puts off all those paffions and burdens with it; never spends one thought more about food and raiment, health and ficknefs, wives and children, riches or poverty, but lives henceforth after the manner of angels, Matth. xxii. 30. It is now unrelated to, and therefore unconcerned about all these things.

3. In the unbodied state it is perfectly freed from fin, both in the acts and habits; a mercy it never enjoyed fince the first moment it dwelt in the body. The cure of this disease was indeed begun in the work of fanctification; but it is not perfected till the day of the foul's glorification. 'Tis now, and not till now, a spirit made perfect; that is, a foul enjoying its perfect health and rectitude: No more groans, tears, or lamentations, upon the account of indwelling fin.

4. The way and manner of its converfe with, and enjoyment of God is changed. There are two mediums by which fouls converfe with God in the body, viz.

(1.) One internal, to wit, faith.

(2.) The other external, to wit, ordinances,

(1.) If a man walk with God on earth, it must be in the ufe and exercise of faith, Cor. v. 7. Nor can there be any communion carried on betwixt God and the foul without it, Heb. xi. 6.

(2.) The external mediums are the ordinances of God, or duties of religion, both public and private, Pfal. Ixiii. 2. Betwixt these two mediums of communion with God, this remarkable difference is found: The foul may fee and enjoy God by faith, in the want or abfence of ordinances; but there is no feeing or converfing with God, in the greatest plenty and purity of ordinances, without faith, Heb. iv. 2.

But in the fame moment the foul is cut off from union with the body, it is alfo cut off from both thefe ways of enjoying God, I Cor. xiii. 12, Ifà. xxxviii. 11, But yet the foul is no lofer; nay, it is the greatest gainer by this change. The child is no lofer by ceafing to derive its nourishment by the navel, when it comes to receive it by the mouth, a more noble way, whereby it gets a new pleafure in tafting the variety of all delectable food. Hezekiah bemoaned the lofs of ordinances upon his fuppofed death-bed, faying, "I fhall not fee the Lord, even "the Lord in the land of the living :" q. d. Now farewel temple and ordinances; I fhall never go any more into his temple, where my foul hath been fo often cheared and refreshed with the difplays of his grace and goodness; I fhall never more join with the affembly of his people on earth. And fuppofe he had

not, fure he would have loft nothing, had he then exchanged the temple at Jerufalem, for the temple in heaven; and communion with finful imperfect faints on earth, for fellowship with angels, and the fpirits of juft men made perfect." By this change we lofe no more than he lofeth, who whilst he stands delightfully contemplating the image of his dearest friend in a glafs, hath the glafs fnatched away by his friend, whom he now feeth face to face.

Upon this change of the mediums of communion, it will follow, that the communion betwixt God and the separate soul, excels all the communion it ever had with him on earth, in (1.) The clearness. (2.) The fweethefs.

(3) The conftancy of it.

(1.) Its vifions of God, in the ftate of feparation, are more clear, diftinct, and direct than they were on earth; clouds and fhadows are now fled away: The foul now feeth as it is seen, and knoweth as it is known; its apprehenfions of God there, differ from thofe it had here, as the crude and confused apprehenfions of a child do, from those we have in the manly state.

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(2.) They are alfo more fweet and ravishing: As our vi fions are, fo are our pleasures; perfect vifions produce perfect pleasures: The faculties of the foul now, and never till now, level to that rule, Matth. xxii. 37. The vifions of God com mand, and call forth all the heart and foul, mind and strength, into acts of love and delight. It was not fo here; if the fpirit was willing, the flesh was weak; but there the clog is off from the foot of the will.

(3.) More conftant, fixed, and fteddy. 'Tis one of the greatest difficulties in religion, to fix the thoughts, and cure the wildness and rovings of the fancy: The heart is not fteddy with God; and hence are its ups and downs, heatings and coolings; which are things unknown in the perfect ftate. By all which it apears, the change by diffolution is great and marvellous, both upon the body and foul, but upon the foul more especially.

Propofition 4. The fouls of the righteous, at the inftant of their feparation, are received by the bleffed angels, and by them transferred unto the place of bleffedness.

Though angels are by nature a fuperior order of spirits, differing from men in dignity, as the nobles and barons in the kingdoms of this world, differ from inferior fubjects; yet are they made miniftring fpirits, (i. e.) ferviceable creatures in the kingdom of providence, to the meaneft of the faints, Heb, i. 14. And herein the Lord puts a fingular honour upon his pea

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ple, in making fuch excellent creatures as angels ferviceable to them: Luther affigns to them a double office, to wit, to fing the praises of God on high, and to watch over his faints here below. Their ministry is distinguished into three branches : N89rxov, for admonition or warning; PuλaxTxov, for protection and defence; Borov, for fuccour, help and comfort. This laft office they perform more especially at the foul's departure: Like tender nurfes, they keep us whilft we live, and bring us home in their arms to our Father's houfe when we die.

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They are about our death-beds, waiting to receive their precious charge into their arms and bofoms. When Lazarus breathed out his foul, the text faith, it was carried by the an"gels unto Abraham's bofom," Luke xvi. 23. And upon this account, Tertullian calls them evocatores animarum, the callers forth of fouls. At the tranflation of Elijah, they appeared in the form of horfes and chariots of fire, 2 Kings ii. 11. Horfes and chariots are not only defigned for conveyance, but for conveyance in ftate; and truly, it is no fmall honour to have fuch a noble convoy and guard to attend our fouls to heaven.

Object. If it be demanded, What need is there of their help or company? Cannot God by his immediate hand and power gather home the fouls of his people to himself at death? He infpired them into our bodies without their help, and can receive them again when we expire them, without their aid.

