Chapter V (6)

The first covenant was so perfect that nothing could be added to it, but the manifestations of that which was promised in it. It was a promise of life and redemption to mankind, to be fulfilled in and by the seed of the woman. Now the promise, and the fulfilling of it, are not (as in human matters) two _distant_, _separate_ things, that begin at different times, nor can the one ever be without the other. They both began together, and must exist together. The end, that is, the fulfilling, grows out of the beginning, goes along with it, and has all its efficacy from it; and the beginning, that is, the promise, is only so much of the end.

That which Christ did, suffered, and obtained in our flesh, calling all to turn to God, to deny themselves, to enter into the strictest union with him, giving all divine graces, and yet only _according to their faith in him_; that very same, the seed of the woman from the beginning was always doing, yet solely _according to their faith in it_.

* The loss of _this faith_ in the first ages of mankind, gave birth to that which is called the _heathen_, or _rational_ world; for they both began together, and brought forth a race of people, full of blindness, wickedness, and idolatry. For so far as they departed from faith, so far they fell from God, under the dominion and government of their reason, passions, and appetites. And thence began the kingdom of this world, and the wisdom of this world, which ever must have full power over every man, as soon as he ceases to live by faith.

* _Reasoning_ instead of faith, brought about the first dreadful change in human nature, no less than a real death to God. And nothing but faith instead of reasoning, can give any one fallen man power to become again a son of God. Now to the end of the world, this will be the unalterable difference between faith in God, and reasoning about the things of God: they can never change their place, or effects; that which they did to the first man, that they will do to the last.

* It _matters_ not, how much the _revelations_ and precepts of God are increased, since the first single command given to _Adam_; for no more is offered to our reasoning faculty by the whole bible, than by that single precept. And the benefit of the whole bible is lost to us, as soon as we reason about the nature and necessity of its commands, just as the benefit of that first precept was lost in the same way.

_Hath God indeed said, ye shall not eat of every tree in the garden?_ This was the first essay, or beginning of reasoning with God. What it was, and did then, that it will always be, and do. Its nature, and fruits will never be any other, to the end of the world. And though in these last ages, it hath passed through all schools of quibbling, and is arrived at its utmost height of art, and precision of argument, yet as to divine matters, it stands just where it stood, when it first learnt that logic from the serpent, which improved the understanding of _Eve_. And at this day, it can see no deeper into the things of God; give no better judgment about them, than _that_ conclusion it at first made, that _death_ could not be in the tree which was _so good for food, so pleasant to behold, and to be desired for knowledge_.

In short, these two, faith and reasoning, have, and always will divide all mankind, from the beginning to the end of the world, into two sorts of men.

The faithful, thro’ every age, are of the seed of the woman, the children of God, and heirs of redemption.

The reasoners are of the seed of the serpent, they are the Heathens thro’ every age, and heirs of that confusion, which happened to the first builders of the tower of _Babel_.

* To live by faith, is to be in covenant with God; to live by reasoning, is to be in compact with ourselves, with our own vanity, and blindness.

* To live by faith, is to live with God in the spirit and power of prayer, in self-denial, in contempt of the world, in divine love, in foretastes of the world to come, in humility, in patience, long-suffering, obedience, resignation, absolute dependence upon God, with all that is temporal and earthly under our feet.

* To live by reasoning, is to be a prey of the old serpent, eating dust with him, groveling in the mire of all earthly passions, devoured with pride, imbittered with envy, tools and dupes to ourselves, tossed up with false hopes, cast down with vain fears, slaves to all the good and evil things of this world, to-day elated with learned praise, to-morrow dejected at the loss of it; yet jogging on year after year, defining words and ideas, dissecting doctrines and opinions, setting all arguments and all objections upon their best legs, sifting and refining all notions, conjectures, and criticisms, till death puts the same full end to _all the wonders_ of the ideal fabric, that the cleansing broom does to the wonders of the spider’s web, so artfully spun at the expence of its own vitals.

* This is the unalterable difference between a life of _faith_, and a life of _reasoning_ in the things of God; the former is from God, works with God, and therefore all things are possible to it; the latter is from the serpent, and therefore vain opinions, false judgments, errors and delusions are inseparable from it.

Every scholar, every disputer of this world, nay every man, has been where _Eve_ was, and has done what she did, when she sought for _wisdom_ that did _not come_ from God. All libraries are a full proof of the remaining power of the first sinful thirst after it: they are full of a knowledge that comes not from God, but from the first foundation of subtlety that opened her eyes. For as there cannot be any goodness in man, but so far as the divine goodness works in him, so there cannot be any divine truth, or knowledge in man, but so far as God’s truth and knowledge works in him?

