go not by eye-sight: but we are well assured the soul of Lazarus was, by these glorious spirits, carried up into the bosom of Abraham; neither was this any privilege of his, above all other the Saints of God; all which, as they land in one common harbour of blessedness, so they all participate of one happy means of portage.

SECT. IX.

THE RESPECTS WHICH WE OWE TO THE ANGELS.

SUCH are the respects of good angels to us: now what are ours to them?

It was not amiss said of one, that the life of angels is political; full of intercourse with themselves and with us. What they return to each other in the course of their Theophanies, is not for us to determine; but, since their good offices are thus assiduous unto us, it is meet we do enquire what Duties are requirable from Us to Them.

Devout Bernard is but too liberal in his decision, that we owe to these beneficent spirits reverence for their presence, devotion for their love, and trust for their custody'. Doubtless, we ought to be willing to give unto them so much, as they will be willing to take from us: if we go beyond these bounds, we offend and alienate them: to derogate from them is not so heinous in their account, as to over-honour them. St. John proffers an humble geniculation to the angel, and is put off, with a See thou do it not: I am thy fellow-servant; Rev. xix. 10. The excesses of respects to them, have turned to abominable impiety: which howsoever Jerome seems to impute to the Jews, ever since the Prophets' time"; yet Simon Magus was the first, that we find guilty of this impious flattery of the angels; who, fondly holding that the world was made by them, could not think fit to present them with less than divine honour. His cursed scholar, Menander, whose error Prateolus wrongfully fathers upon Aristotle, succeeding him in that wicked heresy, as Eusebius tells us, left behind him Saturnius, not inferior to him in this frenzy ; who, as Tertullian and Philastrius report him, fancied, together with his mad fellows, that seven angels made the world, not acquainting God with their work. What should I name blasphemous Cerinthus, who durst disparage Christ in comparison with angels? Not altogether so bad were those heretics", though bad enough, which took their ancient denomination from the angels: who, professing true Christianity and detestation of idolatry, as having learned that God only is to be worshipped properly; yet reserved a certain

'Bern. in Psal. Qui habitat.

n

m Hieron. quest. 10. ad Algasiam.

Angelici.

kind of adoration to the blessed angels. Against this opinion and practice, the great Doctor of the Gentiles seems to bend his style, in his Epistle to the Colossians, forbidding a voluntary humility in worshipping of angels: whether grounded upon the superstition of ancient Jews, as Jerome and Anselm; or, upon the ethnic philosophy of some Platonic, as Estius and Cornelius à Lapide imagine; or, upon the damnable conceits of the Simonians and Cerinthians, as Tertullian; we need not much to enquire: nothing is more clear, than the Apostle's inhibition; afterward seconded by the Synod of Laodicea. Whereto yet Theodoret's noted Commentary would seem to give more light; who tells us, that upon the ill use made of the giving of the Law by the hands of angels, there was an error of old maintained, of angel worship, which still continued in Phrygia and Pisidia so that a Synod was hereupon assembled at Laodicea, the chief city of Phrygia, which, by a direct canon, forbad praying to angels; a practice, saith he, so settled amongst them, that even to this day there are to be seen amongst them and their neighbours, the Oratories of St. Michael. Here, then, was this mishumility, that they thought it too much boldness to come immediately to God; but that we must first make way to his favour, by the mediation of angels: a testimony so pregnant, that I wonder not if Caranza flee into corners, and all the fautors of angel-worship be driven to hard shifts to avoid it.

But what do I with controversies? This devotion we do gladly profess to owe to good angels, that though we do not pray unto them, yet we do pray to God for the favour of their assistance and protection; and praise God for the protection, that we have from them. That faithful Patriarch, of whom the whole Church of God receives denomination, knew well what he said, when he gave this blessing to his grandchildren: The angel, that redeemed me from all evil, bless the children; Gen. xlviii. 19: whether this were an interpretative kind of imploration, as Becanus and Lorichius contend; or, whether, as is no less probable, this angel were not any created power, but the great Angel of the Covenant, the same which Jacob wrestled with before for a blessing upon himself, as Athanasius and Cyril well conceive it; I will not here dispute: sure I am, that if it were an implicit prayer, and the angel mentioned, a creature; yet the intention was no other, than to terminate that prayer in God, who blesseth us by his angel.

Yet, further: we come short of our duty to these blessed spirits, if we entertain not in our hearts a high and venerable

Prateolus Elench. v. Angelici.

