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CHAP. III. Of the Creation of the Heavens, the Angels, the Elements, Light, Day and Night.

I Shall now insist more largely on the particular Creatures, and draw some Consectaries from them, saying little of the reasonable Creatures, Angels and Men; because I intend more fully to treat of them by themselves.

The Creation of the Heavens is a great and wonderful work of God; the Heavens were not always, neither came they by chance, or any other way, but by the wonderful power of God creating them. So the Scripture telleth us often, Psal. 102. 15. Isa. 40. 12. & 22. & 42. 5. & 45. 2. & 48. 13. God frequently challengeth to himself the glory of this exceeding great work, alleging it as an effect of his wonderful power and greatness. The excellency and greatness of this work appears in divers things:

1. The Abstruseness of the matter.
2. The Perfection of the form.
3. The exceeding hugeness of its Quantity.
4. The height of it.
5. Its swift motion.

Lastly, The excellent Usefulness of it for the Creatures here below, and all other things contained in it.

First, The Matter of the Heavens is dark and hidden, and goes beyond the power of mortal Creatures, certainly to determine of it. Philosophers know not what to say here; some of them do think, that the upper Heavens are made of the same matter with these inferior bodies; and some again do deny it, and think it consists of another, which they call the fifth Essence; because they perceive it to be of such different working and qualities from the things below.

Secondly, The Perfection of the Figure of the Heavens, and all the Stars of Heaven doth marvelously grace it: For it is of an Orbicular or round form, a circle encompassing the earth and waters round, which is of itself also for the main Orbicular; and this concerning the Stars our senses do declare, and concerning the whole Heavens the motions of the Stars, which our eye doth tell us: for the Sun riseth every Morning over against the place it did set the Evening before, and so evinceth that its course is round : The round figure is the most beautiful, strong, perfect and capacious figure, and this may mind us of God's Infiniteness, Perfection, and Unchangeableness.

Thirdly, Consider the hugeness of its Quantity: for who can measure the back-side of Heaven? or tell how many miles space that mighty Circle doth contain? The Globe of Earth and Water is very great, but all that is, as it were, an undiscernable point, compared to the whole Globe of Heaven: how incomprehensibly great is he which hath made a building so great? The whole circuit of the heavens, wherein are the fixed Stars, is reckoned by Astronomers to be a thousand and seventeen millions of miles at least.

Fourthly, It is a high and stately building, Job 22. 12. an hundred and sixty millions of miles high from Earth to Heaven: It is so far by the Astronomers rules. It is a wonder (saith one) that we can look up to so admirable a height, and that the eye is not tired in the way. If this ascending line could be drawn right forward, some that have calculated curiously, have found it five hundred years journey unto the starry Heaven. This putteth us in mind of the infinite mercy and goodness of God, Psal. 103. 3. and of his Majesty; The highest Heavens are a fit Palace for the most High, Psal. 104. 3.

Fifthly, Its admirable swift Motion and Revolution in four and twenty hours, which our conceits cannot follow; teacheth us, that God is far more swift and ready to help us in our need. A Bullet out of a Musket flies swiftly, it will sly an hundred and eighty miles an hour according to its motion. The Sun moves swifter, 1160000 miles in one hour; the fixed Stars some of them two and forty millions of miles each hour.

Macrobius saith by Hercules the driver a way of evils, is meant the Sun, whence Porphyry interprets those twelve labors of his so often celebrated by the Poets, to be the twelve Signs of the Zodiac yearly run thorough by the Sun. The Philosophers have ascribed certain intelligences to the Orbs to move them, but there is no warrant for it in Scripture; they say the Orbs move regularly, which cannot be without some understanding mover: there is the same order in inferior creatures, and that which worketh by nature worketh equally always. Archimedes the great Mathematician did make Sphaeram automatam, a Sphere to move itself, which many yet imitate. Poterit ergo sine angelis movere sphaeram suam homo, non poterit Deus? saith Ludovicus Vives, Vossius also denies it.

Lastly, the use of it is admirable, the motion of the heavenly bodies is the cause of generation and corruption here below: if they should cease moving, the being of sublunary bodies would cease. The inferior heavens are fitted for the generation of Meteors, Rain, Snow, Thunder, Lightning, by their fit distance as it were from the Earth and Stars. Here is room for the making and showing of them all. The lower part of it also, by reason of its thinness and subtlety, is fit for the flying of Birds, and for the breathing and the living of man and beast; and it is fitted to be enlightened by the Sun-beams, and to receive that illumination and heat, without which the Creatures here below could not subsist, and the stars, chiefly the Sun, are placed at a convenient distance; and it is sitted for the swift motion of the heavenly bodies, in regard of its rarity and subtleness, which if it were thick and gross, could not have so speedy a passage through, or about the same; especially the highest heavens are fitted for the in habitation of those immortal persons; some of which do, and others shall inhabit a being so spacious, bright, and every way glorious, that the multitude of those happy persons may have space enough to see the beauty of God.

The Philosophers divide the Region of the world into two Regions, the Celestial, and Elementary Region. The Celestial, they divide into divers Orbs, or Globes: for the Heaven of heavens, sedes Beatorum, the seat of the blessed Saints and Angels, they had little knowledge of, if any at all. The first moveable, as they termed it, the highest Orbe, by the unspeakable swift circumrotation of which, they thought all the other Orbes were carried from East to West, in the space of 24 hours. This is the tenth Globe or Orbe; the next they call the Crystalline or watery Orb, because it is clear bright, and apt to shine through as water. The next is the Starry heaven, which hath eight Spheres, one for the fixed Stars, and seven other for the Planets, each Planet having (as they say) his distinct Orbe. Saturn is the uppermost, next Jupiter, then Mars, in the midst the Sun, then Venus, next Mercury, the last and lowest of all is the Moon. So is the division of the heavenly Region; the Elementary they divide into the region of fire next to the Moon, and of air next to that; and that they distinguish into three Regions, the highest, middle, and lowest; then that of the Water and Earth, compounded together; so they: But now the Scriptures divide the World into two parts, Heaven, and Earth, as you read in the first words of the Bible, In the beginning God made Heaven and Earth. By Earth, it meaneth this Globe of Earth and Water, where Men, Beasts, and Fishes are. By Heaven, all the space from the Earth upward; and of this Heaven it maketh three parts:

1. The highest Heaven, the Heaven of Heavens, 1 Kings 8. 27. the habitation of God himself, and all his Saints and Angels, John 14. where God reveals his glorious presence to them forever. This is called by Paul the third Heaven, 2 Cor. 12. 4. for its situation, above the Air and Sky, both which have the name of Heaven, and Paradise , 2 Cor. 12. 4. because the earthly Paradise was a figure of it; and because it is a place of endless joy and pleasure.

2. The Starry Sky, where the Stars are; it is described ie Job to be firm as a molten Looking-glass.

3. The lower Heavens; all that place above our heads to the Starry Heaven. Hence the clouds are called the clouds of Heaven, and the Fowls of Heaven, and Birds are said to fly in the face of the Heavens.

Everyone is to fall out with himself, and blame himself for slighting and neglecting the consideration of this work, that offers itself so constantly to our eyes, even this so curiously wrought Curtain, which God hath spread forth, especially let us blame ourselves for not seeing God in the workmanship of heaven; that we take not notice of him, as the Author of it, and raise our hearts higher then the heavens, to him that measures them forth as with a Span: we should believe that he is so Great, Good, and Wise, as this Heaven proclaimeth him the Maker thereof to be. Let us see and bewail this blindness; there is no place in the earth, which hath not the Heavens spread over it. Oh that we could put ourselves in mind of him that did spread out the Heavens, and remember, that be sees us everywhere; for where any work of his is to be seen, surely there is himself to be seen; and there he sees all things that are there; especially, let us learn to presle this knowledge upon our will and affections, that it may be get in us obedience, love, fear, joy, confidence, and other holy virtues; without which, all talking, yea and thinking of God, is idle and fruitless. Let us press ourselves to become subject to him, who hath the heavens at command, because he made them, to love him that hath formed, for our use, so excellent an house, so richly vaulted above; see the invisible things of him that made all in these things which you behold, thy conversation should be there where Christ is, Col. 3. There is thy Fathers house, thine own Country, thy inheritance. It is a great deal of comfort to God's people, that have such a Father, who can so easily stretch out Heaven, trust in him for house-room, that can build a world with so much ease.

For the Angels (because I intend to speak more largely of them afterwards) I shall here only answer one question about them.

Why are they not spoken of in the Creation, where man and beasts are mentioned, and why is not the special day named wherein they were made?

Answ. Not so much, for fear the Jews, a people prone to Idolatry, should have worshipped them: for then by the same reason Moses should have forborne to have mentioned them in the whole story of Genesis, which was published at the same time, and to the same people, that the first part of it: but it may be to give us to understand, that God did not use any of their help in the Creation, and had no need of them at all, but made the whole world without them, or because he relates the making of sensible things only, but that they were created, appears, Col. 1. 16.

The Scripture hath not so clearly expressed the precise time and day of their Creation, therefore Ambrose and Danaus confess that they know not when they were created. But it is probable they were made with the highest Heaven, the first day of the week.

As man was then first made, after his habitation the earth was made and adorned; so it is probable that the Angels were made together in a great multitude, after the Heavens their habitation was finished. Chemnit in loc▪ commun.

Gen. 2. 1. The heavens and all the host of them. It is plain from Job 38. 7. that they were made before the Earth. When God laid the foundations of the earth, and laid the Corner▪ stone thereof: then the Sons of God (that is, the Angels, Job 17.) shouted for joy.

An Element is that whereof anything is compounded, and itself uncompounded. Each element is superior to other, not more in place then dignity.

The dry land is called earth, which is a firm, cold, and dry Element, round and heavy, hanging immovably in the midst of the world, fit for habitation.

The Psalmist describes the creation of the earth, Psal. 104 5. Who hath laid the foundation of the earth, or founded the earth upon his Basis, that it should not be iremoved forever. The earth is the heaviest and lowest element. It is so made that it doth stand firm in its place, so that neither the whole earth is moved out of its place, nor yet the great parts of it. This is an exceeding wonderful work of God to settle the earth so upon certain foundations, that it is not shaken out of its place. Take a little piece of earth not bigger then ones fist, • ay then ones eye, or the apple of it: hold it up in the air, let it fall, it will never cease moving till it come to lie upon some solid body, that it may hold up and stay the motion of it. Now how is it, that this whole lump of earth, the whole body I say of the earth hangeth fast in the wide and open air, and doth not sway and move now hither and now thither? what is it that holdeth it up so stead • ast in the very midst of the air? It is God's work who hath founded it on his Basis that it cannot be moved. This work is often mentioned in the Scripture, Job 26. 7. There is nothing which might hold it up, and yet behold it hangeth still and qu • et, as if it had some pillar or base upon which to rest itself. The Lord doth in larger words commend it to the consideration of Job, when himself comes to speak with him, Job 38. 4. & 6. God there compareth himself to a builder that lays the foundation, and then sets up the building by line and measure, and convinceth Job of his weakness, that knoweth not how this earth should be set up or founded, whereas the Lord himself effected this building long before Job was. David telleth of it, Psal. 24. 2. as a ground of God's right unto it, and to all things that are in it: for saith he, He hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods. And Solomon mentions it, Prov. 8. 29. and 30. 4. Eccles. 1. 4. This is a great work, because it is both necessary and unsearchable. It is necessary, for it is the cause of the order of things in all the world, and of their not being jumbled and confounded together. If the lowest part of any building be not firm, all that is built upon it will totter and tumble, and come down quickly: so if the earth, this lowest part of the world should shake or reel, and be apt to move hither and thither, the things that be upon it by nature, or that are built upon it by the workmanship of man, could not possibly subsist or endure, Rivers and Channels would be daily altered, dry ground would ever and anon become Sea, and Sea dry ground: trees would often totter and fall, or else be chan ged from place to place: buildings and houses would still be falling and tumbling down off the earth, did it not keep its own room: nay heaven and earth would come together, utter confusion would overcome the face of the earth, and men, beasts, and all things below would come to nothing. So needful it was for this great Architect to set the Corner-stone of the earth fast, firm, and immovable▪ But the cause of it is unsearchable, who can find out to the full, the reason of this so necessary a work? Every heavy thing we see must have something to keep it up, something on which to rest itself, that it may go no further but abide where it is: but what doth this earth rest on? How is it held so even in the very midst, and swayed neither one way nor another? who can tell me a full, just, satisfactory reason in nature? We must not think that God doth hold it up by an immediate, violent, supernatural, or miraculous working, but in a natural way, by ordering the principles of nature so, that they shall necessarily concur to effect this settledness. Philosophers give this reason of it, they say, the simple bodies were made, some of a light, subtle, thin, and spiritual nature: and their property is to ascend, to go upward still, so as the light still flies higher; and some of a more gross, thick, and heavy nature, and the property of these is to move downward, and still the heavier to make itself a way through the lighter, and to press toward the Center, that is the middle point of the whole round of the world; for it must be confessed that the world is round. Wherefore seeing every part and portion of the earth presseth toward the very middle point of all, it cannot be, but that all must stand fast in the midst, seeing each part thronging the other, and leaning upon the other toward the very middle: all will be quiet if the parts be even poised. But now how heavy things should be made so to move toward the Center, and how each part should so evenly move, and a number of other questions more, let them answer that are able, especially seeing the earth doth not carry in itself to sense, a perfect, even, and smooth roundness, it is hard then to answer to the question which God propounded to Job, Upon what be the sockets of it fastened? It is a work of God exceeding our capacity, and must therefore quicken and call up our admiration.

We should blame ourselves for so seldom putting ourselves in mind of this great work, to stir up ourselves to magnify the Author of it, and make it an argument of our blessing his Name, for which David speaketh of it, Psal. 104. or of humbling ourselves before him in acknowledgement of his power and wisdom, and of our weakness and folly, to which end it is mentioned in other places, or indeed to any good purpose of informing ourselves the better, either of his nature or our duty. Oh how brutish and blockish are we! So strange and so mighty a work is done and continued in our sight, here it was done before I was here, and here it will remain and be continually done after I am gone hence. I enjoy the benefit of it as well as any other, and with all others, and yet when did I take it into consideration? When did I once offer it to the serious meditation of my mind? When did I say to myself, How doth this great ball of earth remain immovable in the midst of this wide and spacious Heaven? Why doth it not reel or totter toward the North or South, the East or West, or now upward, now downward? What hand doth hold it up, and that so steadfastly, that for thousands of years it hath not moved? surely some potent and intelligent workman hath in such a wonderful manner reared up and founded this building. This is he whom we call God; why do I not fasten in myself a more sure and firm notion of his being, and a more lively, firm, and effectual acknowledgement of his excellency?

We are worthy of great blame that have scarce ever directed our minds to the contemplation and fruitful meditation of this great act of God among the rest, for any good, spiritual, and holy intent. Scholars sometimes in their Philosophical studies stumble upon these questions, and set their wits on work to find out the natural reason of them, but alas in how unsanctified a manner, so as not at all to enforce the thing upon their souls, for making of them more thankful and obedient! But for the plain man that is no Scholar, though he have wit enough for all things else, yet he hath no wit to enter upon these cogitations: and when he findeth the matter so far above his reach, yet to tell himself that this is one of God's works, and so to call on himself to fear, know, and obey him, this, this is that we must every man lament in himself, as a just and due cause why the Scripture should ascribe brutishness unto us, and we unto ourselves, and why we should present ourselves before the divine Majesty with bashful and lowly confessions of our wrong done to God, in robbing him of the honor due unto him for his works which ourselves have the fruit of. Secondly, to ourselves, in depriving ourselves of the best and most excellent fruit of them, which is to be led by them above themselves unto him.

This may exhort everyone of us to take this work of God from David, and to make it as it were our theme, or the object of our meditations. Whosoever applieth himself to raise up such thoughts, shall find a great unaptness in himself, and a kind of weariness to them with a vehement inclination to entertain other •• ncies, and the Devil will take occasion hence to dissuade him from doing the duty at all, as if it were as good omit it, as perform it so weakly: it is a fall • e tale which Satan tells, for God hath promised acceptance to the weakest endeavors, in calling himself a Father, but to accept of the non-performance he hath never promised, for even a Father cannot do that.

Lastly, we must learn to seek unto God, and trust in him for spiritual stability of grace in our souls, and must thus importune him. Lord, when there was never an earth, thou madest one, and didst lay the foundation of it so sure, that no force nor skill can move it. O, thou canst also create a frame of holiness in my heart and soul, and so stablish, settle, and confirm it that it shall never be mov • d. I beseech thee do it, and trust that th • u wilt do this as thou hast done the former. One prime use to which we must improve these natural benefits, is to quicken our prayers, and confirm our faith in begging, and expecting such as are spiritual. When God will confirm the faith of his people, and win them to call upon him for good things, he puts them in mind of these wonders in nature, they must make use of them therefore for this purpose.

The second Element is water , so necessary a creature, as nothing can be more dangerously or uncomfortably wanting to the life of man. It is an Element moist in some degree, and cold in the highest, therefore it cools the body, and tempers the heat that it grow not excessive. It hath manifold uses constantly. Triplex maxim aquarum est usus, in irrigando, in abluendo, in navigando, Vossius.

1. We and our Cattle drink of it, and neither can continue without water or something made of it, our bread must be kneaded with it, and our meat boiled with it.

2. It serves to wash our bodies and the apparel we wear: if our hands and feet were never washed, what an evil smell should we carry about?

3. It makes the earth fruitful. The Husbandman looseth his labor, if after sowing there come no rain; it is

1. Of large and common use, no Country can want it, neither rich nor poor, man nor beast.

2. Of constant use, we must have it daily, or something made of it, and our beasts also.

3. Very profitable, we drink it, and wash with it, and our meat is prepared by it, and beasts drink it.

Because of so many good things in water, God himself in his word hath so often • ompared the grace of his Spirit with it, Isa. 55. 1. John 4. 14. Rev. 22. 17. Divine grace purgeth the soul from sin, extinguisheth the heat of anger, lust, and other perturbations, satisfies the desires of the soul thirsting after God.

It reprehends us, that so ungratefully enjoy and devour this benefit without lifting our hearts up to God, and praising him for it; A secret Atheism prevails in our hearts, which is the cause of this great blockishness and ingratitude, and corrupts all things to us, and forfeits them, and provokes God's justice against us, Say, Lord, thou mightest justly choke me for the time to come, for want of water, that have not been particularly thankful to thee for this mercy. We should bring in the parcels of God's goodness for bread, water, fire; when thou washest thy hands, let thy heart be lifted up to God that made the Element; Stay, O that I could praise, love, and obey him, that hath done this for me.

The usefulness, abundance, and easiness to come by; doth highly commend this benefit, and the giver of it, showing water to be very good, and ourselves much beholding to him that giveth it.

Anciently, in th • se warmer Countries especially, water was the usual drink of men; therefore in the description of the cost of families in house-keeping, when we read of so many Oxen and Sheep slain, and so much meal and fine flower, we read not of any wine; which would have been mentioned, if it had been usually drunk.

3. The Air or all the void place between the clouds and the earth, giving breath of life to all things that breathe, this is the third Element, light and subtle, moving upward, not downward, because it hath no heaviness in it.

It is divided into three regions or stages. The highest is said to be exceeding hot, and also dry, because it is near the fiery Element and Stars, by the force of whose beams it receiveth the heat, which is much increased by following the motions of the Heavens. The lowest region is (they say) hot and moist: hot by the reflection of the Sun-beams meeting with the earth, and moist from its own proper nature, and by reason of the vapors exhaled out of the earth and water: or rather it is variable; now hot, now cold, sometime temperate, differing according to times and seasons of the year, and places also, or several climates. The middle region of the air, is cold in respect of the two other, because it cannot follow the motions of the Heavens (as the upper region doth) being hindered by the tops of mountains. 2. Being free from the reflex beams of the Sun, by which the lower region of the air is made hot.