Indeed nothing but the one Spirit of Christ, living and working in man, from the beginning to the end of the world, can possibly be the source of any goodness, holiness, or redemption of man.

The scriptures abound with proof of this. What can be more decisive than the following words? _If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. If Christ be not in you, ye are reprobates._ And must not this be equally true of every man in the world? As true of all men in the patriarchal as in the gospel ages? _If any man_, says the apostle; therefore no regard is had to time or place, but where there is _any man_, there this truth is affirmed of him by the apostle, that unless he hath the Spirit of Christ he is none of his, but is a reprobate. But if none can be Christ’s, but because they have his Spirit living in them, and none can be God’s, but because they are Christ’s, it follows that if Christ was not the Spirit and power of _that_ first, universal covenant made by God with fallen _Adam_, if he was not that which was meant by the _seed of the woman_, if his Spirit was not from that time the real bruiser of the serpent’s head, both _Adam_, and all his posterity, for much more than three thousand years lived and died mere reprobates, and that, by an unavoidable necessity, because they had not the Spirit of Christ living in them.

And now, my Lord, I think I have sufficiently proved not only my two propositions, but also that the first covenant with _Adam_, by the seed of the woman, was the one Christian means of salvation, so wonderfully manifested by the whole process of Christ revealed in the gospel. Therefore it is a truth of the utmost certainty, that from the beginning of the world to the end of it, there never was, nor ever will be any more, or any other, but one and the same true religion of the gospel, which began with _Adam_ and _Eve_ thro’ Jesus Christ, the one mediator and reconciler of God to man, who was as certainly the life, strength, and salvation of the faithful in the old world, as he was in after-times, when the Son of the Virgin _Mary, the way, the truth, and the life_, to all that have faith in him.

And indeed a plurality of religions, or means of salvation, is as gross an imagination as a plurality of gods, and can subsist upon no other foundation.

A better religion necessarily supposes a better God, and a change in religion a change in that God that makes it. A partial God, with-holding the _one true power_ of salvation, till the last ages of the world, is as atheistical as _Epicurus_’s god.

In sundry times, and in divers manners, it may please the wisdom of God, to vary that which is only an outward help to the truth of religion; but the inward spirit and truth of salvation, is as unvariable as God himself.

The law therefore of _Moses_, as consisting of carnal ordinances, not only _makes nothing perfect_, but brings nothing new into the one covenant of redemption, but was only a temporary, provisional help, _added because of transgressions, till the promised seed should come_; that is, till the whole process of Christ, should in its last and highest degree of evidence manifest itself in all its parts.

* _This law_ then no more belonged to the _true religion_ of the Old Testament, than of the New, neither did it ever stand _between_ these two dispensations, as in their stead. No: it was merely on the _outside_ of both, had only a temporary relation to the true religion, either before or after Christ, but was no more a _part_, or _instead_ of them _for a time_, than the hand that stands by the road, directing the traveller, is itself a part of the road, or instead of it.

Now, tho’ the reason of man ought not to pretend to fathom all the depths of divine wisdom, in the whole of this _additional covenant_, yet two ends of it are apparent.

_First_, To bring this corrupted people of _Israel_ into a new state of such observances, as might preserve them from the gross superstitions and idolatries to which they were too much inclined. And this, by a _ritual_ of such condescensions to their carnal minds, as might nevertheless be a school of restraints and discipline, full of such purifications, types, and figures, as gave much spiritual light and instruction, both backwards and forwards. Backwards, as truly significative of their fallen state, daily memorials of their lost purity and perfection: _forwards_, as variously pointing at _that promised_ victory over the serpent, which had been the constant faith and hope of their forefathers.

_Secondly_, That by a theocracy added to this ritual, which shewed itself in a covenant of continual _care and protection_, openly blessing their obedience, and punishing their rebellion, and working all kinds of miracles in the overthrow of their enemies, not only they themselves, but all the rest of the world, might be forced to see and know, that there was no God, that had all power in heaven and on earth, but the one God of _Israel_.

As to the _Israelites_ themselves, this temporal covenant was a great instance of God’s goodness towards them. For they were thus called out of idolatry, separated from the rest of the world, built into an holy church of God, put under a most amazing theocracy, indulged for a time with a ritual of carnal institutions, because of the hardness of their hearts, which ritual was full of every instruction by doctrines, types, figures and miracles, all shewing in the strongest manner, that they were to be heirs of the heavenly promises made to their forefathers.

And as to the rest of the world, no particular message or messenger, tho’ new risen from the dead, proclaims to them in so powerful a manner, the vanity of their idols, the knowledge of the one true God of all the world, as this remarkable body of people set up in the midst of the world did. So that the law, tho’ nothing but a temporal covenant of _outward care and protection_, was not only most divinely contrived to preserve the faith of the first holy patriarchs, and guide them to the time and manner of receiving the promises made to their fathers, but it was all mercy to the rest of the world, being no less than one continual, daily, miraculous call to them to receive blessing and protection, life and salvation in the knowledge and worship of the one true God of heaven and earth.

