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But the plain meaning of this text is, that they lived and died in the faith of many promises, some of which were to be fulfilled after their days here on earth, but were not fulfilled in their life-time: They did not enjoy the privileges and blessings of the gospel of the Messiah, in that perfect manner, in which we do, since the Messiah is actually come, and has fulfilled these promises, and by his death, or offering himself as the same apos tle expresses it, for ever perfected them that are sanctified; Heb. x. 14. But all this does by no means preclude their existence and happiness, in a separate state, as spirits made perfect; that is, in a perfect freedom from all sin and sorrow; though it is probable this very state of comparative perfection might have several degrees of joy added to it at the ascension of Christ, and will have many more at the resurrection from the dead.

VIII. 2 Pet. i. 13, 14. I think it meet, as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up, by putting you in remembrance; knowing that, shortly, I must put off this my tabernacle. Here it is evident, that the person, who thinks it meet to stir up christians to their duty, has a tabernacle belonging to him, and which he must shortly put off. The soul, or thinking principle of the apostle Peter, which is here supposed to be himself, is so plainly distinguished from the tabernacle of the body, in which he dwelt for a season, and which he must put off shortly, that it most evidently implies, an existence of this thinking sou! very distinct from the body, and which will exist when the body is laid aside. Surely the conscious being, and its tabernacle or dwelling-place, are two very distinct things, and the conscious being exists when he puts off his present dwelling.

After all these arguments from scripture, may I be permitted to mention one, which is derived partly from reason, and partly from the sacred records, which seems to carry some weight with it?

The doctrine of rewards and punishments, in a separate state of souls, hath been one of the very chief principles or motives, whereby, virtue and religion have been maintained in this sinful world throughout all former ages and nations, and under the several dispensations of God among men, till the resurrection of the body was fully revealed: Now it is scarce to be supposed, that such a doctrine which God, in the course of his providence, hath made use of as a chief principle and motive of religion and virtue through all the world which had any true virtue, and, in all ages before christianity, should be a false doctrine. Let us prove the first proposition, by a view of the several ages of mankind and dispensations of religion.

The heathens, who have had nothing else but the light of nature to guide them, could have no notion at all of the resurrection of the body; and, therefore, not only the wisest and best of

them, but, perhaps, the bulk of mankind among the Gentiles, at least in Europe and Asia, if not in Africa and America also, who have been taught by priests and poets, and the public opinions of their nation, and traditions of their ancestors, have generally supposed such a separate state after this life, wherein their souls should be rewarded or punished, except where the fancy of transmigration prevailed; and even these very transmigrations into other bodies, viz. of dogs, or horses, or men, were assigned as speedy rewards or punishments of their behaviour in this life.

Now though this doctrine of immediate recompences could not be proved by them with certainty and clearness, and had many follies mingled with it, yet the probable expectation of it, so far as it hath obtained among men, hath had a good degree of influence, through the conduct of common providence, to keep the world in some tolerable order, and prevent universal irregularities and excesses of the highest degree; it hath had some force on the conscience to restrain the enormous wickedness of men,

The patriarchs of the first ages, whose history is related in scripture, had no notion of the resurrection of the body expressly revealed to them, that we can find; and it must be the hope of such a state of recompence of their souls after death, that influenced their practice of piety, if they were not informed, that their bodies should rise again.

Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had no plain and distinct promise of the resurrection of the body; yet it is said; Heb. xi. 13-16. They received the promises, that is, of some future happiness, and embraced them, and confessed they were strangers and pilgrims on earth, whereby they plainly declared, that they sought some other country; that is, a heavenly, and God hath prepared a city for them. What city, what heavenly country can this be, which they themselves sought after, but the city or country of separate souls or paradise, where good men are rewarded, and God is their God, if they had no plain promises or views of a resurrection of the body? And, indeed they had need of a very plain and express promise of such a resurrection, to encourage their faith and obedience, if they had no notion or belief of a separate state, or a heavenly, country, whither their souls should go at their death.

Job seems to have some bright glimpses of a resurrection, in chapter xix, 25-27. but this was far above the level of the dispensation wherein he lived, and a peculiar and distinguishing favour granted to him under his uncommon and peculiar sufferings.

In the institution of the Jewish religion by Moses, there is no express mention of a resurrection, and we must suppose their hope

of a future state, was chiefly such as they could gain from the light of nature, and learn by traditions from their fathers, or from unwritten instructions. For though our Saviour improves the words of God to Moses in the bush; Ex. iii. 6. I am the God of Abraham, &c. so far as to prove a resurrection from them, yet we can hardly suppose the Israelites could carry it any further, than merely to the liappiness of Abraham's soul, &c. in some separate state; and thence came the notion of departed souls of good men going to the bosom of Abraham.

I grant that David in his Psalms, Isaiah and Daniel, in their prophecies, have some hints of the resurrection of the body; but this doth not seem to have been the common principle or support of virtue and goodness, or a general article of belief among the Jews, in the early ages.

In the days of the later prophets, and after their return from Babylon, I confess the Jews had some notion of a resurrection; but they also retained their opinion of the righteous souls being at rest with God, in a separate state before the resurrection. See the book of wisdom, chapter iii. 1-4. "The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God. And there shall no torment touch them. In the sight of the unwise, they seemed to die, and their departure is taken for misery, and their going from us to be utter destruction; but they are in peace: for though they be perished in the sight of men, yet is their hope full of immortality." and iv. 7. "Though the righteous be prevented with death, yet they shall be in rest."