The air is most thin, without light or color, but apt to receive heat, light and cold, heavier then the fire, lighter then the earth or water, placed in the midst of them, fit for breathing, seeing, smelling and moving.

This Element also leads us to God. For 1. It truly and really subsisteth though it be not seen: So also the Lord, the Maker of it, hath a real, but invisible existence. 2. It is everywhere within and without us, so is God everywhere present. 3. It is the preserver of my life, and we may say of it truly, as the Apostle of God himself, in it (under God) we live, move, and have our being.

4. Fire, which is (some say) to be understood in light, an adjunct and quality of it, Scaliger would prove a fiery Element because fire tends thither. First, God made the Elements of the Earth and Water, which in Geography make one Globe. Others say light neither is that Element, nor proceeds from it, but the Sun: however I shall handle it here among the works of the first day.

Without light God's other works could not have been discovered by men. Light is an excellent work of God, tending to manifest his excellency to men, it is a comfortable thing to behold the light, Psal. 104. 2. Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment, that is, createdst the light: thereby showing his excellency as a man doth by making and wearing a rich and glorious suit of cloths: he made and doth maintain the light in its perfection.

God expresseth his greatness above Job, in that he could not make light, nor knew not what it was, q. d. Job, thou art a mean Creature, thou dost not create nor order the light, neither dost thou know the nature and working of it. The greatness of this work appears principally by two considerations.

1. The hidden, abstruse, and difficult nature of it. Philosophers cannot tell what to say of it, whether it be a substance or accident: and if a substance, whether corporeal or incorporeal and spiritual, it is a quality (say they) which makes other things visible: that is the effect of it. This word, light, in English, signifieth both that which the Latins call lux. and that which they call lumen, which yet are two distinct things: The first being in the Sun or Moon properly, the second in the air, and an effect of the other.

Some think that it is a substance, and one of the simple substances, which they call Elements; of which compounded substances are made, by mixing them together; and is nothing but the Element of fire, which Philosophers speak of▪ being more subtle theu the air. And as the water compassed the earth, and the air the water, so did light the air, and was far greater then the air, as that was then the water and earth, so as this is the highest of all the Elements. See Sir Kenelm • Digb. Treatise of Bod. c. 7.

2. It is very useful, needful, and beneficial; For first it carrieth heat in it, and conveyeth heat, and the coelestial influences unto all other things. 2. It distinguisheth day and night each from other: without it, what were the world but a dungeon?

3. It is exceeding necessary for the dispatch of all business.

4. To make the beautiful works of God visible, Heaven and Earth, and dissipate those sad thoughts and sorrows, which the darkness both begetteth and maintaineth.

1. We cannot see light without light, nor know God without his teaching.

2. This serves to condemn ourselves which cannot see God in this light, though we see it with content, we should lament this blindness. When the day begins to peep in at your windows, let God come into your thoughts, he comes clothed and thus attired, tell yourselves how beautiful and excellent he is.

3. It may exhort us to labor to raise up our hearts to God in hearty thankfulness for the light, How merciful and gracious art thou, who givest me light and the sight of it! take heed of abusing it to sin, and thy eyes, whereby thou discernest it, especially magnify God that giveth you spiritual light, and sight. Christ is the light of the world; natural darkness is terrible, light comfortable, what is spiritual?

Light is so pure, fair and clear, that nothing can pollute it, a resemblance of God's infinite purity.

The creation of day and night, and the distinction and vicissitude of both, is the last thing in the first days work.

Day is the presence of light in one half of the world, and night the absence of it in the other. So that the dispute whether day or night were first, seems superfluous, seeing they must needs be both together: for at what time the light is in one half of the world, it must needs be absent from the other; and contrarily, for all darkness is not night, nor all light day: but darkness distinguished from light, that is night, and light distinguished from darkness, that is day; unless we will take day for the natural, not the artificial day; that is, the space of 24 hours, in which the Sun accompl • sheth his diurnal motion about the earth. Darkness is nothing but the absence of light. Night is the space of time in every place, when the light is absent from them. Day is the space of time in every place, when the light is present with them; it is not simply the presence of light, but presence of light in one half of the world, when the other is destitute of it; and night is not simply the absence of light, but the absence of it from one half of the world, when the other half enjoyeth it. God made the Sun the chief instrument of continuing the course of day and night forever, by its diurnal and constant motion. This is a wonderful work of God, and to be admired.

The Scripture notes it, The day is thine, and the night also is thine, saith the Psalmist, and the ordinances of day and night cannot be changed.

The greatness of this work appeareth in the cause of it, and the beneficial effects.

First, for the cause, it is the incredibly swift motion of the Sun which goeth round about the world in thes ace of 24. hours, that is, the space of 60 miles every hour in the earth, but how many thousand 60 miles in its own circle or circumference, for the earth is a very small thing, compared to the Sun. The body of the Sun is 166 times (as it is thought) greater then the earth, therefore the circumference that it goes must needs be at least so much larger then the compass of the Earth, therefore its course must needs be at least 160 times 60 miles every hour, that is, almost 16000 miles every hour, that is, 166 miles every minute.

The celerity of this motion * is incredible, it goes beyond the thoughts of a man to conceive distinctly of the passage through every place; if a man should divide the circumference of the circle of the Sun into certain parts, he could not so soon have thought of them, as the Sun runs through them. God doth this great work, it is thought to be caused by the turning round of the highest Sphere or the Firmament, which pulling along with itself the inferior Orbes, makes them to move according to its course: but who can give a reason why that Sphere itself should go so swiftly, even much more swiftly then the Sun, because it is far higher then the Sun, as much as that is higher then the earth: but the immediate power of God who doth move all in moving this one. But that God should make the Sun fulfil such a daily race to make day and night, it highly commends the work.

Again, the usefulness of it is great: for if it should be in any place always night, what could they do? how should they live? How would anything grow, seeing the nights are cold, light and heat being companions, and cold and darkness companions. If no light had been in the world, the world would not have been a place fit for living things. But if one half only of the world should have had light with it always, it would have caused excessive heat, and so would have burnt up and consumed all things, and been no less harmful then the defect of heat: but now the succession of one of these to the other, viz. light and heat to darkness and cold, doth so temper them by a kind of mixture, that it is in such proportion in every place, as is necessary to bring forth all sorts of living things, especially the fruits of the earth. So God hath assigned such a way and race to the Sun, which by his presence makes day, and by his absence night, as was fit, and only fit for the quickening, enlivening, and comfort of every kind of living creature, so that upon this course the well-being, yea the very being almost of all things doth depend.

We should lament and bewail our exceeding great blindness, that live day after day, and night after night, and yet busy not ourselves about this work, nor se • God in it, though it be so constant as it was never stopped but twice s • nce the beginning of the Creation, viz. in Hezekiah 's time by going back of the Sun, and in Joshua 's time by stopping of the Sun for a certain time by the immediate power of God.

We have the profit of the day and of the night, but neither in one nor other do we mark the wisdom, goodness, and power of God. In the night men rest and refresh their bodier with sleep, wild beasts then wake and hunt for their prey. In the day men and tame creatures make and dispatch their business, and eat and drink, and wild beasts then rest in their dens. God is still working for us, our thoughts are still idle towards him: thir is a proof of our Atheism and estrangement from him; this is the blindness of our minds, a not being able to discern of things by discourse of reason, and the power of understanding; for the conceiving of which, just and plain reasons are offered unto us. There is a natural blindness of the eye, when it is unable to discern things by the light of the Sun: this is felt and complained of, but spiritual blindness of mind is, when it is unable to discern supernatural truths which concern the soul, and another and better life, by the use of reason, and help of those principles which are as light unto it: this is not felt nor lamented, but it is therefore not felt, because it is so natural to us, and because we brought it into the world. The beginning of the cure of spiritual blindness, is to see it: let us see it therefore, and be troubled at it; why do not I see God's great work in making night and day to succeed each other?

Let us look up to God in this work, and meditate on it at fit times, in the morning so soon as we are awake, and begin to see the darkness vanquished, and the light conquering, and that the Sun is raised above our Horizon, and is come to visit our parts again, it were a fruitful thing to think thus. How great a journey hath the Sun gone in this little time wherein I have been asleep, and could observe nothing, and now returned again as it were to call me up? say, Lord, thou hast made night, I have the benefit of it, and now light visits me. O that I could honor thee, and magnify thy power and the greatness of thy hand and use the light of the day to do the services that are required at my hand in my place. Again in the evening a little before we sleep, we should think of the great work of making day, for these many hours the Sun hath been within our sight, and shown its beams and light unto us, and hath run a long race for our good, bringing with it lightsome cheerfulness, the companion of the day. Now it is gone to the other part of the world to visit them, that God might show his goodness to one place as well as to another. Where a multitude of things concur to one effect, with which none of them in particular is acquainted, there we cannot but know that one common wisdom ruleth them all, and so it is in the working of the Sun, Moon, and Stars, to make the Seasons of the day and night, and of Summer and Winter, therefore some common wisdom must over-rule all of them. There is a spiritual light in our Horizon: whereas Judaism and Tur • isme is darkness, and Popery, a glimmering light. We should pray to God to give us spiritual light, and be thankful for it. He makes day and night also in respect of prosperity and adversity: weeping may continue for a night: this vicissitude keeps the soul in growth, in good temper, as the other is profitable for the body, pray to God to send. Christ to them which sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and vouchsafe to make it day with them as well as with us. He hath said in his word, that he will discover the glory of his Son, and all the earth shall see it together.

CHAP. IV. Of some of the Meteors, but especially of the Clouds, the Rain, and the Sea, the Rivers, Grass, Herbs, and Trees.

BY the name of Clouds and Waters above the Firmament, Gen. 1. We may understand all Meteors both watery and fiery, which were then created in their causes, and so by clouds and winds, Psal. 104. 3. must be understood all the Meteors, the great works of God by which he showeth himself and worketh in this lower Heaven.

They are called Meteors, because they are most of them generated aloft in the air.

Zanchius saith there are four sorts of Meteors, others make but three sorts.

1. Fiery, which in the Supreme Region of the air are so enflamed by the fire, that they are of a fiery nature, as Comets, Thunder.
2. Airy, which being begotten of dry vapors of the earth, come near the nature of air, as winds.
3. Watery, which retain the nature of the water, as snow and rain.
4. Earthly, which being begot of earthly vapors, are also digged out of the Earth, as metals, stones.

The efficient cause is God, according to that of the Psalmist, hail, snow, ice, wind and storm do his will.

The remote matter of the Meteors are Elements, the next matter are exhalations, which are twofold, fumus & vapor, smoke is of a middle nature between earth and fire, vapor between water and air. If it come from the earth or some sandy place, it is fumus a fume or kind of smoke: if it come from the water or some watery place, it is a vapor.

Vapours or exhalations are fumes raised from the water and earth by the heavenly bodies, into one of the three Regions of the air, whence divers impressions are formed according to the quality and quantity of the exhalations.

Thunder is a sound heard out of a thick or close compacted Cloud, which sound is procured by reason of hot and dry exhalations shut within the cloud: which seeking to get out with great violence rend the cloud, from whence proceeds the tumbling noise which we call Thunder.

The earth sends out partly by its own innate heat, and partly by the external heat and attraction of the Sun, certain hot and dry steams, which the Philosopher calls exhalations: and these going up in some abundance, are at last enclosed within some thick cloud, consisting of cold and moist vapors, which finding themselves straightened, do with violence seek a vent, and break through the sides or low part of the cloud. There is first a great conflict and combat there of the contrary qualities, a great rumbling and tumbling and striving of the exhalations within the cloud, until it break forth into a loud and fearful crack. Then the exhalation by its heat incensed in the strife, proves all on a flame as it comes in the air, and that is Lightning.

Lastly, the exhalation falling down upon the earth is so violent, that sometimes it breaks trees, sometimes it singeth and burneth what it meets with, it kills m • n and living creatures, and in the most abundance of it, there is a Thunder-bolt begotten through exceeding great heat hardening the earthly parts of it.

God hath power over the Thunder. He commands it, rules it, orders it, for time, place, manner of working, and all circumstances, the Thunder in Egypt at the delivering of the Law proves this. Therefore in the Scripture it is called the voice of God, and the fearfulness and terribleness thereof is made an argument of the exceeding greatness of God, that can at his pleasure destroy his enemies even by the chiding of his voice; in Egypt he smote them with hail, lightning, thunder, and with stormy tempest.

At the delivering of the Law, mighty thunder-claps made way to the Lord's appearance, and were his harbingers to tell of his coming, and prepare the hearts of the people with exceeding great awfulness and obedience to receive directions from him. The Lord puts down Job 40. 9. with this question, Canst thou thunder with a voice like God, speak terribly, and with as big and loud a voice as thou canst; and if thy voice be answerable to loud thunder, either in terribleness or loudness, then will I confess myself to be thy equal; and Elihu reasoned for God by consideration of this great work.

David, Psal. 29. showeth the greatness of God in the greatness of this mighty sound. But it pleaseth God to effect this work, not immediately but mediately, using natural and ordinary causes according to his own good will and pleasure for the effecting thereof.

There do arise from the ends of the earth as the Scripture speaks, that is, from all quarters of this inferior part of the world, consisting of earth and water, certain steams or fumes partly drawn up thence by the heat and influence of the Sun and other Planets or Constellations, partly breathed out of the earth by the natural heat thereof. Whereof some are hot and moist, being us it were of a middle nature betwixt water and air: some hot and dry being of a middle nature betwixt fire and air, as some Philosophers think, of which two, as of the matter, are brought forth these strange things which we see in the air, and among the rest, Thunder. Though thunder be first in nature, being by the violent eruption it makes out of the cloud the cause of fulgurations, yet we see first the lightning before we hear the Thunder, because of the swiftness of the fire above the air, and because the eye is quicker in perceiving its object then the ear.

This is done for the benefit of the world, that by shaking of the air it might be purged and made fit for the use of man and beast, being cleansed from those ill and pestilent vapors, which otherwise would make it too thick, gross, and unwholesome for our bodies, for this is one special end of winds, thunders, and the like vehement works that are in the air, besides the particular work for which God assigneth them, and therefore with thunder likely is joined much rain, because the cloud is dissolved at the same time, and sometimes violent winds and tempests, because the exhalation inflamed, snatcheth with itself such windy fumes as it meets withal in the air, and so by violent stirring the air purgeth it, and openeth the parts of the earth by shaking and moving it.

1. We must turn all this to a spiritual use, viz. to instruct us in the fear of him that is Lord of Hosts, who shows his greatness in these mighty deeds of his hand, to which purpose always the Scripture speaks of it, exhorting the mighty to give unto the Lord glory and strength in regard of this.

2. We must observe God so in this and all his great works, as to cause our minds to increase in the knowledge of his excellency, and our hearts in the love and fear of him. All his works are therefore exhorted to praise him, because we by all should learn his praise and greatness. How able is God to destroy sinners! how quickly and in a moment can he bring them to ruin! let him but speak to the thunder, hail, tempest, and they will beat down and consume his adversaries before his face. O then tremble before him.

3. We must learn to put our confidence in God, and boldly to promise ourselves deliverance when he promiseth it.

God is wonderful in making and ruling the clouds. This is a work which God doth often allege in Scripture to prove his greatness, Job 37. 26. He binds the waters in a garment, Prov. 30. 4. that is, makes the Clouds. How as it were by an even poising of one part with the other God makes these Clouds to hover a great while over the earth before they be dissolved, is a thing worthy admiration, and greatly surpasseth our knowledge, Job 38. 34. Psal. 14. 78. and Prov. 8. 28. Psalm 104. 3. The cloud is water rarified drawn upward till it come to a cold place, and then it is thick, and drops down.

They are but nine miles (say some) from the earth, but they are of unequal height, and are lower in Winter then in Summer, when the Sun hath the greater force, then they ascend higher, and in his smaller force they hang the lower. Vide Vossium de orig. & progress. Idol. l. 2. c. 83.

Let us consider the causes of these clouds, and the uses of them.

The efficient causes are thought to be the heat and influence of the Sun and the Stars which doth rarify the water, and draw thence the matter of the clouds, as you shall perceive if you hold a wet cloth before the fire, that a thick steam will come out of it, because the fire makes thin the thickness of the water, and turns it into a kind of moist vapor, and the earth hath some heat mixed with it through a certain quantity of fire that is dispersed in the bowels of it, which causeth such like steams to ascend out of it, and the coldness of the middle region doth condensate and thicken these steams or breaths, and turn them again into water at length, and at last to thick clouds.

2. The matter is the steams that the waters and earth do yield forth by this heat.

The uses of it are to make rain and snow, (snow is nothing but rain condensated and whitened by the excessive cold in the winter time as it is in descending) for the watering of the earth and making it fruitful, or else for the excessive moistening of the earth to hinder the fruitfulness of it, if God see fit to punish. The earth without moisture cannot bring forth the fruit that it should, and some parts of the earth have so little water near them below, that they could not else be sufficiently moistened to the making of them fruitful. God hath therefore commanded the Sun among other offices to make the vapors ascend from the Sea and Earth, that he may pour down again upon the forsaken wilderness or other places, whether for punishment or otherwise.

Obj. How can it be conceived, that the clouds above, being heavy with water, should not fall to the earth, seeing every heavy thing naturally descendeth and tendeth down-ward?

Ans. No man by wit or reason can resolve this doubt, but only from the word of God, which teacheth that it is by virtue of God's Commandment given in the Creation, that the Clouds fall not, Gen. 1. 6. Let the Firmament separate the waters from the waters: by force of which commanding word the water hangeth in the clouds, and the clouds in the air, and need no other supporters, Job 26. 7, 8. setting out the Majesty and greatness of God in his works, here beginneth, that He hangeth the Earth upon nothing, he bindeth the waters in the Clouds, and the Cloud is not rent under them. Philosophy is too defective to yield the true reason of this great work of God, which commonly attributeth too much to Natura naturata, Nature; and too little to Natura naturans, the God of nature.

Now we must here also blame our own carelessness and folly which forbear to consider of this work that hangs over our heads. The Clouds are carried from place to place in our sight, and cover the Sun from us. They hinder the overvehement heat of the Sun from scorching the earth, and yet we never think what strange things they be, and what a merciful Creator is he that prepared them. Not seeing God in the works of nature, shows great stupidity, and should make us lament. Let us endeavor to revive the thoughts of God in our minds by his works. When we see the Clouds carried up and down as we do sometimes one way, sometimes another swiftly, then let us set our heart a work to think there goes God's Coach, as it were, here he rides above our heads to mark our way, and to reward or punish our good or bad courses with seasonable rain for our comfort, or excessive showers for our terror. O seek to him and labor to please him, that he may not find matter of anger and provocation against us.

When the Clouds either favor or chastise us, let us take notice of God's hand in these either comfortable or discomfortable effects, and not impute it all to the course of nature.

By means of the Clouds God waters the earth, yea the dry wilderness: without moisture there can be no fruitfulness, without clouds no rain, without that no corn or grass, and so no man or beast.

Rain is as it were the melting of a Cloud turned into water, Psal. 104. 13.

It is a great work of God to make rain, and cause it fitly and seasonably to descend upon the earth. It is a work often named in Scripture, Deut. 11. 14. & 28. 12. Levite. 26. 4. Ier. 5. 24. It is noted in Job divers times, ch. 36. 27. He maketh small the drops of water. God propounds this work to Job, as a demonstration of his greatness, Job 38. 25, 34. See Ier. 30. 13. Psal. 137. 8. Now this work is the more to be observed in these respects.

1. The necessity of it in regard of the good it bringeth, if it be seasonable and moderate, and the evil which follows the want, excess or untimeliness of it.