Now when the children of the patriarchs, were to be entered into this new covenant, the utmost care was taken by the Spirit of God, that to eyes that could see and ears that could hear, enough should be shewn and said, to prevent all _carnal atheism_ to temporal and outward things, and bring forth a spiritual _Israel_, full of that faith and piety, in which their holy ancestors, as pilgrims on earth, had lived and died devoted to God, in hope of everlasting redemption.

To this end _Moses_, tho’ bringing them under a ritual of bodily washings and purifications, yet that they might use them only as outward confessions and memorials of an inward spiritual pollution, and as types and figures of their being to be delivered from it; is led by the inspiration of God, not only to insert in the books of the law, the most sublime doctrines and heavenly precepts of patriarchal holiness, but to lay before them, for their daily instruction, a history of the most deep and affecting truths: truths that had every thing in them fitted to awaken and keep up that strong hope of an eternal redemption, under the power of which, the holy patriarchs had overlooked every thing in time for the sake of eternity.

I mean, the most wonderful history of the creation and curse of this world, of the high origin of man and his dreadful fall from it, his redemption and covenant of life restored in a seed of the woman, the lives and deaths of the holy patriarchs, their patience under all sufferings, their contempt of worldly advantages, their heavenly visions, revelations and speeches from the invisible God, keeping them thereby in an holy intercourse with the _invisible world_, full of faith and hope of the good things of eternity.

To mention one or two of those great doctrines of _Moses_, which set forth the original perfection and heavenly nature of man.

God said, _Let us make man in our own image and likeness_. Is not this as high a doctrine of _immortality_, does it not give the same instruction, raise the same hope, and call for all the same elevation of the heart to God, as when St. _John_ saith, _Beloved, it does not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be LIKE him_? Just the same truth, and fitted to have the same effects, as when _Moses_ said, God made man in his own LIKENESS.

St. _Paul_ says, _God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself_. A comfortable doctrine indeed, and full of hope of immortality; yet only the same comfort and hope of immortality which had been openly preached by _Moses_.

When _Moses_ bringeth in the Deity, as saying, _The seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the serpent_; he preaches _that_ very same gospel, and in the same manner which the apostle did. For his words plainly teach, _that God was in the seed of the woman reconciling the world unto himself_; as when St. _Paul_ says, _that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself_; the difference is nothing else, but in two different names given to our Redeemer.

* Now tho’ _Moses_ was the first _recorder_ of the gospel salvation in a written book, yet was he not the first _preacher_ of it. For it was proclaimed in _Adam_’s day, from heaven, as the birth of Christ in the flesh, in the days of Herod. For when God said, _The seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the serpent_, the same good tidings of salvation was _proclaimed from heaven_ by God himself, as when the angel said to the shepherds, _Unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord_.

* But how can we know this? Only by God’s own teaching. For nothing can be truly known of God by the creature, but that which God makes known of himself.――So far as God operates in the creature, and manifests himself in it, so far it truly knows, and _is taught of God_.――Any other knowledge of God, however learned, high, or deep it may pretend to be, is as vain and spurious as _that goodness_ which proceeds from something else, than God’s good Spirit living in us.

* Genius, parts and literature, however set forth with wit and rhetoric, have no affinity with divine knowledge; they can no more give it, than the lust of the eyes and the pride of life can generate humility and purity of heart. These accomplishments live and act in a sphere of their own, and have no more power of taking to themselves any living knowledge of God, than the art of painting to the life, can give the power of _creating_ life.

* The blindness, and follies which have over-run both the antient and modern world in matters of religion, are a full proof of the capital doctrine of divine revelation, _namely_, that man (now the defaced image of God) is so miserably changed and fallen from his first created state, that nothing less than a new birth, can bring him again into the region of divine _truth_.

And hence it is, that tho’ religion has its deepest ground in the nature of man, tho’ God be _essentially_, present in the souls of all men, yet from the fall of _Adam_ to the end of the world, it will be an immutable truth, that _strait is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth_ unto divine knowledge; and none but the simple of heart, _the poor in spirit_, or the real followers of Christ can find it.