Solut. True, he can do fo; but it hath pleafed him to appoint this method of our tranflation, not out of mere neceffity, but bounty. Souls afcend not to God in the virtue of the angels wings, or arms, but of Chrift's afcenfion. Had he not afcended as our head, and representative, all the angels in heaven could not have brought our fouls thither: He afcended by his own power, and we afcend by the virtue of his afcenfion. is therefore rather for the ftate and decorum, than any abfolute neceffity, that they attend us in our afcenfion.

God will not only have his people brought home to him fafely, but honourably: They fhall come to their Father's houfe in a becoming equipage, as the children of a king. This puts honour upon our afcenfion-day; that day is adorned by the attendance of fuch illuftrious creatures upon us. It is no finall honour which God herein defigns for us, that creatures of greater dignity than ourfelves, fhall be fent from heaven to attend, and wait upon us thither.

Yea, that our afcenfion-day fhould, in this, refemble Chrift's afcenfion, is an honour indeed. When he afcended, there were multitudes of thefe heavenly creatures to wait upon him,

Pfal. Ixviii. 17, 18. "The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels; the Lord is among them as in Si"nai, in the holy place. Thou haft afcended on high," &c. A cloud was prepared as a royal chariot, to carry up the King of glory to his princely pavilion; and then a royal guard of mighty angels to wait upon his chariot; if not for fupport, yet for the greater state, and folemnity of their Lord's afcenfion. And O what jubilations of bleffed angels were heard that day in heaven! How was the whole city of God moved at his coming! The triumph is not ended to this day, no, nor ever shall.

Now, herein God greatly honours his people, that there shall be fome resemblance, and conformity betwixt their afcenfion, and Chrift's; Angels rejoice to attend those to heaven, who must be their fellow-citizens for ever in heaven! It is convenient alfo, that those who had the charge of us all our life, should attend us to our Father's house at our death: In the one, they finish their ministry; in the other, they begin their more inti mate fociety,

Moreover, the angels are they whom God will employ, to gather together his elect from the four winds of heaven, at the great day, Matth. xxiv. 31. And who more fit to attend their fpirits to heaven fingly, than thofe who must collect them into one body at last, and wait upon that collective body, when they fhall be brought to Chrift? Pfal. Ixv. 14.

Object. But the fight, and presence of angels is exceeding awful, and overwhelming to human nature: It will rather aftonifo and terrify, than refresh and chear us, to find ourselves, all on a fudden, furrounded, and befet with fuch majestic creatures. We fee what effects the appearance of an angel hath had upon good men in this world: "We fhall die, (faith Manoah) for we have "feen God," Judges xiii. 22. So Eliphaz, "a fpirit passed be"fore my face; the hair of my flesh ftood up," Job iv. 15.

Solut. True, whilft our fouls inhabit thefe mortal and finful bodies, the appearance of angels is terrible to them, and cannot be otherwife, partly upon a natural, and partly upon a moral account. The dread of angels naturally falls upon our animal fpirits: They fhrink and tremble at the approach of spirits; not only the fpirits of men, but of beafts, quail at it. A dog, or a horse is terrified at it, as well as a man, Numb. xxii. 25. The dread of fpirits frikes the animal, or natural spirits prima

* As they, (i. e. angels) ferved the head, in like manner do they ferve the members. They rejoice to ferve them on earth, whom they fhall have afterwards for companions in heaven, Gerbard.

rily; and the mind, or rational foul, by confent.

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fo another caufe of fear in man, upon the fight, or presence of angels, viz. a confcioufnefs of guilt. Wherever there is guilt, there will be fear, efpecially upon any extraordinary appearance of God to us, though it be but mediately upon an angel.

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But when the foul is freed, both from flefh, and fin, and fhall enjoy itself in a nature like to thefe pure and holy fpirits, the dread of angels is then vanished, and the foul will take great content, and fatisfaction in their company and communion The foul then finds itself a fit companion for them; looks upon them as its fellow-fervants, for fo they are, Rev. xix. 1o. And the angels look upon the fpirits of juft men, not as inferiors, underlings, but with great refpect, as fpirits, in fome fenfe, nearer to Chrift than themselves: So that henceforth no dread falls upon us from the prefence of thefe excellent creatures; but each enjoyeth fingular delight, in each other's fociety. And thus we fee in what honourable and pleafing company the fouls of the just go hence to their Father's house, and boom.

Propofition 5. The foul is not fo maimed and prejudiced by its feparation from the body, but that it both can, and doth live, and act without it; and performs the acts of cogitation, and volition, without the aid, and miniftry of the body.

I know it is objected by them that affert the foul's fleeping till the refurrection, that though its effence be not destroyed by death, yet its operations are obftructed by the want, and abfence of the body, its tool, and inftrument: And thus they form their objection.

Object. All that the foul understands, it understands by species t; that is, the images of things which are firft formed in the phantafy: As when we would conceive the nature of a house, a Ship, a man, or a beast: we first form the image, or Species thereof in our fancy, and then exercife our thoughts about it: But this depending upon bodily organs, and inftruments, the feparated foul can form no fuch images: It hath no fuch innate fpecies of its own, but comes into the world an abrafa tabula, white paper; and being deprived by feparation of the help of fenfes, and phantafms, it confequently understands nothing.

+ There are three conditions requifite for the acts of the under ftanding. 1. The object, a being that is real and intelligible. 2. The Phantafm, or fenfible image lurking in the phantafy. 3. The intelligible image, which is a fpiritual accident, reprefenting to the understanding, in an ideal way, the material object that exias without the understanding.