2. In regard of man's utter inability to procure or hinder it, as in the days of Noah, all the world could not hinder it; and in the days of Ahab none could procure it. The Hebrews say, God keeps four Keys in his own hand, 1. Clavis Pluviae, the Key of the Rain, Deut. 28. 12. 2. Clavis Cibationis, the Key of Food, Psal. 145. 15, 16. 3. Clavis Sepulchri, the Key of the Grave, Ezek. 37. 12. 4. Clavis Sterilitatis, the Key of the Womb, Gen. 38. 22.

3. In regard of the greatness of the work in the course of nature, for the effecting of which so many wonders concur.

First, Without this drink afforded to the fields, we should soon find the world pined and starved, and man and beast consumed out of it for want of food to eat. It is the cause of fruitfulness, and the want of it causeth barrenness, and so destruction of all living creatures that are maintained by the increase of the earth. As mischievous and terrible a thing as a famine is, so good and beneficial a thing is rain which keepeth off famine.

Secondly, It procureth plenty of all necessaries, when the Heavens give their drops in fit time and measure, the earth also sends forth her offspring in great store and fit season, and so both men and beasts enjoy all things according to their natural desire, this so comfortable a thing as plenty is, so worthy a work of God, is the effect of rain, I mean rain in due season and proportion.

Terra suis contenta bonis, non indiga Mercies,

Aut Iovis, in solo tanta est fiducia Nilo. Lucan.

Egypt no rains nor merchandize doth need,

Nile doth all her wealth and plenty breed.

The Romans accounted it their Granary.

Lastly, The greatness of the works which must meet together for making and distributing of ram, doth magnify the work. The Sun by his heat draws up moist steams and breath from the earth and water, these ascending to the middle region of the Air which is some what colder then the lower, are again thickened and turn into water, and so drop down by their own heaviness: by drops, not all together as it were by cowls full, partly from the height of place, from which they fall, which causeth the water to disperse itself into drops, and partly because it is by little and little, not all at once thickened and turned into water, and so descends by little portions, as it is thickened. So the Sun and other Stars, the earth, the water, winds, and all the frame of Nature are put to great toil and pains as it were to make ready these Clouds, for from the ends of the earth are the waters drawn which make our showers.

God is the first efficient cause of rain, Gen. 2. 5. It is said there, God had not caused it to rain, Job 5. 10. Ier. 14. 22. Zech. 10. 1. 2 The material cause of it is a vapor ascending out of the earth. 3. The formal, by the force of the cold the vapors are conden • ed into clouds in the middle region of the Air. 4. The end of rain, to water the earth, Gen. 2. 6. which generation and use of rain David hath elegantly explained, Psal. 147▪ 8.

The cause of the Rain bow is the light or beams of the Sun in a hollow and dewy cloud, of a different proportion, right opposite to the Sun-beams, by the reflection of which beams, and the divers mixture of the light and the shade, there is expressed as it were in a glass the admirable Rain-bow.

We should be humbled for our unthankfulness and want of making due use of this mercy, the want of it would make us mutter, yet we praise not God nor serve him the better when we have it, Ier. 14. 22. intimating, without God's omnipotency working in and by them, they cannot do it. If God actuate not the course of Nature, nothing is done by it; let us have therefore our hearts and eyes fixed on him when we behold rain, sometime it mizleth, gently descending, sometimes falls with greater drops, sometime with violence, this ariseth from the greater or less quantity of the vapor, and more or less heat or cold of the Air that thickeneth or melteth, or from the greater or smaller distance of the cloud from the earth, or from the greater purity or grossness of the Air by reason of other concurring accidents; either we feel the benefit or the want of rain likely once every month. Let not a thing so admirable pass by us without heeding to be made better by it. Want of moisture from above must produce praying, confessing, turning, 1 King. 8. 35, 36.

The colors that appear in the Rain-bow are principally three, 1. The Cerulean or watery color, which notes (they say) the destroying of the world by water. 2. The grassie or green color, which shows that God doth preserve the world for the present. 3. The yellow or fiery color, showing the world shall be destroyed with fire.

Dew consists of a cold moist vapor which the Sun draweth into the Air, from whence when it is somewhat thickened through cold of • he night, and also of the place (whether the Sun exhaled it) it falleth down in very small and indiscernible drops to the great refreshment of the Earth. It falleth only morning and evening.

Hath the rain a Father? or who hath begotten the drops of Dew? Out of whose womb came the rain and the hoary frost of Heaven? who hath genared it? saith God to Job, Chap. 38. 28, 29.

A frost is dew congealed by overmuch cold. It differs from the dew, because the frost is made in a cold time and place, the dew in a temperate time; both of them are made when the weather is calm and not windy, and generated in the lowest region of the Air.

Hail and ice is the same thing, viz. water bound with cold, they differ only in figure, viz. that the hail-stones are orbicular, begotten of the little drops of rain falling, but • ce is made of water continued, whether it be congealed in rivers, or sea, or fountains, or pools, or any vessels whatsoever, and retains the figure of the water congealed.

Though Ice be not Crystal, yet some say Crystal is from Ice; when Ice is hardened into the nature of a stone it becomes Crystal; more degrees of coldness, hardness and clearness, give Ice the denomination of Crystal, and the name Crystal imports so much, that is, water by cold contracted into Ice. Pliny in his natural History saith, The birth of it is from Ice vehemently frozen. But D ^r Brown in his Enquiries into Vulgar Errors, doubts of it.

The winds are also a great work of God, he made and he ruleth the winds . They come not by chance, but by a particular power of God, causing them to be, and to be thus, he brings them out of his treasures, he caused the winds to serve him in Egypt to bring Frogs, and after Locusts, and then to remove the Locusts again. He caused the winds to divide the red Sea that Israel might pass. He made the winds to bring quail; and the winds are said to have wings for their swiftness, the nature of them is very abstruse.

The efficient causes of them are the Sun and Stars, by their heat drawing up the thinnest and driest fumes or exhalations, which by the cold of the middle region being beaten back again, do slide obliquely with great violence through the air this way or that way. The effects of it are wonderful, they sometimes carry rain hither and thither, they make frost and they thaw, they are sometimes exceeding violent, and a man that sees their working can hardly satisfy himself in that which Philosophers speak about their causes, The wind bloweth where it listeth, we hear its sound, but know not whence it cometh, nor whether it goeth. It is a thing which far surpasseth our understanding to conceive fully the causes of it.

They blow most ordinarily at the Spring and fall, for there is not so much wind in Winter, because the earth is bound with cold, and so the vapor the matter of the wind cannot ascend; nor in Summer, because vapors are then raised up by the Sun, and it consumes them with his great heat.

These winds alter the weather, some of them bringing rain, some dryness, some frost and snow, which are all necessary; there is also an universal commodity which riseth by the only moving of the air, which air if not continually stirred, would soon putrefy and infect all that breath upon the earth.

It serves to condemn our own blindness that cannot see God in this great work; the wind cometh down unto us, it is near us, we feel the blasts of it, and yet we feel not the power and greatness of God in it. When God doth so plainly, and so many ways discover himself to us, yet blind wretches we perceive him not. We are now to stir up our minds to the consideration of God in this his mighty work. See him walking through the earth, and visiting it in the swift wings of this creature. It hath also an apt resemblance and image of God in it, 1. In the subtleness and invisible nature of it, the swiftness of the wind may note his omnipresence, who is said to ride on the wings of the wind. 2. In its powerful motion and efficacy which no man can hinder or resist. 3. In the freedom of its motion, John 3. 7. 4. In the secrecy of his working of mighty works, the winds are invisible.

The consideration of the winds, leads us into ourselves, and that

1. For Humiliation; for who knoweth the nature of the wind, the place of the wind, the way of the wind, to see in it our own vanity, Job 7. 7. Psal. 78. 39.

2. Instruction: Shall so fierce a creature be at a beck, and shall not I? See the miserable estate of wicked men, on whom destruction and fear shall come as a whirl-wind, Prov. 27. 18. They shall be as stubble or chaff before the wind, Psal. 1.

Metals are mineral substances, fusible and malleable. They are commonly distinguished into perfect and imperfect; perfect, because they have less impurity or heterogeneity in them, as gold and silver: imperfect, because they are full of impurities, as iron, copper, tin and lead.

Gold of all metals is the most solid, and therefore the most heavy. It will lose none of his substance neither by fire nor water, therefore it will not make broth more cordial, being boiled in it. The second place is given to silver amongst metals, because next to gold it is the most durable, and least endamaged by fire.

Precious stones (in Latin Gemmae ) are esteemed for their rarity, or for some virtue fancied to be in them, or for their pureness and transparentness.

Those Pearls are preferred which are most white, bright, round, light, especially if naturally they be pierced. Rueus l. 1. c. 13. de Gem.

The Psalmist declares the great work of God in distinguishing the waters from the earth, and making Sea and dry land. The waters at the first did encompass and cover the earth round about as it were a garment, and overflow the highest parts of it altogether, so that no dry ground was seen or could be seen in the world, this was the first constitution of them, as Moses relateth, Gen. 1. 2. The deep was the whole Orb of waters which enclosed the earth in themselves. But then God pleased to divide the waters from the earth, so as to make dry land appear, and for that end, 1. He drave the waters into one place, spreading the earth over them, and founding it upon them, Psal. 104. 6, 7. God by his mighty power (compared there to a thundering voice) did make the waters to gather together into the place that he had appointed for them under the earth, and that by raising up hills and mountains, and causing dales and valleys, then God appointed the waters their bounds, that they should still continue in these hollows under the earth, and not return to cover the earth, as else of their own nature they would have done.

There are divers profitable Questions about these things:

1. Whether the Sea would not naturally overflow the Land, as it did at the first Creation, were it not withheld within his banks by divine power?

The answer is affirmative, and the reason is evident, the water is lighter then the earth, and heavier things are apt to pierce through the light, and the light will take to themselves an higher place, and give way to the heavier things to descend through them; mix a great deal of dirt and water, and let it stand a while and take its own proper course, and the dirt will sink to the bottom, leaving the water above itself. Aristotle and others say, that the Sea is higher then the earth, and they can render no reason why it (being apt to run abroad) should be kept from overslowing the Land, whence he proves God's providence; but Vossius de Orig. & Progress. Idol. l. 2. c. 67. and others deny that the Sea is higher then the earth.

Secondly, Whether there be more Sea or Land. The multitude of waters made by God at first did cover the earth, and inclose it round, the Sea therefore must needs be far greater then the Earth. The Maps show it to be greater in quantity then the earth.

Thirdly, Whether the deepness of the Sea doth exceed the height of the mountains.

It was a great work of God to make mountains and valleys, hills and dales. The Scripture often mentions it, Prov. 8. 25. Psal. 65. 6. & 95. 4. & 90. 2. Psal. 104. 8. Amos 4. 13. Therefore are the mountains exhorted to praise God, Psal. 146. 9. Isa. 40. 12. He is said to have weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in balances, that is, to have poised them even, so that the earth might remain immovably in the parts of it as well as in the whole. The greatness of this work appears:

1. In the strangeness and hiddenness of it.

How should so heavy a thing as the earth thus heave up itself into so great ascents, to give place unto the waters under it? The immediate power of God is the cause of it, Psal. 24. 6. & Psal. 136. It may be some hills were made by the fury and violent motion of the waves of the waters of Noah 's flood, but the most and greatest were created on the third day. See Gen. 7. 20.

2. In the usefulness of it.

1. For beauty and ornament, it gives a more delightful Prospect to see hills and dales, then to look upon all one even and flat piece of ground without any such risings.
2. It conduceth to the fruitfulness of the earth. The vales are much more fruitful then if they were flats without hills, because of the dew and moisture that descendeth upon them from the hills, and some things grow better upon the higher places, on the sides or tops of the mountains.
3. Without such hills and mountains there could not have been room for the waters which before did swallow up the earth in its bowels, neither could the dry land have appeared.
4. Without such hills and dales there could not have been rivers and springs running with so constant a course.
5. Hills and mountains are the receptacles of the principal mines for metals and quarries for all kind of useful stones, Deut. 8. 9. & 33. 15. They are for boundaries betwixt Country and Country, Kingdom and Kingdom. We should tell ourselves how admirable and useful this kind of frame and situation of the earth is.

4. Whether Islands came since the flood? See D ^r Browns Vulgar Errors refuted by M ^r Ross, c. 13.

5. What is the cause of the saltness of the Sea?

The water of the Sea is salt, not by nature but by accident. Aristotle refers the saltish quality of the Sea-water to the Sun, as the chief cause, for it draws up the thinner and fresher parts of the water, leaving the thicker and lower water to suffet adustion of the Sun-beams, and so consequently to become salt; two things chiefly concur to the generation of saltishness, drouth and adustion; Therefore in Summer, and under the torrid Zone, the Sea is salter. Our Urine and Excrements for the same reason are also salt, the purest part of our nourishment being employed in and upon the body. Lydiat attributes it to under-earth or rather under-sea fires of a bituminous nature, causing both the motion and saltness of the Sea. Vide Voss. de orig. & progress. Idol. l. 2. c. 68.

The Sea is salt, 1. To keep it from putrifaction, which is not necessary in the floods, because of their swift motion. 2. For the breeding and nourishing of great fishes, being both hotter and thicker.

6. What is the cause of the ebbing and flowing of the Sea?

There have been many opinions of the cause of the ebbing and flowing of the Sea. De quo plura pro ingeniis differentium, quam pro veritatis fide expressa.

Some say it is the breathing or blowing of the world, as Strabo, Albertus Magnus One said it was because the waters getting into certain holes of the earth, were forced out again by Spirits remaining within the earth. Macrobius said it was by meeting the East and West Ocean. Cicero seems to ascribe it only to the power of God; others for the most part ascribe it to the various light or influences of the Moon, which rules over all moist bodies. Some attribute it to certain subterranean or under-sea fires. The final cause of the Seas motion is the preserving and purging of the waters, as the Air is purged by winds. Isaiah alludes to the ebbing and flowing of the Sea, chap. 57. 2.

Coelius Rhodiginus (Antiq. Lect. lib. 29. cap. 8.) writeth of Aristotle, that when he had studied long about it, at the last being weary, he died through tediousness of such an intricate doubt. Some say he drowned himself in Euripus, because he could find no reason why it had so various a fluxion and refluxion seven times a day at least, adding before that his precipitation, Quoniam Aristoteles non coepit Euripum, Euripus capiat Aristotelem. Since Aristotle could not comprehend Euripus, it should comprehend him. But D ^r Brown in his Enquiries seems to doubt of the truth of this story. And Vossius lib. 2. de orig. & progress. Idol. cap. 69. denies that Decumani fluctus are greater then the other nine, for he saith, that he and his friends often observed it at the Sea that they were no greater then the others.

Other Questions there are concerning Rivers. What is the original of Springs and Rivers? What manner of motion the running of the Rivers is, whether straight or circular?

As one part of the waters, and the far greater part, is gathered into one place, and much of it hidden in the bowels of the earth, and there as it were imprisoned or treasured up by making the Sea and dry Land, so another part of them was appointed to run up and down within the earth, and upon it in Springs and Rivers, which Rivers are nothing but assembling of the waters into divers great channels from the fountains and springs, which the Psalmist describeth by its matter and use or effect, Psal. 104. 10. He sendeth the springs into the valleys which run along the hills, that is, He made the Springs and Fountains to convey waters from place to place, the use of this is to give drink unto the beasts, even unto the wild Asses who quench their thirst there, verse 11. There be many other uses of Springs and Rivers, but this is noted as the most manifest and evident. Another use is for the Fowls, which have their habitation in the Trees which grow near, and by means of these Springs, and there they sit and sing, verse. 12. These Springs bring up so much moisture to the upper parts of the earth, as causeth Trees to grow also for Fowls to build and sing in *. Some of the waters were drawn up into the middle region of the world, and changed into Clouds, that so they may be dissolved and poured down again from thence upon the hills also and other places which cannot be watered by the Springs, that so the whole earth may be satisfied with the fruit of God's works.

John Baptista Scortia, a Jesuit, hath published two Books of the River Nile. Wendeline hath written a Book, which he calleth Admiranda Nili. It seemeth not without cause that the name Paper is derived from Papyrus, growing in Nile; so much Paper hath been written thereof. Purchas his Pilgrimage, lib. 6. cap. 1.

The soil of Egypt is sandy and unprofitable, the River both moistening and manuring it. Yea, if there die in Cairo five thousand of the plague the day before, yet on the first of the Rivers increase, the plague not only decreaseth, but merely ceaseth, not one dying the day after. Id. ibid. The name Nachal, a Torrent, is given to this River in the Bible, Numb. 3. 5. Josh. 15. 47. Isa. 27. 12. 2 Chron. 7. 8. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , and the name Nile is derived from it.

The Poets feigned that Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto divided the Universe, and that Neptune had the Sea for his part, which is called Neptunus, either à nando from Navigation, or a à nubendo, from Covering, because the Sea covers the earth: and Pontus; the Nations about Pontus thought no Sea in the world like unto their own, and doubted whether there were any other Sea but that, whence Pontus was used for the Sea in general.

The Sea is a wide and spacious place, Psal. 104. 25. The great deep, the womb of moisture, the well of fountains, the great pond of the world.

The reason of the greatness and wideness of it is the multitude of waters which were made by God at the first, which because they did cover the earth, and inclose it round, it must needs be far greater then the earth, and therefore when God saw fit to distinguish the dry land from the earth, must needs have very great ditches cut for it in the earth, and caverns made to hold it; and therefore the earth in the Scripture is said to be spread out upon the Sea, because a great part of it is so in respect of the waters that are under it.

Again, The principal use of the Sea and waters thereof was, that it might supply vapors for making of the Clouds by the attraction of the Sun, and native heat of the Sea, in respect of some fire which God hath mixed with the earth and waters that they may be more fit to give life to living things.

Now if the Superficies of the Sea were not very large and wide, the Sun could not have power enough by its attractive heat and warmth, by which it doth attenuate and make thin the waters into vapors: which after the cold of the air, when they come into the middle region of it, doth again thicken and turn it into waters. I say, The Sun could not else have power to draw out of the Sea sufficient store of these vapors for watering the earth with showers. So the multitude of the waters and the necessity of having much of them drawn up for rain required, that they should not have little receptacles, but one so great and spacious a receptacle, which we call the Sea. Oceanus, the Ocean is that general collection of all waters which environeth the world on every side, Mare the Sea is a part of the Ocean, to which we cannot come but by some strait.

In the Sea are innumerable creatures, small and great, there walk the Ships, there play the Leviathans. What living mountains (such are the Whales, some of which have been found six hundred foot long, and three hundred and sixty foot broad) roll up and down in those fearful billows! for greatness of number, hugeness of quantity, strangeness of shapes, variety of fashions, neither air nor earth can compare with the waters.

Another use of the Sea is, That there go the Ships, as the Prophet speaks in a kind of wonderment.

The whole art of Navigation is a strange Art, the Lord fitted the Sea for this purpose, that it might be useful to transport men from place to place. and other things from Country to Country. Men build moveable houses, and so go thorough the waters on dry ground: they fly thorough the Sea by the help of winds gathered in fitly with sails, as birds do thorough the air: and having learnt of birds to steer themselves in the Sea, they have an Helm, at the which the Master sitting, doth turn about the whole body of his Ship at his pleasure. The swiftness of the motion of a Ship is strange; Some say, that with a strong wind they will go near as fast as an arrow out of a Bow. The Lord hath given understanding to man to frame a huge vessel of wood cut into fit pieces, and to join it so close with pitch and rozin and other things mixed together, that it shall let in none or but a little water, and it shall carry a very great burden within, and yet will not sink under water; and hath given wisdom also to man to make sails to receive the strength of the wind, and cords to move them up and down at pleasure, and to make masts to hang on those sails, and hath given men a dexterity to run up to the tops of these masts, by means of a cord framed in fashion of a ladder, that can but even amuze an ordinary beholder, and all this for a most excellent use, viz. of maintaining commerce betwixt Nation and Nation, and of conveying things needful from one place to another, that all places might enjoy the commodities one of another.