* But it is time to have done. I shall only trouble your Lordship with the few following remarks.――Dr. _Warburton_ says, “He has proved that the doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments is not to be _found in_, nor did make a _part_ of the Mosaic dispensation.”¹ The Mosaic dispensation means nothing else, but a _temporary_ ritual, and a _temporary_ theocracy of worldly blessings and curses to support it. These are its fixed bounds within which it is confined.――Therefore, to prove that a state _beyond_ this world, was not to be _found in_, nor did make a _part_ of a state, that is confined to this world, is as easily and as vainly done, as to prove that the _garden of Eden_ is not to be _found in_, nor makes a _part_ of a map that is confined to _England_. And to infer _that_ the _Israelites_ therefore had no notion of an immortality, because it was not a _part_ of their ritual, is no better than to infer, that the people of _England_ can have no notion of the garden of _Eden_, because nothing of it is to be seen in the map of this island.――But tho’ not in the _ritual_, yet _Moses_ in other parts of his books written for the instruction of those to whom he gave the ritual, has given them the fullest notice and highest proof of that _godlike_ and _immortal_ nature they received at their creation, shewing them to be the children of the _patriarchal covenant_, heirs of all the promises of eternal redemption made to their fathers from the beginning of the world. Nay, the most heavenly doctrines and precepts given by the apostles to the redeemed of Christ, as _heirs of immortality_, are to be found in the books of _Moses_.

¹ D. L. Vol. II. page 474.

Dr. _Warburton_ takes much pains to get rid of the only true sense of the following texts of _Moses_. Thus, _Let us make man in our own image and likeness_. From these words, he says, _it is inferred, that the soul is immaterial_. But he thinks _Moses intimated quite another matter_. And so do I; for to intimate the _immateriality_ of the soul, by saying, that man was made in the _image and likeness_ of God, is quite short of the sense of the words: to say, that the soul is _immaterial_, is saying no more, than that it is not a _circle_ or a piece of _clay_, it is saying nothing at all of it but only of something that it is not. Therefore _Moses_ cannot be supposed to intimate such a nothing as this, by the image and likeness of God. But he asserts a much higher matter, namely, that being created in the image of God, he was made a partaker of the divine nature, and therefore had not only immortality, but the riches and perfections of the Deity grounded and growing up. And this is the true ground of our eternal happiness, that is, of that _eternal increase_ of union, perfection and glory, which the redeemed soul will find in God; it is because the image of God, being as a seed sown into it at its _creation_, it will to all eternity, after his admission into heaven, open more and more its divine nature, and spring forth in new and farther fruits of _glory_, _beatitude_ and _union_ with God.

Every thing that is endless, numberless in the depth of eternity, is endless and numberless in the silence of the soul; what _seeing_ is, what _hearing_, _feeling_, &c. are in their boundless variety, and ever increasing newness of delights in eternity, these, with all their wonders, are the innate birthright and sure inheritance of every immortal godly soul. And on the other hand, the same boundless, numberless depth and growth of every tormenting, painful, frightful sensation, will open itself in every soul, _that_ has lost its God, and is left to its own immortal life within itself.

Vain therefore, is that principle published to the world, by a celebrated philosopher of the last century, that the soul in its _first created state_, is a mere _rasa tabula_, or _blank paper_. A fiction, that is contradicted by all that we know of every created thing in nature.

For every creature of this world, animate or inanimate, is in its degree, a _microcosm_ of all the powers, that are in the great world, of which it is a part. And nothing through all this universe, has in its essence, only the nature of a _rasa tabula_, or blank paper, but is in its kind, full of the riches, and powers of all outward nature.

In like manner must it be with the eternal world; every thing which comes from it, must be in its degree, a _microcosm_ of all the powers and glories of eternity.

Let it be said, that the _matter of this world_, was in its first created state, free from all extension, solidity and parts, and this would be as grave a saying, and as much founded in nature, as the _rasa tabula_ of the soul: say again, that by degrees it got a materiality of length, breadth and parts, from _without_, and this would be no greater a wonder, than that a soul, created inwardly destitute of any principle of knowledge, should from outward causes grow up into a profound philosopher. _Again_, say that the soul was at first, but a _blank paper_, till the organs of the body began to act upon it; and may not the enemies of religion, as justly say, that it must be the same blank paper again at the last, when the body shall be broken off from it?

If therefore the _Essay upon human understanding_ (which the Doctor calls the most original book that ever was published) has produced a metaphysicks, in many points dangerous to religion, and greatly serviceable to false, and superficial reasoning, it is not to be wondered at, since so eminent an error, is the fundamental principle on which it proceeds.

But to return to the Doctor: he says, “The divine image and likeness must consist in something that is peculiar to man,――that the two things _peculiar_ to man, are his shape, and his reason; that it cannot be in his shape, therefore it must be in his reason.”¹

¹ Page 554.

