanctifying grace is compared to an unction, and this unction is faid to abide in them? And I John iii. 9. it is called the feed of God, which remaineth in the foul. All our natural and moral excellencies and endowments go away when we die; Job iv. 21. “ Doth not their excellency that is in them