To this Art of Navigation do Kingdoms owe most of their riches, delights and choice curiosities, a great part of Solomon's riches came in this way; it is the easiest, safest and quickest way of transportation of goods.

How obnoxious are we to God, therefore we should not be bold to offend him, how much danger do we stand in if he should let the waters take their own natural course, and exalt themselves above the mountains.

At the flood he gave leave to the great Deeps to break their bounds, and permitted the waters to take their own place, and the waters were some seven yards higher then the tops of highest mountains. He can do as much now for the demonstration of his just wrath, for though he hath promised that the waters shall never overflow the whole earth, yet not that they shall never overflow England which stands also in the Sea.

2. Let us praise the goodness of God which preserveth the whole world alive by a kind of miracle, even by keeping the water from overflowing the earth. God would convince us that we live of his mere favor, and that his special power and goodness keeps us: the waters if they were left to their own natural propensity, would soon overwhelm the earth again, but that God locked them up in the places provided for them. This work is mentioned in divers places, Job 38. 8. & 26. 10. Psal. 37. 7. Prov. 8. 29 Ier. 5. 22.

First, It is absolutely useful for the preservation of the lives of all things that live and breathe out of the Sea.

Secondly, It is a strange and hidden work, God effecteth it by some settled reason in the course of nature, but we cannot by searching find it out. Perhaps this may be it, the natural motion of every heavy thing is toward the Center, and then it will rest when it hath attained to its own proper place. Now the earth is stretched over the floods, and it may seem that a great part of them doth fill the very bowels and concavity of the earth in the very place where the Center or middle point of it is seated.

Hence it is, that they will not be drawn up again, nor follow the upper parts which toss themselves up and down, but rather pull down those rising graves again, especially seeing it is most evident in nature by many experiments every day, that it is utterly impossible there should be any Vacuum, as they call it, any mere empty place in which nothing at all is contained, because that would divide the contiguity of things, and so cause that the world should be no longer an orderly frame of divers things together: for the parts would not be contiguous and united together if such a vacuum should fall out, therefore water will ascend, air will descend, and all things will even lose their own nature, and do quite contrary to their nature, rather then such a thing should be.

Now it may seem the Lord hath hidden the water in the earth with such turnings and windings, some places in which it is, being larger, some less large, that the larger places having no open vent for air to succeed the water, cannot be so soon filled from below, as they would empty themselves upward, and so there must needs be vacuity, if they should not return back again, and stop their course, and therefore they must needs stop as it were in the midst of their career. And this also may seem to be a great and principal cause of the flux and reflux of the Sea, which if it were not, the waters having their course always one way, must needs by little and little return again to cover the earth. If this be the cause (as is probable) it is wonderful, that God should set such an inclination into all parts of the world, that they will suffer any crossing of their own particular natures, rather then not maintain the general course of nature in the close joining together of things: for if they might be sundered one from another, at length the whole must needs be quite out of frame, and a general confusion would follow.

We must even chide and reprove ourselves for our extreme stupidity that are so little (if ever a whit) affected with this work so great in itself, and so behooveful for our very life and being.

How are we daily and hourly preserved from the swelling waves! how comes it that in all this length of time the Sea hath not broken in upon us, and over-topped the earth? We do not tell ourselves of our debt to God for commanding the waves not to be so bold as to drown us.

It may exhort us to fear him that hath appointed the Sands for a bound of the Sea, and will not let the waves prevail over us for all their tossing and tumbling. He is of great power, and can over-rule so furious an Element, and fear not though the waters roar, and though the Mountains were cast into the midst of the Sea.

This commends unto us God's greatness who doth so infinitely surpass the Seas greatness, and who hath made so much water for it, and it a place for so much water. Let us think of it in particular, and dwell a little upon it, that we may also know our nothingness. What a great thing is the Sea in itself considered! What is this Island in comparison of the Sea, and yet we call it Great Britain? It must needs be greater then the earth, for the waters did round about involve and encompass the Earth, what then is the whole Globe of Earth and Water, and yet that whole Globe is a thing of nothing in comparison of Heaven, and yet all that is nothing in comparison of God. Oh how great is he, and how much to be admired? Great, not in quantity and extension of dimensions, but in perfection of Essence. How great is he that is beyond Earth, Sea and World, and all more, then these are beyond Nothing!

And let us a little compare ourselves with this great and wide Sea. The Sea is but part of this Globe, yet hath in it water enough to drown all the men that are in the world, if either it were suffered to overflow, as once at Noah 's flood, or else they were cast into it, so that all men are but a small trifling thing in comparison of this Sea, and then What am I must everyone say to himself▪ and what compared to God the maker of the wide Sea and this wide world? Oh how nothing is man, am I myself among other men, and why am not I humble before God? Why do I not cast down and abase myself in his presence, and carry myself to him as becometh so poor mean and small a creature, to so infinite and great a Creator? Let us morally use the things we see, else the natural knowledge will do us no good at all.

We may see in the Sea a Map of the misery of man's life, it ebbeth and floweth, seldom is quiet, but after a little calm a tempest ariseth suddenly. So must I look for storms upon the Sea of so troublesome a world.

For the great work of Navigation, and so of transportation of things by Sea, and for the fitness of the Sea to that use we must praise God, every man hath the benefit of it. By virtue of it we have Pepper, Cloves and Mace, Figs and Raisms, Sack and Wines of all sorts, Silks and Velvets, and all the Commodities of other Kingdoms distant a thousand of miles from us, and by this they have from us such Commodities as our Land affords above theirs.

There is no art which helps more to enrich a Nation, and to furnish it with things for State, pomp and delight. And yet how is it abused by Mariners, who behold God's wonders in the deep, being the worst of men, and never good but in a storm, and when that is gone, as bad or worse then ever?

The materials of a Ship are wonderful▪

First, It is made of the strongest and durablest Wood, the Oak and Cedar. Now it is a strange work of God to make such a great Tree out of the Earth.

Secondly, The Nails in it are made of Iron, that the pieces may be closely compacted.

Thirdly, Tarre and Pitch to stop every crevice, that no water or air might enter, this they learned of God himself, who bid Noah to plaster the Ark within and without with pitch.

Fourthly, Cords made of Flax, a multitude of strange things concur to this work.

What pity is it that Soldiers and Mariners (as was said) who are so subject to dangers, and have such frequent experience of God's goodness and mercy to them in their preservation, should generally be so profane and forgetful of God. For the Soldier it is an old saying,

Nulla fides pictasque viris qui castra sequuntur.

And for the Mariner,

Nautarum vota, is grown into a Proverb.

In the third days work were likewise created Grass, Herbs, Plants and Trees.

The first is Grass, or green Herb, which is that which of itself springs up without setting or sowing.

2. Herb bearing seed, that is, all Herbs which are set or sown, and increase by man's industry.

The third, Trees and Plants, which are of a woody substance, which bear fruit, and have their seed, which turns to fruit in themselves.

God by his powerful word, without any help of man's tillage, rain, or Sun, did make them immediately out of the Earth, and everyone perfect in their kind, Grass and Herbs, with Flowers, and Seeds, and Trees with large bodies, branches, leaves and fruits, growing up suddenly, as it were in a moment by God's word and power.

The great power of God appears in this, He is able to work above nature without means, the fruitfulness of the Earth stands not in the labor of the Husbandman, but in the blessing of God. He also caused the Earth to yield nourishment for such divers Herbs and Plants, yea Herbs of contrary quality will grow and thrive close one by another, when those which are of a nearer nature will not do so.

The Herb was given at first for man's use as well as beasts, Gen. 1. 9. Psal. 104. 14. Herbs are one wonderful work of God. The greatness of the work appeareth in these particulars:

1. The Variety of the kinds of Herbs.
2. The Variety of their Uses, of their shapes and colors, and manner of production, and of their working and growth. Some come forth without seed, some have seed, some grow in one place, some in another, some are for food, some for medicine, and some for both.

That out of the earth by the heat of one Sun, with the moisture of one and the same water, there should proceed such infinite variety of things, so differing one from another, is a wonder; some are hot in operation, some cold, some in one degree, some in another, some will draw, some heal, some are sweet, some four, some bitter, some of mild tastes.

In the bowels of the earth the Lord created gold, silver, precious stones, and the face of the earth above was beautified with grass, herbs and trees, differing in nature, qualities and operations.

Plants grow till they die, whence they are called vegetables.

At the first, Herbs were the ordinary meat of men, Gen. 1. 20. and they have continued ever since of necessary use, both for meat to maintain life, and for medicines to recover health.

Solomon's wisdom and knowledge was such, that he was able to speak of the nature of all plants, From the Cedar tree that is in Lebanon, even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall, not that he spake of the greatest tree and lest plant, as some interpret it, because some trees are greater than the Cedar, and some plants lesser than the h • sop, but because he discoursed of noble and baser plants. It is likely (saith Bartholinus de latere Christi cap. 8.) Salomonem ad crucem Christi ejusque per hysopum contemptum respexisse, That Solomon had respect to the Cross of Christ, and his contempt, by hyssop.

We must here condemn our stupidity and blindness of mind, that are not provoked many times by this particular to magnify the name of God. When a man hath occasion to travel thorough a close or ground, how great store of herbs seeth he, whose nature, yea names he is ignorant of, yet admireth not God in them, nor confesseth his power and goodness.

Secondly, We are to lament the fruit of our sin, which hath made us blind, there is nothing hurtful to man's body, but some herb or other rightly applied would cure it.

It is a great and worthy work of God to make grass on the earth . Psal. 104. 14, 15. & 147. 8. He maketh grass to grow upon the mountains▪ The omnipotent power of God was exercised to make this creature, else it could not have been, and at his appointment it came forth. This is one of the benefits which God promiseth to his people upon their obedience, Deut. 11. 5. Zech. 10. 16. There are many things considerable in this work of making grass.

First, The plenty, store and commonness of it: It groweth everywhere, and in abundance, covering the face of the earth, and hiding the dry and naked face thereof.

Secondly, The color of it. It is of a green and somewhat of a dark green color, which is neither over-light nor over-dark, but of an indifferent and middle nature, and so most fit to content and delight the eye, refresh and preserve the sight.

Thirdly, The usefulness of this creature for the Cattle, it is a soft covering to make the lodging of the poor beasts more easeful for them, even as it were a matteresse for them to lie upon. It hath a sweet juice and verdure in it by which it is pleasant to the tastes of the beasts, as any dainty meat can be to us, and is fit to nourish them to be turned to blood and flesh, so to make them fat and well liking.

Fourthly, The ways, means, and manner for bringing it forth for this use, the whole course of the Heavens, Sun, Moon and Stars, which run a large race daily with great swiftness, and the great works done in the air for producing divers Meteors, do tend in great part for the bringing forth of this grass. The grass itself hath a life and vigor in the root of it, by which it draws from the earth that moisture which is agreeable to it, and disperseth it likewise.

1. We are dull and blind, and behold not God in this great work, when we go into the fields, and can scarce tread beside it: We do not consider God's greatness and goodness in making so beneficial a thing so common: We let this work of God perish in respect of any spiritual use we make of it, to make our souls the better.
2. Let us stir up ourselves to observe God's hand in this work with others, and confess our debt to him, that gives us Commons and Pasture for all our Cattle.

Trees are certain plants springing from a root with a single Trunk or Stem (for the most part) shooting up in height, and delineated with limbs, sp • igs or branches.

Leaves are Ornamenta Arboris, & munimenta fructus, they serve to grace the Tree, make it pleasant to behold, and defend the fruit from the injury of the weather.

The Philosopher saith, Homo est arbor inversa, a man is a Tree turned upside down, for a Tree hath his root in the ground, and his branches spread above ground, but a man's root is in his head, therein is the fountain of sense and motion, and there doth he take in nourishment, but the arms and legs are branches of this Tree, they spread downward. The Psalmist compares a good man to a Tree, Psal. 1. 3.

The Palme-tree grows in Egypt all along the shores of the red Sea. It is said to yield whatsoever is necessary to the life of man. The pith of it is an excellent Sallet, better than an Artichoke, which in taste it much resembleth. Of the Branches they make Bedsteads and Lattices; Of the Leaves, Baskets, Matts, Fanns, of the outward half of the Codde, Cordage, of the inward, Brushes.

It is the nature of this Tree, though never so huge or ponderous a weight be put upon it, never to yield to the burden, but still to resist the heaviness thereof, and to endeavor to lift and raise itself the more upward; for which cause it was given to Conquerors in token of victory. Hence figuratively it is used for the victory itself, Plurimarum Palmarum homo: and for the sign of it,

—Palmaque nobilis

Terrarum Dominos evehit ad Deos.

Revel. 7. 9. With white robes, in token of their innocence; and palms in their hands, in token of their victory.

It is reported that the Arms of the Duke of Rhoan in France, which are Lozenges, are to be seen in the wood or stones throughout all his Country, so that break a stone in the middle, or lopa bough of a Tree, and one shall behold the grain thereof (by some secret cause in nature) diamonded or streaked in the fashion of a Lozenge. Fullers Profane State, l. 5. c. 6.

It was a great work of God in making all sorts of Trees to proceed out of the earth, Psal. 104. 16, 17. The nature of the Trees is wonderful in these respects principally.

First, The way and manner of their growing and being. An Oak comes from an Acorn, an Apple-tree from a Kernel. What a kind of power and virtue is that which God hath put into a kernel being so small a thing, that it should pull to itself by an unknown way the juice of the earth, and should send some of it downward into little small strings as it were to fasten itself in the earth, and send some upward to spread itself above the ground; and yet it should distribute the moisture so fitly, as to grow in due proportion within the earth and without; that it should frame to itself a body, and divers branches in such fashion, that it should bud and put forth leaves, that it should cause a fruit to grow upon it, or seed, and that in great numbers, everyone of which is able to make another Tree, and that Tree to yield as much more!

Secondly, The great variety of kinds of Trees; we in our Country have divers Oaks, Elmes, Ashes, Beech-trees, Chesnut-trees, Sally, Willow, Maple, Sycamore, besides Apple and Pear-trees of divers kinds, Cherry-trees, Hazel, Walnut-trees. Some Trees are of huge growth, as Oaks, Cedars, Elms, some low as the Thorn, the Nut. Some of one fashion, color, making and manner of growth, some of another: this showeth an exceeding great measure of wisdom in him that made them all.

The use of Trees in the next place is manifold:

1. They serve for fruit: what great variety of fruit do they yield, what pleasant and wholesome fruit, what store and plenty of fruit? Some Summer fruit that will be gone quickly, some Winter fruit that will last most part of the year, and some all the year.
2. For building both by Land and Sea, to make us houses both strong and stately, warm, dry and cool, under which we may rest ourselves, in Summer free from scorching heat; in Winter and stormy times, free from pinching cold, and the injury of the weather. With wood also we make floating and fleeting houses, with which we may dwell upon the face of the waters, and pass through the deep Sea, as upon dry ground.
3. It yieldeth fuel too, by which we do both prepare our food, and keep ourselves warm in the Winter, and in the time of weakness and sickness. Had we not something to burn, we could neither bake our Bread, nor brew our Beer, nor seethe our meat, nor roast it, nor at all make use of flesh, to eat it as now we do.
4. For delight: How comfortable a shade doth a spreading Ash or Oak yield in the hot Summer, how refreshing is it to man and beast!

How pleasant a place was Paradise, and what made it so? but the artificial order, fashion, and growing of all sorts of Trees fit for food and shadow.

We must observe our own faultiness with sorrow and humiliation, for that we have not observed more seriously and usefully this work of God. We have perpetual use of Timber and Fuel: We eat much fruit from these Trees, we reap the benefit of this work of God from time to time. We sit upon wood, we feed upon wood, we dwell under wood, under Trees cut down and fitted for our use: We cannot step out of doors but our eyes are fixed upon some Tree or other, great or small: but we take not notice of God in this work, and praise his name that made all these Trees.

Let us mend this fault, and stir up ourselves to consider God in this work, praise him for fruitful Trees, and all other kinds of Trees. Let us acknowledge his power, wisdom and goodness in them, and his exceeding bounty and tender care to man that hath so furnished the world with innumerable sorts of Trees.

Let us be careful of preserving these works of nature for our own use, and the use of posterity, let us set and plant Trees for after ages.

CHAP. V. Of the Sun, Moon and Stars.

ON the fourth Day were made the Sun, Moon. and Stars, which are as it were certain Vessels wherein the Lord did gather the light, which before was scattered in the whole body of the Heavens. The Hebrew word translated Lights, signifieth Lamps, Torches, or other things which shine forth and give light.

It was a great work of God in making and ordering the Sun, Moon, and other heavenly bodies. This work is often spoken of in Scripture, Gen. 1. 14. Psal. 104. 19, 20, 21, 22, 23. Psal. 136. 7, 8, 9. Psal. 148. He calleth upon the Sun, Moon and Stars of light to praise God: and Psal. 19. he saith of the Sun, God hath set a Tabernacle for the Sun. In another place he saith, He guideth the Stars, and calleth them by their names.

The wonderfulness of these works of God is seen,

First, In the very matter and substance of them, which is wonderful and inexplicable, who can tell what the Sun is made of?
2. In their quantity, both in respect of multitude and greatness. For multitude they be innumerable: and for magnitude, many of the stars are far greater then the earth.
3. In their qualities, which are principally three.
- 1. Their figure, the fittest for motion and use, round and orbicular.
- 2. Their brightness and shining, especially the splendor of the Sun and Moon.
- 3. Their durableness: they do not change.
4. In their motion which is very swift and regular.
5. In their effects, working so constantly and variously in the seasons of the year.

The most beautiful bodies of the Stars which we see fastened in Heaven, are not God's, as Plato in Timaeo called the Stars, by the worshipping of which the blind Gentiles, and the Jews also horribly polluted themselves: but excellent works of God, by the contemplation of which we ought to be stirred up to acknowledge and celebrate the Majesty, Glory, Wisdom and Power of the Creator, Psal. 8. 3, 4.

First, For the Sun that is called the greatest Light, and that most truly and properly, both for the body and substance of it, and also for the brightness and abundance of light which is in it. For the most skillful Mathematicians have demonstrated, that the very body of the Sun doth exceed the whole earth in bigness a hundred sixty six times, others say a hundred and forty times.

The Sun is the glorious servant of all the world, therefore it hath its name in Hebrew from serving.

The Sun is the fountain of heat and light, the life of the Universe, the great Torch of the world, and the Ornament of Heaven.

Its beauty, magnitude, the swiftness of its course, and its force are commended by David:

1. Beauty, It comes forth as a Bridegroom out of his chamber, Psal. 19. 6.
2. Strength, It is compared to a Giant.
3. Its Swiftness, v. 6. goes ten hundred thousand miles, say the Mathematicians, in an hour.
4. Its force and efficacy upon the inferior bodies, There is nothing hid from the heat thereof.

The Sun is fitly situated, being in the midst of the six other Planets, neither too high nor too low.

Altius egressus coelestia tecta • r • mabit,

Inferius terras: medi • tutissimus ibis.

Ovid. lib. 2. Metamorph.

The Philosophers conceive that the Sun and Moon are not Actu calidi, only they have a virtue, and by way of eminency as it were, they do produce heat below, and are not hot themselves. To contain anything by way of eminency, is a property of God, he contains all things eminenter, these faculties which he hath not actually, habitually and subjectively in himself, as faculties, yet he contains them eminently, as being able to produce all; but no creature can produce anything but by some virtue put into it. D ^r Stoughtons Burning Light.