The divine image and likeness cannot consist in something that is peculiar to man. It might as well consist in his shape, as in his faculty of making _syllogisms_; but on the contrary, it must consist in that, and only that, which is, peculiar to God. Nor could man possibly be created in the image and likeness of God, unless something peculiar to God, had been the divine glory and perfection of his creaturely life. For the creaturely life, and all that is peculiar to it, is at the utmost distance from God, and can only have a likeness to that, which is to be found in creatures.――God dwelling in a supernatural way in the creature, is the only possible image of God that can be in it. The fallen angels have every thing _that_ was creaturely _left_ in them, but they are horrible devils, because they have lost their supernatural image of God, which dwelt in them at their creation. They have still reason, craft and subtlety; but because they have nothing, but what is peculiar to the creature, they are all rage, torment and misery.

The Doctor therefore, instead of appealing to two things in man, his shape and his reason, as his true distinction from beasts, should have said, by the authority of _Moses_, that only one thing was peculiar to man, as his glorious distinction both from fallen angels, and terrestrial animals, and _that_ one thing is, his being created in the image and likeness of God. As to his outward shape, considered only as different from other animals, there is but little distinction in it; because they are as different in shape from one another, as man is from them all. And if man at his creation had had no higher a guest within him, than his reason, his shape would have been little better, than that of a fox, or a serpent. For reason, when not under the government of a higher principle, is that same craft, and cunning, _that_ is visible in variety of beasts; and is for the most part, as earthly an instrument of mischievous passions, and lusts in man, as it is in beasts. And what is more, it must be so, till it comes under the government of _that_, which was the _image and likeness_ of God, in the first creation of man.

* What is the difference between reason in St. _Paul_, a _Spinosa_, a _Hobbes_, or a _Bolingbroke_? None at all, or no other than in their outward shape. Therefore if reason be the divine image and likeness of God in man, a _Hobbes_ and a _Bolingbroke_, had as much of it as St. _Paul_. And a man that is all his life long reasoning himself into atheism, and the wisdom of living according to his own lusts, must be allowed to give daily proof of his having the image and likeness of God, very powerfully manifested in him.

The Doctor’s great proof, that reason is the image and likeness of God, is because _Moses_ immediately adds, _Let them rule over the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of heaven, and over the beasts of the earth_. “For what, says he, could invest man with this dominion _de facto_, as well as _de jure_, but his reason?”¹

¹ D. L. page 554.

Our blessed Lord, at leaving the world, saith, “These signs shall follow them that believe; in my name, they shall cast out devils, they shall speak with new tongues, they shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them.” Now let it be asked, _what could invest the believers in Christ with this dominion_ de facto, _as well as_ de jure, _but their reason_? Both this question, and the solution of it, is just as sound, and theological as the Doctor’s.

For it was not any thing of their own, but solely the name, that is, power of Christ dwelling, and operating in them, that invested them with the dominion over devils, serpents, diseases, and all outward deadly, or hurtful things. Now _that_ which gave this power, to the believers in Christ, was _that very same_, which gave to the first perfect man, a _power of ruling_ over all the creatures of this world, and of living in full superiority and dominion over all that was, or could be hurtful, and deadly, in fire, or water, heat or cold, or any elementary things. So _that Adam_ whilst standing in his first state of glory, and power, had the same reason to say of all _that_ he was, and did, that which St. _Paul_ said, yet _not I, but Christ that liveth in me_.

And how the Doctor came to think of any other power, as the _ability_ of man to _rule_ over the creatures, is very strange, since the gospel has so plainly told him, _that they only are the children of God, who are led by the Spirit of God_. If therefore the first man, created in the image and likeness of God, may be supposed by his creation, to have been a child of God, then sure is it, that he had the _Spirit of God_, living and working in him. And that surely may be allowed to have been his _true_ and his only qualification, to have and exercise a dominion over the rest of the creation.

The Doctor, in order to find out _that_ image, and likeness of God in man, of which _Moses_ writes, looks into the constitution of that _two-legged_ animal, who is the _disputer of the world_. As likely to succeed, as if in order to find out _that paradise_, of which _Moses_ writes, he should search for it in the _hundreds_ of _Essex_, or in the _wilds_ of _Kent_.

For _Moses_, to prevent the folly of looking for the divine image in any thing, that is _natural_ to the _present_ state of man, has given us assurance, that _this first_ man, created in the image of God, died the very day that he did eat of the forbidden tree. And that nothing of this divine man remained but terrors within, and such a figure of himself, as filled him with shame and confusion.

And a greater than _Moses_ has told us, _that_ man, in his present _natural state_, is so dead to that first divine glory, that he has no possibility of entering into the kingdom of God till he is born again from above. This sufficiently shews _that_ he who will find out in what the image of God in man consisted, must as the apostle saith, _walk by faith and not by sight_.

The next text of _Moses_, which the Doctor miserably injures, is thus quoted by him, “The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into him the breath of life, and man became a living soul; that is, say the objectors, had an immortal soul.”

