on fuch occafions. Befides, when he forefees our Advantages or Mercies, he beftirs himself to prevent or hinder us of them; if Ministers set themselves to study and preach Truths that are more piercing, weighty or neceffary, they may obferve more moleftations, interruptions, or difcouragements of all forts, than when they lefs concern themselves with the business of the fouls of Men. He forefees what Sermons are provided, and often doth he upon fuch forefight endeavour to turn off thofe from hearing, that have most need, and are moft likely to receive benefit by them. Many have noted it, that thofe Sermons and Occafions that have done them moft good, (when they came to them) they have been fome way or other moft diffwaded from, and refolved againft before they came; and then when they have broken through their strongest hindrances, they have found that all their obftruction was Satans diligent forefight, to hinder them of fuch a Bleffing as they have (beyond hope) met withal. The like might be obferved of the conftant returns of the Lords day, if Men watch not against it, they may meet with more than ordinary, either Avocations to prevent and hinder them, or Disturbances to annoy and trouble, or bodily Indifpofitions to incapacitate and unfit them: And 'tis not to be contemned, that fome have observed themselves more apt to be Droufie, Dull or Sleepy on that day. Others have noted greater bodily Indifpofitions then ordinarily, than at other times; all which make no unlikely conjecture of the Devils fpecial dillgence against us on fuch occafions. . Let's caft in another instance to these, and that is, Of those that are upon the point of Converfion, ready to forfake Sin for Chrift. Oh! what pains then doth the Devil take to keep them back? He vifits them every Moment with one hindrance or other; fometimes they are tempted to former Pleafures, fometime affrighted with prefent Fears and future Difappointments; fometime difcouraged with Reproaches, Scorns and Afflictions that may attend their alteration; otherwile obftructed by the perfwafion or threatning of Friends and old Acquaintances; but this they are fure of, that they have never more Temptations, and those more fenfibly troubling than at that time; a clear evidence that Satan is as Diligent as Malicious. Ifhould now go on to difplay the Subtilty of this Powerful, Malicious, Cruel and diligent Adverfary. There is but one thing in the way, which hitherto I have taken for granted, and that is, Whether indeed there be any fuch things as Devils and wicked Spirits, or that these are but Theological Engines contrived by Perfons that carry a good will to Morality, and the publick Peace, to keep Men under an awful fear of fuch Miscarriages, as ・may render them otherwife a Shame to themselves, and a Trouble to others. It must be acknowledged a tranfgreffion of the rules of Method to offer a proof of that now, which (if at all) ought to have been proved in the beginning of the Difcourfe: And indeed the question at this length, whether there be a Devil, hath fuch affinity with that other (though for the matter they are as different as Heaven and Hell) whether there be a God, that as it well deferves a confirmation, (for the use that may be made of it to evidence that there is a God, because we feel there is a Devil,) fo would it require a serious endeavour to perform it fubftantially. But it would be not only a needlefs labour, to levy an Army against profeffed Atheists, who with high fcorn and derifion roundly deny both God and Devils; feeing others have frequently done that, but also it would occafion too large a digreffion from our present defign. I fhall therefore only speak a few things to those that own a God, and yet deny fuch a Devil as we have defcribed, and yet not to all of these neither; for there were many Heathens who were confident Affertors of a Deity, that nevertheless denied the Being of Spirits, as fevered from Corporeity; and others were fo far from the acknowledgment of Devils, that they confounded them in the number of their Gods; others there were, who gave fuch credit to the frequent relations of Apparitions, and difturbances of that kind, that many had attefted and complained of, that they expreffed more Ingenuity than Lucian, (who pertinacioufly refused to believe, because he never faw them,) and yet though they believed fomething of reality, in that that was the affrightment and trouble of others, they