If the Stars be not fiery, why are waters (saith Vossius ) placed above the Heaven, as Moses, and in other Scriptures, but to temper their burning heat, least the Heavens should be destroyed by their burning? Vossius de orig. & progress. Idol. l. 2. c. 39. Vide c. 38.

Secondly, The Moon is also called a great Light, not for the bigness of the body of it, but because it is the lowest of all the Planets, and nearest unto the earth, and therefore appears biggest of all next unto the Sun, and gives to the earth a greater light then any of the Stars, which are far greater in substance, and brighter in light.

Some say it is the cause of the ebbing and flowing of the Sea, for it agreeth exactly with the Revolution of the Moon, it causeth it, 1. By its motion, as it brings its beams, 2. By its beam, as that brings the influence. 3. By infusion, as that stirs the waters.

It is called in Latin Luna à lucend • , saith Tully, or because Solâ lucet nocte, saith Varro. In Hebrew Iareach and Ierech, which words signify a month, because it is renewed every month.

A Star is the thicker part of Heaven, round and full of light.

In the day the glistering light of the Sun (say some) obscures all the Stars, but in the night how many hundred thousand of them do we see, besides those that are hidden from us in the other part of the Sphere which is not seen by us? The number of Stars set upon the Globe are 1025. and divers of them have proper names. All the Stars of the Heaven are not numbered nor cannot, since divers of them are so small: but these 1025. are the principallest amongst them, and all that have ever been accounted of.

Philosophers distinguish them into fixed Stars and Planets. The Planets are apparently seven, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, then the Sun in the midst as it were the King of all, after Venus, Mercury, and the Moon. Neither Moses, Job, nor the Psalms (the most frequent in Astronomical observations) mention any of the Planets but the Sun and Moon.

Of these Stars some are greater then other, and are distinguished into six sorts of quantities. Their proportions are thus delivered, viz. a Star of the first bigness or magnitude, is a hundred and seven times bigger then the earth.

A Star of the second magnitude, ninety times bigger then the earth.

A Star of the third bigness, seventy two times bigger then the earth.

A Star of the fourth bigness, is four and fifty times bigger then the globe of the earth.

A Star of the fifth magnitude, is six and thirty times bigger then the earth.

A Star of the sixth bigness, is eighteen times bigger then the globe of the earth.

We are to bewail our own great folly and blindness, that we have not more admired, honored, feared, loved that great worker to whom these Creatures do point us. We do not often enough tell ourselves, this Moon, this Sun, these Stars could not, nor did not make themselves. They could not possibly be without any beginning at all, for they are but parts of the whole world, and no part of any whole can be eternal, because there must be something before that did unite those parts together; wherefore they were made by some superior essence, and more excellent then themselves, and that is God. How great, how wise, how good, how infinitely excellent is he whose hand framed and ordered these things! The Sun ariseth to us constantly, the Moon also keeps her course with like constancy. Doth not that mighty Army of Stars which in a clear night show themselves, even speak to us as it were to consider of his incomprehensible excellency, which made and rules them? See Job 38. 31, 32, 33.

Let us accustom ourselves hereafter to these Meditations, if God had not beautified Heaven with these excellent bodies, light and heat could not have been equally and in due quantity conveyed into all the quarters of the world. We must observe this work so as to praise God for it, to inform ourselves of his nature, and strive to work more love, fear, obedience and confidence in ourselves towards him. The Apostle saith, That in the times before the Gospel, the Gentiles might have found God as it were by groping, Act. 17. 27.

Now we that have the Scripture to direct us as in the day-light, shall not we find God out by these illustrious works of his?

CHAP. VI. Of the Fishes, Fowls, Beasts.

THe fifth Days work was the Creation of all living Creatures which live and move in the two moist Elements, the Water and the Air, viz. Fishes and moving Creatures, which live and move in the waters; and all kind of Fowls which fly in the open Region of the Air, divers in nature, shape, qualities, and manner of living.

The Hebrew verb 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 of which the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 which is here translated The moving Creature, is derived; is used as here, so in other Scriptures frequently, first to signify creeping or moving forward without feet, as Gen. 7. 21. & Levite. 11. 19. And secondly also to bring forth abundantly as here, and also Exod. 1. 7. Fishes breed and bring forth young in great abundance, more then any other creatures do, by the multitude of spawn they would increase beyond all measure and number, if by one means or other the spawn were not devoured and consumed.

Who can render a reason of their ability to swim so in the waters, to support themselves in the midst of the waters, and convey themselves up and down in it?

Fishes are in Scripture termed Reptilia, Psalm 104. 25. In the great and wide Sea there are things creeping innumerable both small and great, so called, because things when they swim seem to creep along in the water. As Birds have their wings and trains by means whereof they cut their way, and make smooth passage through the Air, so Fishes are furnished with fins wherewith they guide themselves in their swimming, and cut the current of the streams and waves for their more easy passage, wherein their course is directed by their tail, as Ships are conducted by their Helm.

The Sea gives more and greater dainties then the Earth, those that did most affect to please their Palate of old, set great store by Fishes, and paid dearer for them then flesh. God hath furnished them with a strong power of increasing. Birds bring forth some four or five in a nest, some three, and some but two, the most but twenty, as the little Wren, for being so little, the kind would be consumed by the things which devour such weak creatures, if those that be did not bring forth very many: But every Fish brings forth a great multitude, many hundreds, as we may see in their spawn.

That God should give unto these things a power to multiply so very fast, is wonderful, and it is agreeable to reason too, for the fishes do more devour one another then the beasts do, the greater being much more ravenous then any beast, as being bigger; and their stomachs by an Antiperistasis of the cold water more vehement in digesting.

They are said to be without number, Psa. 104. 25. not simply, but to us, for we cannot tell the number of them, though God (which made them) do know the particular number of them. He can tell how many fishes there be in the Sea, though to us they exceed the power of counting, yet he hath the precise and exact number of them.

We know not the kinds of fishes, how much less the particulars!

There be (saith Pliny ) of fishes and other creatures living in the Sea; one hundred seventy and six several and distinct kinds.

What Philosopher can tell how many Dolphins, Herrings, Whales, Sword-fishes there be in the Sea?

A Crocodile equals eighteen cubits, it comes from an Egg as big as that of a Goose: Nec aliud animal ex minori origin in majorem crescit magnitudinem. Pliny lib. 8. cap. 25. From so small a beginning it increaseth to eight or ten yards in length. Their bodies are not much longer then their tails, which is of like use with them, as the Proboscis is to the Elephant; their mouths are very wide, at one gulf able to swallow horse or man. The name is taken a Croceo color, or per Antiphrasin quod Crocum timeat. The Ichneumon steals into his belly, and gnaws his guts, whilst he opens his chaps to let the little Troclill pick his teeth, which give it feeding. Herb. Trav. l. 3.

The Echeneis, Remora, or stop-ship, but half a foot long is able to stay the greatest Ship under sail. Keckermannus humori frigido à remora fuso adscribere videtur qui aquam circa gubernaculum conglaciet. in Dispute. Physic. The Cramp-fish Torpedo is able to benumb and mortisie the arms of the lustiest and strongest Fishers that be by touching only the end of any part of an angle-rod, which they hold in their hands, although they stand aloft and a great way from her: hence it hath its name, quod torpore manus afficiat, because it benumbeth the hands. See Voss. de orig. & progress. Idol. l. 4. c. 11. both of the Remora and Torpedo.

The Naturalists tell us of one fish which they call the Uranoscope, which hath but one eye, and that in a vertical point, on the top of the head, directly upward: by which it avoids all rocks and dangers.

There have been known Whales six hundred foot long, and three hundred and sixty foot broad, some like mountains, and some like Islands. God himself speaking of his own power over all the creatures, rehearseth only two, the Behemoth, Job 40. 15. to the end, that is, the Elephant; and the Leviathan Job 41. per tot. that is, the Whale, this being the greatest among the Fishes, as that among the Beasts.

The Sword-fish hath a beak or Bill sharp-pointed, wherewith he will drive through the sides and planks of a Ship, and bore them so, that they shall sink withal.

The Dolphin is said to be a fish of such exceeding great swiftness, as that oftentimes he out-strippeth a Ship under sail in the greatest ruffe and merriest wind, in swiftness of course. In this fish is propounded to us an example of charity, and kind affection toward our Children, as Pliny ^b in his description of the nature of this fish showeth, and Aelianus l. 5. c. 18. As also of his singular love toward man, whereof Aelianus produceth strange examples.

It may seem strange that it should please the Pope to forbid flesh to men rather then fish, that is, the less dainty and luxurious, before the more: for what is by some alleged, that the curse fell upon the earth, and not the Seas, is fondly affirmed, seeing when it is said, cursed be the earth, by earth is meant the whole globe of the earth consisting of Sea and dry Land.

Some fishes are exceeding small, and for their smallness and workmanship bestowed upon them, admirable. In the Sea the Cockles, a little kind of shell-fish, yet in its kind very artificial, somewhat resembling a Cre-fish, which are dainties for rich men.

Those little and small things are made with so many joints and parts and turnings, such a proportion and shape, and everything so exact and suitable, as would stir up astonishment in any beholder. God's power is likewise seen in the greatness of some fishes, as the Whale, some of which are 80. yards long, their eyes are as big as an hogshead, and their mouth so wide, that a man sitting on horseback might be held in it.

God hath created the Fowls of Heaven among other creatures, Psa. 104. 12. Gen. 1. 20, 21.

The things wherein the Fowls differ from other creatures are. 1. That they be winged, having feathers and wings by which they are covered, and by which they do pass through the air, and the place wherein they fly, viz. in the open firmament in this lower heaven. Their creation is wonderful in divers respects.

1. Their making is wonderful, far differing from that of beasts, fishes, and men.
2. They have great variety of kinds, some wild, some tame, some great, some little, some Sea or water birds, some land birds.
3. Their manner of breeding, they lay eggs and hatch them, and out of a kind of confused substance, that to us seems void of life, by the heat of their bodies they do bring forth their young naked at first, which after by the same cherishing of warmth, do bring forth feathers to cover them. Many of them are so beautifully adorned with their feathers for color, and are so glorious, as a man cannot but look upon them with wondering and delight, for where doth nature show more variety, and a pleasinger composition of colors then in Doves neck, a Peacocks tail, and some other like Birds?
4. For their swiftness of flying, that they can with such celerity pass through the air.
5. They are many ways serviceable to many: they are a dainty food for weak stomachs, they pull up many kinds of worms and vermin, that else would be harmful to us.

Fowls or Birds are more worthy then Fishes, because they do more participate of air and fire (the two noblest Elements) then of water and earth. All birds are mastered under the name of Fowls as under their Genus.

There are examples of virtues in the fowls propounded for us to imitate, and of vices for us to shun.

In the Phoenix an example of the Resurrection: in the Stork of loving affection: In the Dove of innocence and conjugal faith: in the Crows and Estridges of unnaturalness.

We should imitate the Stork, Crane ond Swallow in acknowledging the seasonable time of our repentance.

The Stork hath her name from 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , love, and the * Hebrew word is near of kin with another, which signifieth bowels of compassion, as which indeed are most tender in her. A story whereof we have in the description of the Netherlands, viz. of a Stork, that when the house was on fire where her nest was, kept the fire off from her young ones with her own body and wings so long till she was burnt herself.

It is loving to mankind, delightful to build in the tops of houses and chimneys, as is usual to be seen in Germany.

It is the emblem of a grateful man: for at her departure from the house where she builds (as some report) she usually leaveth a young one behind her. Aelian lib. 8. de Animal. cap. 19. writeth of a Stork which bred on the house of one which had a very beautiful wife, which in her Husbands absence used to commit adultery with one of her base servants; which the Stork observing, in gratitude to him who freely gave him houseroom, flying in the villains face, struck out both his eyes. It is recorded also of the Stork, that when the dams are old, the young ones feed them; and when through age they are ready to faint in their flying, the young ones help them; and when they are past flying, the young ones carry them on their weak backs.

The Eagle is reckoned the Sovereign Queen of all Fowls, as the Lion is reputed the King of all beasts.

It is Altivolans avis, an high soaring bird, that sometime flieth so high a pitch as she transcendeth the view of man, whence the Proverb, Aquila in nubibus, she makes her nest also in the high trees or rocks, lest her young ones should be hurt of the lesser birds, Ier. 49. 16. She flies also swiftly, Job 9. 26. She sees acutely when she is so high that men can scarce see her, she sees (they say) fishes swimming in the Sea.

—tam cernis acutum,

Quam aut aquila aut serpens Epida • r 〈…〉 .

She hath a tender care of her young, when they be • l • sh and ready for flight▪ then she stirreth up her nest and fluttereth over them; yea she taketh them on her wings, and so soareth with them through the air, and carrieth them aloft, and so freeth them from all danger. In that she carrieth her young ones rather upon her wings then in her • alons, she showeth her tender care and love that she beareth unto them, Exod▪ 19. 4. Deut. 32. 11.

The Hebrew name 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 which is translated Fowl, Gen. 1. 26. signifieth in general every living thing, which by help of wings flieth above the earth in the air: so that not only birds, but also bees, wasps▪ hornets, and all other winged things may here be understood: Bees are principal among the Insects; Bees are notable,

1. For their good husbandry, she is very painful, she flies to every herb and flower, and seeks and searches into every corner of the same. She so abhors idleness that she punisheth the idle drone, and will not give it any quiet harbor in the hive. 2. She is thrifty, which is another part of good husbandry, what she hath gotten in the Summer, she charily lays up in her Cells, and doth not spend it till she must needs.
2. For their cleanliness and neatness, mundissimum omnium hoc animal, they will not suffer any sluttery within if they may go abroad, neither can they endure any unsavoriness without nigh unto them, Pliny l. 11. c. 10. & 18.
3. For their care of the common good, she is an admirable lover of that, she labors, eats, fights in common, and all her pains is directed to the common good, she will with unresistable courage assail any enemy though never so strong, which shall offer to wrong the common body.
4. For their concord, Bees of the same hive are linked together in the bond of amity, though they be many of them, yet they know and love each other, and keep peace among themselves, and fly domestical sedition, unless the rulers be multiplied, and by their disorders set the rest of the Bees at variance.
5. For their dutifulness to their King or Prince (for they have a Monarchy, as the Ants a Democracy) they are most loyal subjects to him, they labor for him, and build him more then one Palace, and that more large and stately then their own, they fight for him, and go abroad with him.

The workmanship of God is more excellent in some Insects, as Bees, and others little creatures, then in those of great bulk; See Pliny l. 7. c. 21. and 36. 5. Austin prefers a fly (in regard of its life) before the Sun. But some things (saith Vossius ) are not so much to be valued for their form, as their end, which is more excellent in the Sun, then in any perfect living creature, man only excepted.

We see and use the fowls, and eat their flesh, and lie upon their soft feathers, and yet contemplate not the goodness of God in them.

We have divers kind of tame fowl in our back-sides, they bring us young, and we kill and dress them, and let them upon our Tables and feast with them. They lay eggs, and we eat of them: they sit and hatch and cherish their young, and we see that admirable manner of drawing actual life out of a potential life by the working of heat. And we have many wild fowl, but who seeth God's wisdom, power, bounty, in giving them to us?

Let us stir up ourselves to give God his due glory, in respect of this kind of creature.

Amongst other creatures, the Lord hath stored the world with divers kinds of four-footed beasts, which move and walk upon the face of the earth, Psa. 104. 11, 12. these were created on the sixth day. Gen. 1. 24.

These beasts are creatures endued not with life alone, but with sense also: Yea, they excel man in quickness of sense,

Nos aper auditu praecellit, ar •• ea •• ctu,

Vultur odoratu, lynx visu, simia gustu.

They consist of a body and of a sensible soul, and besides the life of vegetation which is to be found in plants, by which they grow and are nourished; They have also a soul whereby they discern divers bodily objects, and can both discern and follow that which is good for them, and shun what is evil, and so preserve themselves alive by using things helpful for them, and avoiding the contrary. All these beasts were made to walk upon the ground with 4. feet, having their heads bowing down to the ground to seek their diet, without which they could not live, and which is provided for them upon the face of the ground.

This work is wonderful in respect of the divers sorts of these beasts, some great, and some small, some of one shape and nature, some of another.

We see great variety of them in our own Country, and there is far greater variety abroad in the world which we have never seen. That out of the same earth and water all these kinds should grow by a word spoken with the mouth of God, let it be so, is a strange and wonderful thing. By virtue of these words, there were Sheep, Goats, Kine, Horses, Camels and Dromedaries, Elephants, Lions, Bears, Dogs, Tigers, Wolves, Foxes, Deer. What are all these but a most artificial mixture of earth and water put into a certain shape or form of members, having head, feet, back, breast, belly, brain, liver, heart, guts, and other entrails, and having power to see, hear, to touch, smell, taste, to eat, drink, go, generate, to remember, to have a kind of thought of things within, to imagine and discern, having also affections and passions. They carry us, feed us, clothe us, till the ground for us. How full of tedious and toilsome pains would our lives be, if we had not a horse to bear us up and down from place to place, and Horses or Oxen to convey all manner of things for us!

We must magnify the name of God, and frame ourselves to sincere thankfulness unto him who hath made such a multitude of creatures inferior to ourselves, and given to us the use of them. O what a wonderful skillful workman is he, that out of the earth could produce such a number of such creatures! And how good was he to us, that he did not give reason unto them as well as sense; for if they had reason to know their own strength and our Weakness, we should never keep them under as we do.

Let us not abuse creatures of God to bad purpose, or use them in a cruel and inhumane manner: they are our fellow-creatures, made of a little courser earth; and since they obey us with all cheerfulness, let us be likewise obedient to God.

There is no creature among all the beasts of the world which so aptly demonstrates the power and wisdom of Almighty God as the Elephant, both in respect of his proportion of body and disposition of spirit. He is by the Hebrews called Behemoth, by way of excellency, as the Latins for the same cause call him Bellua, and by Job 40. 15. he is likewise called Behemoth in the plural number. Behold now Behemoth which I made with thee, he eateth grass as an ox. The LXX and Chaldee by Behemoth understand all earthly beasts of great bulk, but the Hebrews think the Elephant is only meant, whom Thomas Aquinas and Nicolaus Lyranus follow; God stirs Job up to consider well of this huge beast, as if he had said, If thou dost not yet understand how weak a man thou art, and how unfit to grapple with me, see how thou canst deal with this great beast. Vide Vossi. de Orig. & progress. Idol. lib. 3. cap. 50, 51. He is wittily called by Julius Scaliger, Bestiarum Heros: and by Job in the same Chapter, verse. 19. the chief of the ways of God, that is, the greatest, strongest, and most understanding of all earthly irrational creatures, as Deodate interprets it. Vide Fulleri miscel. Sac. l. 4. c. 10.

Elephas peregrinum est apud nos animal, Indis & aliis notissimum & obvium, Certe turres olim armatorum in praelia ferebant, Johnstoni Thaumatographia. The Elephants were useful in the wars, they carried Towers, whence ten or fifteen soldiers did cast darts or spears, See Mac. 6. 37. If by accident in their fury they kill him that feeds them, they so mourn for it afterward, that they die through hunger, saith Strabo: the like I have heard reported of an Elephant here in England.

Aristotle l. 9. de hist. animal. c. 47. makes mention of a memorable thing to make men fly incest. The King of Scythia had a Mare of a most excellent race, which brought forth most excellent colts; among the rest she had one which excelled them all; the King was desirous that this colt might horse his damme, that so he might have an excellent race of them: but the colt when he was brought to his damme, would not horse her; the King seeing this, he caused them to cover the damme that he might not know her. But he perceiving afterwards that it was his damme, ran away and cast himself over a steep rock, and brake his neck. Vide Vos. de orig. & prog. Idol. l. 3. c. 61.