Who the objectors are, I know not; but the truth of the text requires us to say, that therefore man had a divine and godlike soul, a true offspring of the divine nature. Because the breath or Spirit of the holy triune God, was that breath by which he was made a living soul.――And therefore the riches of this first life in man, were the riches of the divine nature manifesting itself in the soul.

But the Doctor will have it, that only an unlearned _English_ reader, can collect any thing to be divine in the soul, from the words of _Moses_, as not knowing that what is translated a living soul, signifies, in the original, only a living animal. But this, every _English_ reader may know to be a vain criticism; for no stress is laid upon the expression, a living soul, no more than if it had been said, a living animal. But the full proof of the divine greatness of the human soul, lies solely in this, that the breath or spirit of the holy Trinity was breathed into it, and was that which made it to be a living soul, and therefore the life that arose in it, was the life of God in the soul.

The Doctor thus comments upon the words of the text. “God, the great plastic artist, is here represented, as making and shaping out a figure of earth and clay, which he afterwards animates or inspires with life. He breathed into this statue the breath of life, and the lump of clay became a living creature.”

Had this elegant and most graphical description been only found in some minor poet, or school declamation, it might have been overlooked; but in a prose treatise of divinity, it ought not to pass uncensured. I know of nothing that can equal it, unless it be supposed that some ingenious anthropomorphite, reading these words, _and the Lord God did unto Adam and Eve make coats of skins, and cloathed them_; should thus describe the matter, “Here, God, the great artist, is represented, as having the skins of beasts before him, and with his divine hands, cutting, shaping and joining them together in forms of garments, fitted to the size and distinction of the first man and his wife.”

I may defy any one to shew, that this comment does not pay as great a regard to the _letter_, and do as much honour to the sense of this scripture, as the Doctor’s doth to the other text.

The sacred text, _God formed man_ of the dust of _the ground, and breathed into him the breath of life_, is a short and full declaration of a most important truth, namely, that man was brought into being, _in a twofold nature_, having the nature of this outward world, and the nature of heaven; the former signified by his being formed of the dust of the ground, the _latter_, by the breath of God breathed into him. To be formed out of the dust of the ground, is the same thing, as if it had been said, that he was formed out of all the _riches_, _powers_, and _virtues_ that are in this whole visible world. For every property of nature is hidden in the earth. And man, so far as he was designed to be a creature of this outward world, is therefore said to be formed out of the earth, because the earth is not only the treasure-house of all that is in outward nature, but is the _mother_ of all the three other elements. And as all things of this world, whether animate or inanimate, are from the earth as their mother, so in the earth is there every power and blessing of life, to sustain every thing _that_ has its body from it; as appears by that fruitful power, which is continually giving forth itself in all kinds of vegetable food, _fitted_ to the wants of every living creature.

* What therefore can it be called, but a most deplorable blindness in learned reason, to consider man as making his first entrance into paradise in no _better a state than that of dust and clay_, formed into a dead lumpish figure of a man, for this reason, because he was said to be formed out of the dust of the ground? Blindness indeed! when it is so evident, _that_ even now, after the curse is in the earth, yet every thing, even the poorest _weed_ that comes out of the dust of the ground, is in a much higher state, and enters into this world with a degree of life from its mother _the_ earth.――Had the Doctor never seen, or heard of any other things formed out of the earth, but such as our potters, and dealers in clay can make out of it, there might have been some sort of excuse for his _Adam_ of dead clay formed out of the earth. But when every day of his life has shewn him that almost infinite variety, powers, virtues and wonders in the kingdom of vegetables, all coming out of the earth, and nourished by it; when the scripture has told him _that_ the beasts and cattle of all kinds were formed out of the earth, and their flesh and blood from it, and their daily sustenance from its fruitful womb: it is strange to a degree of astonishment, that he should hold, _that_ out of this _rich_ earth, when in its paradisical state, when man, the glory of the creation, was formed out of it, and God the former, nothing would come forth, but a dead lump of clay in the figure of a man.

_Again_, What a total disregard has the Doctor here shewn to the very letter of scripture? The text saith, _God formed man out of the dust of the ground_, nothing else is ascribed to God, as his work in this matter; but the Doctor adds quite another matter as the work of God, namely, shaping and forming lumpish clay into a dead figure of a man.

And then follows another fiction equally against the letter of scripture. For he says, that AFTERWARDS, God, breathed life into it. But in the scripture account, there is not a syllable of any first, or afterwards.――Two things are spoken of the birth of man, and as they cannot be spoken both at once, so one must come after the other in the relation of them. The scripture mentions them as two distinct things; and the reason of mentioning them thus distinctly, is not to teach us, they were done at two different times, the one first, and the other afterwards, but to give us the assurance, that man came into the world in a twofold nature, the one from the heavenly breath of God, and the other from this visible world.