nevertheless afcribed fuch extraordinary things to Natural Caufes: Some to the powers of the Heavens and Stars in their Influences upon Natural Bodies, The Peripateor by the mediation of certain Herbs, Stones, Minerals, Creatures, ticks. Voices and Characters, under a special obfervation of the motion Porphyrius. of the Planets. Some refer fuch things to the fubtilty and quick- Aug. De Civ. nefs of the Senfes, of hearing and feeing, which might create Galen, Forms and Images of things, or difcover (I know not what) Reflections from the Sun and Moon. Some fancy the Shapes Pomponatius. and Visions to be exuvia, thin Scales or Skins of Natural things, Epicureans. giving reprefentations of the Bodies that caft them off, or Exha L lations Cardan. Lations from Sepulchres reprefenting the fhape of the Body. Academicks. Others make them the Effects of our untrufty and deceitful Senfes, the debility and corruption whereof, they conclude to be fuch, and fo general, that most Men are in hazard to be imposed upon by delufive Appearances. But with far greater fhew of likelihood, do fome make all fuch things, to be nothing else but the fues of Melancholly and corrupt Humors, which makes Men believe they hear, fee, and fuffer ftrange things, when there is nothing near Caffius ad Bru- them; or really to undergo ftrange fits, as in Lunacy and Epilepsy. tum ex lu- Leaving these Men as not capable of Information from Scripture tarch. in vita evidence, becaufe difowning it: Let us enquire what mistaken Bruti, Averroes. apprehenfions there have been in this Matter, among those that have pretended a reverence to, and belief of Scripture: The Sadducees deferve the first place, because they are by name noted in Scripture to have denied the Refurrection, and to have affirmed that there is neither Angel nor Spirit, Acts 23. 8. Matth. 22. 23. This opinion of theirs (could we certainly find it out) would make much for the confirmation of the Truth in queftion, feeing (what ever it was) it is pofitively condemned in Scripture, and the contrary afferted to be true. Many (and that upon confiderable grounds) do think, that they do not deny abfolutely that there were any Angels at all, but that acknowledging that fomething. there was which was called an Angel, yet they imagining it to be far otherwife than what it is indeed, were accufed juftly for denying fuch a kind of Angels as the Scripture had every where afferted and defcribed: For confidering that they owned a God, and (at leaft) the five Books of Mofes, if not all the other Books of the Vid Spanhem. Old Teftament, (as Scaliger and others judge, not without greatdub. Evang. probability, for neither doth the Scripture, nor Jofephus, menPart 3.dub.29. tion any fuch thing of the Prophets) it is unimaginable that they would altogether deny that there was Angel or Spirit at all. They read of Angels appearing to Lot, to Abraham, and met with it fo frequently, that believing Scriptures to be true, they could not believe Angels to be an abfolute fiction, for one Fable or Falfity in Scripture which fo highly afferts it felf to be an unerring Oracle of the true God) mult of neceffity have destroyed the credit of all, and rendred them as juftly fufpected to be true in nothing, when apparently falfe or fabulous in any thing. Again, If we call to mind what Apprehenfions they had of God, (which all confent they did acknowledge) we might more eafily imagine imagine what apprehenfions they had of Angels, for in regard that Mofes made mention of Gods Face and Back-parts, and that Exod. 33. ! frequently Hands and other parts of Mans Body were attributed to him, they concluded God to be Corporeal; and feeing the best of Creatures which God created cannot be supposed to have a more noble Being than was that of their Creator, and at the utmost, to be made according to the Pattern of his own Image and likeness, they might upon this Bottom cafily fix a denial of Incorporeal Spirits, and by confequence, that the Soul of Man was mortal, and therefore that there could be no Resurrection; fo that the nature of Angels being defcribed under the notion of Spiritual Substances, they are judged to deny any fuch thing, fuppofing that to be Incorporeal, was as much as not to be at all; and yet it were unreafonable to deny, that they had not fome Interpretation for those paffages of Scripture that mentioned Angels, which in their apprehenfions might be fome Salvo to the truth of