There are many things wonderful in the Dog, his sagacity, docility, fidelity: Of this creature and the horse is Pliny's Elogie. Fidelissimi ante omnia homini canes atque equi.

A dog in Epirus in a great assembly of people, knowing the man that had murdered his Master, flew upon him with open mouth, barking and snapping at him so furiously, that he was ready to take him by the throat, until he at length confessed the fact, that caused the dog thus to rage and foam against him. Vide Voss. de orig. & progress. Idol. l. 3. c. 61.

Alexander the Great being on his voyage toward the Indies, received for a Present a very great Dog which the King of the Albanians sent him, with advice, that he should not set his Dog against Wolves, Bears or Bores, but against Lions and Elephants. Alexander desiring to see some sport, made a Lion to be brought, whom the dog overcame, and with a trice tare in pieces. Then he commanded to set an Elephant upon him, longing to see the issue of that fight. The dog seeing his adversary, begins to bustle himself, and to bristle his hair all his body over, and casting out a furious bawling, maketh the Elephant turn tail, and proceedeth so courageously, to the great applause and astonishment of all that beheld it. Pliny l. 8. c. 40. See Camerar. Histor. meditat. l. 2. c. 6. & Voss. de orig. progress. Idol. l. 3. c. 56.

The dogs which be near unto Nile lap of the River, running still, and never stay while they are drinking, for fear of the greedy Crocodiles. Aegyptio canes e Nil • nunquam nisi currents lambitant, dum Crocodilis insidias cavent.

It happened, that upon a narrow thin plank that lay for a Bridge, one goat met another, both coming from divers parts: now by reason that the place was so narrow, that they could not pass by, nor turn about, nor yet retire backwards blindly, considering how long the plank was, and so slender withal; moreover the water that ran underneath, ran with a swift stream, and threatened present death if they failed and went besides, Mutianus affirmeth, that he saw one of them to lie flat down, and the other to go over his back.

In Sibaris there was a young man named Crathis, which being not able to retain lust, but forsaken of God, and given over to a reprobate sense, committed buggery with a female Goat, the which thing the Master Goat beheld and looked upon, and dissembled, concealing his mind and jealousy for the pollution of his female. Afterward finding the said young man asleep (for he was a Shepherd) he made all his force upon him, and with his horns dashed out the Buggerers brains.

Alexander the Great had a very strange and rare horse called Bucephalus, eithr for the greatness of his head, or else from the mark or brand of a Bulls head, which was imprinted upon his shoulder. He would suffer no man to sit him, nor come upon his back but Alexander, when he had the Kings saddle on, and was also trapped with royal furniture, for otherwise he would suffer any whomsoever. When he was dead the King solemnized his funerals most sumptuously; erected a Tomb for him, and about it built a City that bare his name Bucephalia.

That is a lofty description of a horse, Job 39. 19. to 26. By which words it is signified, that that terrible strength of the horse is from God, that neighing almost like to thunder, that mettle, when not being able to stand still, he hollows the earth with his hoofs, goes on undaunted into the battle, neither is terrified with so many darts falling near him and his rider, and runs with that swiftness that he seems to swallow up the earth, and rejoiceth at the sound of the Trumpet stirring up the soldier to battle.

If Banks had lived in elder times, he would have shamed all the Enchanters of the world; for whosoever was most famous among them, could never master or instruct any beast as he did his Horse. He would restore a glove to the due owner after his Master had whispered that man's name in his ear; he would tell the just number of pence in any piece of silver coin barely shown him by his Master, and obey presently his command in discharging himself of his excrements whensoever he bad him.

That story of Androdus and the Lion is commonly known: Vide Auli Gellij noctes Atticas, l. 5. c. 14. and Vossius de orig. & prog. Idol. l. 3. c. 52. relates a strange story out of Aelian, of the sagacity of the Lion; a Bear in the mountain of Thracia entering into his Den, and killing the young Lions, the old He and She-Lion returned at last home from hunting, and seeing this Spectacle, they pursued the Bear, and the Bear getting up into the next Tree, the Lioness stayed at the tree, and the Lion wandered about all the mountains, till he met with a Carpenter, who at the first sight of him out of fear let the hatchet fall from his hand, but the Lion fawned upon the man, and with his foot shown him the hatchet, that he might take it up, and at length with his tail embracing the man he brought him to his den, and the Lioness came thither, both show the destruction of their whelps, and also looked up to the tree where the Bear was, then the Carpenter conjecturing that the Bear did this injury, cut down the Tree, that falling with the Bear, the Lion and the Lioness presently tear the Bear in pieces, and the Lion brought back the man safe to the place where before he did cut wood: See more of the Lion in that Chapter, and 53. of Vossius his Book before-cited.

It is a great token of God's goodness to us, that from the vety Serpents (which are poisonful for man's sin) a threefold profit redounds to man.

1. In respect of nourishment, in Africa, as Pliny relates lib. 6. cap. 29. men feed on them.
2. They serve for Medicament: See Vossius de Origin & Progress. Idol. lib. 4. cap 62.
3▪ They are a Preservative against poison, amoletum ab amoliendo, or as they commonly write it amuletum. Treacle is made of the flesh of a viper, the oil of Scorpions is good against the sting of Scorpions. Being bitten by a Serpent, if you anoint the wound with spittle, it will hinder the poison from spreading any farther.

CHAP. VII. Of the Angels good and bad.

AMong the works of Creation, the principal are the reasonable Creatures, Angels and Men.

The Name Angel comes of the Greek 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , which signifies a Messenger, sent forth from some superior person or State to deliver a message, and to declare the mind of him or them that sent him. The Hebrew name 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 which is the name of an Angel in the Old Testament, signifies also a Messenger; but yet in a more full and large sense: for it signifies such a Messenger as doth not only deliver and declare a Message by word of mouth, but also doth act and execute indeed the will of him that sent him, and doth perform his work enjoined as a faithful Minister and servant.

First of all, It signifieth that chief and principal Messenger and Ambassador of God, his Son Jesus Christ, who is called Malachi 3. 1. The Angel of the Covenant.

Secondly, Pastors are called Angels, Rev. 2. and 3. Ch. being God's Messenger sent to the Church.

Thirdly. This word is most frequently used to signify the heavenly Spirits, who are so called, because they are both ready to be sent on God's message, and often are sent out to do the will of God, Gen. 19. 1. Psa. 103. 20. 21. Mat. 18. 10.

That there are Angels is proved out of Scripture. where they are often mentioned, Psa. 68. 17. Dan. 7. 10. Col. 1. 16. and 2, 10. Heb. 12. 12. and by the manifold apparitions of them, Gen. 3. 24. Cherubims, that is, Angels, appearing in the form of flying men to keep the entrance into the Garden. Abraham entertained Angels unawares. They were sent to destroy the filthy Sodomites, and the Cities about them that ra • into the like exorbitancies. An Angel stopped Abraham's hand which he lifted up according to God's Commandment to slay his only son Isaac. Abraham told Eleazar that God would send his Angel with him to prosper him in the business of taking a wi • e for his son Isaac. An Angel of the Lord met Hagar and sent her back to her Mistress, when through discontent she had plaid the Fugitive. An Angal appeared to Zacharias and foretold the conception and birth of John the Baptist. An Angel acquainted the blessed Virgin that she should conceive our Savior in her womb by the over▪shadowing of the Holy Ghost. A multitude of Angels celebrated the Nativity of our Blessed Savior with an hymn of joy. Angels ministered to Christ after his temptation in the wilderness, and in his bloody agony in the Garden. An Angel also set Peter at liberty when he was imprisoned between two soldiers. An Angel shook the foundation of the Prison wherein S ^t Paul and Si • as were laid fast in the stocks, An Angel shown unto John the vision of the Revelation at the appointment of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now besides these and many more apparitions of the heavenly Spirits, we read that the Angels of God are many thousands, yea millions, and of the company of innumerable Angels, and of Angels pitching their tents about the righteous, and holding them up in their hands, and chasing the wicked and destroying them.

And besides the testimony of Scriptures, the Heathens also had some notions of them, as appears in their writings▪ but indeed it was in some respect a false notion; for they conceived them to be a certain kind of petty God's, and did perform worship unto them, the evil angels beguiling them: and if there be evil angels, there must needs be likewise good.

The Angels are diversely called in Scripture: Spirits, Psal. 104. 4. to express their nature; and Angels to express their Office, as Messengers sent from God: They are called Sons of God, Job 1. 6. & 38▪ 7. Yea Elohim, God's, Psal. 8. Cherubims, Gen. 3. 24. Ezek. 10. 1. from the form they appeared in, viz. like youths. Caph is a particle of similitude, and Rabiah signifies a young man in Chaldee, witness R. David. But Ludov. de Dien in his Animadversions upon Mr. Medes Clavis Apocalyptica saith, Hoc est puerile & frivolum. Seraphim, Isa. 6. 2. Burning quasi accensi ardore justitiae divinae, they execute those things which God commands when he sits in the Throne of his justice, and according to it judgeth mankind. Not from their burning love toward God, as some imagine. Watchmen, or the watchful ones, Dan. 4. 10. 13. being in heaven as a watch-tower, and keeping the world. Stars of the morning▪ Job 38. 7. from their brightness of nature. A flaming fire, Psal. 104. 4. because God useth their help to destroy the wicked.

In the New Testament they are called Principalities for their excellency of nature and estate; and Powers for their wonderful force.

Reasons why God made Angels.

The will and power of God, therefore they are, because God saw it fit to make them, yet two reasons may be rendered of this work.

1. God saw it • it to raise up our thoughts from meaner to more excellent creatures, till we came to him: First, things (say some) were made which had no life; then living things without fence, as plants and trees, then sensible, then reasonable.
2. It was convenient that every part and place of the world should be filled with inhabitants fit for the same, as the air with birds, the earth with beasts and men, the sea with fishes, and the heavens which we behold with stars, and the highest Heavens with Angels.

God is the maker of Angels. These glorious Creatures which shall have no end, had a beginning as well as the silliest beast, bird, or fish, and they are equally beholding (nay more, because they have received more excellent endowments) unto God for their Being, with the silliest worm. And though Moses mentions not in particular either the act of creating them, or the time; yet S ^t Paul saith, that By him were all things made, visible and invisible: and it is evident by discourse of reason, that the Angels were made by God. That is too bold an assertion of Mr. Hobbes his in his Leviathan, part 3. c. 34▪ Concerning the creation of Angels there is nothing delivered in the Scriptures: See more there. What can be meant but the Angels by Thrones, and the words following, Col. 1. 16. Vide Grotium in loc. For either they must be made by God or some other maker, or else they must be eternal; for whatsoever is not made by some maker, cannot be made at all; and whatsoever is not at all made, is eternal. Now if the Angels were eternal, then were they equal with God in self-being, they might be called self-subsisting essences, and so should be equal with God, standing in no more need of him then he of them, owing no more service, homage and praise to him, then he oweth to them, and so they were God's as well as he; and then we should have multitude of God's, not only one God, and so should not God be the first and best Essence, there being so many others beside him, as Good and Omniscient as he; wherefore they must be made by some Maker, because they cannot be Eternal: and if made, then either by themselves or some other thing besides themselves, not by themselves, because that implies an absolute contradiction: and if by some other thing, then by a better or worse thing, not by a more mean, for the less perfect cannot give being to a more perfect thing, for then it should communicate more to the effect then it hath in itself any way, which is impossible that any efficient cause should do, not by any better thing then themselves, for excepting the Divine Majesty which is the first and best, there is no better thing then the Angels, save the humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ, which could not be the Maker of them, because they were created some thousands of years before the humanity was formed in the Virgins womb, or united to the second person in Trinity.

We are not able to conceive of their Essence, they are simple, incorporeal, Spiritual substances, therefore incorruptible.

An Angel is a Spiritual, created, complete substance, endued with an understanding and will, and excellent power of working.

An Angel is a substance.

1. Spiritual, that is, void of all corporeal and sensible matter, whence in Scripture, Angels are called Spirits , Psal. 104. 4. Heb. 1. 14. Therefore the bodies in which either good or evil Angels appeared, were not natural to them, but only assumed for a time, and laid by when they pleased, as a man doth his garments; not substantial, but aerial bodies: they were not Essentially or personally, but only locally united to them, so that the body was moved, but not quickened by them.

The Hebrew, Greek and Latin words for Spirit, signify breath; there is no more subtle being that we are acquainted with then breath, being condensed by the cold indeed it may be seen.

The Angels good and bad are Spirits, because 1. They are immaterial and incorporeal. 2. Invisible, 1 Tim. 1. 16. That was a foolish fancy of the disciples, Luke 24. 37. If Christ had been a Spirit he could not have been seen. 3. Impalpable, Luke 24. 37. compared with verse. 39. 4. Incorruptible and immortal, they end not of themselves, and no creature can destroy them. God alone hath immortality, 1 Tim. 6. 16. Origin in himself, so as to communicate it to others. 5. They are intellectual beings, all understanding. 6. Their spirituality appears in the subtlety of their moving. It is a question whether they do transire ab extremo ad extremum, without going through the middle parts, yet they • ove like lightening. 7. In respect of their strength and power, there is a great deal o • • orce in a natural spirit extracted, Isa. 31. 3.

2. Created, By which name he is distinguished from the Creator, who is an infinite Spirit, John 4. 24. Nihil de Deo & creaturis univoce dicitur.

3. Compleat, By which an Angel is distinguished from the reasonable soul of man, which also is a spiritual substance, but incomplete, because it is the essential part of man.

4. Endued with 1. An understanding, by which an Angel knoweth God and his works. 2. A will, by which he desireth or refuseth the things understood. 3. An excellent power of working, by which he effects what the will commands, this is great in them, Psalm 103. 20. See 2 Kings 19. 35.

The Angels are most excellent creatures, when the highest praise is given of anything, it is taken from the excellency of Angels, Psal. 78. 25. 1 Cor. 13. 1. They are called holy Angels, Luke 9. 26. Mark 8. 36. therefore they are clothed with linen, Dan. 11. 4. to signify their purity, and are called Angels of light, 2 Cor. 12, 14. to note the purity wherein they were created. All the individual Angels were made at once; and as God made Adam perfect at the first, so they were made of a perfect constitution. They have all our faculties, save such as be badges of our weakness: They have nobody, therefore not the faculties of generation, nutrition, augmentation. They have reason, conscience, will, can understand as much as we do and better too, they have a will, whereby they can refuse evil and choose good, a conscience, reasonable affections, though not such as depend upon the body.

They are endowed with excellent abilities, know more of God, themselves, us, and other things then we do; love God, themselves and men, are obedient to God. The good Angels obey God.

1. Universally, in all things, Psalm 103. 20.
2. Freely and readily, make hast to do what he would have done, therefore they are said to have Harps, Revel. 15. 2▪ as a sign of their cheerful mind.
3. With all their might, They serve God with diligence and sedulity, therefore they are said to have wings to fly.
4. Constantly, Rev. 7. 15. & 14▪ 4.

They have incredible strength, and therefore by an excellency they are called Strong in strength, Psal. 103. 20. Angels of the power of the Lord Jesus, 2 Thes. 1. 7. Powers, Ephes. 3. 10. Col. 2. 10. One Angel is able to destroy all the men, beasts, birds, and fishes, and all the creatures in the world, and to overturn the whole course of nature if God should permit it; to drown the earth again, and make the waters overflow it; to pu • ▪ the Sun, Moon, and Stars out of their places, and make all a Chaos: Therefore we read of wonderful things done by them, they stopped the mouths of Lions that they could not touch Daniel; they quenched the violence of the fire that it could not touch so much as a hair of the three Children's heads, nor a thread of their garments; they made Peters chains in an instant fall from his hands and feet; they can move and stir the earth (say the Schoolmen) as appears Matth. 28. 2. The Angels shook the foundation of the Prison where Paul and Silas lay, and caused the doors to fly open, and every man's bands to fall from him. They destroyed the first born of Egypt, Sodom and Gomorrah. One Angel slew in one night in the host of Sennacherib an hundred fourscore and five thousand men.

Reas. Their nature in respect of bodily things is wholly active not passive, they are of a spiritual nature, what great things can a whirl-wind or flash of lightning do?

They are swift and of great agility, they have no bodies, therefore fill not up any place, neither is there any resistance to them, they move with a most quick motion, they can be where they will, they move like the wind irresistibly and easily, without molestation, and in an unperceivable time; they move more swiftly then the Sun, can dispatch that space in as few minutes which the Sun doth in twenty four hours.

They have admirable wisdom, 1 Sam. 18. 14. & 14. 20. The knowledge of the good Angels is increased since their Creation; for besides their natural knowledge, they know many things by revelation, Dan. 9. 22, 23. Matth. 1. 20. Luke 1. 30. either immediately from God or from his Word, Ephes. 3. 9, 10. 1 Pet. 1. 12. Luke 15. 18. by experience and conjecture, Ephes. 3. 10. So perfectly knowing are they, as that the very Heathen Philosophers have styled them by the name of Intelligences, as if their very being were made up of understanding.

How an Angel doth understand is much disputed, their understanding is not infinite, they know not all things, Mar. 13. Of that day the Angels know not: Again, they cannot know future contingent things any further then God reveals these things to them, neither can they know the secrets of man's heart, 1 Kings 8. 39. Psal. 7. 10. for that is proper to the Lord alone.

They are said indeed to rejoice at the conversion of a sinner, but that is no further then their inward conversion puts itself forth into outward actions.

They do not know the number of the Elect, nor the nature of spiritual desertions, the manner of mortifying sin, unless by the Church and Ministry of the word. So again, for the manner of their knowledge, That of the Schools about their morning and evening knowledge, is vain: but it is plain they know discursive as well as intuitive: though some say they are creaturae intelligentes, but not ratiocinantes.

There are three degrees of their knowledge (say the Schoolmen ) 1. Natural, which they had from the Creation, John 8. 4. Some abode in the truth, others fell from it. 2. Revealed, 1 Pet. 1. 12. Ephes. 3. 10. The Greek word signifies to look into it narrowly. Piscaetor thinks it hath reference to the Cherubims who did turn their faces to the propitiatory which was a type of Christ. 3. Experimental, which they have by the observation of those things which are done among us, so they know the repentance of the godly, Luke 16. 10.

2. The will of Angels is to be considered: Will in the good Angels is that whereby they desire good things known, and forsake evil.

The Angels would never have sinned if they had not been voluntary, for although the good Angels be now so confirmed in holiness, that they can will nothing but good, yet that hinders not liberty, no more then it doth in God or Christ himself; to be a free Agent is a perfection, to sin is a defect, and ariseth not from the liberty, but the mutability of the will.

3. Their motion and place. That they are in a place is plain by Scripture, which witnesseth that they are sometimes in heaven, and sometime on earth, as their service and office doth require.

They are not in a place as bodies are, they are not circumscribed by place: for a legion of devils was in one man, Luke 8. 30. They are so here, that they are not there, and therefore one Angel cannot be in many places, although many Angels may be in the same place, and they move not in an instant though they move speedily. They continue in the highest heavens, unless they be sent thence by the Lord to do something appointed by him: where being freed from all distractions and human necessities, they behold the glorious presence of God, their understanding and will being pitched upon him. Mat. 18. 10. & 22. 30. Ps. 68. 1. Luk. 2. 13.

4. Their society and communion: for it cannot be conceived that these glorious Spirits should not signify to one another their meaning: but how this should be, it is hard to determine; they say that the Angels make known their minds to one another by their mere will.

5. Their multitude and order. That there are many Angels appears, Dan. 7. 10. and Heb. 12. 22. an innumerable company of Angels, Rev. 5. 11. Matth. 26. 23. that is, seventy two thousand, as Jerome computes it.