But the union of these two natures in the formation of man, was owing to one, and the same operation of God.――There is no sooner, or later, in the beginning of the soul, and of the body: the beginning of one, is the beginning of the other.

To suppose that man was made a dead image, and afterwards had life breathed into it, is no better philosophy, than to suppose, that God first created the vegetable creature, and afterwards added a vegetable life to it; that he first created the globe of the sun, and afterwards added heat and light to it.

_God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature._ What a folly to suppose, that the creature, and its life, are two separate things, that the one came first, and the other afterwards? No better, than supposing, that a circle and its roundness, are two separate things, that first comes forth the figure, and afterwards its roundness.

But the general design of the D. L. is to establish this most horrible doctrine, that _Moses_ designedly and industriously secreted from God’s chosen people, all thought of any eternal relation that they had with God; which is the same as saying, that he designedly suppressed the one only possible foundation of true religion. For the immortality of the human nature, is the only ground of homage and regard to an invisible and eternal God. And unless man was by nature essentially related to God, and the eternal world, it would have been as unreasonable for the God of the eternal world to call man to an heavenly adoration of him, as to bid earthly flesh and blood _be_, and _do_ that which angels are, and do in heaven. Therefore the first notice from an eternal God, given to man of a religious homage due to him, and the bare capacity of man to embrace such notice, is the greatest proofs that man has something of the eternal God in him. For as nothing can hunger, but that which by nature both wants and has a capacity to eat; so nothing can receive a religion relating to the eternal God, but that which has within itself, both a want and capacity to partake of the eternal world. And had not man an eternal spirit in him, as an offspring of the eternal God, he could no more want to have any intercourse with the eternal world, than a fish can want to be out of the water. Nor could any taught adoration of the one eternal God enter any further into his heart, or be of more use to him, than so much religion taught to a parrot. For man being, or believing himself to be, as merely a creature of this world, as the parrot is, could no more regard any thing, but what his earthly nature has a fondness for, than the parrot doth. _Let us eat and drink for to-morrow we die_, would be the highest and truest philosophy, if there is no more of a divine life, or heavenly nature in man, than in the chattering sparrow. In this case, worldly craft, whether in a fox or a man, is the highest use of its natural powers. For if the earthly life is equally _the all_ of both, earthly wisdom must be _equally_ the perfection of them both. For it can no more be the duty of an earthly creature to be heavenly minded, than of a celestial creature to be carnally minded.

If therefore the _Israelites_ under _Moses_, were by him directed to consider themselves merely as creatures of this world, having nothing to enjoy, or hope for, but the good things of this life, it must be said he did all that well could be done, to make them an _earthly_, _covetous_, _rapacious_, _stiff-necked_ and _brutal_ people. And all the complaints which the prophets have brought against them, on that account, ought to have been made only against _Moses_ himself, and the religion that was set up by him. For a religion only offering, and wholly confining people to earthly enjoyments, may surely be said, not only to make, but even require them to be wholly sensual and earthly minded. And every hearty believer of such a religion, is by his very faith called upon, to make the most that he can, of the _lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life_.

* _Moses_ saith, “Hear, _O Israel_, the Lord our God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength.” Now these _Israelites_ looking backwards to God’s covenant of redemption, made with their forefathers, of which they were the undoubted heirs; and forwards to this new covenant of a new theocracy, added, as God’s peculiar mercy to them in this life, to keep them to himself, to support them under their afflictions, and to arm them with patience in waiting for that eternal redemption, in the faith of which, their ancestors had died so full of joy and comfort: in this double view of their state under God, which _Moses_ had so fully set before _them_, and with the strongest injunctions to be daily teaching them to their children, they had the highest reason to rejoice in God, and to love him with all their heart and soul and strength.

But to suppose that _Moses_, designedly secreting from them, the knowledge of that eternal relation they had to God, on which the hopes of their forefathers were founded, and on which he himself was made able to chuse the afflictions of Christ, has something very shocking in it. For if _Moses_ was so good a man, because he had faith in the eternal redemption promised from the beginning, can there be more cruelty, than in supposing him, designing by his religious system, wholly to obliterate all thought and remembrance of God’s unchangeable covenant of life, and extinguish all sense and hope of a redemption to come? To what purpose is it to say to such a people, shut up in earthly hopes, “Thou shalt love the one God of heaven with all thy heart?” For if he had succeeded in his design, fixed them in the belief, that they had no treasure but in this world, we have Christ’s word for it, that the affections of their hearts could go no where else, saying, as an eternal truth, _that where our treasure is, there must be the heart also_. So that in this case, no love of God, and therefore no other divine virtue, could have any place in those who conformed to the design of _Moses_.