P Rejecta expositio à pontificiis, ut non modò periculosa sed et falsa. Vid. Binium in notis in Pium Pap. in Tom. i. pag. 103. 4 Reading it angulos instead of angelos.

conceit of their wonderful majesty, glory, and greatness; and an awful acknowledgment and reverential awe of their presence; a holy joy and confident assurance of their care and protection; and, lastly, a fear to do ought, that might cause them to turn away their faces, in dislike, from us. All these dispositions are copulative for certainly, if we have conceived so high an opinion of their excellency and goodness as we ought, we cannot but be bold upon their mutual interest, and be afraid to displease them. Nothing in the world, but our sins, can distaste them they look upon our natural infirmities, deformities, loathsomeness, without any offence or nauseation; but our spiritual indispositions are odious to them, as those which are opposite to their pure natures. The story is famous of the Angel and the Hermit, walking together: in the way there lay an ill-scented and poisonous carrion: the hermit stopt his nose, and turned away his head, hasting out of that offensive air; the angel held on his pace, without any shew of dislike: straightway they met with a proud man, gaily dressed, strongly perfumed, looking high, walking stately; the angel turned away his head and stopt his nostrils, (while the hermit passed on not without reverence to so great a person,) and gave this reason, that the stench of pride was more loathsome to God and his Angels, than that of the carcase could be to him.

г

I blush to think, O ye Glorious Spirits, how often I have done that whereof ye have been ashamed for me. I abhor myself to recount your just dislikes; and do willingly profess, how unworthy I shall be of such friends, if I be not hereafter jealous of your just offence. Neither can I, without much regret, think of those many and horrible nuisances, which you find every moment from sinful mankind. Woe is me, what odious scents arise to you perpetually from those bloody murders, beastly uncleannesses, cruel oppressions, noisome disgorgings of surfeits and drunkennesses, abominable idolatries, and all manner of detestable wickednesses, presumptuously committed every where; enough to make you abhor the presence and protection of debauched and deplored mortality!

But, for us, that are better principled, and know what it is to be overlooked by holy and glorious spirits, we desire and care to be more tender of your offence, than of a world of visible spectators: and, if the Apostle found it requisite to give such charge, for but the observation of an outward decency, not much beyond the lists of indifferency, because of the angels; 1 Cor. xi. 10: what should our care be, in relation to those blessed spirits, of our deportment in matter of morality and religion! Surely, O ye Invisible Guardians, it is not my

Jo. Bromiar. Sum. prædic. v. Superbia.

sense, that shall make the difference: it shall be my desire to be no less careful of displeasing you, than if I saw you present by me, clothed in flesh: neither shall I rest less assured of your gracious presence and tuition, and the expectation of all spiritual offices from you, which may tend towards my blessedness, than I am now sensible of the animation of my own soul.

THE INVISIBLE WORLD.

THE SECOND BOOK:-OF THE SOULS OF MEN.

SECT. I.

OF THEIR SEPARATION AND IMMORTALITY.

NEXT to these angelical essences, the Souls of Men, whether in the body or severed from it, are those spirits, which people the invisible world: next to them, I say; not the same with them, not better. Those of the ancients, which have thought that the ruin of angels is to be supplied by blessed souls, spake doubtless without the book: for he, that is the Truth itself, hath said, they be loáyyeλoi, like; not the same. And justly are those exploded, whether Pythagoreans, or Stoics, or Gnostics, or Manichees, or Almaricus, or, if Lactantius himself were in that error as Ludovicus Vives construes him, who falsely dreamed, that the souls of men were of the substance of that God, which inspired them: these errors are more fit for hellebore, than for theological conviction. Spiritual substances, doubtless, they are; and such, as have no less distant original from the body, than heaven is from earth. Galen was not a better physician than an ill divine, while he determines the soul to be the complexion and temperament of the prime qualities: no other than that harmony, which the elder naturalists dreamed of; an opinion no less brutish, than such a soul: for how can temperament be the cause of any progressive motion; much less of a rational discourse? Here is no materiality, no physical composition, in this inmate of ours: nothing, but a substantial act, an active spirit, a spiritual form of the king of all visible creatures.

But as for the essence, original derivation, powers, faculties, operations of this human soul as it is lodged in this clay, I leave them to the disquisition of the great secretaries of nature my way lies higher, leading me from the common consideration of this spirit, as it is clogged with flesh, unto the