those Historical Writings, which they acknowledged, but what that was, we are next to conjecture: And indeed Jofephus by a little hint of their Lib. 2. de Opinion seems to tell us, that they did not fo much deny the Being Bello Jud. c.7. of the Soul as the permanency of it, and fo by confequence they might not fo much deny abfolutely the existence of Spirits as their Natural Being and continuance. Something there was that was called by the name of Angel, (that they could not but own) and that this must be a real, and not an imaginary thing, is evident from the real Effects and things done by them; yet obferving their appearances to have been upon fome fpecial occafion, and their disappearing to have been on a fudden, they might conjecture them to be created by God for the prefent fervice, and then reduced to nothing when that fervice was done. Ψυχῆς τε τὴν διαμονὴν, καὶ καὶ as a d weias y πas avage. Their Opinion then of Angels feems to be one of these two, Either that they were Corporeal Substances created upon a special Inftit: 1.1.c.i4. emergency, but not permanent Beings; or that they were but $9. Fuit illa quiImages and Impreffions fupernaturally formed in the Fancy by the dem olim Sadfpecial Operation of God, to fignify his Mind and Commands to ducæorum opiMen, upon which they might fitly be called God's Meffengers and nio, per An elos nihil defigMinifters. I put in this laft into the conjecture, because I find it nari quam vel mentioned by Calvin, as the Opinion of the Sadducees, but both motus quos are noted by Diodate on Acts 23.8. as with equal probability be- Deus hominilonging to them; his words are, They did not believe they were fub- bus afpirat, vel fifting and immortal Creatures, but tranfitory Apparitions, or fome virtutis fuæ divine fpecimina. L 2 ca que edit divine Actions and Motions to produce fome special and notable Effect. Others alfo have been lately hammering out the fame apprebenfion concerning Angels, and profefs themselves delivered from it Hobs Lev.c 34. -with great difficulty, differing only in this from fome of the Heap. 212. & 214. thens before mentioned, that what those ascribed to the Puissance of the Stars, Natural Powers, or to weakness of Senfes and corrupt Humors, they (by the advantage of the general notions of Scripture) have afcribed to God, putting forth his Power upon the Minds and Fancies of Men, or working by the Humours of the Body: upon this foundation they will eafilier make bold with Devils to deny, if not their Being, yet their Temptations, imagining that we may poffibly do him wrong, in fathering upon him these Sollicitations and Provocations to Sin, which we by experience find to be working and acting upon our Minds, thinking that our own Fancies or Imaginations may be the only Devils that vex us; and this they more readily hearken to, from the nature of Dreams and Visions which happen to Men in an ordinary Natural way, where our Fancies play with us as if they were distinct from us: as alfo from this confideration, that the Lunatick, Epileptick and. Frenzical Perfons are in Scripture called Demoniacks, as Matth. 17.15. with Luk. 9. where the Perfon is called Lunatick, and yet faid to be taken and vexed by a Spirit: fo allo Joh. 10. 20. he hath a Devil, and is mad: But these reasonings can do little with an intelligent confidering Man, to make him deny what he fo really feels, and is fo often forewarned of in Scripture: for fuppose these were called Demoniacks by the Vulgar, it doth not compel us to believe they were fo. Men are apt to afcribe NatuDr.More's My. tural Diseases to Satan, and Chrift did not concern himself to ftery Godli- cure their Mifapprebenfions, while he cured their Difeafes. This fome nefs. 1.4. c.6. fuggeft as a Reason that may anfwer many Cafes, though indeed it cannot answer that of Matth. 17. becaufe verf. 18. 'tis faid exprefsly that Jefus rebuked the Devil, and be departed out of him, which would not have been proper to have been spoken on the account of Chrift by the Evangelift, to exprefs the cure of a Natural Difeafe, for fo would he unavoidably have been rendred guilty of the fame mistake with the Vulgar. But if we should grant, that divers mentioned under the name of Demoniacks, were Men difturbed with Melancholly, or the Falling-Sickness, all were not fo; for those in Matth. 8. 31. befought Chrift after their ejection, to have liberty to go into the Herd of Swine: fo that if S. 10 Mr. |