The Doctor, with some indignation, tries to evade this unavoidable consequence. “The true foundation of morality is the will of God. But is not the distinction between right and wrong, perpetually enforced by the law of _Moses_ on this principle? This then is the spring of all virtue, and to give it the greatest efficacy, the love and fear of God is there incessantly inculcated. But how does a long or short existence, a life here, or elsewhere, affect at all the practice of virtue so founded?”¹

¹ _D. L._ page 587.

All this is quite beside the point, and leaves the _Jews_ under the same incapacity of every divine virtue, as has been above asserted. For a short or long existence, is here never thought of, as a reason, why we should, or should not be morally good. For duration, considered in itself, whether short or long, is only a natural consequence of _that kind_ of life, which the creature hath. For, such as is its _internal_ nature, such is the good, and evil _that_ belongs to it, without any regard to its longer or shorter duration.

Now it is the internal nature of man, not considered as short, but as wholly earthly, and created for only _earthly goods_, _that_ is the reason, why such a kind of life is incapable of any divine virtue, and cannot possibly have any other love, affections or tempers, but such as are confined to this world: and also, why every kind of envy, greediness, craft, and contrivance how to get the most of every earthly thing, must govern every man, that has only the earthly nature in him, as unavoidably, as they govern birds, and beasts. And to tell such a people of a goodness, to which their earthly nature does not lead them, as it leads every other animal to _that_ which it likes, is as vain, as to preach to the sparks, not to fly upwards. Nor can a nature, wholly earthly, any more sin by coveting only earthly things, than the _lion_ sins, by having all his heart set upon his prey.

But the Doctor has a maxim, by which he proves, that the _Jews_, though wholly confined to earthly hopes, and enjoyments, yet might and ought to have been heavenly minded, _namely_, because _the true foundation of morality, is the will of God_. And yet this very maxim is itself a sufficient proof, than an earthly people, created only for earthly goods, are by the very will of God, directed to be earthly minded. For the will of God, in every creature, is manifested by _that kind_ of nature, which it hath only from God. Therefore earthly creatures, by being earthly minded, pay as full obedience to the will of God, as pure heavenly spirits by their being heavenly minded. Therefore if man is only an animal of this world, by the will of God, distinguished only from other creatures, by superior skill, subtlety, and contrivances, (as they are from one another) he neither is, nor can be, under any other law, relating to his good and evil, but that which is the law of all other animals, that have all their good and evil from this world. And as it is as good in the wolf, to be ravening, as in the lamb to be harmless, because they both follow their created nature; so if man is as merely a creature of this world, as they are, when he, by his superior subtlety, in order to make the most of his worldly life, either feigns the innocence of the lamb, or puts on the ravening wolf, he follows his nature, as they do theirs, and is just as good and as bad as they are. And to tell such a man of the beauty of holiness, or call him to the denial of his own will, for this reason, because the true foundation of virtue, is the will of God, would be to as much purpose, as if you was only to require him never to sleep any more, because holy angels never sleep in heaven. For what can a creature that can have no good, all its life, but that which is like the good of milk and honey, have to do with any divine virtue?――If therefore _Moses_ designedly, fixed the _Israelites_ in a belief, that they had no good to hope for, but that which flesh and blood could find in earthly things, they were by him taken out of the sphere of every virtue, that can be called godly or divine, and could have no fear of God, but like that, which they might have towards him, or the giants, nor any love of God, but that which they had to their bellies.

Farther, that the Doctor has not entered into any right conception of the subject, he is upon, is plain from his asking, “But how does a short or long existence, a life here, or elsewhere, at all affect the practice of virtue so founded?”――It just so much affects it, as place, or space affects the existence of bodies. They are not brought forth by place or space, but they could have no existence but in place or space. And thus it is, that duration affects the practice of all divine virtue, it could have no possibility of existence, but in a nature incapable of dying.――Corruptibility, and divine goodness, are as impossible to be united, as life and death.――Death may as well exert the functions of life, as a mortal creature breathe heavenly tempers and affections. For though the duration of the creature is not the ground, or reason of any divine virtue, yet no creature can be capable of it, but that, which by the divinity of its birth, is born immortal.

What an inconsistency, to say of a creature of a short existence, or whose life is vanishing away, that its true father is in heaven, and that it ought therefore “to be perfect as its heavenly Father is perfect?” Can that which is daily tending to non-existence, be daily growing up in the perfection of God, or that which is always approaching towards death, be a child of the ever-living God? As well might it be said of the mushroom, that it has the angels in heaven for its brethren, as of man, beginning to exist to-day, and ending his existence to-morrow, that he is a child of his everlasting Father in heaven.