The Fathers generally thought that the number of the Angels which fell, should be made up by the Elect Saints: Some think that Heb. 12. 27. seems to speak little less.

Some say the good Angels exceed the number of the wicked Angels, by how much evil men exceed the good; the greatest number of evil Angels that we read of is but Legion, the good very many, as those places in Daniel, Matthew, Hebrews, and Revel. 5. 11. will show.

As for their order, the Apostle indeed, Colos. 1. showeth that there is an order among them, so that one may be above another in dignity, but not in power and command: Hence they are called an host, which word signifieth chiefly what hath a complete order.

Dionysius Areopagita makes nine orders of Angels, and distinguisheth them into threes. The first containing Cherubims, Seraphims, Thrones. The second Dominions, Armies and Powers. The third, Principalities, Arch-angels and Angels. Much more modest is Augustine: Qui fatetur se rationem hujus distinctioni • ignorare. cont. Priscil. c. 11, &c. 57. Enchirid ad Lau. See Doctor Prideaux on Mat. 18. 10. for their Nature, Properties, Order and Ministry.

The Papists say there are different degrees of Angels, and that this is founded in their nature. The Protestants say that this difference lies not in natura Angelica, but in Officio, as they are drawn forth to more eminent employment.

The Scripture makes mention only of two orders of Angels, Angels and Archangels, Heb. 1. 4. 1 Thes. 4. 16. Seraphim is a common name unto all Angels: they are all described to be flames of fire, Psal. 104. 4. and all the Angels are Cherubims, as is evident by the Curtains of the Tabernacle which were set forth and garnished with Cherubims only, Exod. 26. 31. signifying the presence of the Angels in the Assembly of the Church, as the Apostle expounds it, 1 Cor. 11. 10.

It is evident (saith M ^r Cartwright ) that the Apostle, Col. 1. 16. heapeth up divers words of one and the same signification, thereby the more effectually to set forth ^d the supereminent power of our Savior Christ above all.

6. The names of the Angels. The first and most common name is that of Angel, which name is common to the good and evil Angels, yet in a far different sense. The evil spirits are seldom called so simply, though they be sometimes, to note the excellency of their original, because they fell from their blessed condition, 1 Cor. 6. 3. Jude 6.

The evil spirits are called Angels, the name which was first given them: Otherwise they are not absolutely called Angels, (that name being peculiar to the Angels which stood) but angels of the devil and angels of Satan, viz. because they are sent by the devil their Prince.

Some as proper names are given to certain Angels, Michael, Dan. 10. 13. which is compounded of three Hebrew particles, Mi-ca-el, who is like or equal to the strong God? It signifieth the power of God, because by him God exercised his power: And Gabriel, Dan. 8. 16. & 9. 21. Luke 17. 19. that is, the glory of God, who executed the greatest Embassages in God's name to men. Vide Sculteti exercitat. Evangel. l. 1. c. 9.

7. The Angels Ministry and service. Their service may be considered either in respect of God, the Church, or the enemies of the Church. Respecting God, and the Church, and the people of God, they have divers services.

The office of good Angels in respect of God:

1. They enjoy God and glory, Matthew 18. 10. & 22. 30. This implieth their great purity and happiness, and withal their Ministry: What God bids them do they are ready to do. They shall attend Christ when he comes to judgment.

2. They praise God and celebrate his Name, cleave inseparably unto him, and obey his Commandments, Isa. 6. Psalm. 103. 20, 21. & 104. 4. Dan. 7. 10. Job 1. 6. they see the worth and excellency of God, that he deserves more praise then they can give.

3. They praise and worship Christ as the Head of the Church, Apoc. 5. 11, 12. Heb. 1. 6. Phil. 2. 10. also as his Ministers, Matth. 4. 11. Luke 22. 43. Matth. 28. 2. they stand always ready to do him service, so in his agony an Angel comforted him.

2. Their service in respect of the Church and people of God.

1. They are glad for the good which befalls the Elect: So when Christ came into the world how glad were they, Luke 2. they cried Glory be to God on high: They rejoice at their conversion, Luke 15. 10.

2. They reveal unto them the will of God, Dan. 8. 9. Rev. 1. 11.

3. They keep the Elect from dangers both of soul and body, so far as is expedient, Gen. 19. 16. & 28. 12. & 25. 7. & 32. 1. 2. Psal. 34. 7. & 91. 11. Numb. 22. 1 King. 19. 7. 2 King. 6. 16. & 8, 9, 10. Both in the curtains of the Tabernacle, Exod. 26. 1. and the wall of the Temple Cherubims were painted up and down, to signify (as judicious Divines think) what protection the people of God have in serving him.

4. They comfort them in distress, heaviness and distraction, Gen. 20. 17, 18. & 3 • . 1, 2. Isa. 6. 6. Luke 1. 30. & 2. 10. Matth. 28. 5. Acts 10. 4. & 27. 23, 24. Judges 6. 12. & 13. 10. Dan. 10. 12. Matth. 1. 20. & 2. 12, 13.

5. They suggest holy thoughts into their hearts, as the devil doth evil and unclean thoughts: Resist Satan, as in Jude.

6. They carry the souls of the Elect into heaven at the end of this life, Luk. 16. 22. And at the day of judgment they shall gather the Elect from the four winds, and separate between the Elect and reprobate, Matth. 24. 31. & 13. 27.

3. Their services against the wicked and all the enemies of the Church.

They are ready to execute vengeance upon the enemies of God's people, Isa. 37. 36. An Angel smote bloody persecuting H • rod, Acts 12. At the last day the Angels shall hurry the wicked to Christ's Tribunal, and cast the reprobate into hell, Matth. 13 40, 41, 42, 49, 50.

8. The speech of Angels.

Angels and devils communicate with God, and one with another; not by speeches, for language requires bodily instruments, which these Spirits want: but as they apprehend every object without senses, so they express it without language in a secret way.

We come now to some profitable questions about the Angels.

The first is this, If the Angels be so beneficial to us, whether may they not be prayed unto?

The ground and cause which brought in praying • o Angels, is laid down Col. 2. 18. where you have a general prohibition of religious worshipping of Angels, with the cause of it.

There are three causes why they attempted this.

1. They entered into things which they did not know, as the Papists, How can they tell whether the Angels pray for us, whether they know our wants?
2. They follow their carnal mind, because they see in the world that to great Magistrates we use Mediators and Intercessors, they dare not go of themselves, so here.
3. Humility, For this they talk as Papists do now, We are unworthy to go directly to God, and therefore we need the help of Angels: but this is vain, for Christ is nearer to us then Angels are, Ephes. 3. 12. Tutius & jucundius loquar ad Iesum, quam ad aliquem sanctorum.

We say that all lawful and moderate reverence is to be given to Angels, which consists in these particulars.

1. We acknowledge the great gifts of God in them, and praise God for them. We confess it is his mercy that he hath made such noble creatures to be serviceable to us, and then for themselves in our judgments.

1. We honor them and judge them more noble creatures then man, they have greater wisdom, holiness and power then man hath.
2. For our will and affections, we love them because they love us and delight in our good, being ready to help us everywhere.
3. We should be careful of our carriage because of their presence, we should not sin because of the Angels.
4. We desire to make them examples of our lives, that we may do God's will as they do.
5. If Angels should appear visibly to us, we should honor them as more excellent creatures, but yet still keep within the bounds of civil or sraternal honor as to our fellow servants; but yet above us, and not honor them with Religious worship.

The Papists say a Religious worship is due unto them, but (yet that we may do them no wrong) not indeed such as is due to God, but secondary; yet still Religious; and so they say they intercede • or us, not as Christ, but in an inferior way: and in this sense they hold they may be worshipped and prayed unto.

Now we will refute their arguments, and then confirm the truth with strong reasons.

For the first, All law • ull reverence is commanded by the sust Table, and that is Religious; or else by the second, and that is civil: But that manner and degree of their worship is required in neither, Therefore it is merely invented.

Secondly, By general consent, Religious worship is that whereby we do acknowledge God to be the primum principium, the ultimum finem, and summum bonum, now this is but one: and we may as well say there is a summum bonum secundario, as there is a secondary Religious worship.

Thirdly, There is the same reason of a Religious worship, as there is of a Divine act of faith, love and hope: but if a man should say, We may with a Divine faith believe in God primarily, and Angels secondarily, it were ridiculous, therefore here if Religious worship were due because of supernatural excellencies, then every godly man were religiously to be worshipped.

Our arguments in general against this are these.

1. Matth. 4. 10. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Heb. 1. it is applied to Christ.
2. The promise is to those only which call upon him, Psal. 51. 15 Call upon me.
3. It cannot be of faith, for how shall I know whether they hear me, whether they be present?
4. Colos. 2. 8. It is condemned for will-worship, so that Idolatry is here committed, that kind of it Quando divine colitur id quod non est verus D • us. John was reproved for this, Rev. 19. 10. & 22. 9. Now John might have distinguished, I do not worship you religiously, as God, but in the second place.

The second question is, Whether every man hath his peculiar Angel?

This is not a question of faith, but yet the more to be suspected, because it was generally held among the Heathens, who did ascribe to every man born a bad angel to afflict, and a good one to defend him: a good and ill Genius as they called them. Becanus brings places of Scripture to prove it, but there is altogether silence in the Scripture concerning it: for when the Angels are charged to have care over us, it implieth that it is all their care. The chiefest place which most seems to favor that opinion, is Act. 12. 15. where they said that it was his Angel: Now to this some answer, that the men spake according to the opinion of men then generally received, and not according to the truth, as we may give an instance concerning the blind man, when they asked Whether he or his parents had sinned, that he should be born blind: How could he sin before he was born? but some answer, that there was an opinion generally received, which all the Platonists held (and so Origen and many of the Ancients) that the soul was created before it was put into the body; and as it did good or ill it was put into a well▪tempered or a maimed body: Especially they thought these Angels did appear a little before or after men's death.

Calvin thinks that it was an Angel peculiarly destinated to Peter for that time of his imprisonment. If it were a peculiar Angel, then it would follow, that he spake and had the same gestures that men have to whom they belong. Therefore it may well be rendered it is his messenger, as the word is elsewhere translated. But you will say then, they thought the messenger spake like him; No, but it might fall out, that they thought Rhode did mistake: and when he said, I am Peter, they might think he said I am come from Peter, and so it may be answered. If every man have one Angel, why did more then one carry Lazarus his soul to heaven, And he hath given his Angels charge over thee, that is, many over one particular man Cameron tom. 2. Praelect. Vide Reynold. de lib. Apoc. tom. 1. cap. 61. & Voet. Th • s. de Angels.

The third question, What is the meaning of that, Let her be covered because of the Angels? Where the Apostle commands a woman in public duties to have power, that is, covering, in sign of her subjection to God, and that because of the Angels. Some understand this properly of the Angels the heavenly Spirits, but differently, some because they are present at our Assemblies: and if you ask What need that, seeing God and Christ are there? they answer, That he mentioned God and Christ before, and now addeth these as inseparable servants which are sent for the salvation of believers: Others as probably make it a new argument from the Angels, Isa. 6. as they covered their feet before God to show their subjection, so should these.

Others understand it of the Ministers ^d who are called Angels, because they are the Messengers of God, and so they compare this place with that, Eccles. 5. 6. Before the Angel ^e , there is He notificative, by which is signified the high Priest, before whom vows were made, Levite. 27. 8. Some interpret it generally of all good men, for we ought to be as so many Angels.

The fourth is, What is the meaning of those places, Acts 7. 53. & Gal. 3. 19. • earned Junius renders the words, Acts 7. 53. You have received the law in the midst of the ranks of Angels, viz. who ^f accompanied God their Sovereign Lord when himself came to deliver the Law. The same answer may be made, as it is by the same Learned Writer (among Angels) they attending God when he ordained and delivered it. It seems improper that Angels in the plural number ^g should have been employed in speaking of the Law: For without extraordinary guidance of God many speakers at once would have bred confusion of sounds, and by an extraordinary guidance one would have sufficed. There is no necessity to ascribe the delivery of the Law of the Decalogue to Angels, Exod. 20. there is not so much as a word of the Angels in the whole matter. The earthquake, thunder, lightening on mount Sina were raised by the Angels (saith Cameron ) who can easily change the state of the elementary Region.

The fifth, What is the meaning of that story, Jude v. 9. Michael striving with the devil: The Apostle aggravates the sins of those who speak evil of Dignities, by an argument from the greater to the less, the Archangel durst not do so, where you have the chief cause, Michael, which is as much as who is like God, and then you have the adjunct, he is the Archangel, that is, a chief among the Angels, therefore it cannot be meant, say some, of Christ, because Christ is expressly distinguished from him, 1 Thes. 4. 6. Now what this dispute was, and where the Apostle had it, it is hard to say: but that there was such a thing done is plain. The matter of the strife was Moses dead on mount Nebo, Deut. 34. 6. which is added either by Samuel, Joshua or Ezra: Some make this to be the body of Christ, and therefore called Moses his, because he prophesied of it: Very likely the dispute was that it should not be buried to occasion idolatry, the Archangel rails not on him, but leaves him to God. Now, Deut. 3. 44. where it is said the Lord buried him, that is to be understood by the means of the Archangel, and no man knew his burial, that divine honor might not be given him, and the devil might say how fit it was such a man should be solemnly buried.

The sixth, What is meant by the voice of an Angel, 1 Thes. 4. 15. where the Apostle describes the great and glorious coming of Christ to judgment, from some circumstances which commend his power and Majesty; the Lord himself shall come down in his own person with a shout: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 is that voice which mariners and soldiers use when they call one another to put to their strength, so that it is no more then a great command of God that all be ready, Matth. 25. like that, There was a voice, Behold the bridegroom comes, or like that, John. 5. All that are in theeir graves shall hear his voice; So it shall be the instrument to raise them up as it was Lazarus; for this may be compared with Matth. 24. The voice and the trump of God are all one, that is a great noise expressed by this Metaphor, so that it should go to all in their graves.

The seventh, Whether they have any efficacy in our conversion. Though they be sent Heb. 1. for the salvation of those that believe, yet they have no efficacious power on the heart of man, for it is God only that can turn the heart; and therefore it is a wicked opinion of some, who give God no more efficacy in moving the heart to conversion, then good Angels have, which can be but by persuasion: It is true, in the Scriptures you may read of their admonishing and comforting, so an Angel comforteth Elias, and Christ himself as he was man; Joseph was admonished in a dream: but then you must know this was a sensible appearance or like it, viz. in dreams. But now you may read of the devil tempting in Scripture Judas and David without such a way: the change of our hearts is to be ascribed to God.

The eighth, Whether the Angels need Christ as a Mediator. Some say no, They never sinned and therefore need not a Mediator to reconcile them to God, 1 Tim. 2. 5. Heb. 2. 16. A mediator is where two parties do disagree. As for that place (say they) Ephes. 1. 22. He hath reconciled all things in heaven and earth: some do mean by those things in heaven, the souls of those departed; the Greek word signifieth briefly to recollect the things which were more largely spoken, and so a sweet consent of all things together: As by sin God was angry with us, so were the Angels, for they hated whom God hated; but by his death it is otherwise. But though Angels needed not such a reconciliation as supposeth a breach of peace, yet they needed such a one as consists in the continuance of that peace which they had before. The Lord hath now so fully revealed himself and his excellencies unto them, and his love and favor, and the necessity of their being obedient, that they cannot but continue to obey and serve him, they were not so far enlightened and sanctified at the first creation, but that then in respect of themselves there was a possibility of sinning as well as of those that did sin, but now they are so confirmed by the clear sight they have of God, that they cannot be willing to sin against him.

The Angels by Christ obtained, 1. A glorious Head: Men had a head at their creation, Adam. The Angels stood by virtue of their personal Covenant. 2. From his becoming their Head they are confirmed in grace; they were created perfect, but mutable, Job 4. 18. 3. By Christ their nature was elevated above what it was in itself; Electio sive hominum sive Angelorum, extra Christum intelligi non potest. A • optati sunt in silios Dei propter Christum. 4. They have an honorable employment, by this means they serve Christ in his human nature.

The Angels which abode in the truth are called good Angels, not only in respect of the righteousness which God bestowed upon them at their creation, but also in respect of the obedience which they performed, and •• eir confirmation in that good estate. The causes why they abode still in the true •• ▪ are the firm and unchangeable decree of God, 1 Tim. 5. 21. his free grace, Phil. 2. 13. wherewith they were holpen, and their own free choice of will cleaving f • rmly unto God.

The ninth and last question concerning Angels is, How can they be happy in enjoying God's face, and yet be on the earth, Matth. 18. 10. By heaven there is not meant the place, but their heavenly estate and condition: Now though they go up and down doing service, yet this hinders not their happiness, for they do not this with distraction: and these things are appointed as means for the end, viz. enjoying of God, and as the soul is not hindered in its happiness by desiring the body again, so it is here.

1. We should imitate the Angels.

2. It shows us how much we are beholding to Christ, no Angels could love us if it were not for him.

How much are we to love God who hath provided helps for man, especially Christ who took our nature upon him, not that of Angels. God's Angels are our Angels to defend and keep us. God hath committed the care of us to these ministering Spirits.

3. It shows the woeful condition of the impenitent, when Christ shall come with all these Angels, when those great shouts shall be, Come thou swearer, drunkard, how terrible will this be?

The more potent God is in Himself and in his Ministers, the more wretched are they, and the surer is their destruction.

4. This confutes the Papists in three errors.

1. In that they hold nine orders of Angels, They are distinguished ration objectorum & officiorum, in respect of the object and message they go about.

2. They would have them worshipped, but the Angel forbad John.

3. They say everyone hath his good Angel to keep him, so Bucan thinks in his Common places.

2. The Sadducees, who said there was neither Angel nor Spirit, Acts 24. 8. but held good Angels only to be good thoughts, and evil angels to be evil lusts and affections. Their names, offices, actions, apparitions show plainly, that they are not bare qualities, but true substances.

It serves for instruction, 1. To see the blindness and erroneousness of mankind, in that a great number of men of learning and wit and parts good enough, and that such as lived in the Church and acknowledged the five books of Moses to be divine, should yet make a shift to wink so hard, as to maintain that there were no Angels.

What falsehood may not the devil make a man entertain and defend, and yet seem not to deny the Authority of Scripture, if a man confessing Moses writings to be true, will yet deny that there be either Spirits or Angels, which are things so plainly revealed by Moses, that a man would account it impossible to receive his writings and not confess them? But if God leave man to the devil and his own wit, he will make him the verier fool because of his wit, and he will err so much the more palpably, by how much he seems better armed against error, even as a man's own weapon beaten to his head by a far stronger arm, will make a deep wound in him.

See we our aptness to run into and maintain false opinions, and let us not trust in our own wits, but suspect ourselves, and seek to God for direction.

Secondly, Let us learn humility from this, and by comparing ourselves with these excellent Spirits, learn to know how mean we be, that we may be also mean in our own esteem. So long as a man compares himself with those things and persons which are baser then himself, he is prone to lift up himself in his own conceit and to think highly of himself; but when he doth weigh himself in the balance with his betters he begins to know his own lightness. The Lord hath set us men in the midst, as it were, betwixt the brute beasts and the celestial Spirirs, we do so far exceed them as the Angels exceed us; as for bodily gifts, the beasts in many things go beyond us, some are more strong, swift, have more excellent sight and smell then we, but in few things do we equal the Angels. They are swifter and stronger then we, and their excellent reason goes beyond ours in a manner, as the understanding which is in us excelleth the fancy of the beasts, they know a thousand things more then we do or can know, One Angel can do more then all men, can speak more languages, repeat more histories; in a word, can perform all acts of invention, and judgment, and memory far beyond us.