That this was the most common doctrine of the Jews, except the Sadducees and their followers, in our Saviour's time, and that it was the doctrine of the primitive christians also, need not be proved here; though they also, had the expectation of the resurrection of the body.

Now if this be the clief or only doctrine, which men could attain to, under the dispensation of natural reason, as the most powerful motive to virtue and piety, if this be the chiefest doctrine of that kind that we know of, which the patriarchs aud primitive Jews enjoyed, if this also be a constant doctrine of later Jews, that is, the wisest and best of them, and also of the primitive christians, which had so much influence on the good behaviour of all of them toward God and men, and by which God carried on his work of piety in their hearts and lives, and by which also he impressed the consciences of evil men in some measure, and restrained them from their utmost excesses of vice and wickedness, is it not hard to be supposed, that this doctrine is all mere fancy and delusion, and hath nothing of truth in it? And, indeed if this doctrine had been taken away, the heathens would be left without any possible true notion of a future state of recompence, and the patriarchs seem to have had no sufficient

principle or motive to virtue and piety left them, and the principles and motives of goodness, in the following ages, among Jews and christians, had been greatly diminished and enfeebled.

At the conclusion of this chapter, I cannot help taking notice, though I shall but just mention it, that the multitude of narratives, which we have heard of in all ages of the apparition of the spirits or ghosts of persons departed from this life, can hardly be all delusion and falsehood. Some of them have been affirmed to appear upon such great and important occasions as may be equal to such an unusual event; and several of these accounts have been attested by such witnesses of wisdom, and prudence, and sagacity, under no distempers of imagination, that they may justly demand a belief; and the effects of these apparitions, in the discovery of murders, and things unknown, have been so considerable and useful, that a fair disputant should hardly venture to run directly counter to such a cloud of witnesses, without some good assurance on the contrary side. He must be a shrewd philosopher indeed, who upon any other bypothesis, can give a tolerable account of all the narratives in Glanvill's "Sadducismus triumphatus," or Baxter's "World of Spirits and Apparitions," &c. Though I will grant some of these stories have but insufficient proof, yet if there be but one real apparition of a departed spirit, then the point is gained, that there is a separate state.

And indeed the scripture itself seems to mention such sort of ghosts, or appearances of souls departed, Mat. xiv. 26. When the disciples saw Jesus walking on the water, they "thought it had been a spirit;" And, Luke xxiv. 37. after his resurrection they saw him at once, appearing in the midst of them, and they supposed they had seen a spirit; and our Saviour doth not contradict their notion, but argues with them upon the supposition of the truth of it, a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me to have." And Acts xxiii. 8, 9. the word "spirit" seems to signify the "apparition of a departed soul," where it is said, "The Sadducees say, there is no resurrection, neither angel, nor spirit," and verse 9. "If a spirit, or an angel hath spoken to this man," &c. A spirit here is plainly distinct from an angel, and what can it mean but an apparition of a human soul which has left the body?

SECT. IV. Objections answered.

Having pointed out so many springs of argument, to support this doctrine from the word of God, as well as from reason and tradition, I proceed now to answer some particular objections, which are raised against it.

Objection I. The scripture is so far from supposing, that the soul of man is immortal, or that there is any such thing as the

any soul. death of every soul of "And Sampson said, Ezek. xviii. 20.

life of the soul continuing after the death of the body, that it often speaks of the death of the soul, if the words were transJated exactly according to the original. Numb. xxxi. 19. "Whosoever hath killed any person," "Hebrew" 1 Sam. xxii. 12. I have occasioned the thy father's house." Judges xvi. 30. let my soul die with the Philistines." soul that sinneth, it shall die." Ps. lxxxix. 48. is he that liveth, and shall not see death? Shall he deliver his soul from the hand of the grave ?" 1 Kings xix. 4. "Elijah requested for himself that he might die," "Hebrew" that his soul might die.

"The

"What man

Answer. The word "soul" in English, "nephesh" in Hebrew, "psyche" in Greek, and "anima" in Latin, &c. signifies not only the conscious and active principle in man, which thinks and reasons, loves and hates, hopes and fears, and which is the proper agent in virtue or vice, but it is used, also to signify the principle of animal life and motion in a living creature. And though these two in themselves are very distinct things, yet upon this account the word soul is attributed to brutes, as well as to men for the Jews, as well as some heathens, in their mistaken philosophy, supposed the same soul of man, which gives natural life to the body, to be also that very intellectual principle, which thinks and reasons, fears and loves; and upon this account, they gave both these principles, how distinct soever in themselves, one common name, and called them the soul.

Now the soul, or the principle of animal life and motion, being the chief or most valuable thing in an animal, it came to pass that the whole animal was called a soul: therefore, even birds and fishes are called living souls; Gen. i. 20. and any animals. whatsoever in scripture are called souls, or living souls. And then for the same reason, that is, because the soul of man is his chief part, the whole person of man is called his soul; Gen. ii. 7. "Man became a living soul," that is, a living person. So Exod. i. 5. "All the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob, were seventy souls," that is, all the persons were seventy.

And this is not only the language of the Jews, but even of other nations. In our country we use the word souls to signify persons: so we say a poor soul, when we see a person in misery: We use the word a meagre soul, for a thin man : We say, there were twenty souls lost in the ship, that is, twenty persons, &c.

Now the word soul among the Jews, being so universally used to signify the person of man, they used the same word to signify the person when he was dead, as well as when he was alive. Numb. vi. 6. "He shall come at no dead body, in the

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