Thirdly, Since God hath made Angels to serve and attend him, should not we that are far inferior to them be content also to serve him, yea exceeding glad and thankful that he will vouchsafe to admit us into his service. Doth he need our service that is served with such Ministers and Messengers? Let us frame ourselves to obedience, and do God's will on earth with all readiness and cheerfulness, seeing there is so great store of more worthy persons in heaven that do it. An Angel will not esteem any work too difficult or base, why should we?

Fourthly, The Angels which wait about the throne of God are glorious, and therefore the Lord himself must needs excel in glory, Isa. 6. 1, 2. Ezek. 1. 28.

Of the Devils or evil Angels.

The Angels which persisted in the truth, are called good Angels, Luke 9. 26. but those which revolted and kept not the law were called evil Angels, or evil spirits, angels of darkness , Luke 8. 20. & 19. 42. and Angels absolutely, 1 Cor. 6. because they were so created of the Lord. In respect of their nature they are called spirits, 1 King. 22. 21. Matth. 18. 16. Luke 10. 20. In respect of their fall they are called evil spirits, 1 Sam. 18. 10. Luke 8. 2. unclean spirits, Matth. 10. 1. Zach. 13. 2. not so much because of their instigation to lust, as because their natures are defiled with sin: Lying spirits, 1 King. 22. 22. John 8. 44. Devils, Levite. 17. 7. 1 Cor. 10. 20.

The Hebrew names for the devil are 1. Satan an adversary, 2 Sam. 19. 32. of Satan to oppose and resist, 2 Pet. 2. 14. Belial, 2 Cor. 6. though some read it Beliar unprofitable. He is likewise called Beelzebub, or Beelzebul, which word comes of Bagnal Dominus, a Lord or Master, and Zebub a fly, the Idol of the Achronites, because they thought these best of those pestiferous creatures, or else because the devils were apprehended as flying up and down in the air; but if it be read Z • bul, then it signifieth by way of contempt a Dunghill god, Levite. 17. 7. The devils are called Shegnirim the hairy ones, because they appeared to their worshippers like hairy goats and in the mountains.

The devil is called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 from 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to accuse, because he accuseth men to God and God to men, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 from 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 scio, because they know much by creation and by experience.

The devil is called an enemy or the envious man, Matth. 13. 139. The tempter, Matth. 4. 3. 1 Thes. 3. 5. A destroyer, Apoc. 9. 11. The old serpent, Apoc. 12. 7, 9. A roaring lion, 1 Pet. 5. 8. The strong man armed, Matth. 12. 24. The prince of the world, three times, John 12. 31. & 14. 30. & 16. 11. Nay The God of this world, 2 Cor. 4. 4.

2. Their nature.

The evil angels are spirits created at first entire and good, Genesis 1. ult. Vide Aquin. part. 1. Q. 11. Art. 4, 5. But by a willing and free apostasy from their Creator, are become enemies to God and man; and for this eternally tormented, John 8. 44.

It was a total, willful, malicious apostasy from God with spite and revenge: 1. Total, because God never intended to offer to the Angels a second Covenant, Heb. 2. 16. 2. With despite and revenge; therein lies the formality of the devils sin, and of the sin against the holy Ghost, 1 John 5. 19.

That they are spirits appears by the opposition, Ephes. 6. We wrestle not with flesh and blood; and this is to be opposed to those that deny that there are any spirits, or that the devils are incorporeal.

For their sin, what, when, and how it was, it is hard to determine. That they did sin is plain, but the sin is not specified. Some say it was lust with women, misunderstanding that place, The sons of God saw the daughters of men, for it is plain the devils were fallen before. Chrysostom and our Divines generally conclude it was pride, from that place in Timothy, 1 Tim. 3. 6. though there be different opinions about what this pride shown itself, whether in affecting a higher degree then God created them in, or refusing the work and office God set them about; which (some conceive) was the ministration or the guardianship of man, which trust they deserted or scorned. Zanchius thinketh their sin was, That they were not contented with the truth of the Gospel concerning Christ propounded to them at the beginning, and that they chose rather to leave their heavenly mansion, then subscribe to the truth. An inordinate desire of power to be like God in omnipotency, say the Schoolmen. Pride seems to be the devils sin by his first temptation of man to be like God.

Concerning the time when the devil first sinned, it is uncertain, Tempus lapsus non definite Scriptura; It seemeth they continued in their integrity till the sixth day was past , Gen. 1. 31. It is likely that neither man nor Angel did fall before the eighth day, Gen. 2. 1, 2.

The devils stood not long, John 8. He was a manslayer from the beginning: They fell before man, that is plain.

3. How the devil sinned, seeing his understanding and will were perfect.

It was initiatively in his understanding, and consummatively in his will. Many of them fell, as appeareth Luke 8. 30. there was a legion in one man: one of the chiefest (as some conceive) fell first, and drew the rest with him by his persuasion and example. That one great Angel (now Beelzebub) did first fall, and then drew after him the rest, is likely enough. Capel of Tentat. part 1. c. 1.

It was in all likelihood some prime Angel of heaven that first started aside from his station, and led the ring of this highest and first revolt; Millions sided with him, and had their part both in his sin and punishment. B. Hals Invis. world. l. 3. Sect. 2. Vide Aquin. part. 1. Q. 63. Art. 8. Yet Voetius seems to doubt of this.

They fell irrecoverably being obstinate in wickedness. The Schoolmen and Fathers give reasons why they fell so, and not man.

Aquinas gives this reason from the condition of an Angels will; whose nature is such (they say) that what it hath chosen with full deliberation, it cannot refuse it again: but this is no good reason, because the choice made cannot alter the nature of the will. The Fathers give these reasons, 1. The devil sinned of himself, but man was tempted. 2. In man's fall all mankind would have been damned, but in the Angels fall, not all Angels.

The best answer is this, When they had sinned, God out of his justice refused to give them any help of grace, by which they might rise from sin, and without which it was impossible for them to recover: and this is the Apostles argument, If God were so severe that he would not give these so great and noble Creatures time of repentance, neither would he others. The Angels were intellectual Spirits, dwelling in heavenly places in the presence of God, and the light of his countenance, and therefore could not sin by error or mispersuasion, but of purposed malice, which is the sin against the Holy Ghost and irremissible. But man fell by mispersuasion, and being deceived by the lying suggestion of the spirit of error.

The devils malice against mankind appears, Gen. 3. where there is an imbred enmity in the devil, as likewise, 1 Pet. where he is said to be a roaring lion, a lion roars when he hath got his prey, by way of triumph, or when he is hungry and almost starved and so most cruel.

This malice of his appears in his going up and down the whole world to damn men, and that though he get no good by it, nay, though his condemnation be so much the greater, and therefore if God should let him do what he would against us, he would first bring all outward misery as upon Job, and then eternal damnation. And though he knows God will defend the godly, yet he never leaveth to vex them, to tempt them to sin, to overwhelm them with grief and dispair, so that he is opposite to God. The devils malice is beyond his wisdom, else he would never oppose the people of God as he doth, since he doth hereby advance their glory and his own ruin.

The devils are subtle creatures; 1. In nature. 2. They have perfect intelligence of all things done in the world. 3. They have gotten subtlety by long experience, Job 32. 7. 4. They have strong delusions and great stratagems, 2 Cor. 11. 14. 5. Their subtlety appears by their prevailing over the wises • men in all ages, and by making choice of the sittest instruments to accomplish their designs: When he would deceive Eve he made choice of the serpent; when he would deceive Adam he made choice of the woman. The devils design was to draw Job to curse God, therefore he spared him two things, his tongue that he might be at liberty to curse God, and his wife to be a counselor to him thereto.

Their craft is seen likewise in their divers and suitable temptations, 2 Cor. 2. 12. We read of his methods, Eph. 6. and depths, Rev. 3.

His first stratagem and device is to observe the natural constitution of every man's mind and body, and to sit his temptations thereunto.

2. To observe our natural abilities and endowments, and accommodate his temptations thereunto.

3. To apply his temptations to men's outward estate, condition and place.

4. To tempt us by method, beginning with questionable actions, thence proceeding to sins of infirmity, and so to willful transgressions, and at last to obstinacy and final impenitency.

5. To bring us from one extreme to another.

6. To persuade that his suggestions are the motions of God's Spirit.

7. To make advantage of time by alluring every age to the peculiar vices thereof, as children to idleness and vanity; youth to lust; perfect age to violent and audacious attempts, old age to covetousness, and everyone to the sins of the time.

The devil is called the Tempter, because of his trade and way. He takes advantages, tempted Eve when she was alone; our Savior in the wilderness, and being hungry. He hath variety of temptations, if one will not take another shall, if not presumption then dispair; and strives to prevail by his importunity. He assaults the Saints ardentius, the wicked liberius.

The devil is very powerful Eph. 6. 12. the devils are called Principalities and powers. Alexander of Hales saith they have as great power as the good Angels; wicked men may be stronger then the Saints. Peccatum non tollit naturam, say the Schoolmen. Yet the Schoolmen generally say, that the lowest order of good Angels is stronger then the highest order of the evil Angels. And Aquinas part. 1. Qu. 109. Artic. 4. saith, Boni Angeli habent praelationem super malos.

He is said Ephes. 2. 2. to be the god of the world which rules in the children of disobedience. He is called the strong one, Matth. 12. 29. He hath a strong power over everyone by nature, John 12. 31. the Lord represented this spiritual bondage by the Egyptian and Babylonish bondage.

But here is our comfort, Christ is stronger then he. He hath bruised his head, Col. 1. He hath led them captive, and triumphed over them; and their power is wholly limited by God. The Devil is chained up as it were; he could not enter into the swine without a permission. He cannot produce any substance, or change one substance into another, he cannot call the souls of men out of their place and unite them to the body again, he cannot turn the will of man, as he pleaseth, nor do that which is properly a miracle. The works of the Devil are called lying wonders *, 2 Thess. 2. 9.

In respect of the work itself, they are for the most part feigned though not always, but in respect of the end they always tend to deceive and beguile.

The Devil can 1. Hurry bodies up and down in the Air, Matth. 4. 5. Luke 8. 29, 33.

2. Raise tempests, Job 1. 16, 19.

3. Bring diseases both of body and mind, Luke 13. 16. & 9. 31.

4. Overthrow houses and buildings, Job 1. 18.

5. Break chains and bars, Mark 5. 4.

They are used as instruments by God, to punish the wicked, and exercise the godly; as we may read in that story where God sent one to be a lying spirit in the mouth of the Prophet; and so Paul had one, 2 Cor. 12. to humble and try him.

Therefore in all thy temptations, in all the sad exercises and buffetings of Satan, still remember this, He is at God's command, he bids him go and he goeth, leave off and he leaveth. That is a difficult place, 2 Cor. 12. 7. Paul repeateth the first words in that verse twice, as a thing worthy to be observed, Least I should be exalted above measure, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan (so we read it) it may be rendered with Beza the Angel of Satan to buffet me. Some interpret this of a bodily disease, others of the concupiscence of the flesh; others think he meaneth some inward suggestion of Satan working upon his corruption, whatsoever it was.

I proceed to resolve some Questions concerning the Devils:

Quest. 1. Whether the Devils have all their punishment already?

No; What are thou come to torment us before our time? and they are reserved in chains.

They have the beginning of eternal wrath, although the aggravation and increase of it shall be hereafter, as men's souls damned are full of God's anger, yet shall have greater torment at least extensively when soul and body are united at the day of Judgment, and while they are in the Air and go up and down tempting, they have not all they shall have, but hereafter they shall have the accomplishment of all; and shall never be received into favor again, although Origen held otherwise.

Quest. 2. How can they be punished with fire?

Seeing the fire is corporeal, how can it work upon immaterial substances?

Some therefore to answer this, do deny that there is material fire in hell, only the torments thereof are set forth by what is most terrible, and the Worm is metaphorical; others say by God's power it is elevated.

Mark 9 44, 46, 48. The same thing is three times repeated. The never dying worm is the Spirit of God by the co-active power of the Law holding a man's sins before his eyes, and filling him with self-convictions, and so with perfect fear and despair forever. The unquenchable fire is the wrath of God immediately upon the whole soul, especially the Conscience. The Scripture often sets forth the wrath of God, and the effects and impressions of it by fire, Deut. 4. 24. & 3. 24.

Quest. 3. Whether the Devils shall torment the wicked after the day of Judgment? This is handled by the Schoolmen; I see no reason (saith Voetius ) why the affirmative may not be admitted, although it is not to be made an Article of Faith.

The Scripture saith to be tormented with, not by the Devil and his Angels.

Gerhard in his Common-places de Inferno propounding this Question, An Daemones futuri sint damnatorum tortores? thus resolves it, the Devils before judgment, and in this life torment men, but after judgment they themselves shall be tormented in the bottomless pit, therefore they shall be companions in torment, not executioners of it. The object of this wrath in hell is the soul, and the punishment upon it must be its destruction, 2 Thess. 1. 9. The Devils cannot fill all the corners of the soul with wrath, God only can correct and destroy the Spirit. The wrath of God shall be the great and immediate executioner of the ungodly hereafter, 1 Cor. 15. 28. He shall dispense himself immediately in Heaven and hell. The Schoolmen dispute, Whether the Devils that have been incentores in culpa, shall not be tortores in poena. The ministry of the evil Angels shall last no longer then that of the good Angels, that shall be laid down at the Day of Judgment. Vide Calv. in 1 Cor. 15. 24.

Quest. 4. What is the meaning of those Stories, Possessed with Devils?

More were possessed with them in the time of the Gospel, then ever before or after. See Matth. 4. 24. & 8. 16, 28. & 9. 32. & 12. 22. & 15. 2. & Luke 24. 33. Act. 8. 13. The reason is because as our Savior had spiritually, so he would corporally or externally manifest his power over Devils. This possessing was nothing but the dwelling and working of the Devil in the body: one was demoniac and lunatic too; because the Devil took these advantages against his body, and this hath been manifested by their speaking of strange tongues on a sudden. The causes of this are partly from the Devils malice and desire to hurt us, and partly from ourselves who are made the slaves of Satan: and partly from God who doth it sometime out of anger, as he bid the Devil go into Saul; or out of grace, that they may see how bitter sin is, Vide Voet. Thes. de Energ.

Quest. 5. The meaning of Christ's temptation by Satan, and how we shall know Satan's temptations?

Matth. 4. The Devil carried Christ's body upon the pinnacle of the Temple. It is hard to say whether this were done in deed or vision only, although it seem to be real, because he bid him to throw himself down headlong: but now this was much for our comfort, that we see Christ himself was tempted, and that to most hideous things, Satan was overcome by him.

Damascene of old, and some of our Divines say, That Satan in his temptations of Adam and Christ, could not have access to their inward man to tempt them, therefore he tempted Adam by a Serpent and audible voice, and Christ by a visible Landskip of the world.

Satan's temptations (say some) may be known by the suddenness, violence and unnaturalness of them. All these are to be found in the motions of sin which arise from ones own heart, original sin will vent sin suddenly, Isa. 57. 20. Violently, Ier. 8. 6. and it will break forth into unnatural lusts, blasphemies against God, and murders against men, Mark 7. 21, 22. M ^r Liford saith, if they seize upon us with terror and affrightment, because our own conceptions are free, it is very difficult to distinguish them: When thoughts often come into the mind of doing a thing contrary to the Law of God, it is an argument Satan is at hand.

The Devil tempts some • • o sin under the show of virtue, Job. 16. 2. Phil. 3. 6. Omnis tentatio est assimila ••• • o • i, say the Schoolmen. Some under the hope of pardon, by stretching t 〈…〉 ds of God's mercy, lessening of sin, propounding the example of the multitude 〈…〉 e • ting before men what they have done, and promising them repentance hereafter before they die.

The difference between God's temptations and Satan's, they differ:

First, In the matter: the matter of God's temptations is ever good, as either by prosperity, adversity, or commandments, by chastisements which from him are ever good: but the matter of Satan's temptations is evil, he solicits us to sin.

Secondly, In the end, the end of God's temptation is to humble us and do us good: but of Satan's, to make us dishonor God.

Thirdly, In the effect; God never misseth his end, Satan is often disappointed.

A question is made by some, Whether Satan may come to the same man with the same temptation after he is conquered? M ^r Capel resolves it that he may, part 1. of Tentation, cha. 7. pag. 132, 133. It is also a question, An omnia peccata committantur tentante Diabolo? John 8. 41, 44. Every work of sin is a work of falsehood, and all falsehood is from the Devil; And likewise it is questioned, Whether man might not have sinned if there had not been a Tempter? To that it is answered, he might, for Satan fell without a tempter, the angelical nature was more perfect then the human. 2. Nature is now so depraved that we cannot but sin, I am. 1. 14. Non eget demon tentatore qui sibi factus est daemon, saith Parisiensis.

Fourthly, What is meant by delivering up to Satan, 1 Cor. 5. 5? Some with Chrysostom think it was a corporeal delivering of him, so that he was vexed of him by a disease or otherwise, and that they say is meant by destruction of the flesh, and so expound that Mark 6. They had power over the unclean spirits, that is not only to expel them, but to put them in whom they pleased; but this is not approved, therefore others make it to be a casting out of the company of the faithful, and so from all the good things that are appropriated unto that condition, and therefore to the destruction of the flesh, they expound to be meant of his corruption, for so flesh is taken in Scripture .

Sixthly, Whether the Devils may appear, 1 Sam. 28. He which appeared was 1. Subject to the Witches power, therefore it was not the true Samuel. 2. If Samuel had been sent of God, he would not have complained of trouble no more then Moses did, Matth. 17. 3. The true Samuel would not have given countenance to so wicked a practice, to the Magic Art. 4. True Samuel would not have suffered himself to be worshipped as this did. 5. Saul never came to be with the soul of Samuel in bliss: yet he saith 'tomorrow shalt thou be with me. 6. God refused to answer Saul by Prophet, Vision, Urim or Thummim, therefore he would not answer him by Samuel raised from the dead. 7. True Samuel after his death could not lie nor sin, Heb. 12. 23. He said Saul caused him to ascend, * and troubled him, if he had been the true Samuel, Saul could not have caused him to ascend, if not, he lied in saying he was Samuel, and that he troubled him.

If God had sent up Samuel the dead to instruct the living: Why is this reason given of the denial of the Rich man's request to have one sent from the dead? because if they would not believe Moses and the Prophets, They would not believe though one rose from the dead. In so doing the Lord should seem to go against his own order.

The souls of Saints which are at rest with the Lord, are not subject to the power or enchantment of a Witch: But Samuel was an holy Prophet now at rest with the Lord. Bellarmine answereth, That Samuel came not by the command of the Witch, but by the command of God, and that rather impeached then approved Art Magic, which he proveth, because the Witch was troubled. But the Scripture expressly teacheth, that her trouble was, because it was the King: who (having lately suppressed Witches) had now in disguised apparel set her on work, and so deceived her.

Bellarmine objecteth, The Scripture still calleth him that appeared Samuel, as if it were not an ordinary thing in Scripture, to call things by the names of that which they represent, or whose person they bear; the representations of the Cherubims are called the Cherubims. And things are often called in Scripture not according to the truth of the thing, or Scriptures judgment thereof, but according to the conceit and opinion of others. The Angels which appeared to the Patriarchs are called men, Gen. 18. the Idols of the Heathen are called gods, Gen. 25. because they were so esteemed by those which worshipped them.

First, We must walk warily and watchfully against Satan's temptations. We should be sober, 1 Thess. 5. 6, 8. Strong, 1 Cor. 16. 13. 1 Pet. 5. 8, 9. Watchful, 2 Tim. 4. 5. Matth. 26. 41. Prov. 4. 23. Wise, Heb. 5. 14. Prov. 2. 9, 10. and of good courage, Josh. 1. 9. 1 Chron. 28. 10. Taking unto ourselves the whole armor of God, Ephes. 6. 12, 13, 14. that we may be able to stand in the evil day.